Middle East crisis live: Biden to meet national security team as fears grow of Iranian attack on Israel

Nasser Kanaani, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson, said Tehran was not looking to escalate tensions but punishment was ‘“necessary” as a response to the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in the Iranian capital and to prevent further instability.

The Lebanese militant group Hezbollah has hit northern Israel in a drone attack in response to what it called “attacks and assassinations” carried out by Israel in several villages in south Lebanon. The Israeli military says the attack wounded two soldiers and set off a fire.

The violence came amid fears of an all-out war after the killing of a senior Hezbollah commander in Lebanon and Hamas’ political leader in Iran.

The Hezbollah attack appears more in keeping with ongoing border skirmishes, rather than as a direct response to the political assassinations.

The Israeli military said fire services were working to put out a fire that was ignited as a result of the attack in Ayelet HaShahar in the upper Galilee.

US President Joe Biden will meet his national security team to discuss the situation in the Middle East on Monday, the White House has said, as fears grow that Iran will strike Israel in retaliation for the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran last week.

Biden would also speak to Jordan’s King Abdullah II, the White House said. Jordanian foreign minister, Ayman Safadi, made a rare trip to Iran at the weekend in a bid to restrain Iran.

The attempt looked doomed to fail. In a meeting with Safadi on Sunday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said the assassination of Haniyeh was a “major mistake by the Zionist regime [Israel] that will not go unanswered”, Iranian state TV reported.

The US has said it will defend Israel in the event of an attack and moved warships and fighter jets to the region; it has also embarked on another round of frantic diplomacy aimed at deescalating tensions that were inflamed last week after Haniyeh’s killing and that of a senior Hezbollah commander in Beirut.

Israel, which claimed responsibility for the Beirut attack, has not admitted any involvement in Haniyeh’s assassination although it is widely believed to be behind it.

“The overall goal is to turn the temperature down in the region, deter and defend against those attacks, and avoid regional conflict,” Jonathan Finer, the White House’s deputy national security adviser, said on CBS’ “Face the Nation” programme on Sunday.

The US and Israel are preparing for every possibility, Finer added.

In other key developments:

• US secretary of state Antony Blinken spoke with Iraqi prime minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani and emphasised “the importance of all parties taking steps to calm regional tensions, avoid further escalation, and advance stability,” the state department said. Al-Sudani told Blinken that preventing regional escalation was tied to stopping Israeli “aggression” in the Gaza Strip, Iraqi state media said.

• US news service Axios reported that Blinken had told his counterparts from G7 countries that Iran and Hezbollah could start attacking Israel as early as Monday, citing three sources briefed on the call. But Blinken, according to Axios, said it was unclear how Iran and Hezbollah would attack and did not know the exact timing. When asked about the report, the state department referred to a readout of the call, where it said the ministers discussed “the urgent need for de-escalation in the Middle East.”

• Israel is already in a “multi-front war” with Iran and its proxies, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a cabinet meeting on Sunday, and that the country was prepared for any scenario. Military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said there was “no change in the Home Front Command’s defence policy” but that Israel’s protection was not “hermetic”.

• Israeli airstrikes hit two schools and a hospital complex in Gaza on Sunday, killing at least 30 people. The attacks on two schools in Gaza City killed at least 25 people sheltering there on Sunday, and another attack on the courtyard of al-Aqsa hospital killed at least five people and set the tents of displaced people on fire.

• The toll from the war in Gaza reached 39,580 on Sunday, the territory’s health authorities said. Not all the dead have been identified, but civilians make up a majority of the 25,000 who have been named. Thousands more are believed to be buried under the rubble of buildings destroyed in Israeli attacks and tens of thousands have been injured.