Defense Minister Israel Katz was updated Friday morning on the latest situational assessment, which indicated that most of the senior command of the Revolutionary Guards’ Air Force was eliminated while gathered at an underground command post. Among those killed was the commander of Iran’s Air Force.
Earlier reports confirmed the elimination of three senior Iranian military officials in the strike: Revolutionary Guards Commander Hossein Salami, Iranian Chief of Staff Mohammad Bagheri, and Deputy Chief of Staff and Head of the Emergency Command Hatem Alam Ali Rashid.
Iran has reportedly already appointed a replacement for the Chief of Staff — Habibollah Sayyari.
The New York Times reported that another casualty was Ali Shamkhani, senior adviser to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. According to the report, he was critically wounded in the strike and later died.
Also eliminated was Fereydoon Abbasi, former head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization. Abbasi, a nuclear physicist, had previously survived an assassination attempt attributed to Israel 15 years ago. Another casualty was Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi, president of Islamic Azad University. Both were very senior figures in Iran’s nuclear program.
An Iranian official told The New York Times that the Shahid Mahallati neighborhood in Tehran — home to senior Iranian military commanders — was struck, with three buildings destroyed in the attack.