Iran fires missiles at Israel after Israeli airstrike on Beirut

Iran fired missiles toward Israel on Sunday, after a deadly Israeli airstrike on Beirut hours earlier targeting the Tehran-backed militants Hezbollah, Israeli’s military said. It marks the first time Iran has targeted Israel during its ceasefire with the US that went into force in early April.

This action marks a major regional escalation. Iranian officials had threatened to retaliate earlier on Sunday after Israel bombarded the southern outskirts of the Lebanese capital, Beirut, part of an Israeli campaign against the Iranian ally Hezbollah.

Mohsen Rezaei, an adviser to Iran’s supreme leader and a former commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, said on social media that Iran had repeatedly warned that it would not tolerate violations of the cease-fire or aggression against Lebanon.

“Tonight, the aggressors received their response,” he wrote, adding that any further action would be met with “a more crushing response and heavier costs.” The Israeli military said its Air Force had so far intercepted all missiles launched from Iran but has identified additional launches fired toward Israel.

In northern Israel, at least four loud blasts were heard overhead since the Israeli military announced it had detected missile launches from Iran. Previous Iranian attacks agitated many here, who feared that Hezbollah, the Iran-backed armed group just beyond the border in Lebanon, would launch missiles in sync with its patron. There have been no reports of such attacks originating from Lebanon.

The cease-fire between the United States, Israel and Iran had increasingly frayed over the past few weeks — even before Iran fired on Israel on Sunday night. In recent weeks, Israel expanded its campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon, where Iran had demanded a halt to the war as part of the truce.

Arab countries in the Persian Gulf said Iran had launched volleys of missiles and drones at their territory, while American forces engaged in low-level skirmishes with Iran in the Persian Gulf.

Whether this will lead to daily missile launches and bombing attempts by Iran, Israel and the US, remain to be seen. But the fragile ceasefire seems to be fraying, and an uncertain future awaits.