Middle East|The Iranian government supports Hamas and Hezbollah, with whom Israel is at war. In Israel, the discussion has turned to Iran’s role in the Middle East, says Finland’s ambassador to Israel, Nina Nordström.
The summary is made by artificial intelligence and checked by a human.
Iran fired more than 180 ballistic missiles at Israel on Tuesday night.
The missile hit fairly close to the Finnish Embassy in Israel in Tel Aviv.
In Jericho, one person died and two were wounded by shrapnel from the missile.
According to Finland’s ambassador to Israel, it remains to be seen whether Israel will retaliate against Iran.
Iran fired more than 180 ballistic missiles at Israel on Tuesday night. According to preliminary information, some of them reached Israel efficient through the air defense system.
One of the missiles that got through hit just a few kilometers from the Finnish Embassy in Israel and the ambassador’s official residence in Tel Aviv, the ambassador Nina Nordström told Helsingin Sanomat on Wednesday morning.
Nina Nordström.
“Now we are waiting to see if there will be a reaction from Israel to this. It’s entirely possible that it will. In April, in a somewhat similar situation, when Iran had struck, Israel carried out a precise counterattack on military targets,” says Nordstöm.
According to the news agency AFP, on the West Bank in the city of Jericho one person diedwhen fragments of the missile fell to the ground and hit him. Israeli medics have said that two people were slightly wounded by shrapnel from the missiles on Tuesday.
An Israeli soldier took pictures of a car damaged in a missile strike on Wednesday morning.
Nordstrom estimates that if Israel makes a counterstrike, the strike could be aimed at Iranian military targets this time as well. It is impossible to estimate the timetable of a possible attack yet, says Nordström.
According to AFP, Iran has said that if it is attacked, it will hit “all infrastructure” in Israel. Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi wrote on the messaging service X after midnight that the reason for the attacks targeting military and security targets was self-defense and “giving space for a ceasefire” in Gaza.
According to AFP, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard previously informed that the missile attack was revenge for the leader of the Shiite Islamist extremist organization Hezbollah. Hassan Nasrallah killing on Friday.
Israel, on the other hand, vowed to make Iran “pay” and to strike “the Middle East with force”.
President of the United States Joe Biden said after the Iranian missile attack that the country supports Israel. Biden said he would discuss a possible counterattack with the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu with.
Tuesday night the ambassador and a large part of the residents of Tel Aviv had moved to bomb shelters during the missile strike. Nordström was sheltered for a little over an hour.
“People here have been watching the night and waiting for the attacks to continue. It’s kind of special here that the attack happens again,” says Nordström, referring to the April attack.
“It is discussed a lot. There is also a lot of discussion about the role and importance of Iran for the entire region. About their operating model, acting through these indirect actors, Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis.”
According to Nordström, the discussion about Iran’s role is even a dominant theme on television and other media.
“Iran and its current government are seen as the main threat to the state of Israel and its existence,” he sums up.
According to Nordström, the embassy’s operations continue as normal, but some of the staff work remotely.
Correction 2.10. 5:42 p.m.: An earlier version of the news story incorrectly stated that some of the missiles fired by Iran at Israel got through Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system. However, Iron Dome is only part of Israel’s air defense system. Ballistic missiles are countered by Arrow systems.
People take cover during a missile strike on the side of a road in Tel Aviv on Tuesday evening.
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