The Israeli military has said it launched a wave of strikes targeting “regime infrastructure” in central Iran, the first such announcement since the Islamic Republic appointed a new supreme leader.
Israeli forces have “begun an additional wave of strikes on Iranian terror regime infrastructure in central Iran”, the military said in a brief statement, shortly after announcing strikes on Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Iran also fired missiles at Israel in the name of the nation’s new leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, who was selected to succeed his father despite threats by the United States and Israel to target him next.
Nine days after US-Israeli strikes killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and plunged the Middle East into war, clerics convened to choose the country’s third supreme leader since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
An announcer on state television read a statement from the 88-member Assembly of Experts next to a picture of the new 56-year-old leader.
Mojtaba Khamenei “is appointed and introduced as the third leader of the sacred system of the Islamic Republic of Iranbased on the decisive vote of the respected representatives of the Assembly of Experts”, the statement said.
It said the clerical body “did not hesitate for a minute” in choosing a new leader despite “the brutal aggression of the criminal America and the evil Zionist regime”.
State media soon afterwards showed a projectile said to be launched at Israel bearing the slogan, “At Your Command, Sayyid Mojtaba”, using an Islamic honorific.
Explosions were also heard in Qatar, home to a major US air base.
The war came weeks after Iranian security forces crushed nationwide protests against the government, killing thousands.
The younger Khamenei is considered a fellow hardliner who will pursue his father’s rejection of dissent.
US President Donald Trump had previously dismissed Mr Khamenei as a “lightweight” and insisted again yesterday that he should have a say in appointing a new leader.
“If he doesn’t get approval from us, he’s not going to last long,” Mr Trump told ABC News before the announcement was made.
Israel’s military had also warned any successor that “we will not hesitate to target you”.
As Iran retaliates against its oil-rich Gulf Arab neighbours, the benchmark price for a barrel of crude soared beyond $100 for the first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine four years ago.
Mr Trump dismissed the price spike, a politically sensitive issue in the United States, as a “small price to pay” for removing the alleged threat of Iran’s nuclear programme.
But markets in Japan and South Korea, both heavily dependent on energy imports, opened the week sharply lower.
In a sign that the United States does not expect a quick end to the war, the State Department ordered non-emergency staff to leave Saudi Arabia – days after a drone hit the US embassy.
Few expect major changes under Mr Khamenei, a trained cleric close to the Revolutionary Guards, who are the ideological arm of the military.
The Revolutionary Guards quickly pledged support for the new leader, who comes into the role with far less experience than his father, who had been president under the first supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
The Guards Corps said in a statement it was “ready for complete obedience and self-sacrifice in carrying out the divine commands” of the new leader.
Iran was founded on opposition to dynastic monarchies after the toppling of the pro-Western shah in 1979.
Israel struck five oil facilities in and around Tehran early yesterday, killing at least four people and sparking blazes that left the skies filled with acrid smoke.
Tehran’s governor told the IRNA news agency that fuel distribution had been “temporarily interrupted” in the capital.
Authorities warned the fumes could be toxic and urged citizens to stay indoors, but many windows were blown out by the force of the blasts.
Mr Trump has sent mixed messages on the war aims.
He has demanded “unconditional surrender” but also said that the war is all but won.
He also refused to rule out sending US ground troops.
The US military announced that a service member had died after being wounded in Saudi Arabia, the seventh American combat death in the war.
The Revolutionary Guards warned they had enough supplies to continue their drone and missile war over the Middle East for up to six months.
Hezbollah said it was engaging Israeli forces who landed in eastern Lebanon by helicopter across the Syrian border, the second such operation since the outbreak of the latest conflict with Israel.
Bahrain said an Iranian drone attack on the island of Sitra injured 32 people as Gulf nations reported new attacks with Tehran pressing its retaliatory strikes across the region.
All of the wounded were Bahraini citizens and there were four “serious cases”, including children, the health ministry said in a statement carried by the state news agency.
The wounded included a 17-year-old girl who suffered severe head and eye injuries, and a two-month-old baby, according to the ministry.
Several explosions were also heard in the Qatari capital Doha, AFP journalists said, as Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait all reported new attacks.
Doha has been targeted by waves of Iranian drones and missiles since Iran launched a retaliation campaign across the Gulf in the wake of US and Israeli attacks against the Islamic Republic.
Qatar’s defence ministry said its forces had intercepted a missile attack.
Elsewhere in the Gulf, Saudi Arabia’s defence ministry said the kingdom intercepted and destroyed two waves of drones heading towards the Shaybah oil field in the southeast of the country.
In the UAE, the National Emergency Crisis and Disaster Management Authority said in a statement on X that air defences responded to “a missile threat”.
Kuwait, which authorities said was targeted by seven missiles and five drones yesterday, announced another missile and drone attack.
The defence ministry said the country’s air defences were working to intercept the attack.
Gulf countries have borne much of Iran’s response after the United States and Israel launched a massive air campaign against Iran on 28 February.
Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian has warned the country “will be forced to respond” against its neighbours if their territory is used to attack it.