CNN
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The wave of drones and missiles that flew towards Israel overnight on Sunday brought with it a new phase of tension, uncertainty and confrontation in the Middle East.
Iran launched the unprecedented attack in response to a suspected Israeli strike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria, earlier this month.
It marked a new chapter in a discord between the two states that percolated for years and has spiralled since Israel declared war on Hamas last October.
The next steps remain unclear, but Israel is facing pleas from its allies to step back from the brink of open warfare and choose a path of de-escalation.
Here’s what you need to know.
More than 300 projectiles – including around 170 drones and over 120 ballistic missiles – were fired toward Israel in the immense aerial attack overnight. Approximately 350 rockets were fired from Iran, Iraq, Yemen, and Lebanon’s Hezbollah, according to Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson Daniel Hagari.
However, “99%” of the projectiles were intercepted by Israel’s aerial defense systems and its allies, according to the Israeli military, with only a small number reaching Israeli territory.
Tehran’s attack targeted the Nevatim airbase, an Iranian army official said on Sunday, alleging that this is where Israel’s early April strike on the Iranian consulate was launched from.
Iranian ballistic missiles that reached Israel fell on the airbase in the south of the country and caused only light structural damage, Hagari said. The base is functioning and continuing its operations following the attack, with planes continuing to use the base, Hagari added.
A senior US military official told reporters Sunday that the US assessed “there’s no significant damage within Israel itself.”
US ships in the eastern Mediterranean Sea destroyed between four and six Iranian ballistic missiles during the attack and aircraft in the region shot down more than 70 Iranian one-way UAVs headed toward Israel. The US Army Patriot missile battery shot down one ballistic missile in the vicinity of Erbil, Iraq, the official said.
Israel and Iran are long-standing rivals and have been engaged in a shadow war for years.
Israel’s war on Hamas, waged since the militant group attacked Israel on October 7, has heightened those tensions.
Iranian-backed forces in Iraq and Syria have launched attacks aimed at US military positions in those countries and Iran’s leadership has warned that attacks by its allies won’t stop until Israel’s war in Gaza ends.
But fears of a spiralling regional war spiked further in early April, when Iran accused Israel of bombing its diplomatic complex in Syria.
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That airstrike destroyed the consulate building in the capital Damascus, killing at least seven officials including Mohammed Reza Zahedi, a top commander in Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), and senior commander Mohammad Hadi Haji Rahimi, Iran’s foreign ministry said at the time.
Zahedi, a former commander of the IRGC’s ground forces, air force, and the deputy commander of its operations, was the most high-profile Iranian target killed since then-US President Donald Trump ordered the assassination of IRGC Gen. Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad in 2020.
Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Israel would be punished for the attack, while President Ebrahim Raisi said it would “not go unanswered,” state news agency IRNA reported. The Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah said the strike would be met with “punishment and revenge.”
The region has been on edge ever since, with the US and Israel warning of intelligence that an Iranian attack was imminent.
How have Israel and its allies responded to the Iranian strike?
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Read More: Why Iran attacked Israel and what comes next