Israel-Iran conflict: Iran activates air defences in Tehran, 6 provinces, rules out nuclear talks amid ongoing Israeli strikes

Tensions between Israel and Iran have escalated sharply after a wave of military strikes and counter strikes that risk drawing in regional actors and global powers.

The latest crisis began when Israel launched airstrikes targeting Iranian military and nuclear facilities, reportedly killing more than 20 senior personnel, including IRGC commanders and the Iranian armed forces chief. In retaliation, Iran fired ballistic missiles at Israeli targets, wounding at least seven soldiers and intensifying regional fears.

In a related development, three drones were launched toward Ain al-Asad air base in western Iraq, which houses U.S. forces.

According to U.S. officials, the drones were intercepted and shot down, with no casualties reported. No group has claimed responsibility for the attack.

The incident raises concern over the potential expansion of the conflict, particularly given the presence of Iran-backed militias in Iraq that have previously targeted U.S. installations in response to American support for Israel.

Meanwhile, protests erupted in Baghdad, where supporters of armed Iraqi factions took to the streets for a second consecutive day to denounce Israel’s bombing of Iran.

The international community is calling for restraint. The United Nations, the European Union, and several regional players have urged both countries to step back from further escalation. India reaffirmed its call for de-escalation and dialogue, and notably abstained from endorsing an SCO statement criticizing Israel, citing its previously stated neutral position.

With the conflict now spilling over into neighbouring territories and threatening broader regional instability, global powers are closely monitoring developments to avoid a full-scale confrontation.

US President Donald Trump said he and Russian President Vladimir Putin had agreed in a phone call on Saturday that the conflict between Iran and Israel “should end.”

“He feels, as do I, this war in Israel-Iran should end, to which I explained, his war should also end,” Trump said on Truth Social, referring to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

US President Donald Trump said he and Russian President Vladimir Putin had agreed in a phone call on Saturday that the conflict between Iran and Israel “should end.”

“He feels, as do I, this war in Israel-Iran should end, to which I explained, his war should also end,” Trump said on Truth Social, referring to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Three drones were launched toward a base housing U.S. forces in Iraq following Israel’s strikes on Iran, a U.S. military official and a second U.S. official said Saturday.

Both spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

The drones were shot down, the officials said. No group claimed responsibility for the attack on Ain al-Asad air base in western Iraq.

A network of powerful Iran-backed militias in Iraq has remained mostly quiet amid the escalating Israel-Iran conflict. In the past, the militias had periodically attacked U.S. bases in Iraq and Syria in retaliation for Washington’s support for Israel in its war against the Iran-allied Hamas militant group in Gaza.

Also Saturday, for the second day, supporters of armed factions in Iraq demonstrated in central Baghdad to denounce the Israeli bombing of Iran. The protesters did not attempt to breach the heavily fortified Green Zone where the U.S. Embassy is located.

Russian President Vladimir Putin held a 50-minute phone conversation with US President Donald Trump on Saturday during which he sharply criticised Israel’s recent military action against Iran and warned of the potential for dangerous escalation in West Asia, according to the Kremlin.

Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters, “Vladimir Putin condemned Israel’s military operation against Iran and expressed serious concern about a possible escalation of the conflict, which would have unpredictable consequences for the entire situation in West Asia,”.

Iranian media said air defences were activated Saturday over Tehran and six other provinces, on the second day of Israel’s air campaign against the Islamic republic.

News agency Tasnim said air defences were responding to “hostile targets” over Tehran and in the provinces of Hormozgan in the country’s south, Kermanshah and Lorestan in the west, Qom in the centre, East Azerbaijan in the northwest, and Khuzestan in the southwest. State TV reported air defence activity in the same areas.

Another news agency, Fars, shared images of what it said was the “destruction of two Israeli aircraft in Tehran”.

Iranian state television said air defences were activated Saturday to respond to a drone attack at the strategic port of Bandar Abbas on the second day of Israel’s strikes on the country.

“The air defence of Bandar Abbas was activated to combat micro-drones,” state TV reported without elaborating. Citing an air defence commander, it also said that “over the past hour, 10 hostile Israeli aircraft were shot down in different areas” of the country.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Saturday that Tehran would not attend nuclear talks with the United States so long as Israel kept up its attacks on the Islamic republic.

In a call with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron, Pezeshkian said Iran favoured diplomacy, but will not “accept irrational demands under pressure or… sit at the negotiating table while the Zionist regime continues its attacks”, according to a readout shared by the Iranian presidency.

Macron said in a statement of his own that he had asked Pezeshkian to “return swiftly to the negotiating table”.

France’s President Emmanuel Macron urged his Iranian counterpart Masoud Pezeshkian to “quickly” resume negotiations over his country’s nuclear programme, in talks Saturday as a conflict between Tehran and Israel escalated.

Macron said in a message on X that he “invited President Pezeshkian to return swiftly to the negotiating table to reach an agreement — the only viable path to de-escalation”.

Iran insists its uranium-enrichment activities are peaceful but western allies fear they are aimed at developing atomic weapons.

Britain is deploying assets to the Middle East amid tensions between Iran and Israel, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Saturday as he flew to Canada for G7 talks.

“We are moving assets to the region, including jets, and that is for contingency support,” Starmer told reporters travelling with him on his plane.

A governor of a province in northwestern Iran said Saturday that 30 troops and one rescuer had been killed there in Israeli strikes, while 55 others had been wounded.

The remarks by Eastern Azerbaijan provincial Gov. Bahram Sarmast represent one of the first acknowledgments of mass casualties from the ongoing Israeli campaign, which began Friday.

The casualties figures come from strikes in Tabriz, the provincial capital, as well as towns in the province like Azarshahr, Bostanabad, Maragheh, Shabestar and Torkmanchai.

So far, Iranian authorities have not offered any overall death toll as the country’s theocracy has been reeling from an assault that killed many of its top military commanders. The closet number has been 78 people killed and over 320 wounded, which came from Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations.

Earlier Saturday, state TV said strikes Friday killed 60 people in one location in the capital, Tehran.

Iran accused Israel on Saturday of throwing the Middle East into a “dangerous cycle of violence” as it carried out a second day of air strikes on nuclear and military targets in the Islamic republic.

“This aggression pushes the region into a dangerous cycle of violence,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said during a call with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, according to a statement from his ministry. “Iran has responded and will respond in a firm manner to the barbaric actions of the Zionist regime.”

The leaders of Egypt and Turkey on Saturday warned that Israel’s “escalatory approach” risks plunging the entire Middle East into a “full-fledged chaos.”

A statement from the Egyptian presidency said President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan stressed in a phone call that Israel’s attacks on Iran could lead to “catastrophic repercussions” in the region.

They called for an immediate cessation of military operations and a return to the Omani-mediated nuclear talks between the United States and Iran.

An Israeli drone struck a refinery in Iran’s South Pars gas field Saturday, semiofficial Iranian news agencies reported.

If confirmed, it would mark the first Israeli attack on Iran’s oil and natural gas industry. Israel did not immediately acknowledge attacking the field, but such sites do have air defense systems around them, which Israel has been targeting since Friday.

The Fars and Tasnim news agencies both reported the strike, saying it happened in Phase 14 of the field. Iran shares the gas field, which stretches across the Persian Gulf, with Qatar.

Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed the conflict between Israel and Iran, as well as efforts towards a Ukraine settlement in a phone call with US counterpart Donald Trump, Russian state media reported Saturday.

“The dangerous escalation in the Middle East was of course at the centre of the exchange,” the agencies cited the Kremlin as saying.

It added that Putin also informed Trump about the “implementation of the agreements reached at the meeting between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in Istanbul on June 2”.

Iranian media reported a “massive explosion” on Saturday following an Israeli drone strike on the South Pars refinery in the southern port city of Kangan.

“An hour ago, an Israeli drone hit one of the South Pars Phase 14 refineries, causing a massive explosion and fire in the refinery,” the Tasnim news agency said, while the Fars agency reported firefighters were working to extinguish a blaze that had erupted as a result of the attack.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Saturday that Israel’s air strikes on Iran had the “clear support” of US President Donald Trump.

“Our enemy is your enemy… We’re dealing with something that will threaten all of us sooner or later. Our victory will be your victory,” Netanyahu said in a video statement addressed to Trump on the US leader’s birthday.

“This is what Israel is doing with the support, the clear support of the president of the United States, Donald Trump, and the American people and many others in the world.”

China’s foreign minister Wang Yi held phone calls with his Israeli and Iranian counterparts on Saturday, Beijing’s foreign ministry said in separate statements.

Wang told Iran’s Abbas Araghchi that China would support Tehran in “defending its legitimate rights and interests”, the ministry said, while he told Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar that Beijing opposed Israel’s actions of “attacking Iran with force”, the statements said.

Iran and Israel traded missiles and airstrikes on Saturday, the day after Israel launched a sweeping air offensive against its old enemy, killing commanders and scientists and bombing nuclear sites in a stated bid to stop it building an atomic weapon.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel’s strikes had set back Iran’s nuclear programme possibly by years but rejected international calls for restraint, saying the attack would be intensified.

“We will hit every site and every target of the Ayatollahs’ regime, and what they have felt so far is nothing compared with what they will be handed in the coming days,” he said in a video message.

In Tehran, Iranian state TV reported that around 60 people, including 20 children, had been killed in an attack on a housing complex, with more strikes reported across the country. Israel said it had attacked more than 150 targets.

In Israel, air raid sirens sent residents into shelters as waves of missiles streaked across the sky and interceptors rose to meet them. At least three people were killed overnight. An Israeli official said Iran had fired around 200 ballistic missiles in four waves.

A sixth round of nuclear talks between Tehran and Washington planned for this weekend has been cancelled, mediator Oman said Saturday, following waves of Israeli attacks on Iran.

“The Iran US-talks scheduled to be held in Muscat this Sunday will not now take place,” Omani Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi said in a post on X, adding that “diplomacy and dialogue remain the only pathway to lasting peace”.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, in a phone call with his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi, reaffirmed Moscow’s readiness to help resolve issues surrounding Iran’s nuclear program and to assist in de-escalating tensions between Iran and Israel.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said the conversation, initiated by the Iranian side, followed a call Friday between Presidents Vladimir Putin and Masoud Pezeshkian. The ministry said Russia reiterated its condemnation of Israel’s military actions against Iran, calling them a violation of the U.N. charter and international law.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday warned against a “devastating war” between Israel and Iran that could trigger a refugee crisis, in a telephone conversation with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

“President Erdogan said during the conversation that our region cannot tolerate another crisis, and a devastating war could create waves of irregular migration towards all the countries in the region,” the Turkish presidency said in a statement.

The IAEA has not detected any increase in radiation levels at the affected sites.

“There is very little risk that attacks on Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities would result in a harmful radiation release,” said Davenport.

But an attack on Bushehr, Iran’s only nuclear power plant, could “have a serious impact on health and the environment”, she added.

After Israel launched its strikes, IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said that nuclear facilities “must never be attacked” and that targeting Iranian sites could have “grave consequences for the people of Iran, the region, and beyond”.

Authorities in Iran’s northwest said that Israeli air strikes since Friday had killed at least 30 military personnel in East Azerbaijan province, according to news agency ISNA.

“Following the Zionist regime’s aggression against this province since Friday morning, 30 military personnel and one Red Crescent member have been martyred in defence of the Islamic homeland, and 55 people have been injured,” ISNA reported on Saturday, quoting East Azerbaijan provincial authorities.

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatened on Saturday to strike “every target of the ayatollah regime” in Iran, adding that Israeli strikes had dealt a “real blow” to Tehran’s nuclear programme.

“We will hit every site, every target of the ayatollah regime,” Netanyahu said in a video statement on the second day of Israel’s air campaign targeting Iranian military and nuclear sites. “We have dealt a real blow to their nuclear programme” since Friday, the prime minister added.

Israeli warplanes hit more than 400 targets across Iran in the past 24 hours as part of Operation “Rising Lion,” including dozens of missile sites and air defense systems in Tehran, the military said.

Separately, it said over 20 senior Iranian commanders were eliminated, including top intelligence and missile officials.

Israeli army spokesperson Effie Defrin said the road to Tehran was now “open,” calling the strikes the deepest ever carried out by the Israeli Air Force.

Keir Starmer and Mohammed bin Salman spoke on Saturday about the “gravely concerning situation in the Middle East and agreed on the need to de-escalate,’’ Downing Street Office said in a statement.

The United Kingdom is “poised to work closely with its allies in the coming days to support a diplomatic resolution,” it said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has warned that the recent spike in global oil prices, triggered by Israeli strikes on Iran, stands to benefit Russia and strengthen its military operations in Ukraine.

Addressing the media in Kyiv, Zelenskyy said that the increase in oil prices poses a serious risk to Ukraine’s defense capabilities, particularly as Western nations have failed to implement robust price caps on Russian oil exports. His statements were made on Friday but released under embargo until Saturday afternoon.

Iran has formally cautioned the United States, United Kingdom and France that if they interfere with its retaliatory missile and drone strikes against Israel, their forces stationed in the region will be considered legitimate targets.

This announcement was transmitted through state-controlled Iranian media on Saturday and follows intensified hostilities between Israel and Iran following attacks linked to Iran’s nuclear dispute with Israel.

Iranian media reported a police chief and another officer were killed in drone strike Saturday, about 300 kilometres (186 miles) west of Tehran, as Israel kept up its air campaign against the Islamic republic for a second day.

“This morning police chief Major Habibollah Akbarian, along with second lieutenant Amir Hossein Seifi, were martyred by a drone strike in Asadabad city in the western province of Hamedan,” the ISNA press agency reported.

The Israeli military said on Saturday that its air strikes on Iran had killed more than 20 Iranian army and Revolutionary Guards commanders, including armed forces chief Mohammad Bagheri.

“Since the beginning of the operation (on Friday), over 20 commanders in the Iranian regime’s security apparatus have been eliminated,” the military said in a statement, naming several top commanders in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the armed forces.

The images show multiple buildings either damaged or destroyed, including structures experts say supply power to the facility. The images were shot on Saturday by Planet Labs PBC and analyzed by The Associated Press.

This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows the Natanz nuclear enrichment site in Iran after an Israeli strike Saturday, June 14, 2025. AP

Natanz’s enrichment plant — where Iran enriched uranium to 60% purity, a short, technical step away from weapons-grade levels of 90% — was also destroyed.

All the Natanz facilities damaged in Israeli strikes are above ground and it doesn’t appear from the images that below-ground enrichment halls had any apparent damage, though they likely are without electricity.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a China-led regional alliance comprising 10 Eurasian nations including Russia, Pakistan and India, has issued a strong condemnation of Israel’s recent military strikes on Iranian territory.

However, India chose not to join the bloc’s unified stance. While being a founding member of the SCO, New Delhi abstained from participating in the discussions that culminated in the adoption of the statement. Instead, it maintained its diplomatic neutrality, opting to steer a middle course.

Two Revolutionary Guards were killed on Saturday in an Israeli strike on a base in central Iran, the Tasnim news agency reported.

“Following the brutal attack by the Zionist regime on the Zarandiyeh Basij base, two members of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were martyred,” the news agency said, citing the Guards.

When Israel launched a sweeping assault on Iran last week, employing warplanes, drones and covert assets to strike nuclear and military targets, the absence of a robust response from Iran’s closest regional allies raised eyebrows across West Asia.

Hezbollah in Lebanon, often referred to as Iran’s first line of defence in any confrontation with Israel, remained conspicuously silent. So too did powerful Iran-backed militias in Iraq, even as Israel allegedly used Iraqi airspace in part to conduct its attacks.

India distanced itself on Saturday from a statement published by the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) denouncing recent Israeli strikes on Iran, stating that it did not take part in the deliberations that led to the group’s statements.

In a statement, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said, “The Shanghai Cooperation Organization has issued a statement on recent developments between Israel and Iran. India did not participate in the discussions on the above-mentioned SCO statement.”

Our Statement on the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO)⬇️

🔗 https://t.co/bvBnmlSMX9 pic.twitter.com/ZHqCyHFvHs

— Randhir Jaiswal (@MEAIndia) June 14, 2025

The state television reported Saturday that Israel has killed three more Iranian nuclear scientists. “Three of the country’s nuclear scientists – Ali Bekaei Karimi, Mansour Asgari, and Saeed Borji – were martyred during the Zionist regime’s terrorist attacks,” the broadcaster said. Iranian media had said earlier that six others were killed in the Israeli attack.

Abbas Araghchi says nuclear talks with the United States would be “unjustifiable” after Israeli strikes on his country — an indication there would be no negotiations this weekend. The U.S. and Iran teams were to hold talks in Oman on Sunday.

Araghchi spoke in a phone call with Kaja Kallas, the European Union’s top diplomat.

Israeli airstrikes were the “result of the direct support by Washington,” he alleged, according to the state-run IRNA news agency. The U.S. has said it is not part of the strikes.

The “continuation of the indirect talks between Iran and the U.S. is unjustifiable in a situation where the wildness by the Zionist regime continues,” he added.

There was no immediate reaction from the White House.