DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Israel gave the impression to be increasing its air marketing campaign on Tehran 5 days after its shock assault on Iran’s army and nuclear program, as U.S. President Donald Trump posted an ominous message warning residents of the town to evacuate.
“IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON,” Trump wrote Monday evening earlier than returning to Washington early from a Group of Seven summit in Canada. “Everybody ought to instantly evacuate Tehran!” he added.
Trump later denied studies that he had rushed again to Washington to work on a ceasefire, saying his early departure “has nothing to do with a Stop Fireplace. A lot greater than that,” with out elaborating.
Earlier, the Israeli army had known as for some 330,000 residents of a neighborhood within the metropolis heart to evacuate. Tehran is without doubt one of the largest cities within the Center East, with round 9.5 million folks.
Israel says its sweeping assault on Iran’s prime army leaders, nuclear scientiests, uranium enrichment websites and ballistic missile program is critical to forestall its longtime adversary from getting any nearer to building an atomic weapon. The strikes have killed at least 224 people since Friday.
Iran has retaliated by launching more than 370 missiles and hundreds of drones at Israel. To this point, 24 folks have been killed in Israel and greater than 500 wounded.
The back-and-forth has raised considerations about all-out battle between the nations and propelled the area, already on edge, into even larger upheaval.
Earlier than leaving the summit in Canada, Trump joined the opposite leaders in a joint assertion saying Iran “can by no means have a nuclear weapon” and calling for a “de-escalation of hostilities within the Center East, together with a ceasefire in Gaza.”
In the meantime, U.S. Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth headed to the White Home State of affairs Room to fulfill with the president and his nationwide safety crew.
Hegseth didn’t present particulars on what prompted the assembly however mentioned on Fox Information late Monday that the actions had been to “make sure that our individuals are secure.”
Israeli army spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin mentioned Monday that his nation’s forces had “achieved full aerial superiority over Tehran’s skies.”
The army mentioned it destroyed greater than 120 surface-to-surface missile launchers in central Iran, a 3rd of Iran’s complete, together with a number of launchers simply earlier than they launched ballistic missiles in direction of Israel. It additionally destroyed two F-14 fighter planes that Iran used to focus on Israeli plane, the army mentioned.
Israeli army officers additionally mentioned fighter jets had struck 10 command facilities in Tehran belonging to Iran’s Quds Drive, an elite arm of its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard that conducts army and intelligence operations outdoors Iran.
Israel’s army issued an evacuation warning to 330,000 folks in part of central Tehran that homes the nation’s state TV and police headquarters, in addition to three massive hospitals, together with one owned by the Guard.
Israel’s army has issued comparable evacuation warnings for elements of the Gaza Strip and Lebanon forward of strikes. Well being authorities reported that 1,277 folks had been wounded in Iran. Iranians additionally reported gasoline rationing.
Rights teams such because the Washington-based Iranian advocacy group Human Rights Activists have prompt that the Iranian authorities’s demise toll is a major undercount. The group says it has documented greater than 400 folks killed, amongst them 197 civilians.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu mentioned the Israeli strikes have set Iran’s nuclear program again a “very, very very long time,” and instructed reporters he’s in every day contact with Trump.
Iran maintains that its nuclear program is peaceable, and the U.S. and others have assessed that Tehran has not had an organized effort to pursue a nuclear weapon since 2003. The pinnacle of the Worldwide Atomic Vitality Company has repeatedly warned that the nation has sufficient enriched uranium to make several nuclear bombs ought to it select to take action.
To this point, Israel has focused a number of Iranian nuclear program websites however has not been capable of destroy Iran’s Fordo uranium enrichment facility.
The location is buried deep underground — and to eradicate it, Israel might have the 30,000-pound (14,000-kilogram) GBU-57 Large Ordnance Penetrator, a U.S. bunker-busting bomb that makes use of its weight and sheer kinetic power to succeed in deeply buried targets. Israel doesn’t have the munition or the bomber wanted to ship it. The penetrator is presently delivered by the B-2 stealth bomber.
Iran’s overseas minister, Abbas Araghchi, appeared to make a veiled plea Monday for the U.S. to step in and negotiate an finish to hostilities between Israel and Iran.
In a publish on X, Araghchi wrote that if Trump is “real about diplomacy and all for stopping this battle, subsequent steps are consequential.”
“It takes one cellphone name from Washington to muzzle somebody like Netanyahu,” Iran’s prime diplomat wrote. “That will pave the way in which for a return to diplomacy.”
The message to Washington was despatched because the disaster talks between the U.S. and Iran had been canceled over the weekend after Israel’s shock bombardment.
On Sunday, Araghchi mentioned that Iran will cease its strikes if Israel does the identical.
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Lidman reported from Jerusalem and Melzer from Nahariya, Israel. Related Press writers Nasser Karimi and Amir Vahdat in Tehran, Iran, and Tara Copp in Washington contributed to this report.