Israel’s strike plan triggered US attack on Iran: Rubio

Planned Israeli action against Iran that would have seen retaliation against American forces prompted the United States to launch its weekend strikes against Tehran, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Monday.

“We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action, we knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties,” Rubio told reporters.

On Saturday, Israel’s defense minister Israel Katz described its missile attack against Iran as pre-emptive.

Iran has said the US assault was unprovoked, occurring as Tehran and Washington were in negotiations on a nuclear accord.

US President Donald Trump has said the US faced an imminent threat from Iran that justified war, although he gave no specifics and some US lawmakers said he has shown no evidence to back that assessment.

“The United States would not deliberately target a school. Our objectives are missiles, both the ability to manufacture them and the ability to launch them,” Rubio told reporters, while adding that the Pentagon was investigating the alleged incident.

He voiced support for toppling Iran’s Islamic authorities but said it was not the objective of the US and Israeli war against Tehran.

“We hope that the Iranian people can overthrow this government and establish a new future for that country. We would love for that to be possible,” Rubio told reporters.

“But the objective of this mission is the destruction of their ballistic missile capabilities and of their naval capabilities,” he said.

Trump also spoke to CNN on Monday, flagging what he said would be an escalation in the assault on Iran. “The big wave hasn’t even happened,” he said. “The big one is coming soon.”