Iraqi Jets Raid 2nd-Largest Iranian City

Iraqi warplanes attacked Esfahan, Iran’s second-largest city, Sunday in their deepest air raid into Iran since the two countries shattered a truce banning attacks on civilian areas six days ago, Iran reported.

The warplanes hit two areas of Esfahan, about 250 miles inside Iran, with rockets shortly after noon, wounding at least 15 people, Iran’s official news agency said. According to Tehran radio, Esfahan was one of eight Iranian towns bombed by Iraqi warplanes or hit by long-range missiles Sunday.

The Tehran government said that more than 130 people were killed in the raids, most of them in a missile attack on the town of Andimeshk, about 50 miles from the Iraqi border and near the city of Dezful, which was itself hit by missiles twice last week. There was no independent confirmation of the Iranian report on casualties.

Tehran radio said that two Iraqi aircraft were intercepted over western Iran and that one of them was shot down.

In Baghdad, an Iraqi military communique confirmed the attack on Esfahan, adding that the Iranian city of Tabriz in northwest Azerbaijan province was also attacked. The sparse communique gave no details as to the number of planes involved or casualties on the Iraqi side. It also made no mention of the reported attacks on six other Iranian cities.

Diplomats in the Iraqi capital noted that the raid on Esfahan was not militarily significant in itself. However, one diplomat said, “Now that Esfahan has been bombed, Iran may now feel obliged, after promising blow-for-blow (retaliation), to strike deeper into Iraq, and this in turn could lead to bombing of the two capitals, Tehran and Baghdad.”

The Baghdad communique said Iran resumed shelling of the southern Iraqi port of Basra and also bombarded the central border town of Khanaqin, but it made no mention of casualties.

In Basra, Reuters correspondent Tod Robberson confirmed the continued Iranian artillery fire Sunday. Robberson reported that a number of residents were killed there during the last few days but that exact figures were not available.

Iran’s news agency said the city of Abadan, a bustling oil refinery center before the war, was bombed three times Sunday by Iraqi planes and that many buildings were destroyed and fires started.

Tehran also said its planes launched two raids into Iraq on Sunday in response to Iraqi attacks on Iranian towns Saturday.

The latest Iraqi strikes followed a statement Saturday by Iran’s supreme leader, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, that the attacks would not affect the country’s will to continue the 4 1/2-year-old war.

Even as they dragged their children from the rubble, Iranian mothers and fathers shouted, “War, war till victory!” Khomeini said, according to Tehran radio.

Despite Khomeini’s comments, the renewed Iraqi attacks have touched off a wave of fear on the southern Iranian war front.

In telephone interviews, residents of towns and cities within range of Iraq’s attacks say many people have been packing up their most precious belongings and heading for fields or outlying villages to wait out the next Iraqi raid.