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Trump 'really unhappy with Israel' after warplanes bomb Iran in breach of ceasefire
US president Donald Trump sharply rebuked Israel on Tuesday for its military response following a ceasefire deal, and accused both Israel and Iran of violating the agreement just hours after he announced it.
"I didn't like the fact that Israel unloaded right after we made the deal. They didn't have to unload and I didn't like the fact that the retaliation was very strong," Trump told reporters outside the White House.
Israeli defence minister Israel Katz had said he had ordered the military to mount new strikes on targets in Tehran in response to what he said were Iranian missiles fired in a "blatant violation" of the ceasefire.
Iran denied launching any missiles and said Israel's attacks had continued for an hour and a half beyond the time the ceasefire was meant to start.
Trump had announced the ceasefire earlier on Tuesday with a post on Truth Social: "THE CEASEFIRE IS NOW IN EFFECT. PLEASE DO NOT VIOLATE IT!"
Later in the day, Trump told reporters Israel launched its strikes almost immediately after the agreement was reached.
"Israel, as soon as we made the deal, they came out and they dropped a load of bombs, the likes of which I've never seen before. The biggest load that we've seen. I'm not happy with Israel," he said.
Iran and Israel, he added, had been fighting "so long and so hard that they don't know what the f**k they're doing".
In the hours leading up to the ceasefire, Israeli warplanes struck more than a dozen of targets in the Iranian capital and "completed a wave of raids in western Iran" targeting what it said were underground missile bases and launchpads, the Israeli military said.
Israel claimed to have assassinated another Iranian nuclear scientist and hundreds of members of the Basij paramilitary force during the intense wave of strikes.
Israel has killed at least 14 nuclear scientists since it launched its unprovoked war against Iran on 13 June.
Iran replied with a barrage of missiles shortly before the ceasefire went into effect, killing at least five Israelis and injuring 20 others.
The casualties occurred when a missile hit a tower block in the city of Beersheba in southern Israel.
Israeli strikes have reportedly killed at least 950 Iranians and injured almost 3,500 others since Israel launched its unprovoked war against Iran on 13 June. Dozens of Israelis have been killed in Iran's retaliatory attacks.
Iran's top diplomat denied that there had been a formal agreement but said Tehran would cease its attacks if Israel ended its "illegal aggression against the Iranian people".
Reports in US news media suggest that Qatar and White House officials pushed both sides to stop the attacks.
The push for a ceasefire came a few hours after Iran fired more than a dozen missiles at an American military base in Qatar in response to the US bombing of its nuclear facilities.
The US air force on Sunday launched an unprecedented attack against Iran's nuclear sites, dropping more than a dozen of its most powerful bunker buster missiles on the Fordow enrichment plant.
The head of Iran's nuclear energy agency said Tuesday they are continuing to assess the damage caused by the attack.
President Trump has claimed that the sites were "completely obliterated", though experts have expressed caution that it is impossible to determine how much damage was inflicted.
Questions have also been raised about the fate of Iran's centrifuges and stockpile of highly-enriched uranium, with some suggesting that they were moved to undisclosed locations ahead of the strikes.
(Reuters and TNA staff)