On the 3rd (local time), people watch as the Assembly of Experts headquarters building in the religious city of Qom, Iran, collapses after U.S. and Israeli airstrikes. Reuters/Yonhap

The Washington Post (WP) and other outlets reported that the headquarters of the Assembly of Experts, the constitutional body that elects the supreme leader of Iran, collapsed on the 3rd (local time) after U.S. and Israeli airstrikes.

The Israeli military stated that its air force fighter jets “attacked a building in (Iran) where a meeting was scheduled to convene” and said it was “still assessing the results of the strike.”

Israeli military spokesperson Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani explained the background of the airstrikes, saying, “The meeting in question was to select the leader who would lead Iran, which is a key part of how Iran directs its war machine against us and conducts operations in an organized manner,” adding, “This is to prevent the Iran war machine from becoming an effective war machine.”

The Assembly of Experts is a constitutional body composed of 88 clerics who serve eight-year terms. It is selecting a successor to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, who was killed by U.S. and Israeli airstrikes on the 28th of last month. The headquarters of the Assembly of Experts is in the central Iranian religious city of Qom, and it has not been confirmed whether a meeting was underway there at the time of the bombing.

On the fourth day of armed clashes, the United States and Israel continued a large-scale offensive in multiple areas, including the capital Tehran. According to local media such as Mehr News Agency, airstrikes were also carried out at Mehrabad International Airport in Tehran. Local outlets published photos showing the airport with smoke billowing after the bombardment. Local media reported that aircraft parked at Bushehr Airport in the south were also damaged by the airstrikes.