As President Donald Trump pledged to get revenge for the first US casualties in the war he started to overthrow Tehran’s ruling clerics, the United States struck hundreds of sites throughout Iran and Israel extended its bombing to Lebanon on Monday.
Iranian military retaliated for the fight that started Saturday with the death of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, by firing missiles and drones across the Middle East, killing people in Israel and the United Arab Emirates.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) headquarters, the elite group charged with upholding the theocracy that has been in place since 1979, was reportedly destroyed by the US military on Sunday as it expanded its targets throughout Iran.
“The IRGC no longer has a headquarters,” US Central Command said in a statement.
The Israeli military said it was carrying out “large-scale strikes” in the heart of Tehran on Monday and also bombing across Lebanon against Hezbollah, the armed Shiite Muslim movement closely tied to Iran’s Islamic republic.
An AFP journalist heard explosions in Beirut. Hezbollah, which was weakened by an earlier Israeli offensive, said in a statement that it had fired rockets and drones at Israel “in retaliation for the pure blood” of Khamenei.
Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have urged the overthrow of the government in Iran, the sworn foe of Israel and the United States since the 1979 Islamic revolution toppled the pro-Western shah.
Trump, speaking to the New York Times, said the United States and Israel could keep up the level of attacks for four to five weeks.
“It won’t be difficult. We have tremendous amounts of ammunition,” he said, adding he had a shortlist of three unnamed people he favored to lead Iran after the war.
In a video address, Trump urged Iranian security forces “to lay down your arms and receive full immunity or face certain death.”
“It will be certain death,” he repeated. “It won’t be pretty.”
The Pentagon said that three US service members were killed in the operation and five seriously wounded in the operation it has called “Epic Fury.”
“Sadly, there will likely be more before it ends,” Trump said.
“But America will avenge their deaths and deliver the most punishing blow to the terrorists who have waged war against, basically, civilization.”
Trump, who ran on a platform of opposing foreign operations, hasn’t done much to convince Americans that war is necessary.
A “reckless decision” led to the troops’ deaths, according to House of Representatives Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, who also stated that there was no threat to “justify this type of preemptive military strikes.”
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