hamas efforts elsewhere in the region and then conducting this strike into iran. i mean, this is quite amazing, not surprising entirely the israelis have this incredibly capable military force so if they re not sending a message, they re trying to achieve a result. we don t know what that result looks like. that needs to be determined before you determine what the next steps are going to be. all right. but major general spider marks standby again for us, we re going to go back to alex marquardt with some breaking news outlets yeah. abby, i ve just gotten a confirmation from a us official that is israel has indeed struck iran tonight, that what we are seeing this explosion or explosions around the city of isfahan is indeed an israeli attack against iran. this is the retaliation that we have thought me becoming for several days now, ever since iran carried out that strike last
somewhere around 10%. it has a lot of weaponry that it can on leash, on israel. now, the tragedy and all of this is, i don t think either israel or iran wants the beaver war clearly the united states has used its leverage to try to prevent the region from deteriorating into something that is no one can contain. one of the big questions of course, is also what is israel s long-term strategy isn t seeking to prevent a nuclear weapon of capability or is it trying to encourage or do things that lead? eventually to some kind of regime change. and i think israel has proven. its short-term effectiveness in taking out iranian or iranian proxy assets. it s weapons depots, its military personnel, but it s not clear what its long-term threat is. iran on the other hand, it has a long game. it has proven that it is the inferior military power,
of what is happening and around tonight. but airspace affected explosions reported around a significant city was significant basis and a major nuclear research facility in iran. tonight, john nick, a second iranian media reporting that initial behind that, there have been significant strikes there. so let s say whether you mentioned we ve been expecting this just for our viewers. i just got through the time i remember back on april 1st israel was blamed for an attack on an iranian consulate in damascus, syria. and then as nick noted, back last saturday on the 13th, around deployed more than 300 drones and other ariel weapons attack on israel after that, nick, the president united states, who helped the united states hey, it s britain, other western allies helped to repel the iranian attack. and the appeal from president biden to israel was you prove they couldn t hit you don t do anything provocative, don t do anything that further escalates a region already on end. prime minister ne
out air defense platforms that exist in there and to general marxist point, did they attack with a cruise missile? i likely think that they use mann aircraft and this, and this kind of operation to ensure that they re they re targeting was very precise. maybe they did not want to hit that facility on purpose, but they went after for the military targets there. so the kind of military is there is there to protect it just from what israel did, which again, the y becomes sends the signal to iran. it says, we can come after this facility if we want to. all right. general leinz, thank you for all of that. let s bring in math at boot. he is a senior fellow at the council on foreign relations and a columnist at the washington post, matt max you ve been listening patiently to all of this reporting the big question tonight is this the escalation that everyone has been fearing? it certainly looks like it, abby, although we don t know the details, i mean, i think what you re really saying is
breaking news explosions in iran on good evening. i m abby phillip in new york. there s breaking news tonight reports that israel may have hit back iran s semi-official fars news agency, citing local sources, says tonight and explosion was heard northwest of isfahan. that is about four hours south of the capital city of to her on and we can t say anything right now about what caused that explosion. but if israel did in fact strike that decision would ignore persistent pushing from the united states and its allies all across the world to show restraint. cnn supporters are here with us standing by. let s start with alex marquardt. he is live tonight and washington alex, what do we know at the center? our well, abby, details still very much coming in, but we have had percolating reports about explosions blast heard in iran. of course, the immediate assumption is this is indeed the israeli retaliation for a ron s massive strike against