dpa
Tehran/ Tel Aviv
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has called for a considered approach following the Israeli attack on military sites on Saturday.
"How the strength and will of the Iranian people should be made clear to [Israel] is for those responsible to decide,” Khamenei said on Sunday at an event in the capital Tehran, according to the state news agency IRNA.
"What should be done is what is in the best interests of this people and country,” the 85-year-old religious leader added. Khamenei’s words following the Israeli airstrikes are seen as comparatively moderate.
In the context of the Middle East conflict and following the killing of Iranian generals or leading allies, the head of state has also vowed revenge in recent months. His statements are regarded as the last word by which both the Iranian government and military are guided.
According to official sources, four soldiers were killed in the Israeli attack, and several military sites, such as radar installations, were damaged.
Israel’s attack on Iran was, in the words of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday, "precise and powerful”.
Netanyahu stated that the attack "achieved all its objectives,” during a speech at a memorial event on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem for the victims of the Hamas massacre on October 7 last year.
Netanyahu said Israel is in an existential struggle against an "Axis of Evil” led by Iran. He asserted that Israel’s enemies must pay a "very high price.”
Iran, he said, attacked Israel with hundreds of ballistic missiles at the beginning of the month. "This attack failed.” Israel then responded in the early hours of Saturday, Netanyahu said.
The air force targeted numerous sites in Iran. "We severely damaged Iran’s defence capabilities, as well as their ability to manufacture missiles that are directed against us.” He thanked the United States for "their close coordination and support.” Netanyahu addressed the Iranian people directly: "Our fight is not against you, but against the tyrannical regime that oppresses you and threatens the entire region.”
Meanwhile, the Israeli Air Force attacked a command centre of the Palestinian organization Hamas in the Gaza Strip, the military said early on Sunday.
The command centre was located in northern Gaza in a building that previously served as a school, the Israeli military said. The centre was used by Hamas to "plan and carry out terrorist operations against the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] troops and the State of Israel,” the military said on X.
The struggle to survive continues in northern Gaza as Israel’s devastating siege and bombing of the area enters its 23rd day.
An Oxfam official told Al Jazeera on Sunday Israel is using starvation as a weapon in its genocide against the Palestinians and that the United Kingdom-based NGO was unable to reach people in the north because of Israel’s ongoing bombing campaign.
Mahmoud Alsaqqa, who is Oxfam’s food security and livelihood lead in Gaza, warned that some Palestinians are "starving to death” from hunger in northern Gaza and more people will die in the coming days.
"There is nothing. You are talking about tens of days that they are not receiving any supplies,” he said, adding that most Palestinians in the area rely on aid supplies.