JERUSALEM, April 5 (Xinhua) -- Israel continued to prepare itself on Friday for potential retaliation following the strike on the Iranian consulate building in Syria's capital earlier in the week.

An anonymous Israeli diplomatic official confirmed to Xinhua on Friday that about 30 Israeli embassies globally have been temporarily shut down, for a possible attack abroad. The official did not elaborate on which embassies were closed or when will they be reopened.

Israel was also scrambling GPS signals in central Israel and Jerusalem to disrupt possible missile and drone attacks. Residents in Tel Aviv, Israel's financial and cultural hub, found that map applications on their mobile phones placed them in Beirut, Lebanon. Taxi drivers struggled to navigate around the city and food-delivery apps were temporarily out of service. The GPS disruptions in central Israel are rare.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at the security cabinet meeting late on Thursday that "we will know how to defend ourselves and we will act according to the simple principle of whoever harms us or plans to harm us, we will harm them."

An Israeli airstrike on Tuesday targeted the Iranian embassy compound in Damascus. Seven members of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) were killed, including Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a senior commander in the al-Quds force, his deputy and five military advisers.

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei vowed retaliation. Israel will be "punished by the hands of our brave men. We will make it regret this crime and others it has committed," he said.

A day later, the Israeli military began increasing its manpower by drafting reserve soldiers to bolster its Aerial Defense Array. The move was made following a situational assessment, the military said in a statement.

On Thursday, the army announced that it had temporarily paused leave for all soldiers in combat units. "The IDF (Israel Defense Forces) is at war, and the deployment of forces is under continuous assessment according to requirements," read a military statement.

Israel has not assumed responsibility for the strike, yet analysts perceive it as an escalation of the Israeli actions against Iran and its allied groups in the region, raising concerns about sparking a broader conflict in the Middle East extending beyond the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict in Gaza. Enditem

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