Israeli health minister calls Soroka strike a war crime

The Iranian missile that struck Soroka hospital hit an old surgical building that had been evacuated one day earlier due to safety concerns, Israeli officials said Thursday.

Patients and staff were moved to a safer location on Wednesday, anticipating a possible strike. Magen David Adom director Eli Bin said the health ministry had also ordered further evacuation of the affected floor the night before the attack, helping save lives.

Iran's main targets in Thursday morning’s missile attack were the Israeli military’s command and intelligence headquarters, as well as an intelligence camp located near Soroka hospital in southern Israel, Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported.

Israeli ambassador to the United States Yechiel Leiter told CNN on Wednesday that the Jewish state was considering various options to attack the Fordow underground nuclear site, including "surprises".

“It might require multiple strikes, it might require something else or it might require one of our surprises,” Leiter said. “We have a few tricks up our sleeves."

“If we have to pursue this and prosecute this by ourselves, we’re going to know what to do," he added. "We’re not going to allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon.”

Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a veteran Iraqi cleric who is one of the preeminent authorities in Shi'ite Islam, condemned attacks against Iran and called any killings of its leaders "criminal".

The top cleric "once again strongly condemned the continued military aggression against the Islamic Republic of Iran, as well as any threats of assassination targeting the country's top religious and political leadership," his office said in a statement.

"He firmly warned that any such criminal acts — in addition to being blatant violations of religious and moral principles and a clear breach of international norms and laws — would have extremely grave consequences for the entire region," it added.

"It could potentially lead to a complete loss of control over the situation and trigger widespread chaos, further deepening the suffering of the region's peoples and severely endangering the interests of all."

"Iran has now been offline for over 12 hours as authorities impose a nation-scale internet shutdown, citing Israel's alleged 'misuse' of the network for military purposes," the internet observatory NetBlocks said early Thursday.

"The measure continues to hinder residents' access to information at a critical time," it added.