At least nine people were killed in an Iranian military strike on Sunday on a residential district in Beit Shemesh, an Israeli city about 18 miles west of Jerusalem, the worst casualty toll in the country after two days of conflict with Iran.
The Israeli military and the country’s ambulance service said an Iranian missile had caused the strike. It was not immediately clear what the target of the strike was, but the Israeli military accused Iran of aiming at civilians.
Israel’s police chief, Danny Levy, said rescue workers were searching through the rubble and appealed for people to call a special help line to report the names of anyone they know who has not been accounted for.
The attack occurred after Ali Larijani, Iran’s top national security official, wrote in a post on social media that Iran would hit Israel and the United States “with a force that they have never experienced,” in retaliation for the killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader.
Some of those killed in Beit Shemesh had been sheltering in a communal bunker, according to paramedics at the scene who were interviewed by Israeli media. In addition to the deaths, the ambulance service said that at least 28 people had been injured, and were evacuated to hospitals.
Eyewitnesses described scenes of widespread destruction, horror and confusion. Streets in the area were dotted with burned, upturned cars and roofs were blown off buildings around the impact site.
“I heard a huge explosion, and my wife was pushed forward by the blast,” said Liran Elimelh, 42, who lives nearby. A former volunteer first-responder, he said he rushed out to help.
“Flames were blazing, homes were reduced to rubble, and I saw body parts scattered around,” he said.
“If it had been just a few meters to the left or right, it could have been my family,” he added.
Yehuda Shlomo, one of the first paramedics to arrive at the site, said in a statement, “When I arrived, I saw a terrible scene — heavy structural damage, smoke in the air, and a great deal of chaos, with dozens of frightened casualties emerging from the damaged buildings.”
Photos and videos from the scene shared by rescue workers and independently verified by The Times showed severe damage to several buildings. The roofs and walls of buildings were damaged or collapsed by the strike, and fires were blazing in at least two locations. Emergency responders rushed a toddler covered in blood from the scene.
A building that Google Maps described as a bomb shelter was destroyed by the strike, a Times analysis of videos and aerial images of aftermath shows. A videoshowed the ceiling of a structure collapsed on a row of chairs set against a wall. Other images showed emergency crews working to quench the fires and several body bags laid on the ground.
The strike in Beit Shemesh followed a direct hit on a residential building in central Tel Aviv on Saturday night that killed a woman in her 50s, according to the Israeli authorities. The woman was a Filipino caregiver, according to Oren Marmorstein, the spokesman for Israel’s Foreign Ministry.
Isabel Kershner, a senior correspondent for The Times in Jerusalem, has been reporting on Israeli and Palestinian affairs since 1990.
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