Shafaq News/ Iranian authorities have confirmed the deaths of several senior military officials, prominent nuclear scientists, and civilians following Israel’s airstrikes on Iranian territory under Operation Rising Lion.

Among those confirmed killed are Major General Amir Ali Hajizadeh, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Aerospace Force, Major General Hossein Salami, Commander-in-Chief of the IRGC, Major General Mohammad Bagheri, Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, Major General Gholam Ali Rashid, Commander of the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters.

Brigadier General Gholam Reza Mehrabi, Head of Intelligence Affairs at the General Staff, and Brigadier General Mehdi Rabani, Chief of Operations, were also killed later.

From the scientific community, the fatalities include Fereydoon Abbasi, former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi, President of Azad University, Ahmad Reza Zoulfaghari, nuclear engineering professor.

Additional nuclear scientists were also killed in the Israeli strikes. They include: Dr. Abdolhamid Minouchehr, head of the Faculty of Nuclear Engineering at Shahid Beheshti University, Dr. Amir Hossein Faghihi, deputy head of the Atomic Energy Organization and head of the Institute of Nuclear Sciences, Motalibi Zadeh, a researcher affiliated with Iran’s nuclear program.

Iran has not yet released the full casualty count, but confirmed that civilians, including women and children, were also killed in the strikes, which hit not only military facilities but also residential blocks.

The attacks, which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described as a “historic” and “strategic shift,” targeted nuclear sites and command centers across Tehran, Isfahan, and Tabriz. Israel claims the operation was designed to “eliminate Iran’s ability to produce missiles and prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons.