Israel launches strikes on Iran's nuclear sites and other targets; Iran launches retaliatory drone strike
Israel's military said it targeted Iranian nuclear facilities and research scientists in dozens of preemptive airstrikes early Friday morning local time, the first wave of what it said could be a dayslong attack — and leading Iran to launch a wave of more than 100 drones at Israel in retaliation. The Israel Defense Forces said its air defenses were "working to intercept the threats."
The Iranian drones could take as long as nine hours to reach Israel's airspace, but Israel has previously intercepted Iranian weapons before they get that close. The timing of the Iranian drone launch was not clear, but Israeli media said some were expected to start arriving in the country's airspace by about midday local time, which would be about 4 a.m. Eastern.
In a video statement, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described Israel's strikes — dubbed "Operation Rising Lion" — as "a targeted military operation to roll back the Iranian threat to Israel's very survival."
Iranian state television said the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Hossein Salami, was killed in the strikes, as was Maj. Gen. Mohammad Bagheri, chief of the staff of the Iranian Armed Forces.
Netanyahu said the strikes "will continue for as many days as it takes to remove this threat."
IDF Spokesperson Brigadier General Effie Defrin said in a video statement Friday morning that "200 fighter jets went on the attack and dropped over 330 different munitions" on more than 100 targets in Iran, beginning Operation Rising Lion. He said the IDF had confirmed that "senior members of the Iranian regime's security leadership" had been killed, including the Iranian military's chief of staff and the Revolutionary Guard's Salami.
Deffrin said Israel had launched its operation "at the most appropriate time in light of an existing and real threat and with the highest military readiness," claiming intelligence showed "the Iranian regime has made significant progress in achieving nuclear capability and its ability to act against us," calling it an emerging and existential threat to Israel.
Iranian officials had indicated they planned to retaliate against Israel. The country's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Israel "should await a harsh response" in a message reported by Iranian state media.
The IDF spokesperson Defrin, in his Friday remarks, provided no further information on the wave of drones launched by Iran, other than saying there were over 100 of them and that "all defense systems are working to intercept the threats."
U.S. not involved in Israel's strikes, Rubio says
The United States was not part of the operation and was not involved in intelligence sharing, multiple U.S. sources told CBS News, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio confirmed this in a statement.
"Israel took unilateral action against Iran," he said. "We are not involved in strikes against Iran and our top priority is protecting American forces in the region. Israel advised us that they believe this action was necessary for its self-defense."
Rubio added, "Iran should not target U.S. interests or personnel."
President Trump told Fox News' Bret Baier late Thursday he was aware of the strikes in advance, but the U.S. did not assist Israel militarily.
Mr. Trump is convening a National Security Council meeting in the Situation Room on Friday, the White House said.
The U.S. Embassy in Israel told government employees and their families to "shelter in place until further notice," amid the threat of a retaliatory strike by Iran.
IDF says it hit "dozens" of targets in "first stage"
Iranian state media reported loud explosions and some casualties in the capital city of Tehran. State television later reported strikes in several other Iranian cities, including Natanz, which is south of Tehran and home to one of the country's uranium enrichment facilities.
Defrin, the IDF spokesman who gave the remarks on Israeli television Friday morning, said the goal of Israel's attack was to eliminate the threat of an Iranian "plan to destroy Israel that has taken shape in recent years," consisting, he said, of three components.
The first of which is the Iranian regime "racing towards a nuclear bomb," Defrin said, claiming new Israeli intelligence indicated the Iranian regime "has established a secret program, within the framework of which senior nuclear scientists in Iran secretly conducted the experiments required to build nuclear weapons."
"This is unequivocal proof that the Iranian regime is working to obtain nuclear weapons in the near future," said Defrin. He did not share any details of the new intelligence.
Second, Defrin said Iran had thousands of ballistic missiles, "and it plans to double and triple them in light of the understanding that this is an effective threat to Israel. This is a quantity of missiles that constitutes an existential threat."
Finally, the IDF spokesman said Iran "continues to finance, arm, and operate its proxies throughout the Middle East against the State of Israel."
"All of this is connected to the plan to destroy Israel that has taken shape in recent years," he said.
Strikes come amid U.S.-Iran nuclear talks
The strikes came as the Trump administration has been seeking to negotiate an agreement with Iran's government to limit the country's nuclear program. Mr. Trump has said Iran cannot be allowed to enrich uranium, but Iran is unwilling to accept those terms.
The U.S. and Iran are still expected to hold talks on Sunday, multiple U.S. officials told CBS News. Steve Witkoff, the president's Mideast envoy, was planning to hold a sixth round of talks in Oman over the weekend.
Mr. Trump told Fox News, "Iran cannot have a nuclear bomb and we are hoping to get back to the negotiating table. We will see."
Israel has long been skeptical of striking a deal with Iran, its top global foe, and has acknowledged carrying out various covert and overt actions over the years to set back Iran's nuclear ambitions.
Iran's nuclear program has existed for decades, though the country denies that it has any interest in building a nuclear weapon. International watchdogs say Iran has increased its stockpiles of highly enriched uranium in recent years, after Mr. Trump withdrew from a 2015 Obama-era nuclear agreement that he viewed as weak.
In a statement announcing the strikes, the IDF said Iran "is closer than ever to obtaining a nuclear weapon" and "has proclaimed that its objective is to destroy the State of Israel." Israel also cited Iran's support for militant groups in the region, including the terrorist group Hamas, and Iran's ballistic missile attacks on Israel last year.
CBS News reported Wednesday that Israel was ready to launch an operation on Iran. The U.S. anticipated Iranian retaliation on American sites in Iraq — leading the Trump administration to advise non-emergency U.S. government officials and military families to leave the entire region.
When asked about those precautionary measures for U.S. nationals in the Mideast, Mr. Trump said only that the region "could be a dangerous place, and we'll see what happens."
If the U.S remains uninvolved in the strikes, it means Israel's operation will not include B-2 bombers, which carry heavy bombs that can penetrate Iran's deep underground fortified uranium enrichment facilities. As a result, a lack of U.S. participation could limit Israel's ability to fully eliminate Iran's nuclear program.
Michal Ben-Gal and Seyed Bathaei contributed to this report.
