Middle East Monitoring Desk Islamabad
BBC published a compiled report after collecting information from various sources. The report shares, More than 160 people have been injured – some seriously – in Iranian missile strikes on two southern Israeli towns close to a nuclear facility, Israeli emergency officials say. BBC report does not see it as direct strike to the nuclear facility.
On the other side, Iranian state television says a missile strike on Dimona, home to a nuclear facility in southern Israel, was a “response” to an earlier attack on its Natanz nuclear site.
Iran’s atomic energy organisation said the “Natanz enrichment complex was targeted this morning”, adding there was “no leakage of radioactive materials reported”, according to local media.
The Israeli army confirmed “a direct impact of an Iranian missile” on a building in the city that houses a nuclear research facility, AFP reported.
Israeli media report that at least 39 people were injured, although officials have yet to provide a full breakdown of casualties.
BBC adds, They say 84 people are being treated in Arad and another 78 in Dimona, after ballistic missiles hit the towns on Saturday evening.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) says it is not aware of any damage to the nuclear research facility located about 13km (eight miles) outside Dimona.
Iranian state TV earlier said the strikes were in response to an attack on Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility on Saturday.
On Sunday, at least seven people were injured in an Iranian missile attack on Tel Aviv, emergency services say.
The Israeli Air Force says Tehran has fired 400 missiles at Israel since the US-Israeli attack on Iran on 28 February. Of these 92% were intercepted, it adds.
In Arad, local residents said the blasts they heard on Saturday were terrifying. The missile badly damaged several buildings, leaving a deep crater.
Naram Zaid, a paramedic in the town, told BBC News she had seen a “lot of children with head and chest injuries” after being crushed by objects inside a damaged building.
“I was trying to reassure a 10-year-old girl with head injuries, with blood on her face from broken glass,” she added.
“She was refusing to get into the ambulance as her parents were still inside the building, and we waited for her parents to be evacuated from the destroyed apartment block and then we sent them all to hospital.”
The outside walls of two residential apartment buildings were gouged out by the impact.
Crowds of dark-suited men stood staring at the damage in this Ultra-Orthodox town in the Negev desert.
Urgent investigations are taking place to ascertain how the missiles breached Israel’s air defence system. But as in the 12-day war last summer, Israelis know that the system is not infallible. As then, such attacks are more likely to harden the public’s resolve rather than weaken it.
The Shimon Peres Negev Nuclear Research Center – located in the Negev desert – is often referred to colloquially as the “Dimona reactor”. It is long accepted as holding Israel’s undeclared arsenal of nuclear weapons.
Officially, the site is said to focus solely on research but for about six decades, it has been an open secret that Israel developed a nuclear bomb there, even if each succeeding government has maintained a position of ambiguity over this. It has meant that Israel is the only nuclear power in the Middle East. So any indication that it is being targeted is taken with the utmost gravity by Israel.
The nearby town of Dimona experienced a similar missile strike.
Among the many injured there was a 10-year-old boy. Medics described his condition as serious.
“In both Dimona and Arad, interceptors were launched that failed to hit the threats, resulting in two direct hits by ballistic missiles with warheads weighing hundreds of kilograms,” Israeli firefighters said.
The ability of Iran to keep inflicting this kind of damage inside Israel is a reminder of the human cost of the war.
Middle East Eye dot Net reported , Dimona sits near one of the most sensitive locations in Israel: the Shimon Peres Negev Nuclear Research Center, long linked to Israel’s undeclared nuclear weapons programme.
The Israeli state continues to refuse transparency, neither confirming nor denying its arsenal, while maintaining one of the region’s most heavily fortified sites in the Naqab desert.
The International Atomic Energy Agency says it is aware of reports of a strike in Dimona but has received no information of damage to the Negev nuclear research centre from Israel
However, with Israel maintaining secrecy over its undeclared nuclear programme, questions remain over how much information is being shared with international inspectors.
The agency said regional authorities reported no abnormal radiation levels and that it is monitoring the situation.
Iran’s Natanz nuclear plant
The strike on Dimona came hours after a US-Israeli attack targeted Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment complex.
Iran condemned the strike as “criminal attacks”, saying it violated international law and nuclear agreements, including the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and warned of wider consequences.
The International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed the Natanz attack but reported no rise in radiation levels outside the facility, as it launched an investigation and urged restraint.
Iran had previously warned it could target Dimona if Israel continued striking nuclear sites. A military source told Tasnim News Agency on Saturday that Iran has shifted its strategy, signalling a move beyond a policy of proportional retaliation.
The source said Tehran now intends to raise the cost of any attack, warning that future responses will be broader and more damaging.
“The enemy must have realized by now that if they attack one infrastructure, we will attack several of their infrastructures; if they attack a refinery or gas facility, we will attack several similar facilities and teach them a crushing lesson.”
The source added: “Iran responds to every mistake of the enemy with surprise and sets their interests on fire.”
