An Iranian missile slammed into the main hospital in southern Israel, wounding people and causing “extensive damage,” according to the medical facility.
However, IRNA, the Islamic Republic News Agency, has said on Telegram that the “main target” of the missile attack early on Thursday “was the large [Israeli army] Command and Intelligence (IDF C4I) headquarters and the military intelligence camp in the Gav-Yam Technology Park”.
It said that this facility is located next to Soroka hospital in Be’er Sheva.
IRNA claimed that the hospital only suffered minor damage from the shockwave resulting from the missile attack.
“The military infrastructure was a precise and direct target,” it said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the attack and promised a response, saying: “We will exact the full price from the tyrants in Tehran.”
Another missile hit a high-rise building and several other residential buildings in at least two sites near Tel Aviv. At least 47 people were wounded in the attacks, according to Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service.
Israel, meanwhile, carried out strikes on Iran’s Arak heavy water reactor in its latest attack on the country’s sprawling nuclear programme, on the seventh day of a conflict that began with a surprise wave of Israeli air strikes targeting military sites, senior officers and nuclear scientists.
Israel’s military said its fighter jets targeted the Arak facility and its reactor core seal to stop it from being used to produce plutonium.
Israel separately claimed to have struck another site around Natanz that it described as being related to Iran’s nuclear programme.
Iranian state TV said there was “no radiation danger whatsoever” from the attack on the Arak site.
Israel is the only nuclear-armed state in the Middle East – but does not acknowledge having such weapons.