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Dubai: Israel unleashed airstrikes across Iran for a third day on Sunday and threatened even greater force as some Iranian missiles evaded Israeli air defences to strike buildings in the heart of the country. Planned talks on Iran’s nuclear programme, which could provide an off-ramp, were cancelled.

In an indication of how far Israel was prepared to go, a US official told The Associated Press that President Donald Trump in recent days vetoed an Israeli plan to kill Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Israel’s strikes have killed at least 406 people in Iran and wounded another 654, according to a human rights group that has long tracked the country, Washington-based Human Rights Activists. Iran’s government has not offered overall casualty figures.

The region braced for a protracted conflict after Israel’s surprise bombardment on Friday of Iranian nuclear and military sites killed several top generals and nuclear scientists. Neither side showed any sign of backing down.

Iran said Israel struck two oil refineries, raising the prospect of a broader assault on Iran’s heavily-sanctioned energy industry that could affect global markets. The Israeli military, in a social media post, warned Iranians to evacuate arms factories, signalling a further widening of the campaign. Iran’s military, on state TV, warned Israelis to stay away from “occupied” areas.

Israel, the sole though undeclared nuclear-armed state in the Middle East, said it launched the attack to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon. The two countries have been adversaries for decades.

Explosions shook the Iranian capital of Tehran around noon and 3:30 pm. Sirens went off in Israel around 4 pm and again around 8:30 pm. The Israeli military noted “several hit sites”, including in Haifa in the north.

Israel said 14 people have been killed in the country since Friday and 390 wounded. Iran has fired over 270 missiles, 22 of which got through the country’s sophisticated multi-tiered air defences, according to Israeli figures. Israel’s main international airport and airspace remained closed for a third day.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said if Israel’s strikes on Iran stop, then “our responses will also stop”. Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, criticised the United States for supporting Israel and said if Israel’s “hostile actions” continue, “the responses will be more decisive and severe”, state TV reported.

Trump said the US “had nothing to do with the attack” and that Iran can avoid further destruction only by agreeing to a new nuclear deal.

Mosques as bomb shelters

Photos shared by Iran’s ISNA News Agency showed bloodied people being helped from the scene of Israeli strikes in downtown Tehran.

Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency cited Deputy Foreign Minister Saeed Khatibzadeh as saying Israel hit a Foreign Ministry building in the north of Tehran, with several civilians injured, “including a number of my colleagues”.

Israeli strikes also targeted Iran’s Defence Ministry after hitting air defences, military bases and sites associated with its nuclear programme. On Sunday night, Israel said it had begun striking dozens of surface-to-surface missile targets in western Iran.

Israel claimed it attacked an Iranian refuelling aircraft in Mashhad in the northeast, calling it the farthest strike the military had yet carried out. Iran did not immediately acknowledge any attack. Video obtained and verified by the AP showed smoke rising from the city.

The Iranian foreign minister said Israel targeted an oil refinery near Tehran and another in a province on the Persian Gulf.

The Human Rights Activists group said its breakdown of the toll so far showed at least 197 civilians and 90 members of the military have been killed across Iran. At least 119 more deaths could not be identified. The group crosschecks local reports against a network of sources inside the country, where access for international media is more limited than in Israel.

In a sign that Iran expects Israeli strikes to continue, state television reported that metro stations and mosques would be made available as bomb shelters beginning Sunday night.

Death toll rises in Israel

In Israel, at least six people, including a 10-year-old and a nine-year-old, were killed when a missile hit an apartment building in Bat Yam, near Tel Aviv. Daniel Hadad, a local police commander, said 180 people were wounded and seven were missing.

Another four people, including a 13-year-old, were killed and 24 wounded when a missile struck a building in the Arab town of Tamra in northern Israel. A strike on the central city of Rehovot wounded 42.

The Weizmann Institute of Science, an important centre for military and other research in Rehovot, reported “a number of hits to buildings on the campus”. It said no one was harmed.

An oil refinery was damaged in the northern Israeli city of Haifa, according to the firm operating it, which said no one was wounded.

Netanyahu says regime change in Iran could be a result

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has brushed off urgent calls by world leaders to deescalate.

In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, he said regime change in Iran “could certainly be the result” of the conflict, and he announced that Israel had killed the intelligence chief for Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps. He also claimed, without giving evidence, that Israeli intelligence indicated Iran intended to give nuclear weapons to Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.