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Iran deems European proposals to curb its nuclear program unrealistic and a hurdle to agreement, a senior Iranian official said, while Israel said it killed a veteran Iranian commander during attacks by both sides that included multiple Israeli strikes in southwestern Iran.
The more than week-long air war between longtime foes Israel and Iran continued with reports of strikes on an Iranian nuclear facility. The US was weighing whether to back Israel in the conflict while other powers urged de-escalation.
Two US officials on Saturday told Reuters news agency B-2 bombers were being deployed to Guam. While they did not disclose details on numbers of B-2s, which can carry weapons designed to destroy targets deep underground, one of the officials said no orders had yet been given to move the aircraft beyond Guam.
Israeli military officials said they had completed another series of strikes in southwestern Iran, having targeted dozens of military targets.
Iran says it would not halt its nuclear program ‘under any circumstances’
Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araqchi met British, French and German counterparts, plus the EU, on Friday (local time) in Geneva in search of a path back to diplomacy and a possible ceasefire.
Proposals made by the European powers, however, were “unrealistic”, the senior Iranian official told Reuters, saying that insistence on them would not bring agreement closer.
“In any case, Iran will review the European proposals in Tehran and present its responses in the next meeting,” the official said, adding that zero enrichment was a dead end and Tehran would not negotiate over its defensive capabilities.
Israel launched attacks on 13 June, saying Iran was on the verge of developing nuclear weapons, while Iran says its atomic program is only for peaceful purposes. Israel is widely assumed to possess nuclear weapons, which it neither confirms nor denies.
In a phone call with French President Emmanuel Macron, Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian said Iran was “ready to discuss and cooperate to build confidence in the field of peaceful nuclear activities”.
“However, we do not agree to reduce nuclear activities to zero under any circumstances,” he added, according to Iran’s official IRNA news agency.
Referring to the Israeli attacks, he said: “Our response to the continued aggression of the Zionist regime will be more devastating.”
Iran’s armed forces threatened to strike shipments of military aid to Israel “from any country”.
Israel’s main arms supplier is the United States, whose President Donald Trump warned on Friday that Tehran had a “maximum” of two weeks to avoid possible American air strikes as Washington weighed whether to join Israel’s campaign.
Meanwhile, Israeli defence minister Israel Katz said that Saeed Izadi, who led the Palestine Corps of the Quds Force, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ overseas arm, was killed in a strike on an apartment in the city of Qom.
The Revolutionary Guards said five of its members died in attacks on Khorramabad, according to Iranian media. They did not mention Izadi.
At least 430 people have been killed and 3,500 injured in Iran since Israel began its attacks, Iranian state-run Nour News said, citing the health ministry.
In Israel, 24 civilians have been killed by Iranian missile attacks, according to local authorities, in the worst conflict between the longtime enemies.
More than 450 Iranian missiles have been fired towards Israel, according to the Israeli prime minister’s office.
Israeli officials said 1,272 people have been injured since the beginning of the hostilities, with 14 in serious condition.
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