Iran cancels all flights after Israel vowed revenge for missile attack

Iran last night grounded all flights from its airports hours after Israel vowed revenge for a barrage of missiles the Islamic regime fired at it on Tuesday. The ban will last from 9pm local time on Sunday (6.30pm GMT) and 6am on Monday (3.30am GMT) Iranian state media said.

The flights were canceled due to operational restrictions, state media cited the Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization as saying, without providing further details. State media said there would be exceptions for ’emergency flight, ferry flights and state aircraft’.

Iran implemented restrictions on flights on Tuesday when it launched missiles at Israel, in an attack to which Israel vowed to respond. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday morning warned Iran the attack would not go unpunished. ‘Although we have not yet completed the removal of the threat, we have clearly changed the course of the war and shifted the balance of the war. And we are not done yet,’ he said.

‘Iran has twice launched hundreds of missiles into our territory, in one of the largest ballistic missile attacks in history. No country in the world would accept such an attack on its cities and citizens, and nor will Israel. Israel has the duty and the right to defend itself and respond to these attacks, and it will do so.’

Tehran earlier this week said any retaliation would be met with ‘vast destruction’, raising fears of a wider war. Iran’s armed forces said direct intervention by Israel’s supporters against Tehran would provoke a ‘strong attack’ from Iran on their ‘bases and interests’ in the region.

Iranian fears of an Israeli attack may be increased by one of its top military commanders being killed in an Israeli attack that targeted the new leader of terror group Hezbollah. Esmail Qaani, head of the Quds Force – the elite wing of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps – was reported to be with the new leader of Hezbollah, Hashem Safieddine, who was targeted in his HQ bunker in Beirut by the Israelis.

The air strike on Thursday night during heavy bombing of southern Beirut was mounted as Safieddine held a secret meeting with other Hezbollah leaders in the underground intelligence headquarters. He had only just taken over from Hassan Nasrallah, who was assassinated by the Israelis last month. Arabic and English language media in the Middle East reported that Safieddine is highly likely to have died.

Netanyahu, commenting after the Jewish New Year, did not address Qaani’s death. He said Israel was fighting a war on ‘seven fronts’ but gave no indication of when he would attack Iran. In its attack on Tuesday, Iran fired more than 180 ballistic missiles at Israel, Israel said. Alarms sounded across Israel and explosions could be heard in Jerusalem and the Jordan River valley.

Israelis piled into bomb shelters and reporters on state television lay flat on the ground during live broadcasts. Iran’s forces used hypersonic Fattah missiles for the first time, and 90 per cent of its missiles successfully hit their targets in Israel, the Revolutionary Guards said.

Central Israel received ‘a small number’ of hits and there were other strikes in southern Israel, he said. The Israeli military published video of a school in the central city of Gadera that was heavily damaged by an Iranian missile. No injuries were reported in Israel, but one man was killed in the occupied West Bank, authorities there said.

U.S. Navy warships fired about a dozen interceptors against Iranian missiles headed toward Israel, the Pentagon said. U.S. President Joe Biden expressed full American support for Israel and described Iran’s attack as ‘ineffective.’ He said there was an active discussion about how Israel would respond, and he would confer with Netanyahu.

Any Israeli response would be met with “vast destruction” of Israeli infrastructure, Iran’s General Staff of the Armed Forces said in a statement carried by state media, also promising to target regional assets of any Israeli ally that got involved. Iran’s foreign ministry said its operation was defensive and only directed at Israeli military and security facilities. Earlier, Iran’s state news agency said Tehran targeted three Israeli military bases.

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