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Day 1, June 13, 2025: Israel Launches Operation Rising Lion

Evidence rating: CONFIRMED. Israel struck first, before dawn on Friday, June 13, 2025. The names of the dead commanders, the targets, and the leaders' statements are on the record in Israeli and international reporting.

The war did not begin with an Iranian attack on Israel or on the United States. It began with a surprise Israeli air, drone and sabotage campaign against a country that was still in nuclear talks with Washington.

The first hours​

"Late that night, nearly 200 aircraft – mostly F-35 stealth fighters and F-16s – took off from bases in southern Israel, flying through Jordanian and Syrian airspace. Just after midnight on Friday June 13, they struck more than 100 targets inside Iran" (The Telegraph, June 24, 2025). A civilian-harm documentation site summarizes the opening as "more than 200 fighter jets and deploying over 330 munitions against approximately 100 targets in five successive waves of airstrikes" (Civilians of Iran). One timeline puts the first blow at 01:30 Tehran time (The Chronologist, June 27, 2025).

A senior Israeli official described how the first strikes were timed: "We simultaneously scheduled three things for 3:00 AM. The elimination of the scientists, the elimination of the military officials, and the destruction of Natanz were synchronized to the exact second at the beginning of the attack. In Natanz, we attacked while the centrifuges were spinning." Of the people targeted: "We eliminated 20 people there... we caught them in their homes" (as posted by @JewishWarrior13, June 15, 2025; the post was viewed more than a million times; the official is not named).

"Caught them in their homes" is also why wives, children and neighbors died in the first hour. See Civilian Harm.

Who was killed​

The Times of Israel liveblog that day named IRGC chief Hossein Salami, armed forces chief of staff Mohammad Bagheri, IRGC air force chief Amir Ali Hajizadeh and Gholam Ali Rashid (Times of Israel liveblog, June 13, 2025). The paper later counted about 30 senior commanders and at least 15 nuclear scientists killed over the whole war (Times of Israel, June 24, 2025). Other reports named nuclear scientist Fereydoon Abbasi among the first-night dead (as summarized in a search result recorded in this investigation's research captures). Iran's new wartime commander, Maj. Gen. Ali Shadmani, appointed after Bagheri's death, was himself killed within days; Israel announced it on June 17 and Iran confirmed it on June 18 (Wikipedia portal, June 2025; Tehran Times timeline).

The attack from inside Iran​

Part of the opening strike came from Mossad teams already inside Iran. In a January 2026 report on Israel's Channel 12 investigative program "Uvda," an Iranian agent working for the Mossad, identified only as "Arash," said rockets and drones deployed inside the country "destroyed key air defense systems, ballistic missile launchers, and targeted senior military figures and nuclear scientists in the early hours of 13 June 2025" (as summarized by The Cradle, January 30, 2026). Another summary of the same report adds that Mossad "had been active inside Iran for years and even built a hidden launch site near Tehran" (@tcf_updates, February 1, 2026). The whole covert side of the war is on Mossad Inside Iran.

What Israel said​

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, two hours after the first explosions: "We are at a decisive moment in Israel's history" (Le Monde). In his televised address: "Moments ago, Israel launched Operation Rising Lion — a targeted military operation to roll back the Iranian threat to Israel's very survival," and the operation would "continue for as many days as it takes to remove this threat" (CNN; The Telegraph). To Iranians he said: "The objective of Israel's operation is to thwart the Islamic regime's nuclear and ballistic missile threat" (Times of Israel liveblog).

Note the second target: ballistic missiles. From the first day, Israel's war aim was wider than the nuclear program.

What Washington said​

The United States first distanced itself from the opening strikes (Israel News Pulse recap). Through June 17, White House officials insisted American forces were "maintaining their defensive posture" (a deputy assistant to the President, as quoted on a forum copy of his post). But Israeli jets did not fly alone. The IDF's air campaign relied on American-supplied aircraft, and Iran's UN ambassador, Amir-Saeid Iravani, told the Security Council on June 13 that Israel's attacks "constituted a declaration of war" in "direct violation of the UN Charter" (Wikipedia, 2025 Twelve-Day War). Iran's later account: Israel attacked "with extensive military, intelligence, and political backing from the United States and certain Western countries" (Tehran Times, July 2025).

What Iran said, and did​

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, within hours: "At dawn today, the Zionist regime opened its dirty and bloody hand to crime in our beloved country and exposed its evil nature more than ever by attacking residential centers. The regime must expect severe punishment... In the enemy attacks, a number of commanders and scientists were killed. Their successors and colleagues will immediately return to their posts" (as posted by @prestonstew_, June 13, 2025). The IAEA was told that Natanz had been hit and that there were no elevated radiation levels; Fordow and Isfahan had not yet been hit, and the Bushehr power plant was not targeted (IAEA statement, as reprinted; OSINTdefender).

That night Iran fired two barrages at Israel. The Institute for the Study of War judged the first response weak: a "two-wave ballistic missile attack targeting Israel from Iranian territory about 18 hours after the initial Israeli strikes. This retaliation seems to have had limited to no effect at this time." ISW also explained why: Israel's strikes were designed to impose "the suppression of Iranian air defenses, the degradation of Iran's ability to retaliate against Israel, and the disruption of Iranian command and control" (ISW on X, June 14, 2025). One missile struck central Tel Aviv that evening (TRT World, June 13, 2025).

Status: Benjamin Netanyahu is alive. Ali Khamenei is deceased (2026). Hossein Salami, Mohammad Bagheri, Amir Ali Hajizadeh, Gholam Ali Rashid and Ali Shadmani are deceased (2025).

Sources​

Last Updated: 2026-09-26

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