Celebrations in Tehran – but fleeing residents tell different story
State television showed jubilant scenes in several cities, with crowds chanting ‘Death to Israel’
Iranian media yesterday broadcast revolutionary songs alongside footage of people celebrating its “revenge” drone and missile strikes on Israel.
State television aired celebratory scenes in several cities, showing crowds – and even Iranian MPS gathered in the parliamentary chamber – chanting “Death to Israel”.
“I’m very, very happy,” said one man on a state broadcast. “I’m proud of being an Iranian.”
Another said: “I was counting down for it.”
However, ordinary Iranians who spoke to The Telegraph painted a very different picture amid fears of how Israel will respond.
Footage obtained by The Telegraph
showed lengthy queues stretching for hundreds of metres outside petrol stations as people rushed to make emergency preparations.
Highways leading out of Tehran were gridlocked with traffic as many began to evacuate.
It was the only way out as the city’s Mehrabad airport was not due to reopen until this morning.
Iranians in the central city of Qom, home to Fordow, the site of an underground uranium enrichment facility located at a former Iranian military base and a potential target for Israeli retaliation, are hunkering down in anticipation of an attack.
“I called my cousins at midnight in Fordow village and told them to leave immediately,” Meysam, from Qom, told The Telegraph.
“We might consider leaving Qom as well. The attack is one concern but the potential nuclear radiation is another matter entirely,” he said.
“People are frightened, and we’re constantly talking with our relatives over the phone, discussing our options.”
“There’s no sleep here,” Ali, a resident of Tehran, said in a telephone interview just after midnight yesterday.
“Even my child knows what’s happening. We’re packing up to flee Tehran for my parents’ place 200km away.”
“People are terrified,” he added. “The authorities took a huge gamble. It’s like a suicide. It might be their downfall, but the public will suffer the most.”
Iran’s decision to strike Israel directly could lead to “military confrontations on multiple fronts”, said António Guterres, secretary-general of the United Nations, and significantly destabilise the Middle East.
Already the region is under stress as Israel’s war with Hamas hit more than six months of brutal fighting a week ago, which had prompted earlier warnings from the UK and other nations that Iran must not react.
Hossein Salami, commander-inchief of the Islamic Revolutionary
‘The attack is one concern but the potential nuclear radiation is another matter entirely’
Guard Corps, claimed that the strikes were “even more successful than anticipated”, despite being “deliberately constrained, matching the scale of aggression exhibited by the Zionist regime”.
Iran has not provided concrete evidence to support this, though such words suggest that the regime still has firepower to escalate – one of the many ways Tehran is threatening Israel and its allies not to engage further.
Meanwhile Tawab, a farmer startled awake by the Iranian attack against Israel, said he had been preparing for this conflict for some time.
“I’ve been stockpiling canned food in anticipation of potential retaliation for years now, but I never imagined they would be stupid enough to do it.
“We don’t know what to do now and where to go,” he said."israel will not just sit and watch. War is just a few steps away from us.”