Beersheba: A tentative truce faltered Tuesday when Israel vowed to retaliate after saying Iran launched missiles into its airspace more than two hours after the ceasefire was supposed to take effect.
Iran’s military denied firing on Israel, state media reported, but explosions boomed and sirens sounded across northern Israel midmorning. Earlier, both Israel and Iran had accepted the ceasefire plan to end their 12-day war.
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz called the missiles a violation of the ceasefire and instructed Israel’s military to resume “the intense operations to attack Tehran and to destroy targets of the regime and terror infrastructure.”
The shaky agreement was announced early Tuesday morning by US President Donald Trump after Tehran launched a limited retaliatory missile attack on a US military base in Qatar Monday.
Between Trump’s post and the start of the ceasefire, Israel launched a blitz of airstrikes targeting sites across Iran before dawn, and Iran replied with an onslaught of missiles that killed at least four people in Israel.
An Israeli military official who spoke on the condition of anonymity in line with military regulations said Iran launched two missiles at Israel hours into the tenuous ceasefire. Both missiles were intercepted, the official said.
“Tehran will tremble,” Israeli Finance Minister Betzalel Smotrich wrote on X after the missiles were launched.
Netanyahu accepts ceasefire as Iranian state TV says fighting has stopped
The midmorning barrage of missiles came after regional leaders, including those in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, welcomed Trump’s announcement of the ceasefire.
“THE CEASEFIRE IS NOW IN EFFECT. PLEASE DO NOT VIOLATE IT! DONALD J. TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES!” he wrote on his social media platform Tuesday morning.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel had agreed to a bilateral ceasefire with Iran in coordination with Trump, pledging to respond to any subsequent violation. He said he had told Israel’s security cabinet that the country had achieved all of its war goals, including removing the threat of Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programmes. Israel also damaged Iran’s military leadership and several government sites and achieved control over Tehran’s skies, Netanyahu said.
Iranian officials did not comment either after Trump announced the ceasefire or Israel claimed it had intercepted additional missiles hours after it supposedly went into effect. Hours earlier, Iran’s top diplomat had said the country was prepared to halt airstrikes.
“As of now, there is NO agreement on any ceasefire or cessation of military operations,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote in a post on X. “However, provided that the Israeli regime stops its illegal aggression against the Iranian people no later than 4 am Tehran time, we have no intention to continue our response afterwards.”
Araghchi added: “The final decision on the cessation of our military operations will be made later.”
Iranian missiles kill 4 in Israel as hostilities expand
The shaky ceasefire followed a day of hostilities spreading further across the region.
Iran launched a limited missile attack Monday on a U.S. military base in Qatar, retaliating for earlier American bombing of its nuclear sites. The U.S. was warned by Iran in advance, and there were no casualties. Israel’s military said Iran launched 20 missiles toward Israel before the ceasefire began Tuesday morning. Police said they damaged at least three densely packed residential buildings in the city of Beersheba.
First responders said they retrieved four bodies from one building and were searching for more. Earlier, the Fire and Rescue service said five bodies were found before revising the number downward.
At least 20 people were injured.
Outside, the shells of burned-out cars littered the streets. Broken glass and rubble covered the area. Hundreds of emergency workers gathered to search for anyone else trapped in the buildings.
Police said some people were injured even while inside their apartments’ reinforced safe rooms, which are meant to withstand rockets and shrapnel but not direct hits from ballistic missiles.
Bases hit in Iraq
Drones attacked military bases in Iraq overnight, including some housing US troops, the Iraqi army and a US military official said Tuesday.
No casualties were reported, and no group claimed responsibility for the attacks in Iraq. Some Iran-backed Iraqi militias had previously threatened to target US bases if the US attacked Iran.
Iraqi army spokesperson Sabah Al-Naaman, in a statement, called the attacks a “treacherous and cowardly act of aggression” and said they had damaged radar systems at Camp Taji, north of Baghdad, and at Imam Ali Base in Dhi Qar province. Iraqi forces shot down drones at other locations, he said.
A senior US military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to comment publicly, said U.S. forces had shot down drones attacking Ain al-Assad in the desert in western Iraq and at a base next to the Baghdad airport, while another one crashed.
Trump says the ceasefire is in effect
Trump promised last night’s ceasefire would bring an “official end” to what he at the time coined the “12 Day War” ahead of Israel’s promise to resume operations on Tuesday.
Trump had communicated directly with Netanyahu to secure the ceasefire, according to a senior White House official who insisted on anonymity to discuss the Monday talks. Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and special envoy Steve Witkoff communicated with the Iranians through direct and indirect channels.
The White House has maintained that the Saturday bombing helped get the Israelis to agree to the ceasefire and that the Qatari government helped to broker the deal.
It’s unclear what role Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s leader, played in the talks. He said earlier on social media that he would not surrender.
Attacks force temporary closure of Israel’s skies
Israel’s Airports Authority said Iran’s barrage forced them to close the country’s airspace to emergency flights for several hours.
Some flights were forced to circle over the Mediterranean Sea, according to Israeli media.
Israel’s airports have been closed since the war with Iran began, but a handful of emergency flights started arriving and departing over the past few days.
By early Tuesday, Qatar Airways resumed its flights after Qatar shut down its airspace over the Iranian attack on Al Udeid Air Base. Flight-tracking data showed commercial aircraft again flying in Qatari airspace, signalling Doha believed the threat to the energy-rich nation had passed.
Conflict has killed hundreds
In Israel, at least 28 people have been killed and more than 1,000 wounded in the war. Israeli strikes on Iran have killed at least 974 people and wounded 3,458 others, according to the Washington-based group Human Rights Activists.
The group, which has provided detailed casualty figures from Iranian unrest such as the protests surrounding the death of Mahsa Amini in 2022, said that of those killed, it identified 387 civilians and 268 security force personnel.
The U.S. has evacuated some 250 American citizens and their immediate family members from Israel by government, military and charter flights that began over the weekend, a State Department official said.
There are roughly 700,000 American citizens, most of them dual U.
AP
