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Over 230 people are reported dead across Israel and Iran since Israel launched its first strikes on Friday, leading to an ongoing exchange of attacks with no end in sight.
On Sunday night, emergency responders were still struggling to contain fires started by strikes on the northern port city of Haifa.
In Haifa, an oil refinery was damaged, the firm operating it said. Israel’s main international airport and airspace was closed for a third day.
Iran raised its death toll on Sunday to 224 people. Health authorities also reported that 1,277 were wounded, without distinguishing between military officials and civilians.
Claiming to operate almost freely in the skies over Iran, Israel said its attacks Sunday hit Iran’s Defence Ministry, missile launch sites and factories producing air defence components. Iran also acknowledged Israel had killed more of its top generals, including the Revolutionary Guard intelligence chief, Mohammad Kazemi.
But Israeli strikes have also extended beyond Iranian military installations to hit government buildings including the Foreign Ministry and several energy facilities, Iranian authorities said, most recently sparking fires Sunday at the Shahran oil depot north of Tehran and a fuel tank south of the city.
The strikes raised the prospect of a broader assault on Iran’s heavily sanctioned energy industry that is vital to the global economy and markets.
Israel, which has aimed its missiles at Iran’s rapidly advancing nuclear programme and military leadership, said Iran has fired over 270 missiles since Friday, 22 of which slipped through the country’s sophisticated multi-tiered air defences and caused havoc in residential suburbs, killing 14 people and wounding 390 others.
World leaders scramble to prevent escalation
Israel, the sole though undeclared nuclear-armed state in the Middle East, has said this attack — its most powerful ever against Iran — was to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.
The latest round of talks between the US and Iran on the future of Tehran’s nuclear program had been scheduled Sunday in Oman but were cancelled after Israel’s attack.
EU Foreign Policy Chief Kaja Kallas will convene an emergency meeting of the 27-nation bloc’s foreign ministers Tuesday to discuss the conflict between Israel and Iran.
The meeting, to be held via video link, “will provide an opportunity for an exchange of views, coordination on diplomatic outreach to Tel Aviv and Tehran, and possible next steps,” Kallas’ office said Sunday.
“We will continue to contribute to all diplomatic efforts to reduce tensions and to find a lasting solution to the Iranian nuclear issue which can only be through a negotiated deal,” it said.
US President Donald Trump in a social media post Sunday said that Iran and Israel “should make a deal, and will make a deal,” comparing his efforts to agreements that had stopped hostilities between India and Pakistan and in other global hotspots.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said if Israeli strikes on Iran stop, then “our responses will also stop.”