Iran attack was ‘declaration of war’, Israeli president says – but insists ‘we are seeking peace’ | World News

Iran’s attack on Israel was a “declaration of war”, the country’s president has told Sky News.

Isaac Herzog said it was “about time the world faces this empire of evil in Tehran”.

World leaders need to “make it clear” to the Iranian regime that its behaviour is “unacceptable”, Mr Herzog added.

“We should be looking lucidly at the phenomena called Tehran and Iran.”

Israel has not sought to go to war since its creation in 1948 and is “seeking peace”, the president insisted.

He described Iran’s launch of more than 300 drones and missiles towards Israel on Saturday as “just another example of how [Tehran] has operated for years and years”.

Follow live updates after Iran’s attack on Israel

“We were attacked last night from four corners of the Middle East with proxies shooting at us, firing missiles and ballistic missiles, drones and cruise missiles,” he told Sky News’s Middle East correspondent, Alistair Bunkall.

“This is like a real war. I mean, this is a declaration of war,” he said, before adding that Israel would exercise restraint.

Asked whether he agreed with Western allies who are calling for calm, Mr Herzog said: “The last thing that Israel is seeking in this region since its creation is to go to war – we are seeking peace.”

But Tehran has been “spreading havoc, terror and instability all over the world, and especially in our region”, he said.

Iran has proxies all over the Middle East and terror cells all around the world, Mr Herzog went on.

Analysis:
Will Israel let an attack by Iran go unpunished? Probably not
All-out war, or not, in the Middle East?

Iran‘s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said its direct assault on Israel was in retaliation for an “attack on the consular section of the Iranian embassy in Damascus” on 1 April.

Two generals and seven members of the IRGC were killed in the strike, which Tehran blamed on Israel. Israel has not publicly commented.

Mr Herzog told Sky News it “wasn’t in the consulate” but in a “separate building nearby the consulate”.

He added that the most senior general assassinated had led operations from Lebanon and Syria.

There had been “terror attacks day in, day out, with the entire machine instructed from Tehran”, he said.

Meanwhile, Rishi Sunak confirmed the RAF shot down “a number” of Iranian attack drones.

The UK prime minister said “additional planes” were sent to the region as part of operations already under way in Iraq and Syria.

Had Iran’s attack on Israel been successful, the “fallout for regional stability would be hard to overstate”, Mr Sunak added.

“This was a dangerous and unnecessary escalation which I have condemned in the strongest terms,” he said.

US planes reportedly downed Iranian drones over northern Syria too.

The Israel Defence Forces is “poised and prepared for further aggression”, IDF spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner told Sky News.

He also called the defence of Israel a “unity of reasonable players against the diabolical plan of Iran”.

Asked if Israel would respond, he said: “It’s a very good question. We are looking towards the government today, the government will convene later today and they will make their decisions and instruct the military accordingly.”