Israeli Air Force fighter jets dropped over 1,200 munitions on Iranian regime targets in the first 24 hours of “Operation Roaring Lion,” the Israel Defense Forces announced on Sunday morning.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Saturday night that “every element of the Iranian regime” was a target, as the IAF continued to hit the Islamic Republic following the joint Israeli-U.S. military operation that eliminated Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei hours earlier.
“This morning, together with the United States and in full coordination with it, the State of Israel launched Operation ‘Roaring Lion’ against targets in Iran—in order to remove an immediate threat to Israel’s security and to the stability of the region and the world,” he said.
Israel “did not wait for the moment when the threat would materialize,” he continued. “We acted to prevent an extremist and murderous regime from possessing capabilities that endanger Israel and the entire world.”
Katz emphasized that “this is not a war against the Iranian people,” adding: “Our struggle is against the ayatollah regime—a regime that spreads terror, destabilizes the region, and oppresses its own citizens.”
“The Iranian regime has worked for years to obtain nuclear weapons and to build a missile array intended to strike Israel and threaten the free world,” said the defense minister, vowing “not to allow this.”
“Now, the Iranian people stand before a historic opportunity, for the first time in 47 years, to free themselves from oppressive rule,” he added.
“With the help of the Rock of Israel and the Israel Defense Forces—we’ll prevail! Am Yisrael Chai,” Katz concluded.
The Israeli military launched preemptive airstrikes against the Islamic regime on Saturday morning to neutralize the threat it posed to the Jewish state, according to an earlier statement issued by Katz.
Tehran subsequently fired many dozens of ballistic missiles into the Jewish state’s territory, killing one and wounding several, with sirens continuing to blare across the country on Sunday morning.
In a statement posted to Truth Social announcing the start of “major combat operations” against the Islamic regime, U.S. President Donald Trump said that his objective was “to defend the American people” by neutralizing the “imminent threats from the Iranian regime, a vicious group of very hard, terrible people.” Its “menacing activities directly endanger the United States, our troops, our bases overseas and our allies throughout the world,” wrote the president on Truth Social.
