Tel Aviv’s night sky turned into a battlefield as a powerful Iranian missile barrage triggered a chain of explosions over Israel’s commercial capital, rattling buildings and nerves from the beachfront to the suburbs, defence officials say.

Just after 11:45 p.m., air‑raid sirens wailed across the Gush Dan region as Israeli radar picked up multiple launches from western Iran. Within seconds, Iron Dome and David’s Sling batteries were firing in rapid succession, streaks of white exhaust and orange fireballs criss‑crossing above the city as interceptors slammed into incoming ballistic and cruise missiles.

Residents sheltering in stairwells filmed dramatic scenes: mid‑air detonations lighting up clouds, shockwaves thudding through high‑rises, and burning fragments cascading onto streets and rooftops. In several neighbourhoods, debris punched holes in roofs, torched parked cars and shattered shopfronts. Magen David Adom reports dozens of people treated for shrapnel wounds, burns and shock; no official death toll has yet been released.

The Israel Defense Forces say “the vast majority” of missiles were intercepted outside dense urban areas but concede a small number of warheads or large fragments reached city limits, striking an industrial zone and a major junction on the Ayalon highway and sparking fires that burned for hours.

In Tehran, the Revolutionary Guard is hailing the barrage as “a calibrated strike” in response to Israeli and US attacks on Iranian soil. In Tel Aviv, the mood is defiant but shaken, with one question echoing from bomb shelters to the war cabinet: if this is only one night’s barrage, what happens when Iran decides to fire everything it has?