[grafmax]

Israel wants a regime change, that is clear. However it’s absurd to suggest the Israeli government has benevolent intentions toward the Iranian people considering that it is bombing people living in residential areas (never mind the Israeli defense minister’s comments that the Tehran residents will pay for Iran’s counterattack on Israel).

[warbaker]

"Israel's defense minister warned Saturday that "Tehran will burn" if Iran continues firing missiles at Israel." https://www.cbsnews.com/news/iran-israel-retaliatory-strikes...

Don't get me wrong, Katz is a douchebag, but this was specifically a threat to retaliate in-kind of Iran continued to target arbitrary Israeli population centers.

I haven't seen any evidence of Israel targeting civilians (nuclear scientists aside), despite having complete air supremacy over Tehran. Air supremacy means Israel could carpet bomb the city if they wanted, but they don't want this. Not only would it be a horrible thing to do and of no military value, they simply don't blame the people of Iran for the IRGC's actions.

[grafmax]

> Not only would it be a horrible thing to do and of no military value, they simply don't blame the people of Iran for the IRGC's actions.

So then it’s remarkable that it’s nevertheless occurring.

I posted this elsewhere ITT but the parent comment is now flagged so it may be difficult to find. I post it below.

> Shock, fear in Tehran after Israel bombs residential, military areas

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/6/13/shock-fear-in-tehra...

> Today, Iran is once again under heavy bombardment with Israeli air strikes targeting residential areas, civilian buildings, hospitals, media offices and military sites.

https://apnews.com/article/israel-iran-mideast-war-news-06-1...

> Health authorities also reported that 1,277 were wounded, without distinguishing between military officials and civilians.

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-attack-iran-civili...

There are countless reports of this nature.

[warbaker]

"without distinguishing between military officials and civilians"

Israel has air supremacy over Tehran. The facts don't support your narrative that Israel is flattening Tehran.

[grafmax]

“Flattening” implies damage more widespread than I have described. My statement, sourced from numerous credible news organizations, which I have linked, is that Israel has attacked residential areas. As for Israel’s air superiority over Tehran (also an established fact as far as I can tell) I have no idea how you think that is supposed to be a rebuttal of anything I’ve said.

[bawolff]

I think you could reasonably say that there is credible information that Israel has attacked targets that are near or in residential areas (at the very least they seem to have done targeted assinations of high level military officials in their homes).

However that's different than saying they are targeting residential areas themselves. That's the part that i think the other poster is objecting to. Air supperiority matters here because it means Israel has the ability to target basically anything they want (so you could assume things not targeted are by choice and not lack of ability).

If total wounded (not even killed, just wounded) of both millitary and civilians is ~1200, that kind of suggests that Israel is not targeting residential buildings in general, since just a few apartment building would likely have more casualties than that.

Not to say this is iron clad reasoning. Maybe Iran is downplaying casualties for propaganda purposes (otoh i think they would be splashing photos of destroyed residential buildings everywhere if Israel was destroying them in general, as that makes for great PR). I don't really know, but there is enough doubt here that I don't think its confirmed Israel is targeting residential areas in general.

[grafmax]

Israel government justified its genocide of Gaza with its supposedly targeted strikes of Hamas. This narrative has lost all credibility. And we have seen with Gaza what effect “PR” has on stopping the atrocities committed there - none.

The Israeli government views non combatants affected as expendable targets with zero value. This is what we are seeing with the strikes on residential areas. It’s not that they are “flattening” Tehran in the initial stages of war, but that Israel military policy so disregards the lives of non combatants that attacks on residential areas are justified in its view.

Thus, the notion that the Iranian people are supposed to unite with the Israeli government to overthrow the “common enemy” (the Iranian government) is absurd; the Israeli war machine should be viewed as having zero regard for the Iranian people; they are expendable as long as Israeli military objectives are furthered; that is an established pattern now and that is what is evidenced by the strikes against residential areas considered against the backdrop of the atrocities in Gaza.