The Israeli military said on Tuesday the missile attack from Iran was over and people could leave air raid shelters, but that the attack was serious and will have consequences.
“Following the situational assessment, it was decided that it is now permitted to leave protected spaces in all areas across the country,” it said in a statement.
Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said he was not aware of any casualties from the missile volley. He said there were a few
hits in the centre of the country and in the south. Israel’s military spokesperson declined to specify how and when Israel would respond.
Iran says it fired dozens of missiles into Israel on Tuesday as the months-long fighting between Israel and Iran’s proxies in the region — Hezbollah and Hamas — escalated, threatening a wider regional conflict. Israel had ordered residents to remain close to bomb shelters as air raid sirens sounded across the country.
Window-shaking explosions were heard in Tel Aviv and near Jerusalem, though it was not immediately clear whether the sounds were from missiles landing or being intercepted by Israeli defences, or both.
Israel and the United States have warned of severe consequences if Iran were to attack. Orders to shelter in place were sent to Israelis’ mobile phones and announced on national television. TV stations reported sirens in parts of Jerusalem as well as central Israel.
The alerts were sounded after a day of rocket and missile attacks from Lebanon, and as Israel said it had begun limited ground operations in southern Lebanon.
Israeli air defence systems are fully prepared for any attack from Iran, IDF spokesperson Hagari said at an earlier televised briefing, minutes after multiple reports from U.S. media outlets warned that an attack could be imminent, citing sources in the White House.
Iran took responsibility for launching dozens of ballistic missiles at Israel. The claim was made in a statement read aloud on state television as explosions could be heard in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
In its statement, Iran referenced Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and Iranian Revolutionary Guard Gen. Abbas Nilforushan, both killed in an Israeli airstrike last week in Beirut. It also mentioned Ismail Haniyeh, a top Hamas leader who was assassinated in Tehran in a suspected Israeli attack in July.
Iran warned that this attack represented only a “first wave,” without elaborating.
In April, Iran launched missiles and drones at Israel in response to an apparent Israeli strike on an Iranian consulate in Syria. According to reports, a number of other countries helped Israel largely repel the Iranian onslaught.
Anticipating more rocket attacks from Iran-backed Hezbollah, the Israeli army announced new restrictions on public gatherings and closed beaches in northern and central parts of the country, including in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. The military also said it was calling up thousands more reserve soldiers to serve on the northern border.
Hezbollah said earlier Tuesday that it fired salvos of a new kind of medium-range missile, called the Fadi 4, at the headquarters of two Israeli intelligence agencies near Tel Aviv. Hezbollah spokesperson Mohammed Afif said the missile attack “is only the beginning.”
Meanwhile, Israeli authorities said at least four people have been critically wounded in a shooting attack in Tel Aviv. It was not immediately clear if the incident had any connection to the recent escalation in violence been Israel and Hezbollah.
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Fears of a regional war
The Israeli military also warned people to evacuate nearly two dozen Lebanese border communities hours after announcing the start of ground operations against Hezbollah.
There was no immediate word on casualties as fighting intensified and concerns of a wider regional war grew.
In its first statement since Israel announced the start of ground operations in Lebanon, Hezbollah spokesperson Afif dismissed what he called “false claims” of an Israeli incursion.
The Israeli army hasn’t said how long the latest operation would last, but it said soldiers had been training and preparing for the mission in recent months.
The UN peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL, which patrols southern Lebanon, said such a cross-border operation would be a “dangerous development” and a violation of Lebanese sovereignty.
The last time Israel and Hezbollah engaged in ground combat was a month-long war in 2006.
Hezbollah is a well-trained militia, believed to have tens of thousands of fighters and an arsenal of 150,000 rockets and missiles. The last round of fighting in 2006 ended in a stalemate, and both sides have spent the past two decades preparing for their next showdown.
Dozens of Lebanese communities told to leave
Israel advised people to evacuate to the north of the Awali River, some 60 kilometres from the border and much farther than the Litani River, which marks the northern edge of a UN-declared zone intended to serve as a buffer between Israel and Hezbollah after their 2006 war.
“You must immediately head north of the Awali River to save yourselves, and leave your houses immediately,” said the statement posted by the Israeli military’s Arabic spokesperson, Avichay Adraee, on X.
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Hagari, the Israeli military’s top spokesperson, claimed troops were conducting “localized ground raids” on Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon to ensure Israeli citizens could return to their homes in the north. He did not provide any evidence.
The border region has largely emptied out over the past year as the two sides have traded fire. But the scope of the evacuation warning raised questions about how deep Israel plans to send its forces into Lebanon as it presses ahead with a rapidly escalating campaign against Hezbollah. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that returning thousands of Israelis to their northern border communities as soon as possible is a top priority.
Hezbollah began firing rockets into northern Israel shortly after the Hamas-led attack on Israel nearly a year ago ignited the war in Gaza. Israel launched retaliatory airstrikes, and the conflict has steadily escalated.
In recent weeks, Israel has unleashed a punishing wave of airstrikes across large parts of Lebanon, killing Hezbollah leader Nasrallah and several of his top commanders, as well as many civilians.
Recent airstrikes wiping out most of Hezbollah’s top leadership and the explosions of hundreds of pagers and walkie-talkies belonging to the group indicate that Israel has infiltrated deep inside its upper echelons.
Even after its recent losses, Hezbollah vowed Monday to keep fighting. The group’s acting leader, Naim Kassem, said in a televised statement Monday that Hezbollah commanders killed in recent weeks have already been replaced.
More than 1,000 people have been killed in Lebanon in Israeli strikes over the past two weeks, nearly a quarter of them women and children, according to the Health Ministry. Hundreds of thousands of people have fled their homes.