🔴 Live: Israel threatens Iran with retaliation after missile attack

This picture taken from the West Bank city of Hebron shows projectiles above the Israeli city of Ashdod on October 1, 2024. © Hazem Bader, AFP

Israel said it would retaliate "at place and time we decide" after Iran launched at least 180 missiles into Israeli territory on Tuesday night. Israel said it intercepted many of the missiles, and officials in Washington said US destroyers assisted in Israel's defence. The attack from Iran came as Israel continued what it described as a “limited” ground incursion in south Lebanon and launched air strikes on Beirut. Read our liveblog for the latest developments in the Middle East.

Summary:

• Iran launched a missile attack on Israel on Tuesday evening with Israeli defence systems identifying approximately 180 missiles fired towards its territory, the Israeli military said. Most of the missiles were intercepted by Israel's Iron Dome air defence system 
• Iran's Revolutionary Guards said its missile launches on Israel were in retaliation for the killing of Islamist leaders Ismail Haniyeh, Hassan Nasrallah, and Abbas Nilforoushan.
• Israel closed its airspace as air raid sirens sounded across the country. An Israeli army spokesperson said a “large number” of the missiles were intercepted.
• Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Iran “would pay” for its attack on Israel.
• US intelligence alerted Israel to the threat of Iran’s attack hours before missiles were launched. President Joe Biden said Tuesday that the United States was "fully supportive" of Israel in the wake of the attack.
• The Israeli military said its troops were carrying out "ground raids" in southern Lebanon against Hezbollah targets and had launched air strikes on targets in Beirut.
• Yemen’s Houthi rebels carried out three operations targeting vessels in the Red Sea, the Iran-aligned group's military spokesman Yahya Saree said in a televised speech. The attacks are the rebels’ first assaults on commercial shipping in weeks.

Yesterday's key developments:

• Israel told the US it had begun conducting limited ground operations inside Lebanon targeting Hezbollah, the US State Department said on Monday evening. Earlier Israel declared three communities along its northern border with Lebanon to be a “closed military zone”, restricting access to military forces only.
• Lebanon's army is "repositioning and regrouping forces" away from the border with Israel in response to an apparently imminent Israeli ground invasion, a Lebanese military official told AFP.
• United Nations peacekeepers in Lebanon have been unable to conduct patrols because of the intensity of Israeli strikes and Hezbollah's rockets targeting Israel, a UN spokesman said.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)