Israel Hits Iran With Retaliatory Airstrikes – Live Updates

Azadeh Moshiri
Presenter, BBC News Channel

The international community was speechless, waiting to see how Israel would respond, in a region where the word “escalation” has been used far more times than world leaders would be comfortable with.

US President Joe Biden has made it very clear that he does not support Israel targeting either Iran’s nuclear research facilities or its oil facilities.

At this point, Iranian state media is downplaying the attack, as it usually does.

The main questions at this stage are:

• how much was really caused

• will Iran feel the need to respond, at a time when its proxies are weakened and it has suffered a series of humiliations this year?

These humiliations include the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, the political head of Hamas, on Iranian soil and the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah.

Will this be another moment leading to that dreaded slippery slope in the region?

• Watch Azadeh live reporting on this story by clicking watch live above