WRAPUP 16-Iran strikes Israeli hospital; Trump to decide on US role in conflict within 'two weeks'

By Alexander Cornwell, Parisa Hafezi, Tala Ramadan and Trevor Hunnicutt

TEL AVIV/DUBAI/WASHINGTON, June 19 (Reuters) - Israel bombed nuclear targets in Iran on Thursday and Iran fired missiles and drones at Israel after hitting an Israeli hospital overnight, as a week-old air war escalated with no sign yet of an exit strategy from either side.

The White House said U.S. President Donald Trump will make a decision within the next two weeks whether to get involved on Israel's side.

That might not be a firm deadline, as Trump has commonly used "two weeks" as a timeframe for making decisions. Meanwhile, Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi have spoken by phone several times since last week, sources say.

Israel has been hitting Iran from the air since last Friday in what it describes as an effort to prevent Tehran from developing nuclear weapons. Iran has denied plans to develop such weapons and has retaliated by launching counterstrikes on Israel.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tehran's "tyrants" would pay the "full price" for a strike that damaged the Soroka medical centre in Israel's southern city of Beersheba

"Are we targeting the downfall of the regime? That may be a result, but it's up to the Iranian people to rise for their freedom," Netanyahu said.

Israeli military spokesperson Brigadier General Effie Defrin accused Iran of deliberately targeting civilians in the hospital attack by using a missile that scattered smaller bombs over a wider area. It was the first reported use of cluster munitions in the seven-day-old war.

“That is state-sponsored terror and a blatant violation of international law," Defrin told a press briefing.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards said they had targeted Israeli military and intelligence headquarters near the hospital. An Israeli military official denied there were military targets nearby.

Israel attacked the special forces headquarters of the internal security apparatus in Tehran in the last 24 hours, Defrin said. Earlier, Defence Minister Israel Katz said the military had been instructed to intensify strikes on strategic-related targets in Tehran in order to eliminate the threat to Israel and destabilise the rule of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

As darkness fell on Thursday evening, Iranian media reported that air defences were engaging "hostile targets" in northern Tehran.

Israel's airstrikes aim to do more than destroy Iran's nuclear centrifuges and missile capabilities. They seek to shatter the foundations of Khamenei's government and leave it near collapse, Israeli, Western and regional officials said.

Netanyahu wants Iran weakened enough to be forced into fundamental concessions on permanently abandoning its nuclear enrichment, its ballistic missile programme and its support for militant groups across the region, the sources said.

In an apparent reference to the U.S., Iran's Supreme National Security Council said it would use a different strategy if a "third party" joined Israel in the war.

STRIKES ON NUCLEAR SITES

Earlier, Israel said it had struck Iran's Natanz and Isfahan nuclear sites. It also targeted the partially built Arak heavy-water research reactor, also known as Khondab, in central Iran.

Airbus Defense satellite imagery published by the Open Source Centre, a London-based research group, showed a large, blackened hole in the roof of the Arak reactor and destroyed heavy water distillation towers nearby.

Heavy-water reactors produce plutonium, which, like enriched uranium, can be used to make the core of an atom bomb.

David Albright, a former U.N. nuclear inspector and head of the Institute for Science and International Security, said the Israelis hit the facility because of concerns about Iran’s declared intention to begin operating the reactor next year.

The Iranians "play all these different games so Israel took it out," he said.

Israeli air and missile strikes have wiped out the top echelon of Iran's military command and killed hundreds of people. Iranian retaliatory strikes have killed at least two dozen civilians in Israel.

On Thursday, Iran's Revolutionary Guards said it had launched combined missile and drone attacks at military and industrial sites linked to Israel's defence industry in Haifa and Tel Aviv.

Iran has been weighing wider options in responding to the biggest security challenge since its 1979 revolution. A member of the Iranian Parliament's National Security Committee Presidium, Behnam Saeedi, told the semi-official Mehr news agency Iran could consider closing the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20% of daily global oil consumption passes.

'STAY AWAY FROM OUR COUNTRY'

Israel, which has the most advanced military in the Middle East, has been fighting on several fronts since the October 7, 2023, attack by the Palestinian militant group Hamas triggered the Gaza war.

It has severely weakened Iran's regional allies, Hamas in Gaza and Lebanon's Hezbollah, and has bombed Yemen's Houthis.

The extent of the damage inside Iran has become more difficult to assess in recent days.

Iran has stopped giving updates on the death toll, and state media have ceased showing widespread images of destruction. The internet has been almost completely shut down, and the public has been banned from filming.

Arash, 33, a government employee in Tehran, said a building next to his home in Tehran’s Shahrak-e Gharb neighbourhood had been destroyed in the strikes.

"I saw at least three dead children and two women in that building. Is this how Netanyahu plans to ‘liberate’ Iranians? Stay away from our country," he told Reuters by telephone.