BEERSHEBA, Israel (AP) — A tentative truce faltered Tuesday when Israel accused Iran of launching missiles into its airspace after the ceasefire was supposed to take effect and vowed to retaliate.
Iran’s military denied firing on Israel, state media reported — but explosions boomed and sirens sounded across northern Israel midmorning, and an Israeli military official said two Iranian missiles were intercepted.
U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House before departing for the NATO summit at The Hague that in his view, both sides had violated the nascent agreement he had announced earlier.
“They violated it but Israel violated it too,” Trump said. ”I’m not happy with Israel.”
On social media, he called on Israel to stop dropping bombs and bring its pilots home.
The conflict, now in its 12th day, began with Israel targeting Iranian nuclear and military sites, saying it could not allow Tehran to develop atomic weapons — and that it feared the Islamic Republic was close. Iran has long maintained that its program is peaceful.
Many worried the war might widen after the U.S. joined the attacks by dropping bunker-buster bombs over the weekend and Israel expanded the kinds of targets it was hitting.
But after Tehran launched a limited retaliatory strike on a U.S. military base in Qatar on Monday, Trump announced the ceasefire.
Both sides accepted the agreement, but it is now unclear if it will hold.
“Tehran will tremble,” Israeli Finance Minister Betzalel Smotrich warned on X, raising the specter that the war might continue.
Israel Accuses Iran Of Violating The Truce. Iran Denies That.
An Israeli military official who spoke on the condition of anonymity in line with military regulations said Iran launched two missiles at Israel hours into the tenuous ceasefire. Both were intercepted, the official said.
Iranian state television reported that the military denied firing missiles after the start of the ceasefire — while accusing Israel of conducting strikes. It offered no evidence to support the claim of Israeli fire, with the last reports of such attacks coming before dawn.
Part of the difficulty in sorting out the competing claims was that Trump’s social media post announcing the ceasefire said Iran would begin holding its fire hours earlier than Israel. He later, however, announced that the ceasefire was in effect, even though the window he initially gave for Israel had not yet closed.
After accusing Iran of violating the ceasefire, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz instructed Israel’s military to resume “the intense operations to attack Tehran and to destroy targets of the regime and terror infrastructure.”
Breakthrough Declared By Trump Wobbles In Initial Hours
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel had agreed to a bilateral ceasefire with Iran in coordination with Trump, while pledging to respond to any subsequent violation.
He said that Israel had achieved all of its war goals,