It's our second day in Tehran - a city under sustained aerial assault. Anti-aircraft fire echoes daily; missile thuds shake neighborhoods. Police stations and checkpoints are repeated targets.
Yet after two weeks, residents barely flinch. In bazaars ahead of Nowruz, shoppers speak quietly of fear - not just of bombs, but of uncertainty: last night’s near-miss strike, hospitals hit, no end in sight.
The government projects control. Banners of Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei and his late father line every highway. But Khamenei has not appeared publicly since assuming leadership.
Deputy Foreign Minister Saeed Khatibzadeh confirmed he is 'in charge' - delivering a defiant message: the war lacks legal mandate, and US boots on Iranian soil would be 'reckless' - echoing Vietnam as a cautionary precedent.
Entire buildings lie flattened. One elderly man survived a mid-afternoon strike next door - his wife and daughter hospitalized with shrapnel wounds and fractures. They left quickly: multiple hospitals have been struck. Now they live amid rubble - and dread.