Live Updates: Israel Says It Killed Another Iranian General as Trump Returns to D.C.

The aid sites were set up under a new Israeli-backed system run by an American-led company, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. It replaces a system overseen by the United Nations and aims to provide food to civilians without the supplies falling into the hands of Hamas.

The United Nations and other international groups have condemned the new initiative, however, partly because civilians must pass Israeli soldiers to reach the sites, putting them in greater danger. They have also said the amount of aid getting through is woefully inadequate for the population’s needs.

“The danger is too high for me to go to these centers,” Awni Abu Hassira, 38, from Gaza City, said in a phone interview. “I don’t want to face death this way.”

The Gaza Health Ministry said that at least 20 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and more than 200 wounded early Monday when a crowd gathered near an aid distribution site in southern Gaza. Israel said it was still looking into the reports.

The ministry reported a similar event on Tuesday morning that it said had resulted in more than 50 deaths. On both days, the victims were taken to a hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis.

Israel said that two of its soldiers had been killed in combat in southern Gaza in recent days.

Asked for comment on Tuesday’s violence, the Israeli military said that “a gathering was identified adjacent to an aid distribution truck that got stuck in the area of Khan Younis” in proximity to Israeli forces operating in the area. The statement, using the abbreviation for the Israeli military added that it was “aware of reports regarding a number of injured individuals from I.D.F. fire following the crowd’s approach” and was reviewing the matter.

It said the military “regrets any harm to uninvolved individuals.”

Naseem Hassan, a medic at a hospital in Khan Younis, on Monday described the difficulty of aiding people who were shot as they tried to collect food from a nearby aid distribution point. He said scores of Palestinian victims had been rushed to his hospital.

“People who are injured have to crawl or be carried for over a kilometer to reach us,” said Mr. Hassan, who works at Nasser Hospital. “We couldn’t reach the aid centers, ambulances can’t get there,” he added.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said on Monday that one of its field hospitals had treated more than 200 people after the shootings near the aid site.

“Due to the ongoing restrictions of humanitarian assistance, people are struggling to access basic goods, including fuel,” the Red Cross said in a statement.

The United Nations has warned that Gaza’s population is on the brink of famine, with thousands of children already severely malnourished.

“The facts speak for themselves,” said Volker Türk, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights. Speaking in Geneva on Monday, he called Israel’s military campaign in Gaza a source of “horrifying, unconscionable suffering” and urged governments to “wake up” and pay attention.

“All those with influence must exert maximum pressure on Israel and Hamas, to put an end to this unbearable suffering,” he said.

Ameera Harouda contributed reporting.

Mr. Macron had told reporters covering the G7 meeting in Calgary, Alberta, that the United States had given assurances that “they will find a cease-fire, and since they can pressure Israel, things may change.”

The speculation about his intentions clearly infuriated Mr. Trump, who said, without elaborating, that the real reason for his departure was “much bigger than that.” In an earlier Truth Social post, he had said that “everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran.”

There was no immediate response from the French presidency.

Mr. Macron — who said last week that Israel had legitimate reasons to defend itself against Iran’s nuclear program but that France did not support its decision to bombard Iran — has repeatedly called for a cease-fire.

But Mr. Trump, facing pressure from Israeli officials to more forcefully back their campaign against Iran, seems to be of two minds. He must decide whether to help Israel destroy the buried Iranian nuclear enrichment facility at Fordo, which only American B-2 bombers dropping the U.S. military’s biggest “bunker buster” can reach. Israel has no such weapon in its arsenal.

But such action would drag the United States into a war of a kind that Mr. Trump has suggested he would prefer to avoid.

Since Mr. Trump took office for a second term in January, the French and American leaders have strained to preserve the friendship they established during his first. Mr. Macron still calls Mr. Trump on a casual basis. But their stark differences over Israel, Gaza, Ukraine and now, it seems, Iran have made the veneer of camaraderie untenable.

Mr. Macron is now the European leader closest to Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, whom Mr. Trump chose to humiliate in a White House meeting in February and missed seeing at the G7 summit because of his early departure. Mr. Trump spent much of the gathering regretting the absence of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, calling the group’s decision to expel Russia in 2014 “a mistake.”

Most recently, Mr. Trump has clashed with Mr. Macron over a planned United Nations conference to explore the creation of a Palestinian state, which the French leader has said he will recognize, most likely on that occasion. The Trump administration urged countries to shun the meeting, which was to have taken place this week but was postponed because of the fighting between Israel and Iran.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a statement on Friday saying that he had named General Shadmani to command the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, the most important economic arm of Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.

General Shadmani had replaced Lt. Gen. Gholamali Rashid, one of several top Iranian military leaders killed by Israel in recent days. So far, Israel has killed at least 11 senior Iranian generals, as well as several scientists, in its campaign to cripple Iran’s nuclear program.

If confirmed, the killing of General Shadmani so soon after his predecessor would likely further destabilize what remains of Iran’s besieged military leadership.

The killing would also mirror Israel’s approach in Lebanon last fall, when its forces decimated Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia, and degraded its military arsenal. Israeli forces not only assassinated Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, but they also killed his expected successor, Hashem Safieddine, as well as the man next-in-line to succeed Mr. Safieddine.

It was not immediately clear who might replace General Shadmani. He had previously served as the deputy coordinator of the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, according to an August report from Iranian state media and Open Sanctions, a sanctions data provider. General Shadmani was born in Hamedan, in western Iran, according to Open Sanctions.

In the statement announcing his appointment, Ayatollah Khamenei praised General Shadmani’s “merits and valuable experience.” He said that General Shadmani was “expected to provide strategic, operational planning and guidance in confronting threats and accurately identifying the combat readiness” of Iran’s armed forces.

Samuel Granados contributed reporting.

United States — The U.S. Embassy in Israel said it was not in a position to evacuate or directly assist Americans in departing the country. That came as the State Department this week raised its travel advisory for Israel to Level 4, “Do Not Travel” — its highest level, signaling extreme risk — after authorizing the voluntary departure of family members and nonemergency U.S. government employees. In March, the State Department warned U.S. citizens not to travel to Iran.

China — Beijing has started to evacuate its nationals in Israel and Iran to neighboring countries, a spokesman for China’s Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday. The spokesman, Guo Jiakun, told a news briefing that Chinese embassies and consulates have activated “emergency consular protection mechanisms” and demanded both Iran and Israel “ensure the safety of Chinese citizens and institutions.” On Monday, the Chinese embassy in Tel Aviv urged its citizens to leave Israel via land border crossings to Jordan.

South Korea — The foreign ministry on Tuesday urged its nationals to leave Iran. South Korea’s government had earlier encouraged citizens to cancel or postpone trips to Israel and parts of Iran.

Britain — The foreign secretary, David Lammy, told Parliament on Monday that British nationals in Israel should register with the British Foreign Office to receive “important information on the situation and leaving the country.” Britain’s government has advised its citizens to avoid travel to Israel and the occupied territories, telling nationals there to follow local guidance. It also has advised against travel to Iran and said it can provide limited consular assistance.

Russia — The country’s ambassador to Israel, Anatoly Viktorov, on Monday advised Russian nationals to leave until the situation normalizes, according to the state news agency, Tass. Moscow said over the weekend that it had evacuated several citizens from Iran and halted activity at its consulate in Tehran.

Australia — The government has advised against travel to Israel and the occupied territories. “Terror attacks can occur anywhere at any time, including by lone actors,” it said in an advisory, urging citizens to follow the guidance of local authorities and be alert. Australians should not travel to Iran and those already there should shelter in place, the government said.

Canada — On Monday, the government warned its citizens to avoid all travel to Israel and issued a similar warning for Iran.

India — The country’s embassy in Iran has urged its citizens there to avoid unnecessary travel within the country. On Sunday, the Indian embassy in Israel told citizens to stay vigilant and avoid unnecessary travel.

Japan — Citizens were advised by the foreign ministry on Friday to avoid travel to the Iranian capital, Tehran, as well as to the Israeli cities of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Around 380 Japanese citizens have notified the embassy in Iran of their presence and around 1,000 did the same in Israel, Japanese media reported on Monday.

The decision by Syria’s new government, led by President Ahmed al-Shara, to remain silent is a sign of just how much the geopolitical sands have shifted in the country since rebels toppled the Assad regime in December, analysts say.

That regime was among Iran’s closet allies in the region, providing key support as Iran built up its network of anti-Israel militias, the so-called Axis of Resistance, across the Levant.

But since coming to power, the new government has made clear that Iran’s proxies are no longer welcome in Syria and pledged that it would not allow any armed groups to launch attacks into Israel from Syrian soil.

That pledge is part of Mr. al-Shara’s effort to win support from Western countries and also the result of deep-seated resentment toward Iran, which provided military aid to the dictator Bashar al-Assad to fight rebel forces during Syria’s nearly 14-year civil war, analysts say.

Now, the conflict between Israel and Iran has offered Syrian authorities an opportunity to prove that they will make good on their promises — and to win the Western support Mr. al-Shara has sought to garner since taking power.

“Syria’s silence is a strong signal to Israel and the United States that Syria is not part of this axis any more and that Syria’s land, its soil, won’t be used by any regional force to launch attacks against Israel,” said Ibrahim al-Assil, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute in Washington.

Syria’s new government “promised that, and now they are showing it,” he added.

Syria’s new leadership has shown once-unimaginable openness to engage with Israel since taking over.

In recent weeks, Mr. al-Shara’s government has been involved in direct talks with Israeli officials over security matters, according to two officials with knowledge of the discussions — a notable shift for two countries that for decades have been on opposite sides of conflict in the Middle East.

Israel has occupied the Syrian Golan Heights since the Arab-Israeli war in 1967. After the ouster of the Assad government, it sent additional troops to the area and carried out hundreds of airstrikes on military bases and weapons depots in Syria, citing concerns that country’s south might fall under the sway of extreme groups that could threaten Israel.

But over the past month, the pace of Israeli bombardment in Syria has slowed. The United States has also called for Syria’s new leaders to establish relations with Israel and eventually normalize ties.

Mr. al-Shara has not said he would consider doing so. And while most expect his government would welcome a more weakened Iran from this conflict, that outcome could also provide Israel with more leverage to pressure Syria into normalizing relations, analysts say.

“I think the al-Shara government would like nothing more than a potential outcome where Iran is weakened, contained and can’t be a regional destabilizer,” said Sanam Vakil, director of the Middle East and North Africa Program at Chatham House.

But that could lead Israel to press Mr. al-Shara to establish ties and give the country a right to militarily respond to what it deems security threats within Syrian territory, she added.

The growing conflict between Israel and Iran has also stoked fears among Syrians that their country could be dragged into the conflict between Iran and Israel.

In Dara’a, a city in southern Syria, residents have watched the night skies light up as missiles have flown between Iran and neighboring Israel.

Mr. Mahmoud Abdul-Omar, 46, a Dara’a resident, said that he spent two nights sheltering inside his home with his children and wife after seeing missiles overhead on Saturday — an image that felt all too familiar in a country that has just emerged from its own civil war.

“I honestly can’t believe the war is over,” he said, referring to the Syrian civil conflict.

“We’re coming out of a tragedy and a long, difficult war in Syria,” he said. “We want peace.”

“God willing,” he added, “Syria will have nothing to do with this and will stay safe.”

Reham Mourshed and Adam Rasgon contributed reporting.

Mr. Trump had at one point encouraged his Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, and possibly Vice President JD Vance, to offer to meet the Iranians, according to a U.S. official. But on Monday Mr. Trump posted on social media that “everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran,” hardly a sign of diplomatic progress.

Mr. Trump also said on Monday that “I think Iran basically is at the negotiating table, they want to make a deal.”

The urgency appeared to be rising. The White House announced late on Monday that Mr. Trump was leaving the Group of 7 summit early because of the situation in the Middle East.

“As soon as I leave here, we’re going to be doing something,” Mr. Trump said. “But I have to leave here.”

What he intended to do remained unclear.

If Mr. Vance and Mr. Witkoff did meet with the Iranians, officials say, the likely Iranian interlocutor would be the country’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, who played a key role in the 2015 nuclear deal with the Obama administration and knows every element of Iran’s sprawling nuclear complex. Mr. Araghchi, who has been Mr. Witkoff’s counterpart in recent negotiations, signaled his openness to a deal on Monday, saying in a statement, “If President Trump is genuine about diplomacy and interested in stopping this war, next steps are consequential.”

“It takes one phone call from Washington to muzzle someone like Netanyahu,” he said, referring to Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister. “That may pave the way for a return to diplomacy.”

But if that diplomatic effort fizzles, or the Iranians remain unwilling to give in to Mr. Trump’s central demand that they must ultimately end all uranium enrichment on Iranian soil, the president will still have the option of ordering that Fordo and other nuclear facilities be destroyed.

There is only one weapon for the job, experts contend. It is called the Massive Ordnance Penetrator, or the GBU-57, and it weighs so much — 30,000 pounds — that it can be lifted only by a B-2 bomber. Israel does not own either the weapon or the bomber needed to get it aloft and over target.

If Mr. Trump holds back, it could well mean that Israel’s main objective in the war is never completed.

“Fordo has always been the crux of this thing,” said Brett McGurk, who worked on Middle East issues for four successive American presidents, from George W. Bush to Joseph R. Biden Jr. “If this ends with Fordo still enriching, then it’s not a strategic gain.”

That has been true for a long time, and over the past two years the U.S. military has refined the operation, under close White House scrutiny. The exercises led to the conclusion that one bomb would not solve the problem; any attack on Fordo would have to come in waves, with B-2s releasing one bomb after another down the same hole. And the operation would have to be executed by an American pilot and crew.

This was all in the world of war planning until the opening salvos on Friday morning in Tehran, when Mr. Netanyahu ordered the strikes, declaring that Israel had discovered an “imminent” threat that required “pre-emptive action.” New intelligence, he suggested without describing the details, indicated that Iran was on the cusp of turning its fuel stockpile into weapons.

U.S. intelligence officials who have followed the Iranian program for years agree that Iranian scientists and nuclear specialists have been working to shorten the time it would take to manufacture a nuclear bomb, but they saw no huge breakthroughs.

Yet they agree with Mr. McGurk and other experts on one point: If the Fordo facility survives the conflict, Iran will retain the key equipment it needs to stay on a pathway to the bomb, even if it would first have to rebuild much of the nuclear infrastructure that Israel has left in ruins over four days of precision bombing.

There may be other alternatives to bombing it, though they are hardly a sure thing. If the power to Fordo gets cut, by saboteurs or bombing, it could damage or destroy the centrifuges that spin at supersonic speeds. Rafael Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said on Monday that this might have happened at the country’s other major uranium enrichment center, Natanz. Israel took out the power supplies to the plant on Friday, and Mr. Grossi said that the disruption probably sent them spinning out of control.

Mr. Trump rarely talks about Fordo by name, but he has occasionally alluded to the GBU-57, sometimes telling aides that he ordered its development. That is not correct: The United States began designing the weapon in 2004, during the George W. Bush administration, specifically to collapse the mountains protecting some of the deepest nuclear facilities in Iran and North Korea. It was, however, tested during Mr. Trump’s first term, and added to the arsenal.

Mr. Netanyahu has pressed for the United States to make its bunker busters available since the Bush administration, so far to no avail. But people who have spoken to Mr. Trump in recent months say the topic has come up repeatedly in his conversations with the prime minister. When Mr. Trump has been asked about it, he usually avoids a direct answer.

Now the pressure is on. The Israeli former defense minister Yoav Gallant, who resigned in a split with Mr. Netanyahu, told CNN’s Bianna Golodryga on Monday that “the job has to be done, by Israel, by the United States,” an apparent reference to the fact that the bomb would have to be dropped by an American pilot in an American airplane. He said that Mr. Trump had “the option to change the Middle East and influence the world.”

And Senator Lindsey Graham, the Republican from South Carolina who often speaks for the traditional, hawkish members of his party, said on CBS on Sunday that “if diplomacy is not successful” he will “urge President Trump to go all in to make sure that, when this operation is over, there’s nothing left standing in Iran regarding their nuclear program.”

“If that means providing bombs, provide bombs,” he said, adding, in a clear reference to the Massive Ordnance Penetrator, “whatever bombs. If it means flying with Israel, fly with Israel.”

But Republicans are hardly united in that view. And the split in the party over the decision of whether to make use of one of the Pentagon’s most powerful conventional weapons to help one of America’s closest allies has highlighted a far deeper divide. It is not only about crippling the centrifuges of Fordo; it is also about MAGA’s view of what kinds of wars the United States should avoid at all costs.

The anti-interventionist wing of the party, given its most prominent voice by the influential podcaster Tucker Carlson, has argued that the lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan is that there is nothing but downside risk in getting deeply into another Middle East war. On Friday, Mr. Carlson wrote that the United States should “drop Israel” and “let them fight their own wars.”

“If Israel wants to wage this war, it has every right to do so,” he continued. “It is a sovereign country, and it can do as it pleases. But not with America’s backing.”

In the Pentagon, opinion is divided for other reasons. Elbridge A. Colby, the under secretary of defense for policy, the Pentagon’s No. 3 post, has long argued that every military asset devoted to the wars of the Middle East is one diverted from the Pacific and the containment of China. (Mr. Colby had to amend his views on Iran somewhat to get confirmed.)

For now, Mr. Trump can afford to keep one foot in both camps. By making one more run at coercive diplomacy, he can make the case to the MAGA faithful that he is using the threat of the Massive Ordnance Penetrator to bring the conflict to a peaceful end. And he can tell the Iranians that they are going to cease enriching uranium one way or the other, either by diplomatic agreement or because a GBU-57 imploded the mountain.

But if the combination of persuasion and coercion fails, he will have to decide whether this is Israel’s war or America’s.

Reporting was contributed by Farnaz Fassihi in New York and Patrick Kingsley in Jerusalem.

The bomb has a much thicker steel case and contains a smaller amount of explosives than similarly sized general-purpose bombs. The heavy casings allow the munition to stay intact as it punches through soil, rock or concrete before detonating.

Its size — 20 feet long and 30,000 pounds — means that only the American B-2 stealth bomber can carry it.

Conventional wisdom has been that Israel can’t destroy Fordo on its own. The United States has blocked Israel from getting the bunker buster, and while Israel has fighter jets, it has not developed heavy bombers capable of carrying the weapon.

But Israel can come close by hitting more accessible power generation and transmission plants that help run the facility, which contains Iran’s most advanced centrifuges, military officials said.

In conjunction with Israel’s aerial bombardment of Iran, going after the Fordo-adjacent plants could significantly slow down the ability of Iran’s most protected nuclear facility to keep enriching uranium.

The Israel Defense Forces and covert operatives could also look for other ways to disable the site, including destroying the entrance to it.

Attacking Fordo is central to any effort to destroy Iran’s ability to make nuclear weapons. In March 2023, the International Atomic Energy Agency reported that it had discovered uranium that had been enriched to 83.7 percent purity in Fordo — close to the enrichment level, 90 percent, necessary for nuclear weapons.

Iran, which is a signatory to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, has maintained that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.

The U.S. Air Force is moving refueling tankers, aircraft and additional warplanes to support any additional American operations in the Middle East, U.S. officials said.

But President Trump has not, at the moment, moved to reverse years of American policy on providing Israel with the bunker buster bombs.

“We’ve had a policy for a long time of not providing those to the Israelis because we didn’t want them to use them,” said Gen. Joseph Votel, who was commander of U.S. Central Command during Mr. Trump’s first term. Instead, the United States viewed its bunker buster bomb largely as a deterrent, a national security asset possessed only by America, but not one that, if made available, might encourage Israel to start a war with Iran.

Iran built the centrifuge facility at Fordo knowing that it needed to bury it deep to prevent it from being attacked. In 1981, using F-15 and F-16 fighter jets, Israel bombed a nuclear facility near Baghdad as part of its effort to stop Iraq from acquiring nuclear weapons. That facility was above ground.

“The Iranians fully understood that the Israelis would try to get inside their programs and they built Fordo inside of a mountain a long time ago to take care of the post-Iraq problem” presented by the 1981 strike, said Vali Nasr, an Iran expert who is a professor at Johns Hopkins University.

Over the years, the Israelis have cooked up a variety of plans to attack Fordo in the absence of U.S.-supplied bunker busters. Under one of those plans, which they presented to senior officials in the Obama administration, Israeli helicopters loaded with commandos would fly to the site. The commandos would then fight their way inside the facility, rig it with explosives and blow it up, former U.S. officials said.

Israel successfully mounted a similar operation in Syria last year when it destroyed a Hezbollah missile production facility.

But Fordo would be a much more dangerous endeavor, military officials said.

American officials say now that Israel has gained air supremacy over much of Iran, Israeli attack planes could circle over Fordo and render it inoperable, at least temporarily, but not destroy it.

“The Israelis have sprung a lot of clandestine operations lately, but the physics of the problem remain the same,” said Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr., who was in charge of the Iran war plans when he ran the Pentagon’s Central Command after General Votel. “It remains a very difficult target.”

David A. Deptula, a retired three-star Air Force general who planned the American air campaigns in Afghanistan in 2001 and in the 1991 Persian Gulf War, agreed that Israel has options that would not require American help.

For example, Israeli special forces “could insert/apply or otherwise use a variety of means to disable the facility,” he said.

Yechiel Leiter, Israel’s ambassador to the United States, hinted at those options on Sunday on ABC News’s “This Week.”

“We have a number of contingencies, which will enable us to deal with Fordo,” he said. “Not everything is a matter of taking to the skies and bombing from afar.”

Even if Mr. Trump were to authorize American B-2 stealth bombers to drop the 30,000-pound bombs, General McKenzie said, there would be several technical, highly classified challenges in coordinating such a strike with Israel.

A decision to use the American bunker busters would also have huge international consequences, General Votel said. For one, there could be nuclear contamination from such a bombardment that could endanger civilians.

“I think there would also certainly be fallout internationally over the idea that the United States joined Israel in what would be viewed as an illegal attack on the sovereignty of Iran,” General Votel added.

And Iran could widen its retaliation to U.S. troops and other American targets in the region and beyond, military analysts say. The United States would be back on war footing in the region.

Mr. Trump has made clear that he has little interest in more military misadventures in the region, and he is seeking not to alienate a noninterventionist wing of supporters firmly opposed to more U.S. involvement in a Middle East war.

Adam Entous contributed reporting.

“We’ve had no help from the government, not even a warning,” said Mr. Jaradat, 43.

Since the confrontation between Israel and Iran began last Friday, roughly 80 pieces of shrapnel have hit Palestinian communities in the West Bank, according to Nael Al-Azza, a spokesman for the Palestinian emergency services, or civil defense.

Israeli settlements in the West Bank, like communities within Israel, typically have bomb shelters and air raid sirens. But Palestinian neighborhoods in the West Bank, sometimes just a few dozen yards from Israeli settlements, have few shelters, warnings or official instructions on what to do in case of attack. According to Mr. Al-Azza, seven people have been injured as a result.

This dynamic has heightened frustration with both the Israeli military occupation and the Palestinian Authority, the semiautonomous body that administers roughly 40 percent of the West Bank. Though the authority’s emergency services have warned Palestinians to stay away from unexploded ordnance, the authority has otherwise offered little guidance on how to prepare for the attacks.

“I keep thinking about how I will repair the house and how we can regain any sense of safety — without any support or assistance from the government,” said Mr. Jaradat, who has moved his family to a relative’s home for now.

Amid the airstrikes, Israeli military raids and attacks by settlers have continued across the West Bank, compounding the sense of uncertainty. Israeli checkpoints and roadblocks also restrict Palestinian movement, making it harder for ambulances to reach the injured, according to Ahmed Jibreel, the head of the Palestinian Red Crescent.

“Continuous passage is nearly impossible,” Mr. Jibreel said, adding that injured or ill people are often carried on foot between ambulances on either side of a checkpoint.

Within Palestinian cities, scenes of panic have played out at gas stations for three days in a row, as residents attempt to stock up on fuel in case the war leads to a shortage.

In turn, that has led to a new joke among Palestinians: “What’s the point of stockpiling fuel if you can’t move?”

Hassan Abedini, the deputy director of Iran’s state broadcaster, said some employees were injured in the Israeli strike, without specifying a number. He said firefighters were trying to contain the fires at the building, which were sending a large column of black smoke into the air.

The attack appeared to have struck only one of the buildings belonging to the state broadcaster, which has a number of other buildings in the area in central Tehran.

Iran’s state news agency, IRNA, confirmed the attack, saying that it took place as programs were being broadcast live. It said that programming was “briefly halted” but “returned to normal” after a few minutes.

The Iranian state broadcaster has long been associated with the government’s dominance of public life and the country’s media. Iran is widely considered to be one of the most repressive states in terms of press freedom; journalists who cross government red lines can face severe consequences.

Before the strike, Israel’s defense minister, Israel Katz, had said in a statement that “the mouthpiece of Iranian propaganda and incitement is about to disappear.”

The Israeli military later said in a statement that its air force had struck the building to target a “communication center” that was being used by the Iranian military “under the guise of civilian activity.” The claim could not be independently verified.

Elham Abedini, another Iranian state television anchor, captured the wreckage in an Instagram livestream. Her video showed chaos as people ran and shouted amid debris. “They are in the glass building, they are all there,” she can be heard telling a guard in uniform, referring to the channel’s employees.

The attack was preceded by an Israeli evacuation order for the densely-populated Tehran district where the state broadcaster lies. In that statement, the Israeli military said it planned to target “military infrastructure” in the area “in the coming hours.”

In the wars in Gaza against Hamas, and in Lebanon against Hezbollah, Israel frequently used the tactic of telling civilians to either flee or face an impending Israeli attack, even on a specific building. The warnings often prompted panic and fear among people in the targeted zone.

“Everything’s uncertain,” he said.

Chaos and fear have gripped Iran in the days since Israel launched its surprise attack on Friday and Iran began launching strikes on Israeli cities in response. Israel’s attacks have killed more than 200 people in Iran, according to the country’s health ministry, and injured more than 1,400. In Israel, at least 24 people have been killed in retaliatory barrages by Iran, with roughly 600 injured.

The sense of foreboding escalated on Monday after the Israeli military issued an evacuation order on social media for a large part of northeastern Tehran, saying it planned to target “military infrastructure” in the area within hours. With internet connectivity disrupted, many people without access to social media may have missed the warning.

Gas stations are closing because there is no fuel, those that are open have imposed a limit of 10 liters per car and internet and phone service is severely disrupted, according to six residents of the area.

In text and voice messages, several residents of Tehran said that they and their neighbors were scrambling to leave, grabbing essentials and getting on the roads. But for some, the destination was unclear.

“Where should I go? Where can I go? Where can half a million people go in a moment’s notice?” said Danial Amin, a resident of Tehran’s Zafar neighborhood. “The highways are completely blocked. We are trapped.”

Shadi, 42, who lives in Dibaji, a neighborhood in the evacuation area, had already left with her parents and was staying at her brother’s house in another part of the city. Fearing that Israeli strikes would target her brother’s neighborhood next, she hoped that her family could leave Tehran, but she said she was worried about being stuck on the roads.

“All the roads are congested, and we can’t get through,” she said. “The long lines at gas stations make refueling nearly impossible.”

Footage posted on social media and verified by The New York Times on Monday showed long lines of traffic on a highway in northeastern Tehran that leads out of the city. Residents said some gas stations were closing because there is no fuel, and those that were open said they could sell at most 10 liters, or about 2.6 gallons, per customer.

Mohsen, 42, an engineer, left Tehran for Semnan Province to the east on Sunday afternoon with his family, including their dog. He said they brought only what they could fit in their car: some clothes and other belongings, food and bottled water.

The roads were so clogged that a drive that normally takes an hour stretched to four and a half, he said. The journey was made even longer by security personnel who were inspecting vans and trucks at checkpoints set up at the entrances and exits to cities.

Even for those who escape Tehran, conditions were far from stable. Meisam, the poet and writer, said that relatives of his had seen a missile strike while driving on a different highway.

It was not clear that things in his hometown would be any better, he said, since many displaced people had flooded in, overwhelming the supermarkets there.

“If this continues,” Meisam said, “shortages seem inevitable.”

Monika Cvorak and Aaron Boxerman contributed reporting.