President Donald Trump called the bombing of three nuclear facilities in Iran a “spectacular military success”.
He called on Iran to quickly bring peace or said the US would go after other targets with “speed” and “precision”.
“This cannot continue. There will be either peace or there will be tragedy for Iran, far greater than we have witnessed over the last eight days,” Trump said in an address to the nation from the White House.
Israel initially attacked Iran earlier this month, while the Americans and the Iranians were in nuclear talks. Trump urged Iran to continue negotiations, but on Saturday he went ahead with strikes.
Appearing alongside Vice-President JD Vance, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Trump boasted of the mission’s success.
“Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated,” Trump said. “Iran, the bully of the Middle East, must now make peace. If they do not, future attacks would be far greater and a lot easier.”
The Iranians have not yet said exactly what damage the strikes, which occurred in the middle of the night, caused. We do not know the full extent of the damage.
The bombing marked the first time since the Iranian Revolution in1979 that the US sent troops into Iran to strike facilities inside the country.
Using “bunker buster bombs”, the GBU-57A Massive Ordnance Penetrator, the US struck Fordo, Natanz and Esfahan in the middle of the night local time.
During his remarks, Trump described the three targets as the “most difficult” and said that if peace does not “come quickly” the US will go after other sites.
“Remember, there are many targets left,” Trump said. “Tonight was the most difficult of them all by far, and perhaps the most lethal.”
Trump announced the strikes Saturday evening in a post on Truth Social after all US planes were out of Iranian air space. The US reached out to Iran “diplomatically” on Saturday to say the strikes are all it plans to do and that “regime change efforts are not planned”, according to the BBC’s US partner CBS News.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Trump administration gave him a heads up about the attack.
“President Trump and I often say: ‘Peace through strength.’ First comes strength, then comes peace,” Netanyahu said in remarks after the bombings. “And tonight, president Trump and the United States acted with a lot of strength.”
The conflict ignited on 13 June when Israel surprised Iran with attacks on nuclear and military targets in an effort to destroy Iran’s nuclear capability.
In retaliation, Iran launched hundreds of rockets and drones at Israel, military officials said.
The Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) – a Washington-based human rights organisation that has long tracked Iran – says 657 people have so far been killed. Iran has retaliated with missile attacks on Israel, killing at least 24 people.
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