Greg Myrie

Greg Myrie, NPR News, Washington.

Israel's military says it launched this new wave of large-scale attacks.

And we've heard these explosions ringing out in Tehran.

Israel says the goal is to establish air superiority.

And really one of the most striking elements in this U.S.-Israel bombing campaign, both last June and again this time, has been how quickly they've crippled Iran's air defenses.

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Hi, Mary Louise.

Yeah, I mean, I think that's the real distinctive thing here.

And they're always looking, the Israelis, when they do this, always looking for a way to catch people off guard.

And it seems that Saturday is the first day of the work week in Iran.

So, in effect, it was a Monday morning there.

And so instead of doing this at night like they might normally do, they did it on the equivalent of a Monday morning.

There's a crisis going on in Iran.

You might expect them to meet, and perhaps they got lucky that they were all having these separate sets of meetings when they attacked.

And Daniel knows this better than I, but we've both been in Israel when the Israelis have carried out airstrikes in a place like Gaza.

And it might take days, weeks even, before they can actually confirm the death of

of certain individuals that they're targeting.

So the fact that they've been able, apparently in the Israeli minds, to think they have a positive confirmation that the Supreme Leader and other senior leaders have been killed is quite extraordinary as well, to know that they were successful this quickly.

Who's next?

We don't know.