Israel bombed Iran’s only working nuclear reactor, a power plant on the Persian Gulf coast.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed revenge after a hospital was struck by an Iranian ballistic missile, as the world waited for news of whether President Donald Trump would commit U.S. forces to Israel’s campaign against Iran’s nuclear program.
“This morning, Iran’s terrorist tyrants launched missiles at Soroka Hospital in Beersheba and at a civilian population in the center of the country,” Netanyahu said in a statement. “We will exact the full price from the tyrants in Tehran.”
The conflict has killed hundreds of Iranians and scores of Israelis since Israel launched a surprise attack on nuclear and military targets on June 13. Israeli warplanes struck three nuclear sites in Iran on June 18, while a military spokesman walked back an earlier Israeli claim to have bombed Iran’s only functioning nuclear power plant.
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Iran’s state-owned IRNA news outlet said its ballistic missiles were aimed at Israeli Defense Forces and intelligence targets located in the same area.
“The claim of an attack on an intelligence base or the presence of military equipment under the hospital is another lie. We are not so despicable as to endanger civilians,” the IDF said in a Persian-language statement, the Times of Israel reported. “Attacking hospitals is a crime. Fabricating a reason does not justify it.”
No deaths were reported in the attack. Six people were seriously injured, emergency workers said.
Dozens killed in Gaza while seeking food aid
Like thousands of other Palestinians in Gaza, Hind Al-Nawajha takes a dangerous, miles-long journey every day to try to get some food for her family, hoping she makes it back alive.
The mother-of-four had to duck down and hide behind a pile of rubble on the side of the road as gunshots echoed nearby.
“You either come back carrying (food) for your children and they will be happy, or you come back in a shroud, or you go back upset (without food) and your children will cry,” said Nawajha, 38, a resident of Beit Lahiya, in northern Gaza. “This is life, we are being slaughtered, we can’t do it anymore.”
In the past two days, dozens of Palestinians have also been killed by Israeli fire as they tried to get food from aid trucks brought into the enclave by the United Nations and international relief agencies, Gaza medics said.
On June 19, medics said at least 40 people were killed by Israeli gunfire and military strikes, including 12 people who tried to approach a site operated by the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in the central Gaza Strip, the latest in near-daily reports of killings of people seeking food.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli army on the incident.
In recent days, the Israeli military said its forces had opened fire and fired warning shots to disperse people who approached areas where troops were operating, posing a threat. It said it was reviewing reports of casualties among civilians.
-Reuters
The “vast majority” of President Donald Trump’s MAGA movement “will get on board” with strikes on Iran, if he goes ahead with military action, his former chief White House strategist Steve Bannon says.
Should he decide there’s no diplomatic solution to be had, Trump will need to walk the American people and MAGA through his thinking, Bannon told reporters at a June 18 breakfast hosted by Christian Science Monitor. But Trump is also likely to win ove most of his naysaying supporters.
“There will be some, but the vast majority of the MAGA movement will go, ‘look, we trust your judgement, you’ve walked us through this, we don’t like it, in fact maybe we hate it, but we’ll get on board,’” Bannon said.
-Francesca Chambers
