Thanks for sticking with us for our live coverage of the unfolding situation between Israel and Iran.

Tensions remain high between the two Middle Eastern nations, with both countries having reported various casualties as a result of waves of air strikes in major cities and other areas.

We'll be back bright and early on Sunday to continue reporting the latest information as it becomes available to us.

Until then, you can stay across more of our reporting via the ABC News website and mobile app.

Until next time!

In addition to the more than 20 Iranian commanders that the IDF reported were killed in Israeli air strikes, Iranian state media has now reported that a police chief and another officer were killed in a separate drone strike.

That strike hit about 300 kilometres west of Tehran, according to the ISNA press agency.

"This morning police chief Major Habibollah Akbarian, along with second lieutenant Amir Hossein Seifi, were martyred by a drone strike in Asadabad city in the western province of Hamedan," the agency said.

Reporting with AFP

Amid fears of being caught up in a nasty regional conflict, the Iraqi government has asked Iran not to strike sites linked to the United States that exist on Iraqi soil, according to an official in Baghdad.

The government in Baghdad is a close ally of Tehran but also a strategic partner of the US — Iran's arch-foe — which has some 2,500 troops in Iraq as part of an anti-jihadist coalition.

"The request was made. They promised us positive things," the Iraqi official told AFP, requesting anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

The official also said that Tehran has shown understanding with regards to Baghdad's request.

The comments come after several pro-Iran groups in Iraq called for an acceleration of the departure of US forces from the country, with the powerful Kataeb Hezbollah warning of "additional wars in the region".

Reporting with AFP

  As part of its latest operational update, the Israel Defense Forces is now saying that it has killed more than 20 senior Iranian commanders in strategic strikes.

According to the Israeli military's latest post on X, Iran's top intelligence officer Gholam-Reza Marhabi, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' missile chief Mohammad Bagheri and the Corps' head of the Air Force Amir Ali Hajizadeh were all "eliminated".

Iran's Tasnim news agency has also confirmed the deaths of those two Revolutionary Guards.

"Following the brutal attack by the Zionist regime on the Zarandiyeh Basij base, two members of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were martyred," the news agency said.

Some imagery is starting to come through to us of smoke plumes rising about Iran's Abadan oil refinery, which is located near to the country's far south-western border with Iraq.

It comes several hours after the Iranian Mehr News Agency reported that fresh Israeli air strikes hit near to the country's north-western Tabriz refinery — some 16 hours north of Abadan.

This latest vision published by the Reuters news agency appears to have been shot from the window of a moving vehicle and shows dark smoke clouds rising in between the refinery's oil towers.

Despite that, there are still towers emitting flames in a suggestion that operations at the refinery haven't been disrupted.

Israel’s military says it has launched a fresh wave of attacks on multiple sites across Iran, declaring it has cleared an aerial path to Tehran by destroying Iran’s aerial defence capabilities. 

“The road to Tehran is open,” an Israeli military official said in a briefing with journalists. 

The IDF didn’t give any further details about the current strikes, but there are reports on Iranian state media that industrial facilities have been targeted. 

The IDF says its ongoing attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities, scientists, weaponry and military personnel show Israel has established aerial superiority from West Iran to Tehran.

As we mentioned a short time ago, the Israel Defense Forces were providing an update on its aerial offensive against Iran.

The IDF's Arabic language spokesperson Avichay Adraee has just posted some more information on X about Israel's overnight air strikes.

He says that the latest wave of attacks involved "more than 70 warplanes, targeting over 40 military objectives in Tehran, including missiles and advanced air defense systems, alongside other military infrastructure."

This comes after earlier claims from the IDF that two of Iran's key nuclear facilities were significantly damaged in those strikes.

The military also said it had killed at least nine senior Iranian nuclear programme scientists and researchers in the attack.

Iran's top diplomat has provided more of an insight into the likelihood of any potential nuclear programme negotiations between his country and the United States, in light of the waves of air strikes seen over the past day.

The main takeaway is negotiations are unlikely to happen soon.

Iranian state media reported that the country's Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi has declared Iran-US nuclear talks are unjustifiable while Israel continues its aerial offensive.

Those comments come just hours after Iran's foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei also said the dialogue with the US is "meaningless".

Reporting with Reuters

To the north of Iran, dozens of foreign nationals — mostly Russians — spent Saturday arriving and crossing the Astara checkpoint into Azerbaijan.

That was because Baku temporarily reopened the country's border with northern Iran, in a bid to allow people to escape the impacts of Israeli air strikes.

The first group of evacuees listed 86 people, including two children, according to the Russian Foreign ministry .

The ministry also posted in its telegram channel a video of a coach arriving at the checkpoint and a photograph showing passengers on board.

The first group of evacuees included the Russian Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra and film crew headed by renowned actor and director Fyodor Bondarchuk as well as citizens from Belarus, Serbia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, the foreign ministry said.

Among those evacuated via Astara were six citizens of Kazakhstan, the Kazakhstani and Azerbaijani news outlets reported.

Reporting with Reuters

Egypt's top diplomat has offered his reaction to Israel's latest air strike operation in Iran.

The Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty denounced the Israeli strikes, saying he believes they could topple the Middle East into "chaos"

He also labelled the strikes as a "serious escalation" that could spark “a state of instability".

Those comments were made during phone calls involving Abdelatty's Italian and Spanish counterparts, according to the Egyptian foreign ministry.