Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that the Israeli Air Force struck Iranian missile targets early Saturday morning in a public address he gave at a state ceremony to mourn the fallen soldiers in Israel’s wars on its southern and northern borders in the last year.
“In the early hours of Saturday morning” the IAF “hit areas in Iran, severely harming its defense capabilities and its ability to produce missiles that would be launched at us,” Netanyahu said at the ceremony in Mount Herzl.
“The attack on Iran was precise and powerful” and “achieved all its objectives,” he said. He thanked the United States for its close cooperation and assistance. The Biden administration has clarified that it was not involved in the attack, although it was given advance notice that it would take place.
It was his first public comments on the attack, which he placed within the larger context of the Swords of Iron War. At the Mt. Herzl ceremony, Netanyahu explained that in the last year, Israel has battled Iran and its proxies as it has rewritten history in its war of resilience, which has been an existential battle.
Exacting a price from Israel's enemies
The Swords of Iron War, he said, has taken place on seven fronts, and the IDF exacted a heavy price from its enemies.
He recalled how Iran had launched a ballistic missile attack against Israel at the start of October in response to Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, almost a year into the IDF war with the Iranian proxy group.
On Saturday, in its response to that Iranian ballistic missile attack, Israel decided to go after “the head of the octopus” after hitting at its tentacles for months.
“Those who strike us, we will strike. This is a tenet that has accompanied us all this time and will accompany us going forward,” he said.
Iran has yet to indicate if and how it would respond. The US and the international community have urged both Iran and Israel to halt their rounds of attacks and counterattacks.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Sunday that "The evil committed by the Zionist regime (Israel) two nights ago should neither be downplayed nor exaggerated," according to Iran's official IRNA news agency.
Khamenei said Iran's power should be demonstrated to Israel, adding that the way to do so should be "determined by the officials and that which is in the best interest of the people and the country should take place."
An American researcher said an Israeli airstrike on Saturday hit a building that was part of Iran's defunct nuclear weapons development program, and he and another researcher said facilities used to mix solid fuel for missiles were also struck. The assessments based on commercial satellite imagery were reached separately by David Albright, a former UN weapons inspector, and Decker Eveleth, an associate research analyst at CNA, a Washington think tank.
They told Reuters that Israel struck buildings in Parchin, a massive military complex near Tehran. Israel also hit Khojir, according to Eveleth, a sprawling missile production site near Tehran.
Reuters reported in July that Khojir was undergoing massive expansion.
Eveleth said the Israeli strikes may have "significantly hampered Iran's ability to mass produce missiles."
Iran's military said the Israeli warplanes used "very light warheads" to strike border radar systems in the provinces of Ilam, Khuzestan, and around Tehran.
In posts on X, Albright said commercial satellite imagery showed that Israel hit a building in Parchin called Taleghan 2 that was used for testing activities during the Amad Plan, Iran's defunct nuclear weapons development program.
The UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and US intelligence say Iran shuttered the program in 2003. Iran denies pursuing nuclear weapons.
Albright, head of the Institute for Science and International Security research group, was given access to the program's files for a book after they were stolen from Tehran by Israel's Mossad intelligence agency in 2018.
On X, he said the archives revealed that Iran kept important test equipment in Taleghan 2.
Iran may have removed key materials before the airstrike, he said, but "even if no equipment remained inside" the building would have provided "intrinsic value" for future nuclear weapons-related activities.
Albright told Reuters that commercial satellite imagery of Parchin showed Israel damaged three buildings about 350 yards (320 m) from Taleghan 2, including two in which solid fuel for ballistic missiles was mixed.
He did not identify the commercial firm from which he obtained the images.
Eveleth said an image of Parchin from Planet Labs, a commercial satellite firm, showed that Israel destroyed three ballistic missile solid fuel mixing buildings and a warehouse in the sprawling complex.
Planet Labs imagery also showed that an Israeli strike destroyed two buildings in the Khojir complex where solid fuel for ballistic missiles was mixed, he said.
According to the image reviewed by Reuters, the buildings were enclosed by high dirt berms. Such structures are associated with missile production and are designed to prevent a blast in one building from detonating combustible materials in nearby structures.
"Israel says they targeted buildings housing solid-fuel mixers," Eveleth said. "These industrial mixers are hard to make and export-controlled. Iran imported many over the years at great expense and will likely have a hard time replacing them."
With a limited operation, he said, Israel may have struck a significant blow against Iran's ability to mass-produce missiles and made it more difficult for any future Iranian missile attack to pierce Israel's missile defenses.
Gallant at the same ceremony said that in the last year the IDF turned the tide of the war, chalking up security up “unprecedented achievements, in all sectors of combat.”
In the south, Hamas ceased to function as a military framework, in the north, Hezbollah continues to suffer a series of blows, the chain of command was eliminated, most of its rocket and missile power was destroyed.
Hamas and Hezbollah which Iran had built up as proxy groups that would act as its long arm against the State of Israel, “are no longer an effective tool in the hands of Iran,” he said.
In addition, he said, Saturday morning’s “precise, deadly” strike on Iran “conveyed a clear message - the long arm of the State of Israel will reach anyone who tries to harm us. No place is too far for us.”