Iran has dismissed as akin to child’s play Israel’s reported retaliation for an unprecedented Iranian strike, as both sides on Saturday appeared to step back from wider conflict stemming from the war in Gaza. A deadly blast at an Iraqi military base on Saturday – which killed a member of an Iraqi security force that includes Iran-backed groups – emphasised the high tensions which persist in the region. Gaza’s civil defence agency said Saturday an overnight Israeli strike killed nine members of a Palestinian family, including six children, in southern city Rafah.
A Palestinian ambulance driver was killed during the evacuation of the wounded during a raid by violent Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, Palestinian authorities said.
Iran’s foreign minister compared the drones used by Israel early Friday to “toys,” in comments that aimed at downplaying the significance of the strike on Iranian territory. The drones intercepted in the central city of Isfahan “were more like toys that our children play with – not drones,” he said. Israeli officials have made no public comment on what – according to a senior US congressional source – were retaliatory Israeli strikes against Iran.
