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by WILL FOLKS
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The dubiously justified regime change war launched by U.S. president Donald Trump and Israeli president Benjamin Netanyahu against the Islamic Republic of Iran early Saturday has succeeded in taking out its head of government and multiple key leaders.
It has also succeeded in inviting a furious counterattack from the leaders who survived the initial onslaught… proof positive Iran is a classic hydra with a deep bench of militants ready to fight this battle to the bitter end.
According to Trump and Netanyahu – and later tearfully confirmed on Iranian television – the initial wave of American-Israeli strikes killed 86-year-old Grand Ayatollah Ali Hosseini Khamenei, a repressive theocrat who had led the Middle Eastern nation since 1989.
Khamenei was killed in Tehran by an Israeli bomb, Trump said, with intelligence support from the United States.
“He was unable to avoid our Intelligence and highly sophisticated tracking systems and, working closely with Israel, there was not a thing he, or the other leaders that have been killed along with him, could do,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social page.
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In addition to taking out Iran’s supreme leader, Trump and Netanyahu’s war – alternately dubbed “Operation Epic Fury” (U.S.) and “Operation Lion’s Roar” (Israel) – also took out Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) leader Mohammad Pakpour and Iranian defense minister Aziz Nasirzadeh, among other key Iranian leaders.
That prompted Trump to extend a limited time offer for peace.
“Lay down your arms,” Trump told Iran’s military. “You will be treated fairly with total immunity, or you will face certain death.”
While bombs and missiles continued to rain down on Iran, counterattacks lobbed missiles across the Middle East – including multiple missile strikes in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
More than two dozen waves of Iranian missile and drone attacks have been launched at targets in Israel, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait and Iraq since the initiation of hostilities early Saturday morning – many of them inflicting significant damage.
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Smoke is seen rising over Jerusalem after a reported Iranian ballistic missile impact. pic.twitter.com/mbiC0YCOwQ
— AMK Mapping ?? (@AMK_Mapping_) March 1, 2026
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On Sunday morning, an Iranian missile detonated at a public shelter/synagogue in Beit Shemesh, a city located just west of Jerusalem. The death toll from that detonation was not immediately available, but Israeli officials reported the declaration of a “mass casualty event” in response.
Iran has claimed more than 200 people were killed in the initial round of American-Israeli strikes – including an estimated 150 people (many of them children) who were killed at a primary school for girls in Minab, a city located just north of the strategic Strait of Hormuz (one of the world’s most critical shipping chokepoints).
American officials have not specifically commented on the explosion at the school except to say they were “aware of reports concerning civilian harm resulting from ongoing military operations.”
“We take these reports seriously and are looking into them,” a military spokesman said.
As for Trump, he claimed Iran was on its heels following the first day of the war.
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RELATED | TRUMP, ISRAEL LAUNCH WAR ON IRAN
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“The country has been, in only one day, very much destroyed and, even, obliterated,” Trump insisted on Truth Social. “The heavy and pinpoint bombing, however, will continue, uninterrupted throughout the week or, as long as necessary to achieve our objective.”
What is that objective?
“Peace throughout the Middle East, and, indeed the world!” Trump claimed.
Once again, keep it tuned to FITSNews as we keep tabs on the latest developments in America’s latest military entanglement in the Middle East…
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR…
Will Folks is the founding editor of the news outlet you are currently reading. Prior to founding FITSNews, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and eight children.
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6 comments
Trump parties at Mar-A-Lago while American troops are being killed.
Don’t worry Donald, the Epstein saga will still be hanging around your neck when you are done playing war.
Rest In Peace, Ayatollah Khamenei.
Rest In Peace Ayatollah Khamenei.
Rest in pieces Ayatollah satan
Operation Epstein Distraction is underway.
“Our president will start a war with Iran because he has absolutely no ability to negotiate. He’s weak, and he’s ineffective. So the only way he figures that he’s going to get re-elected, and as sure as you’re sitting there, is to start a war with Iran.” Donald J. Trump, 2011
Is now a fair time to point out that at no time in the history of the United States has a member of the Trump family served in the armed forces of this nation. How about pointing out that Trump called our war dead losers and suckers? I think it is. Draft Baron!!