After President Trump harshly criticized Israel and Iran on Tuesday for mounting attacks after his announcement that a cease-fire deal had been reached, both countries denied having violated the truce and pushed back with their own timelines of events.
The absence of details surrounding the truce deal added to the confusion about the sequence of the strikes and counter-strikes that took place in the hours after the initial announcement. Mr. Trump did not publicly specify a start time when he announced the truce, for example. There are also time differences involved. Iranian time is half an hour ahead of Israeli time, which is seven hours ahead of Eastern Daylight Time.
Yet despite the discordant Iranian and Israeli claims about timelines, the mutual denials of violations strongly suggested that each side wanted the cease-fire to hold.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said on Tuesday afternoon that the cease-fire had been set to take effect at 7 a.m. Israel time. Four hours earlier, at 3 a.m., Israel attacked targets “in the heart of Tehran,” his office said in a statement, adding that shortly before the truce came into effect Iran fired a barrage of missiles at Israel.
One hit an apartment building in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba, killing four people.
At 7:06 a.m. in Israel, Iran fired another missile, and then two more at 10:25 a.m., according to Israel. Mr. Netanyahu’s office said those missiles were intercepted or fell in open areas.
In response, Mr. Netanyahu’s office said, Israeli forces destroyed a radar position near Tehran.
By then, Mr. Trump had publicly demanded that Israel not respond, describing the last volley of missiles fired by Iran at northern Israel as “one rocket that didn’t land, that was shot perhaps by mistake.”
Despite earlier threats from the Israeli defense minister and military that Israel would respond forcefully to the missile fire, the actual Israeli response appeared to be limited and symbolic.
“Following a conversation between President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu, Israel refrained from further attacks,” the statement from Mr. Netanyahu’s office said.
Around the same time, Mr. Trump wrote on social media that Israel’s warplanes would “turn around and head home.”
Iran, for its part, said its missile fire came as retaliation for Israel’s pre-dawn bombardment, and only before the cease-fire was meant to start.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps said that in retaliation for “savage” Israeli attacks on Iran overnight, Iran had launched 14 missiles at military and logistical centers in Israel in the “final minutes” before the cease-fire came into effect, according to a statement published on the Telegram channel of Press TV, an Iranian state news channel. The statement made no mention of the firing any missiles after the cease-fire came into force, as Mr. Trump and Israel charged.
In addition, an Iranian military spokesman, Lt. Col. Ebrahim Zolfaqari, said Israel had launched “three waves of attacks” against Iran on Tuesday morning, after the cease-fire was supposed to take effect, with the last ending at 9 a.m. Iranian time, according to a Press TV report citing a report from Defa Press, another Iranian outlet.
Fars, a news agency managed by the Revolutionary Guards, reported that explosions were heard in Babol and Babolsar, Iranian cities to the northeast of Tehran, without providing a time or any other details.
Mr. Trump first announced that Israel and Iran had agreed to a cease-fire deal on Monday evening — around 1:30 a.m. Tuesday in Tehran — and Iran’s state television later announced a cease-fire early on Tuesday morning local time. The Israeli government remained silent until it made its own announcement of a cease-fire at about 9 a.m. Israel time, saying Israel had agreed to the truce.
As he departed Washington on Tuesday morning for a NATO summit in the Netherlands, Mr. Trump fumed about violations of the cease-fire he had heralded, saying that he “didn’t like the fact that Israel unloaded right after we made the deal.”
“They didn’t have to unload,” he said, “and I didn’t like the fact that the retaliation was very strong.”
Mr. Trump also said he was unhappy to learn that Israeli warplanes had headed out to retaliate for the Iranian missile fire hours after the truce came into effect.
“I think they both violated it,” he said. “I don’t think, I’m not sure they did it intentionally. They couldn’t rein people back.”
