TEHRAN -- Iran's Supreme National Security Council confirmed that its secretary Ali Larijani has been killed in an attack, Iran's Tasnim news agency reported early Wednesday.

In a statement, the council said Larijani died early Tuesday alongside his son Morteza Larijani, deputy for security affairs at the council's secretariat Alireza Bayat, and several others, Tasnim reported.

The council praised Larijani's long service to Iran's development and called for national unity in the face of external threats.

On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel had killed Larijani in ongoing strikes on Iran.

Meanwhile, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on Tuesday confirmed the death of Gholamreza Soleimani, head of the Basij volunteer force, in a US-Israeli strike.

The deaths came amid heightened regional tensions following joint US-Israeli strikes on Iran starting Feb 28, to which Iran and its regional allies responded with attacks on Israeli and US interests across the Middle East.