SEAToday.com, Jerussalem-On early Sunday (4/14), booms and air raid sirens sounded across Israel, after Iran launched hundreds of drones, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles toward Israel. As reported by AP, the attack marked the first time Iran has launched a direct military assault on Israel, despite decades of enmity dating back to the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The Israeli military’s spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said the vast majority of the attacks were intercepted outside Israel’s borders. A handful of missiles managed to land in Israel. Rescuers said one strike critically wounded a 10-year-old girl in a Bedouin Arab town in southern Israel, while Hagari said another missile struck an army base, causing light damage but no injuries.

“A wide-scale attack by Iran is a major escalation,” Hagari said. Asked whether Israel would respond, Hagari said only that the army “does and will do whatever is required to protect the security of the state of Israel.”

Iran had vowed revenge since April 1, when an airstrike in Syria killed two Iranian generals inside an Iranian consular building. Iran accused Israel of being behind the attack. Israel hasn’t commented on it.

In a statement carried late Saturday by Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency, the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard acknowledged launching “dozens of drones and missiles towards the occupied territories and positions of the Zionist regime.”

IRNA also quoted an anonymous official saying ballistic missiles were part of the attack. A ballistic missile moves on an arch trajectory, heading up into space before gravity brings the weapon down at a speed several times faster than the speed of sound.

Israel’s army ordered residents in the Golan Heights — near the Syrian and Lebanese borders — as well as the southern towns of Nevatim and Dimona and the Red Sea resort of Eilat “to stay near protective spaces until further notice.” Dimona is home to Israel’s main nuclear facility, and Nevatim has a major air base.

The army’s Home Front Command canceled school Sunday and limited public gatherings to no more than 1,000 people. Israel and some other countries in the region closed their airspace.