JERUSALEM/WASHINGTON, June 21 (Reuters) – Iran and Israel launched new bouts of attacks early Saturday, a day after Tehran said it was not going to negotiate on its nuclear programme when it felt under threat and Europe sought to keep peace talks alive.
At just after 2.30am local time in Israel (2330 GMT on Friday) the Israeli military said it detected a missile flurry on its way into Israeli airspace, which switched on air raid sirens in some of central Israel, including Tel Aviv, and the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The sky over Tel Aviv became visible as interceptions were spotted in the air and the metropolitan area could feel the explosion as Israel air defence reacted.
On its part, Israel launched a new round of operations on missile storage facilities and launch sites within Iran, the army said.Alarm followed in southern Israel too, Magen David Adom said. An Israeli military officer indicated that Iran has launched 5 ballistic missiles and there was as yet no sign of any missile hits.
No one was reported as casualty initially.
The emergency service published the photos according to which fire broke out on the roof of the multi-storey residential building in the center of Israel. According to local media, the debris of an intercepted missile became the cause of the fire. Last Friday, Israel started bombing Iran claiming that its old arch-rival was about to produce nuclear weapons. The retaliation did occur in the form of missile and drone attacks by Iran, a nation that claims that its nuclear programme is purely a peaceful endeavour, on Israel.
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It is an open secret that Israel has nuclear arms. This does not confirm or deny this.
The Air attacks that it has made in Iran claim a total of 639 people as found by the Human Rights Activists News Agency, which is a U.S based human rights organization that monitors Iran. The members who are killed are the military top echelon as well as work power.
Israel authorities report that 24 civilians were murdered by Iranian launched missiles.
Reuters was unable to determine casualty numbers of either side on its own.
TALKS SHOW LITTLE PROGRESS
There are attempts to attack Tel Aviv, an urban-satellite area of approximately 4 million inhabitants and business and economic center of the country, where certain strategic military facilities are concentrated as well, on several occasions by the Iranian forces.
Israel claimed to have struck over two dozens of military targets on Friday, including missile plants, a research organization involved in the nuclear weapons development in Tehran and bases of the military installed in western and central Iran.
The Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi added that negotiations with the U.S. were impossible till the Israeli aggression stopped. However, on Friday he came to Geneva where he met with European foreign ministers following which Europe expects to create a roadmap to move towards diplomacy.
U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday again said that he would wait up to two weeks before making a decision on whether the United States is to join Israel in the conflict, more time than enough to see whether or not people come to their senses, he said.
Trump maintained that he would not probably pressure Israel to reduce airstrikes to give time to negotiations.
I believe that the request is quite difficult to make at the moment. By contrast, it is a bit more difficult to do Kareman opiniat when one is winning rather than losing but we are ready to do so, willing to do so, able to do so, and we have been talking to Iran and we will see what happens, he added.
The Geneva talks saw little improvement and Trump quipped: They (fighters) will not secure a ceasefire easily when they (Iran) do not even want to talk to Europe. They desire to address us. Here, Europe cannot come to the rescue, Trump said.
Read: Israel-Iran Conflict Live: Macron Urges Iran to Resume Nuclear Talks
As the air war raged, hundreds of U.S. citizens have fled Iran, Reuters and U.S. State Department cable seen by the news service reported.
Danny Danon, Israel to the United Nations, said to the Security Council on Friday that Israel would maintain its attacks until Iranian nuclear menace is eradicated. U.N. envoy Amir Saeid Iravani of Iran urged the Security Council to act also saying Tehran was concerned by U.S. reports that Washington could join the war.
Russia and China insisted on the de-escalation immediately.
An Iranian official speaking to Reuters indicated that Iran was willing to negotiate a cap on the level of uranium to be enriched but not one which forbade Iran to enrich all the uranium, not under these circumstances of Israel strikes.
