US President Donald Trump on Saturday, February 28, said that the United States had begun what he described as "major combat operations" against Iran, after missile attacks in Tehran and other parts of the country. Briefing on the operation on television, Trump said there could be casualties of American soldiers.
Meanwhile, Several missiles have hit University Street and the Jomhouri area in Tehran, Fars news agency reported. Smoke was seen rising in the city, according to Al Jazeera. Israeli Defence Minister Katz said Israel launched the missile attack to “remove threats to the State of Israel”.
"The lives of American heroes may be lost, and we may have casualties - that often happens in war," said Trump. He said Tehran would never be allowed to obtain a nuclear weapon. “Our objective is to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime, a vicious group of very hard, terrible people.”
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A United States official told Al Jazeera that the attacks were carried out as a joint military operation between Israel and the US, which has assembled a vast fleet of fighter jets and warships in the region to try to pressure Iran into a deal over its nuclear programme.
Trump said activities of Islamic Regime of Iran directly endanger the US, American troops and overseas bases, as well as US allies around the world. “For 47 years, the Iranian regime has chanted ‘Death to America’ and waged an unending campaign of bloodshed and mass murder, targeting the United States, our troops, and the innocent people in many, many countries,” Trump said.
He said the 1979 takeover of the US Embassy in Tehran, where dozens of Americans were held hostage for 444 days, as well as the 1983 Marine barracks bombing in Beirut that killed 241 US service members. He also gave reference to the 2000 attack on the USS Cole and killing of American service members in Iraq.
“The regime’s proxies have continued to launch countless attacks against American forces stationed in the Middle East in recent years, as well as US naval and commercial vessels in international shipping lanes,” Trump stated.. “It’s been mass terror, and we’re not going to put up with it any longer.”
Trump accused Iran of training and funding terrorist militias across Lebanon, Yemen, Syria and Iraq. “And it was Iran’s proxy Hamas that launched the monstrous October 7 attacks on Israel, slaughtering more than 1,000 innocent people, including 46 Americans, while taking 12 of our citizens hostage,” he said. “It was brutal, something like the world has never seen before.”
Calling Iran “the world’s number one state sponsor of terror,” Trump also accused the regime of killing tens of thousands of its own citizens during domestic protests. “It has always been the policy of the United States, in particular my administration, that this terrorist regime can never have a nuclear weapon,” he said. “I’ll say it again, they can never have a nuclear weapon.”
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Trump referred to “Operation Midnight Hammer” last June, saying the United States had “obliterated the regime’s nuclear program at Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan.” “After that attack, we warned them never to resume their malicious pursuit of nuclear weapons, and we sought repeatedly to make a deal,” he said. “We tried. They wanted to do it. They didn’t want to do it. Again, they wanted to do it. They didn’t want to do it. They didn’t know what was happening. They just wanted to practice evil.”
The Associated Press news agency reported that the strike in Iran’s capital happened near offices of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. According to an official cited by Reuters, Khamenei is not in Tehran and has been transferred to a secure location.