Region

TEHRAN — Iran's Revolutionary Guards have launched missile attacks on multiple "terrorist" targets in Syria and in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region, state media reported on Tuesday.

The attacks destroyed "a spy headquarters" and a "gathering of anti-Iranian terrorist groups" in Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, the official IRNA news agency reported, quoting a statement by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

Four people were killed and six others wounded in the attack, according to Iraq's Kurdistan security council.

The prominent businessman Peshraw Dizayee was among several civilians who were killed, the Kurdistan Democratic Party said.

The United States on Monday condemned the attacks as "reckless", warning they undermine stability.

"We oppose Iran's reckless missile strikes, which undermine Iraq's stability," US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.

Earlier, a White House spokesperson said no US personnel or facilities were targeted.

The IRGC also hit targets in Syria with ballistic missiles, including the "gathering places of commanders and main elements related to recent terrorist operations, particularly the Daesh group", their Sepah News service reported.

It added that the strike on Syria was in response to recent attacks by terrorist groups that killed Iranians in the southern cities of Kerman and Rask.

Explosions were heard in Aleppo and its countryside, where “at least 4 missiles that came from the direction of the Mediterranean Sea” fell, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said.

On January 3, suicide bombers struck crowds gathered near the tomb of the revered IRGC general Qassem Soleimani in Kerman, killing around 90 people. The attack was later claimed by Daesh.

In December, at least 11 Iranian police officers were killed in an attack on a police station in Rask. The militant group Jaish Al Adl (Army of Justice), which was formed in 2012 and is blacklisted by Iran as a “terrorist” group, claimed responsibility.

BAGHDAD — Iraq summoned Iran’s envoy in Baghdad and recalled its ambassador from Tehran on Tuesday in a sharp rebuke to its ally over deadly missile strikes on its autonomous Kurdish region.

Iraq challenged Iran’s claim that the strikes targeted Israel’s intelligence services in response to recent Israeli assassinations of Iranian and pro-Iranian commanders.

It said it would lodge a complaint with the UN Security Council over the Iranian “attack on its sovereignty”.

Iran’s strikes, which also hit alleged Daesh group targets in Iraq’s western neighbour Syria, came with tensions high across the Middle East as Israel battles Iran ally Hamas and also drew condemnation from the United States.

Four people were killed and six wounded in the strikes on Iraqi Kurdistan, the region’s security council said.

The casualties included prominent real estate magnate Peshraw Dizayee, his wife and other family members who were hit by a strike on their home, the region’s leading party, the Kurdistan Democratic Party, said.

Iran defended its missile strikes in Iraq and Syria, saying they were a “targeted operation” and “just punishment” against those who breach the Islamic republic’s security.

“The Islamic republic, with its high intelligence capability, in a precise and targeted operation identified the criminals’ headquarters and hit it with precision weapons,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani said.

‘Blood of the martyrs’ 

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they had destroyed the “Zionist regime’s spy headquarters in the Kurdistan region of Iraq”.

The strike came “in response to the recent vicious actions of the Zionist regime which martyred the commanders of the Revolutionary Guards and the resistance front”, a Guard statement carried by Iran’s official IRNA news agency said. 

Senior Guard commander Razi Moussavi was killed in a strike in Syria last month that was widely blamed on Israel. This month, Hamas number two Saleh Al Aruri was killed in a Beirut strike, that Lebanese officials blamed on Israel.

The Guard said their reprisals “will continue until the last drops of blood of the martyrs are avenged”.

They said they also struck a “gathering of anti-Iranian terrorist groups” in the Kurdish regional capital Erbil.

The Iraqi foreign ministry said it would publish the findings of the official investigation, promising to prove to “Iraqi and international public opinion the falseness of the allegations made by those responsible for these reprehensible actions”.

The autonomous Kurdish region’s Prime Minister Masrour Barzani said he would be in contact with “our partners within the international community to put an end to these brutal attacks”.

‘Reckless’ 

The United States condemned the Iranian strikes as “reckless”.

“We oppose Iran’s reckless missile strikes, which undermine Iraq’s stability,” US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.

A White House spokesperson said no US personnel or facilities were hit in the Iranian strikes.

Iran-backed militant groups in Iraq and Syria have carried out a spate of attacks on military bases in the two countries used by soldiers of a US-led coalition against Daesh.

RAANANA, Israel — A woman was killed and 13 people injured in a suspected car ramming in central Israel, medics said, as police arrested two Palestinians over the reported attack.

Israeli authorities said the two suspects stole vehicles and ran over a number of citizens in different areas in the city of Raanana north of Tel Aviv.

Medics from the Magen David Adom emergency service said of the 13 people who were wounded, two were seriously hurt, with the others suffering less serious injuries.

Meir hospital near Raanana confirmed that one woman had died.

"A wounded woman who arrived in a critical condition after having been hit by a vehicle has died of her injuries despite our efforts to save her," the hospital said in a statement.

DUBAI — The crew of a tanker seized by Iran's navy this week in a row with the United States are safe, the vessel's Greek owners said on Sunday.

Empire Navigation said in a statement that an associate had contacted Iranian authorities and reported that "all the crew members on board the St. Nikolas are safe and in good health".

The company added that it had not been itself able to directly contact the 19-man crew of the Marshall Islands-flagged ship, which is anchored in the vicinity of the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas.

Eighteen Filipinos and a Greek are on board.

Iran said it had seized the ship off Oman on Thursday to retaliate for the "theft" of its oil from the same tanker, which at the time was called the Suez Rajan, last year by the United States, state media said.

The United States condemned what it called an "unlawful seizure" and demanded Iran "immediately release the ship and its crew".

Iran has responded with tit-for-tat measures in the past after seizures of Iranian oil shipments.

Crippling US sanctions, reimposed following Washington’s 2018 withdrawal from a landmark nuclear deal, target Iranian oil and petrochemical sales in a bid to reduce Iran’s energy exports.

The vessel had been loaded with 145,000 tonnes of crude oil in Basra, Iraq and was destined for Aliaga in Turkey via the Suez Canal.

British maritime risk company Ambrey this week said the recently renamed tanker was previously prosecuted and fined for carrying sanctioned Iranian oil, which was confiscated by US authorities.

In September, the United States said it had several months earlier seized the Suez Rajan and its cargo of 980,000 barrels of crude oil.

The US Department of Justice said at the time that the oil on the Greek-managed tanker was allegedly being sold by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to China.

The Gulf of Oman, a key route for the oil industry that separates Oman and Iran, has witnessed a series of hijackings and attacks over the years, often involving Iran.

Shipping in the resource-rich region is also on heightened alert following weeks of drone and missile attacks in the Red Sea by Yemen’s Iran-backed Huthi rebels.

GAZA STRIP, Palestinian Territories — The war between Israel and Hamas entered its 100th day on Sunday after Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed "no one will stop us" from destroying the resistance group.

The conflict has triggered a humanitarian crisis, with more than 23,000 people reported killed in Gaza and much of the besieged Palestinian territory reduced to rubble, as fears grow that fighting could engulf the wider region.

Fresh strikes hit Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen on Saturday after the rebels warned of more attacks in support of Gaza on what they deem Israeli-linked Red Sea shipping.

The US Central Command said its forces hit a Houthi radar site, a day after the first strikes by US and British forces on rebel sites in Yemen.

Following Hamas resistance group's sudden attack on Israel on October 7, Israel vowed to destroy Gaza's Islamist rulers and launched a relentless bombardment that has killed at least 23,843 people, mostly women and children, according to the latest toll from the territory's health ministry.

After the Hague-based International Court of Justice heard arguments this week that accused Israel of breaching the UN Genocide Convention, Netanyahu insisted no court or military foe could stop Israel from achieving its aim of destroying Hamas.

“No one will stop us, not The Hague, not the Axis of Evil and no one else,” he told a televised news conference on Saturday, referring to the Iran-aligned “axis of resistance” groups in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen.

Netanyahu is under growing domestic pressure to bring home hostages who have now been held in Gaza for 100 days, with thousands rallying in Tel Aviv to call for their release.

‘We started to scream’ 

Health officials in Gaza said on Saturday Israeli strikes killed at least 60 people in the besieged territory.

Nimma Al Akhras, 80, described one of the strikes that destroyed her home.

“We started to scream and I couldn’t move but someone pulled me out and put me on a cart,” she said.

The Israeli forces said it struck dozens of rocket launchers that were “ready to be used” in central Gaza and eliminated four “terrorists” in air strikes on Khan Yunis, Gaza’s main southern city.

It also reported that its engineers had destroyed a Hamas “command centre” in central Gaza.

Mourners gathered at Rafah’s Al Najjar hospital and prayed around the bodies of slain relatives.

One man, Bassem Araf, held up a photo of a child.

“She died hungry with bread in her hand. We tried to remove the bread from her hand but it was held tight,” Araf said.

“This is the resistance they are targeting in Gaza, just children.”

‘Devastating repercussions’ 

An Israeli siege has sparked acute shortages of food, water, medicine and fuel in Gaza, where the health system is collapsing.

The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, Philippe Lazzarini, said during a visit to the Gaza Strip on Saturday “the massive death, destruction, displacement, hunger, loss and grief of the last 100 days are staining our shared humanity”.

He warned an entire generation of children in Gaza were being “traumatised”, diseases were spreading and the clock was “ticking fast towards famine”.

Winter rains have exacerbated the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza, where the UN estimates 1.9 million, nearly 85 per cent of the population, have been displaced.

Many have sought shelter in Rafah and other southern areas where the health ministry says there isn’t the infrastructure to support them.

Gaza’s health ministry spokesman accused Israel of “deliberately targeting hospitals... to put them out of service”, warning of “devastating repercussions”.

Hospitals, protected under international humanitarian law, have been hit repeatedly by Israeli strikes in Gaza since the war began.

Fewer than half of Gaza’s hospitals are functioning and those only partly, the World Health Organisation says.

An AFP reporter in Rafah said telecommunications had been partially restored, a day after Gaza’s main operator Paltel reported the latest outage.

Paltel did not immediately confirm the service restoration but said an Israeli strike killed two of its employees in Khan Yunis while they were repairing the network.