US pounds near key strait as Iran vows to avenge death
The United States said it pounded Iranian missile sites near the key Strait of Hormuz as the Islamic republic fired missiles Wednesday around the region, vowing to avenge the killing of its powerful security chief.
Two people died from the missile barrage inside Israel, whose defences have helped it avoid mass casualties since it launched the war alongside the United States.
With Iran mostly closing off the Strait of Hormuz, the gateway for one-fifth of the world's oil, the US military said it brought out some of the heaviest bombs in its arsenal to penetrate adjacent missile sites.
The United States dropped several 5,000-pound (2,250 kg) bombs -- estimated to cost $288,000 each -- on "hardened Iranian missile sites" near the coast that posed a threat to international shipping, Central Command said.
Iran has sought to extract a heavy toll on the global economy in retaliation for the US-Israeli attack, including by driving up the cost of oil.
US President Donald Trump earlier Tuesday fumed that American allies, which have largely distanced themselves from his war, were not lining up behind the United States to escort tankers through the Strait of Hormuz.
But Trump earlier Tuesday boasted that the US military did not need its allies, writing on his Truth Social platform: "WE DO NOT NEED THE HELP OF ANYONE!"
- 'National awakening' -
Israel announced Tuesday that it killed security chief Ali Larijani, a key force leading Iran since the death of the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in the first strikes of the war on February 28.
Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards in a statement said that the "pure blood of this great martyr, like other dear martyrs, will be a source of honour, power and national awakening against the front of global arrogance and international Zionism".
Iran will hold funerals Wednesday for Larijani and another powerful figure killed Tuesday by Israel, Gholamreza Soleimani, the head of the Basij paramilitary force, the Fars and Tasnim agencies reported.
Israel vowed also to target Iran's new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, who has not appeared in public since the ruling clerics chose him to succeed his father.
"We don't know about Mojtaba Khamenei, we don't hear him, we don't see him, but I can tell you one thing: we will track him down, find him, and neutralise him," military spokesman Brigadier General Effie Defrin told reporters.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu again called for the end of the Islamic republic, although he and Trump have stopped short of saying that is their goal.
The overthrow of Iran's authorities by the people "will not happen all at once, it will not happen easily. But if we persist in this -- we will give them a chance to take their fate into their own hands," Netanyahu said in a televised statement.
In contrast to Mojtaba Khamenei, Larijani, 68, had walked openly with crowds at a pro-government rally last week in Tehran.
"He has effectively been the figure in charge of the regime's survival, its regional policy and its defence strategy," David Khalfa, co-founder of the Atlantic Middle East Forum, told AFP.
"It's the supreme leader who gives the order, but he is the one who carries it out. He is the right-hand man."
- Deaths near Tel Aviv -
In Israel, medics said two people died after an Iranian missile barrage caused extensive damage to a building near the commercial hub Tel Aviv.
AFP journalists also heard loud explosions in Dubai, the glitzy economic hub whose sense of security has been shaken by persistent Iranian drones and missiles.
In rare dissent within Trump's ranks, Joseph Kent, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, announced his resignation with an open letter.
Kent wrote that Iran posed no "imminent threat" to the United States, which he said started the war "due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby".
Trump denounced the criticism in personal terms, calling Kent "very weak on security".
Israel earlier said it had also targeted Akram al-Ajouri, head of the military wing of the group Palestinian Islamic Jihad, in a strike in Iran.
Since the October 7, 2023 cross-border attacks by Hamas into Israel from Gaza, Israel has targeted the leaders of its enemies.
Turkey's Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on Tuesday called the latest assassinations "truly illegal".
- Sleeping in cars -
The war has taken a particularly heavy toll on Lebanon, where Israeli strikes early Wednesday again hit the heart of Beirut.
Hezbollah, the Shia movement backed by Iran, had struck Israel after Khamenei's killing, prompting a massive Israeli air and ground campaign reminiscent of past wars.
More than a million people have been displaced across Lebanon, where Israeli strikes have killed 886 people since March 2, Lebanon's health ministry says.
In the southern city of Sidon, displaced people were sleeping in their cars, according to an AFP team on the ground.
"Lots of people are coming every day to ask for shelter but we don't have space anymore, we can't accept them," said Jihan Kaisi, the director of an NGO that runs a school-turned-shelter, where more than 1,100 people are crammed together.
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