The Japan Times - Israel says killed Iran intel chief, tells military to hunt down officials

The announcement, the day after Iranian security chief Ali Larijani was confirmed killed in an Israeli strike, is part of a longstanding strategy by Israel to target its enemy's leaders.

"Last night Iran's Intelligence Minister Khatib was also eliminated," Israeli Defence Minister Katz said in a statement.

"Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and I have authorised the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to eliminate any senior Iranian official for whom the intelligence and operational circle has been closed, without the need for additional approval," he added.

"We will continue to thwart and hunt them all down."

There was no immediate comment or confirmation from Iran, which had responded with fury and vows of revenge to the death of Larijani.

The two sides have been at war for more than two weeks since US-Israeli attacks on Iran on February 28 killed supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and ignited a regional conflict.

Israel said this week it had also targeted Akram al-Ajouri, head of the military wing of the group Palestinian Islamic Jihad, in a strike in Iran.

And it has vowed to hunt down Iran's new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, who has not appeared in public since he succeeded his father.

David Khalfa, co-founder of the Atlantic Middle East Forum, described Israel's strategy as "a campaign of 'counter-regime warfare".

It was "aimed at dismantling the regime's politico-security architecture to make it waver on its foundations", he wrote on X before the news on Khatib.

- 'Political assassinations' -

According to Iran's Fars and Tasnim news agencies, funerals for Larijani and Soleimani were due to be held Wednesday alongside those of more than 80 Iranian sailors killed in a US strike on their frigate off Sri Lanka earlier this month.

It was not certain the funerals would go ahead -- the slain ayatollah's funeral was due to be held days after he was killed, but that was later postponed indefinitely.

However, the Mehr news agency published a photo of Larijani's coffin bearing his photo and draped with the Iranian flag, alongside that of his son, whose death was also announced.

In contrast to Mojtaba Khamenei, Larijani, 68, had walked openly with crowds at a pro-government rally last week in Tehran.

He had "effectively been the figure in charge of the regime's survival, its regional policy and its defence strategy," Khalfa told AFP.

Israel has pursued what analysts have described as a policy of decapitation against Iran and the militant movements it backs in the region, killing Hassan Nasrallah of Hezbollah in 2024 and several top Hamas figures since the October 7, 2023 attacks that sparked the Gaza war.

Despite losing its ayatollah of nearly four decades as well as Larijani, a key pillar of the Islamic republic, the powerful Revolutionary Guards and the leadership as a whole have remained defiant.

The Guards, the ideological arm of the military, said they had launched missiles at central Israel as retaliation for Larijani's death and warned of more to come.

The "pure blood of this great martyr... will be a source of honour, power and national awakening against the front of global arrogance," they said.

- Deadly strikes -

An Iranian missile barrage killed two people near Israel's commercial hub of Tel Aviv, medics said on Wednesday, while authorities said falling munitions hit multiple sites in central Israel overnight.

Police said a cluster bomb hit a residential building in Ramat Gan, a city just outside Tel Aviv, and the roof collapsed on an elderly couple.

Omer, a resident of the area who only gave his first name, said "we heard like a streak of booms... it was not just one, it was a splitting missile".

Iranian media meanwhile said Israel and the United States had launched fresh strikes across several areas of the country, including Tehran.

Tasnim news agency said "seven people were killed and 56 were injured in an American-Zionist attack on residential areas in Dorud town" in Lorestan province.

AFP could not independently verify the figures.

The war has engulfed the region, from Gulf nations to Iraq and nearby Lebanon.

In Lebanon, which was drawn into the conflict after Iran-backed group Hezbollah launched rockets towards Israel over the ayatollah's death, Israel repeatedly struck central Beirut Wednesday.

Lebanese authorities reported at least 12 dead, while AFP journalists said three densely populated neighbourhoods in the heart of Beirut were hit.

- US pounds Strait of Hormuz -

In addition to its attacks on Israel and its neighbours, Iran has been hitting the global economy through attacks on energy infrastructure in the oil-rich Gulf.

Its attacks and threats against ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz have all but closed the key waterway, through which a fifth of global oil and LNG flows.

With oil still hovering around $100 a barrel, the US military dropped several 5,000-pound (2,250 kg) bombs on "hardened Iranian missile sites" near the coast that posed a threat to international shipping, Central Command said.

US President Donald Trump on Tuesday fumed that American allies, which have largely distanced themselves from his war, were not lining up behind the United States to escort tankers through the Strait of Hormuz.

But he also insisted on his Truth Social platform: "WE DO NOT NEED THE HELP OF ANYONE!"

burs-ar/ser

K.Inoue--JT