Israel said on Saturday it had killed a senior Iranian commander in a strike on the city of Qom, as its campaign of cross-border air raids intensified and diplomacy over Iran’s nuclear program stalled.
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz announced that Saeed Izadi, head of the Quds Force’s Palestine Department, was killed in the strike, accusing him for helping Hamas plan its October 7, 2023, calling his killing “a major achievement for the Israeli intelligence and for the Air Force.”
🔴ELIMINATED: Saeed Izadi, a founder of the Iranian regime’s plan to destroy Israel, was eliminated in a precise IDF strike in the area of Qom.
Izadi was also the commander of the Palestine Corps of the Quds Force, a key coordinator between the Iranian regime and Hamas, and… pic.twitter.com/ICPna4O4no
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) June 21, 2025
Iranian media confirmed that Israel had carried out strikes in Qom but did not immediately identify Izadi among the dead. Local reports said a 16-year-old was killed and two people were wounded.
Earlier, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards confirmed five members had been killed in Israeli strikes on the city of Khorramabad, though their names were not released.
According to Nournews, a media outlet affiliated with Iran’s top security body, Israeli strikes since June 13 have killed at least 430 people and injured more than 3,500 across the country.
An injured girl is treated in a hospital, amid the Iran-Israel conflict, in Tehran, Iran, June 21, 2025. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
Israeli officials say 24 civilians have been killed by Iranian missile attacks in the same period.
People spend time by the beach of the Mediterranean, amid the Iran-Israel conflict, in Tel Aviv, Israel June 21, 2025. REUTERS/Violeta Santos Moura
A migrant family from the Philippines prepares to spend the night in an old nuclear shelter under Tel Aviv’s central bus station in the southern area of the city, recommissioned by Israeli volunteers Brothers and Sisters in Arms, amid the Iran-Israel conflict, in Tel Aviv, Israel, June 20, 2025. REUTERS/Violeta Santos Moura
Iran Rules Out Nuclear Talks Amid Strikes
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi stated that Israel’s aggression—allegedly with signs of U.S. involvement—must cease for Iran to “come back to diplomacy.”
“It is obvious that I can’t go to negotiations with the U.S. when our people are under bombardments under the support of the U.S.,” he told reporters in Istanbul, where he was attending a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).
An injured woman is treated in a hospital, amid the Iran-Israel conflict, in Tehran, Iran, June 21, 2025. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS – THIS PICTURE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY
On Friday in Geneva, Araqchi met with European foreign ministers who were exploring a return to diplomatic dialogue.
President Donald Trump said he would take up to two weeks to decide whether the United States should join the conflict on Israel’s side—enough time, he noted, “to see whether or not people come to their senses.”
