“There are no more cities of refuge in the Middle East,” Israel Defense Forces Spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin declared on Tuesday night, revealing that dozens of Israeli Air Force fighter jets were “continuously” striking ballistic missile launchers in the central Iranian city of Isfahan.
“We continue to deepen our strikes,” the spokesman said in his briefing on the fifth day of “Operation Rising Lion” in Iran. “A few hours ago, around 60 aircraft from the IAF launched a broad wave of attacks in the heart of Iran, targeting Iranian missile launch sites.”
After the IDF achieved aerial superiority over the Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force, regime forces were “pushed into central Iran,” he said, adding that most missile fire now originates from the Isfahan region.
Dozens of Air Force aircraft are “continuously flying over Isfahan, locating enemy activity in real time and attacking operators as well as launchers,” the spokesperson revealed. “There are no more cities of refuge in the Middle East. This isn’t just a slogan; it’s the reality.”
“What applied to Hamas leaders in Gaza and to Hezbollah leaders in Dahiyeh [in Beirut], now applies to Iranian regime leaders and launch operators in Isfahan who try to fire missiles at Israeli civilians,” he said.
Alongside attacks on missile systems, the IAF continues to strike terror targets across Tehran, including regime offices and assets used by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, including its Quds Force, he said.
“We will not allow an existential threat—whether nuclear or missile—to persist over Israel. We are mission-driven, not time-driven, and will operate until our goals are fully achieved,” according to Defrin.
Early on June 13, more than 200 Israeli fighter jets attacked dozens of enemy targets, including military and nuclear sites, in a “preemptive, precise, combined” opening strike against Tehran’s nuclear program.
Since the start of the war on Friday, Iranian attacks on Israel’s civilian population centers have killed 24 people in the Jewish state. Three were killed on Friday, 13 overnight on Saturday, and eight early on Monday.
Channel 12 said on Tuesday that Iran launched 17 waves of attacks using more than 400 ballistic missiles, in addition to suicide drones.
The Israeli Air Force, in response, attacked and destroyed more than 70 missile batteries across Iran, it said in a statement on Tuesday evening.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the operation would “continue for as many days as it takes to remove this threat,” vowing to end the Iranian threat to the Jewish state’s “very survival.”
