Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on Friday night summoned the Supreme National Council to an emergency meeting at his home after learning that Israel had targeted his closest ally, Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, in an airstrike in Lebanon, according to three Iranian officials with knowledge of the meeting, The New York Times reports.

 

The Israeli military on Friday destroyed several residential buildings in the attack, Israeli and American officials said. It was not immediately clear whether Mr. Nasrallah was in one of the buildings when they were hit.

 

But the initial assessment of Israeli intelligence agencies was that Mr. Nasrallah had been killed, officials said. But they cautioned that assessment was preliminary and might yet change.

 

It was the first time that Mr. Khamenei had convened the Supreme National Council, the group that responds to national security threats, domestic and international, and shapes foreign and national policy, for an emergency meeting since July 31, when Israel assassinated a top Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran.

 

The meeting came as Masoud Pezeshkian, the Iranian president, and the foreign ministry issued statements strongly condemning Israel’s attack, calling it “an undeniable war crime,” without naming Mr. Nasrallah.

 

“Iran will follow up on the Zionist’s latest crime and stand by the people of Lebanon and the resistance,” Mr. Pezeshkian said in a statement.