Because Ferdowsi Street is a dense, high-traffic commercial area, the choice of target required extensive collateral damage estimation mapping, ensuring the precise warhead would collapse the structure into its own footprint.
By Hezy Laing
On March 2, 2026, in the midst of the Rising Lion operation, the streets of Tehran became a fiery battleground.
A dramatic video from a car camera, which has been circulating on social media in recent days, documented the exact moment when an airstrike hit the heart of the Iranian capital.
The footage, which is about 21 seconds long, shows a powerful explosion hitting a building on Ferdowsi Street, the target of which was a building belonging to the Revolutionary Guards.
The precise weapon used in the precision airstrike on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps facility on Ferdowsi Street has not been officially confirmed by military commanders, but defense analysts state that the strike was almost certainly executed using advanced Air-Launched Ballistic Missiles.
The primary munitions utilized by the Israeli Air Force to penetrate the dense urban air defenses of Tehran are the Rocks and the Rampage.
Both missile systems operate at supersonic velocities, giving the localized air defense networks virtually zero reaction time to intercept them.
Furthermore, these standoff weapons are released from fighter jets hundreds of kilometers away from the target zone, allowing the aircraft to remain safely outside the envelope of Iranian surface-to-air missile systems.
The dashcam footage from Ferdowsi Street perfectly demonstrates the pinpoint GPS and optical guidance package of these weapons, which achieved a direct hit on a singular, high-value building in a tightly packed city center without demolishing the entire civilian block.
The Rocks missile is specifically engineered with a heavy penetration warhead designed to destroy heavily fortified structures above or below ground.
The striking of a highly specific target on a street otherwise known for currency exchanges and civilian commerce comes down to a coordinated intelligence protocol.
During these operations, target selection was heavily dictated by the IDF Intelligence Directorate, which identified the building as an active operational hub housing IRGC assets, situational planning rooms, or logistics units managing the regime’s regional missile operations.
Signals and human intelligence allowed tracking agencies to map exactly which buildings were drawing highly encrypted communications or hosting high-ranking commanders.
Because Ferdowsi Street is a dense, high-traffic commercial area, the choice of target required extensive collateral damage estimation mapping, ensuring the precise warhead would collapse the structure into its own footprint.
