Welcome to the News Hour. Tonight, two longtime adversaries in the Middle East are at war.

Massive explosions from an onslaught of Iranian missiles have rocked Israel's largest cities,

including Tel Aviv. The U.S. says it's helping to intercept those missiles, which are retaliation

for preemptive Israeli strikes that killed top military officers and targeted Iran's nuclear

facilities late last night and into today. That includes a strike on an above-ground facility

that led to chemical and radiation contamination that's according to the UN nuclear watchdog

agency. Both Israel's brazen attack and Iran's unprecedented response have world

leaders concerned that the fighting will only escalate.

As night fell in Tel Aviv, the protective Iron Dome system worked to intercept incoming Iranian

missiles. Hundreds, according to Iran's state-run news agency,

launched in revenge. The damage? Devastating. And unlike any, Israel had seen in years.

Last night, the sky above Tehran glowed red, and buildings below were set ablaze, as Israel carried out a

punishing wave of what it called preemptive strikes on military leaders, nuclear facilities, and nuclear

scientists in Iran. Part of an assault, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said was years in the making

to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran.

Israel launched Operation Rising Lion, a targeted military operation to roll back the Iranian threat

to Israel's very survival. This operation will continue for as many days as it takes to remove

this threat.

Israeli strikes last night and today hit multiple sites across the country. Among them,

nuclear targets. Several of Iran's main enrichment facilities at Natanz and Forda,

ballistic missile sites at Shiraz and Kermansha were also hit. Other strikes took out key leaders, including Mohamed Bagheri, the military's commander-in-chief,

and General Hossein Salami, chief of the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

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