At least five girls killed after missile strikes Iranian primary school
Air strikes have killed at least five people at a girls’ school in Iran, according to reports.
Dozens are thought to be injured following an attack on Minab Girl’s Primary School in the southern province of Hormozgan.
Local officials attributed the air strike to Israeli forces, Sky News reported.
‘In today’s attacks by the Zionist regime on Minab city, a girls’ elementary school was targeted and so far 5 students have been martyred’, one official said.
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Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency claimed the death toll was far higher, with more than 40 killed at the school.
It said another 45 were left wounded in the attack, with no further details about the injuries.
The city of Minab is thought to be the site of a base for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
In a speech this morning, Donald Trump warned the military organisation to lay down its arms or ‘face certain death’.
The US president said he would ‘raze’ Iran’s military sites to the ground while calling on Iranian citizens to topple the Ali Khamenei’s government.
The IDF said it had conducted strikes on various targets in western Iran as part of the joint Operation Roaring Lion with US forces.
An Israeli official confirmed to journalists that the joint attack had been months in the planning and had greater aims than that conducted in June last year, when Trump claimed to have ‘obliterated’ Iran’s nuclear sites.
In Tehran, huge traffic jams formed on highways as millions fled the capital following reports that Israel had targeted sites on Saturday morning.
Witnesses said queues had formed at cashpoints and petrol stations across cities.
People were also pictured standing around burnt vehicles in the capital’s streets.
Many have shared concerns that an internet blackout would cut them off from communicating with their families abroad.
Maryam, 54, a housewife in Tehran was leaving the capital for northern Iran with her family.
She told Reuters: ‘We are being killed by the regime and by Israel. We are the victims of this regime’s hostile policies.’
In his speech, Trump told Iranians to stay sheltered while the operation continued, after which they would have a chance to ‘take over the government’.
Satellite imagery appeared to show that supreme leader Ali Khamenei’s home in Tehran had been entirely destroyed in an airstrike, the New York Times reported.
The Ayatollah was not thought to have been in the capital during the attack, having been moved to a ‘secure location’. He has not been seen in public for several days.
Several senior commanders in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and political officials have been killed, officials have said.
Airstrikes have also been reported in several other countries, including at a US air base in Bahrain.
Loud booms and blasts were heard in the UAE, including in the capital Abu Dhabi and Dubai.
Flights were suspended from both cities, which are hubs for gulf carriers Etihad and Emirates, as well as at Doha airport, the home of Qatar Airways.
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