By Enyichukwu Enemanna
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday paid a visit to a town struck by an Iranian missile on Saturday, threatening to pursue senior commanders of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards “personally”.
“We’re going after the regime. We’re going after the IRGC, this criminal gang,” Netanyahu said, as he inspected the damage in the southern Israeli town of Arad.
“We’re going after them personally, their leaders, their installations, their economic assets. We’re going after them personally.”
Another town struck by an Iranian missile on Saturday was Dimona, widely believed to house Israel’s undeclared nuclear arsenal.
Located in the Negev desert, Dimona sustained extensive damage from a direct hit.
On Sunday, Netanyahu visited the town, urging residents to heed instructions from the military’s Home Front Command and take shelter immediately whenever sirens warn of incoming missiles.
“The whole nation is a frontline, the entire home front is a frontline. And when we’re at the frontline, we carry out these orders,” Netanyahu said. “So please do this — and this is an order.”
The Iranian missile strikes on two southern Israeli towns on Saturday wounded more than 100 people, medics said, after Israeli air defence systems failed to intercept the projectiles.
The two direct hits tore open the fronts of residential buildings and carved craters into the ground.
Magen David Adom first responders said 84 people were wounded in the town of Arad, 10 of them seriously, hours after 33 were wounded in nearby Dimona.
Iranian state TV said the missile attack on Dimona, which houses a nuclear facility, was a “response” to an earlier strike on its own nuclear site at Natanz.
AFP footage from Arad showed rescue workers sifting through rubble for wounded people in a bombed-out building.
Fire engines with their lights flashing were at the scene along with dozens of members of the emergency services.
The Israeli military said it would investigate the failed interception.
