Israel’s defence minister warned that his country’s response to Iran’s ballistic missile attack last week will be “lethal” and “surprising”.

Yoav Gallant’s comments came as Joe Biden and Kamala Harris held crunch talks with Benjamin Netanyahu over plans to retaliate.

A White House readout of the call did not mention the US’s involvement in Israel’s retaliation, but said Mr Biden had “condemned unequivocally” Iran’s attack on Oct 1.

Mr Gallant said Iran’s attack was “aggressive but imprecise, on the other hand – our attack will be deadly, precise and above all surprising”. Tehran will not understand “what happened and how it happened, they will see the results”, he added.

Blind-sided

Mr Biden and Mr Netanyahu’s call was their first in six weeks, amid reports that the White House has become increasingly frustrated at being blind-sided by Israel’s military operations against the Iran-backed Hezbollah.

The White House said Mr Biden had “affirmed Israel’s right to protect its citizens from Hezbollah” but stressed “the need to minimise harm to civilians, in particular in the densely populated areas of Beirut”.

He also pressed the need for a “diplomatic arrangement to safely return both Lebanese and Israeli civilians to their homes”.

Washington has been continuing to push Mr Netanyahu to limit his reprisals to avoid a further slide towards war in the Middle East.

Mr Biden said last week that he expected to speak to Mr Netanyahu once he had decided on his response.