The reignited hostilities appear to have dashed hopes of a quick return to negotiations between the foes.

US President Donald Trump had vowed to hit Iran “hard” after Tehran launched missiles at Jordan, its first regional strike in days.

American forces “successfully completed a heavy wave of strikes against Iran”, and struck dozens of Islamic Revolutionary Guard targets including military command centres, US Central Command (Centocom) said.

“The strikes aimed to further diminish threats posed by Iran and its proxies to American forces, commercial shipping, and neighboring Gulf countries,” it said.

Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported hits on several cities in the southwestern Khuzestan province, as well as on Qeshm island in the Gulf.

Areas around the cities of Abadan, Shadegan, Arvandkenar and Ahvaz — all in Khuzestan — were struck, the agency said, citing provincial authorities.

The attack on Qeshm island killed three people, including a two-year-old, the Fars news agency reported on Thursday.

“A US attack on a residential home in the Chah Tangu neighbourhood of Qeshm killed three members of a family: the father, the mother, and their 2-year-old child,” Fars reported citing the Hormozgan University of Medical Sciences, adding that two other children were injured.

In a sign of the war’s spread, Saudi Arabia and the United States announced strikes on Wednesday on militant bases in Iraq, while US ally Israel accused Hezbollah of a truce violation.

The world’s biggest oil exporter Saudi Arabia has reported two days of drone attacks targeting crude facilities that it blames on Iraqi armed groups allied with Tehran.

Meanwhile, Jordan’s army said on Thursday it had intercepted five Iranian missiles, after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) said it had targeted US bases there.

“As long as the threats against the Islamic Republic of Iran continue … the resistance will continue,” the IRGC said.

On another front, Israel accused Hezbollah of deploying a drone overnight against an Israeli vehicle inside Lebanon, in what the military called “a blatant violation of the ceasefire”.

Israel fought alongside the United States in the first weeks of the war against Iran, while battling Hezbollah in Lebanon, but it has yet to join the latest round of strikes against the Islamic republic.

‘Dangerous’

In Iraq, the joint US-Saudi air operation followed attacks by what Riyadh called “terrorist militias loyal to Iran” on its oil facilities.

The US military said logistics and weapons sites belonging to an Iran-aligned group were targeted in the strikes.

Iraq’s Hashed al-Shaabi alliance said the attacks killed at least 20 of its members. It denounced a “dangerous escalation” against an “official security institution”.

Two Hashed officials said five Iranian advisers were among those killed, and AFP correspondents saw coffins draped with Iranian flags.

Iraq denounced the US-Saudi strikes and said it rejects “all acts of aggression, regardless of the party responsible or the justifications presented”.

The Ministerial Council for National Security said it would “confront any violation of Iraq’s sovereignty, and prevent any source from using Iraqi territory to threaten neighbouring states”.

According to Fox News, however, Trump said the strikes were “coordinated with the Iraqi government”.

The strikes follow growing US pressure on Iraq to disarm pro-Iran groups. Earlier this month, Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi visited both the US and Iran.

Red Sea

The United States had said the days-long cessation in fighting was aimed at kickstarting a new round of negotiations, including over the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has blockaded throughout much of the war.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Wednesday they had attacked and stopped three tankers in the strait, insisting Iran has “full control” of the waterway that was previously free to transit.

Tehran has insisted it will retain control of the crucial conduit for energy shipments, and has also announced plans to collect fees for passage, which Washington opposes.

Crude oil prices slipped on Thursday after a jump the day before.

The US also announced new sanctions targeting entities linked to Iran’s Guards that it accused of extorting ships transiting the strait.

The Iran war began on February 28 when the US and Israel attacked Iran and Tehran responded with its own strikes on Israel and Gulf states that host US bases.

US-Israeli strikes on Iran and Israeli attacks on Lebanon have since killed thousands and displaced millions.

The men were part of the Global Sumud Flotilla intercepted by Israel and detained along with more than 400 other activists, some for days.

The group asked Indonesia’s Attorney General on Wednesday to investigate Israel for offences including piracy at sea and crimes against humanity, lawyer Kafin Muhammad said.

“We are asking the Attorney General of the Republic of Indonesia to conduct an investigation into crimes allegedly committed by Zionist Israel,” he said.

Indonesia’s criminal code gives the country’s courts “universal jurisdiction” over cases that involve crimes committed beyond the country’s borders, he said. The complaint mentioned Netanyahu by name as Israel’s commander-in-chief, Kafin said.

It includes testimony from the volunteers about abuses they claim to have suffered during their detention by Israeli authorities, he said.

A spokesman for the Attorney General’s office did not reply to a request for comment. Israel’s treatment of the flotilla activists sparked an international outcry after an Israeli minister posted a video of the volunteers, who were made to kneel with their hands tied behind their backs.

Countries including France, Italy and Austra­lia have opened judicial investigations.

Israel controls all entry points into Gaza, under blockade since 2007.

Published in Dawn, July 30th, 2026

The combined air operation came as President Donald Trump met with his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington for their first in-person talks since the Middle East war began in late February.

Crude oil prices leapt more than four per cent as the fresh Middle East flare-up revived fears over global supplies usually shipped through the pivotal Strait of Hormuz.

The US military said US and Saudi forces carried out precision strikes against “Iran-aligned terrorists” the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) “directed to attack US forces and Saudi energy infrastructure”.

“US and Saudi fighter aircraft struck multiple terrorist logistics and weapons sites across eastern Iraq in a strong response to over 30 IRGC-directed aerial drone attacks in the last 72 hours,” it said.

“The IRGC and its terrorist proxies must cease these attacks to avoid further US military response,” it added.

Saudi Arabia’s defence ministry said the “terrorist militias loyal to Iran” were linked to attacks on the kingdom’s oil facilities.

A days-long pause in hostilities ended late Tuesday, when US forces reported intercepting missiles launched by Iran at American bases in the Gulf.

‘Full control’

Washington had said the cessation in fighting was aimed at kickstarting a new round of negotiations, including over the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran’s IRGC said on Wednesday it attacked and stopped three tankers in the strait, maintaining it has “full control” of the waterway.

Trump hosted Netanyahu at the White House on Tuesday for closed-door talks that the administration described as “positive and productive”.

The discussions lasted for about an hour and a half and took place while Netanyahu and Trump seek to patch over public disagreements on the war.

Netanyahu said in a video message after the meeting that it was “one of the best conversations I’ve ever had with the president of the United States” and that it touched on “our common goal: ensuring that Iran does not obtain nuclear weapons”.

Trump said only that the pair had a “very good meeting”.

Israel has not taken part in the recent round of hostilities between the United States and Iran, which flared earlier this month as an April ceasefire collapsed.

‘Very good meeting’

Trump and Netanyahu had been expected to discuss the implementation of a US-sponsored framework deal signed by Israel and Lebanon last month, whose application on the ground has been challenging.

The talks were also expected to touch on Gaza, as diplomatic efforts to kick-start the devastated Palestinian territory’s reconstruction are at a standstill.

It was not immediately clear on Wednesday whether the leaders discussed those issues.

“Had a very good meeting!” Trump wrote on social media, alongside photos of himself with Netanyahu in the Oval Office.

“Obviously, many important subjects were discussed.”

Nearly three years after the war between Israel and Hamas broke out, the humanitarian situation in Gaza remains dire, and Israel continues to regularly target people the military says are militants.

Danny Danon, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, said on Tuesday that Netanyahu’s visit came at a “critical time for the Middle East,” with Iran continuing “to choose terrorism over negotiations” and blocking the Strait of Hormuz.

Tankers struck in Hormuz

Control of the Strait of Hormuz remains a hurdle to any peaceful resolution to the Mideast war, and Iran insists on managing the crucial conduit for oil and gas.

Its powerful Revolutionary Guards have been stopping vessels trying to transit the trade route, saying on Wednesday it struck three oil tankers “which ignored our warnings and continued sailing an unsafe and illegal route”.

Tehran said earlier this week that it had held talks with Oman, which also borders the strait, on “common principles and operational mechanisms” to ensure the safe passage of shipping.

In June, Muscat and Tehran said they would discuss imposing service fees in the waterway, a move Washington opposes.

But Oman also angered Iran after saying vessels could transit the Hormuz strait via its waters, with Tehran responding by attacking ships.

The 28-year-old woman was six months pregnant and unconscious when medics collected her from her home in the village of Qaryout, south of the city of Nablus, medic Bashar Qaryouti said.

“She was suffering from very heavy bleeding and her condition was extremely critical,” Qaryouti said.

The woman was placed on oxygen and the ambulance set off for Rafidia hospital in Nablus, but soon found itself desperately searching for an open route, Qaryouti said.

The entrance to one nearby village was closed, forcing the ambulance to take dirt tracks through olive groves before reaching the Awarta checkpoint, where a gate was shut and a long queue of vehicles had formed. Qaryouti drove to the front of the line and activated the ambulance siren.

He said soldiers emerged from a nearby watchtower about 10 minutes later and ordered him to switch off the ambulance. Qaryouti said he explained that the vehicle’s medical equipment was being used to keep a patient alive.

“They forced me, at gunpoint, to switch the vehicle off,” he said, adding that the soldiers confiscated the crew’s identity cards.

‘Rushed into surgery’

As the ambulance remained stranded, the woman’s condition worsened. The nurse accompanying her was forced to deliver the baby inside the vehicle, Qaryouti said.

“The baby was stillborn,” he said.

After waiting for more than 30 minutes, the soldiers returned the crew’s identity cards and allowed the ambulance to continue, according to Qaryouti. When they reached hospital, “the mother was rushed into surgery to stop the bleeding”, Qaryouti said.

Rafidia hospital director Fouad Nafaa said the woman had been “prevented by the Israeli army from reaching the hospital”.

Her bleeding had since been brought under control, and she was now in a stable condition, he said. The Israeli military has launched a “counterterrorism operation” across the occupied West Bank, creating several road closures throughout the territory.

The operation followed a deadly clash on Friday between Israeli settlers and Palestinians in the village of Tell that left two Israelis and four Palestinians dead.

Violence in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since 1967, has surged since the Hamas raids on October 7, 2023.

Published in Dawn, July 28th, 2026

Netanyahu’s security cabinet on Sunday approved the legal framework that would allow the force’s entry to Gaza, the official said. Netanyahu is scheduled to depart for Washington on Monday and is expected to meet Trump on Tuesday.

The official said that the mission, called the International Stabilisation Force (ISF), will include 200 members from “friendly countries such as Uganda and Morocco” deploying in areas that are not under Israeli control. Each contingent requires individual Israeli approval to enter Gaza.

It was unclear when the forces would deploy.

Much of Gaza remains in ruins from two years ​of relentless Israeli bombing triggered by the Hamas-led attacks on Israel on Oct 7, 2023.

After a ceasefire deal was struck in October, Trump set ​out a 20-point peace plan for Gaza that provided for a surge in humanitarian aid, civilian administration by Palestinian ⁠technocrats, Hamas laying down its arms and Israeli forces withdrawing.

But the plan has stalled and the group of technocrats — known as the ​National Committee for the Administration of Gaza — has remained outside Gaza.

Israel effectively controls an estimated 64 per cent ​of Gaza while nearly all of its ⁠2 ​million people live on a sliver ​of land on the coast, mainly in makeshift tents or damaged buildings and facing ​dire conditions.

Hamas has so far refused to disarm, and Israel has said it will expand its area of control in Gaza to 70pc of the enclave, where it has continued almost daily military strikes.

Trump’s plan included a Board of Peace as an overarching international authority responsible for implementing the peace framework. It would oversee the security force, among other functions.

The board is planning a pilot humanitarian zone for Gazans as a way to kickstart ​the US president’s stalled plan, a board official said this month.

Nickolay Mladenov, Trump’s Board of Peace envoy for Gaza, welcomed the Israeli decision.

“It is a critical part of the agreed framework for stabilising Gaza, supporting demilitarisation, and enabling the transition to effective Palestinian transitional administration under the NCAG,” he said on X, referring to the Palestinian civilian administration body.

Violence in the Israeli-occupied West Bank has surged since the Israeli assault on Gaza began in October 2023.

Abdel Azim Wadi, mayor of the town of Qusra, south of the city of Nablus, told AFP that settlers torched a mosque under construction in the southern part of the town.

“The fire destroyed the mosque’s entrance and even damaged its stonework,” Wadi said.

He added that the attackers spray-painted Hebrew graffiti on the mosque’s walls, including the word “revenge”.

The Israeli military said troops were dispatched to the outskirts of Qusra after receiving a report that a mosque had been set ablaze.

“The soldiers searched for suspects who had fled prior to their arrival and identified signs of arson and graffiti at the scene,” it said, adding that Israeli police would investigate and collect evidence.

In a separate incident, Israeli settlers set fire to a mosque in the village of Kour, near Tulkarem, and sprayed racist slogans on its walls, according to the Palestinian ministry of endowments and religious affairs.

The ministry said that “groups of settlers burned a mosque in the village of Kour in Tulkarem governorate and wrote racist slogans on its walls”.

On Friday, Israeli settlers attacked Palestinians in the village of Tell, which resulted in the killing of four Palestinians and two Israelis.

The Israeli military subsequently raided the city of Nablus and several nearby towns, announcing the arrest of dozens of Palestinians as it launched what it described as a “counter-terrorism” operation in the West Bank.

On Saturday, the city had largely ground to a halt, with long queues of vehicles forming at petrol stations as fuel supplies dwindled, an AFP journalist reported.

Since the start of the Israeli assault on Gaza in 2023, at least 1,097 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli troops or settlers, according to Palestinian figures.

Official Israeli data show that at least 48 Israelis, both civilians and members of the security forces, have been killed in attacks by Palestinians or during Israeli military operations.

Excluding annexed east Jerusalem, around three million Palestinians live in the West Bank alongside more than 500,000 Israelis residing in settlements that are illegal under international law.

The Iranian declaration came after Washington paused a war nearing its fifth month and reports emerged that concerns over dwindling munitions were restraining plans for further escalation.

“These attacks continued until two nights ago, but over the past two nights the Americans have stopped their attacks,” said army spokesman Mohammad Akraminia.

“Since… our strategy has essentially been retaliatory, we have also halted our retaliatory operations.”

Fighting over the strategic Strait of Hormuz derailed diplomatic efforts between Washington and Tehran, but the conflict then expanded beyond the vital energy corridor to include attacks on US bases, regional shipping and Gulf allies.

But the recent lull has revived hopes of a return to negotiations after nearly two weeks of consecutive nightly US bombardments, although US media reported the pause could also reflect pressure on stockpiles of Patriot interceptors and other defensive weapons.

Meanwhile, US operations against Iran were “on a hold”, CNN reported, quoting an unidentified Pentagon source, even as US President Donald Trump threatened a “much higher level” of strikes on Friday.

Plans to escalate the campaign have been shelved in part because of those shrinking supplies, The New York Times reported, citing two people briefed on the matter.

Trump also faces the risk of a wider Middle East war, the estrangement of vulnerable Gulf allies and further shocks to the global economy, the newspaper said.

Vice President JD Vance and top US general Dan Caine both raised concerns about escalation at a White House meeting on Friday, CNN reported.

Caine told Trump the military could carry out the options available to him successfully but warned of the possible implications, according to the network.

Iran’s army, however, warned on Sunday that the war would widen even further if the US chose to restart its attacks, ahead of a visit by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Washington on Tuesday.

‘Much higher level’

Trump said on Friday he had not decided whether to return to an all-out operation. “We’re talking to them right now. I think they’re getting more and more serious,” he told journalists.

Trump said Iran faced a choice between a deal and strikes at a “much higher level”.

The war that Trump once predicted would last four or five weeks is now nearing its fifth month, and is weighing on the Republican’s approval ratings ahead of crucial US midterm elections in November.

The Pentagon had presented Trump with a plan for a 14th night of strikes, but he declined to authorise it in favour of a push for talks, Axios reported.

On Sunday, locals in Iranian capital Tehran carried on with a normal morning, dealing with heavy traffic jams on their way to work, an AFP journalist said.

Shops and restaurants were open as usual as the city suffered a heatwave.

New front

Fighting has meanwhile spread to a new front. Houthi rebels on Sunday said they downed a Saudi drone over the northwest of Yemen, a day after the Yemeni group claimed it attacked oil facilities in the Gulf kingdom.

A day earlier, the Houthis had said they struck Saudi Aramco sites in Jizan and Yanbu, after Riyadh bombed Houthi targets on Friday.

A surface-to-air battery operated by Greek personnel in Saudi Arabia downed two ballistic missiles and a drone over Yanbu, the Greek air force media office said.

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran could not be blamed for the escalation and offered to broker talks between the Houthis and Riyadh, saying “there is no military solution”.

On Sunday, Iran’s armed forces stopped six vessels attempting to transit the Hormuz Strait over the past 24 hours after warnings, according to state television.

Tehran’s effective blockade of the waterway remains the central flashpoint with Washington.

Iran said on Sunday it had made progress in talks with neighbouring Oman on “common principles and operational mechanisms” for shipping in the Strait.

In June, Oman and Iran said they would discuss imposing service fees, a move Washington opposes, but Muscat also said ships could transit Hormuz via its waters, angering Tehran.

The accusation came after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Kyiv had carried out long-range strikes in the Caspian Sea against vessels involved in transporting military cargo involving Iran, underscoring the increasingly international dimensions of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Iran’s foreign ministry said the attack on Saturday morning caused the ship “to explode, killing one sailor and injuring another”, according to the official IRNA news agency.

The Islamic republic “has never intervened in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine”, it asserted.

On Saturday, Zelensky said on social media that armed forces had achieved “very strong results with long-range strikes in the Caspian Sea including vessels used in military cargo shipments involving Iran, as well as a warship”.

Ukraine’s intelligence services (SBU), for their part, reported on Telegram that drone attacks had been carried out against “cargo vessels under international sanctions that were used to transport military cargo between Iran and Russia”.

According to Iranian state television, the foreign ministry summoned the Ukrainian charge d’affaires in Tehran on Saturday to protest this “hostile and criminal act”.

In a conversation with the European Union’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi called for a “firm response” by the EU and the United Nations Security Council to this attack, IRNA added.

Riyadh struck Houthi military targets in Hodeida on Friday, with rebel media reporting two wounded after the Yemeni group announced a maritime blockade of the top oil producer and hit its ships.

The flare-up marks a new front of the war that has engulfed the region following US-Israeli strikes on Tehran in February, and comes on top of Iran’s parallel blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, Riyadh’s only other maritime route.

The rebels had accused Saudi Arabia of a “dangerous escalation” and said its actions “will not go unanswered”.

The Houthis’ Ansarollah media said on Telegram early on Saturday that a “Yemeni missile strike” had sparked fires in the southern Saudi city of Jizan on the Red Sea.

Saudi Arabia did not immediately comment on the claim.

But Riyadh’s civil defence agency had issued brief warnings to residents in Jizan and Yanbu early Saturday for “potential danger”, only to lift the warnings minutes later.

Similar warnings have been issued in the past when missiles or drones were fired at the kingdom.

The warning came after the Saudi-led coalition said on Friday it had hit Houthi sites and destroyed targets threatening commercial vessels in response to attacks on Red Sea shipping.

A Yemeni security source told AFP a naval base in the port city of Hodeida and a military camp on Kamaran island were among the Saudi targets.

The Houthis claimed attacks on two Saudi ships earlier this week, with Saudi Arabia confirming one of the attacks in the Red Sea.

Blockade

The Yemeni security source, who requested anonymity, said the Saudi strikes targeted a telecommunications building near Hodeida’s port and a naval base at Ras al-Kathib in Hodeida.

The Houthis’ al-Masirah television channel said two people were wounded — a worker in Hodeida and a woman on Kamaran island.

It said a telecoms building had been hit in Hodeida.

On Monday, the rebels had warned in a radio message to ships that they would target vessels “belonging to (the) Saudi enemy” that do not comply with their blockade.

Saudi state media cited a transport authority official on Friday as saying “the vessel (NCC MASA), belonging to a Saudi company, was targeted while sailing in the Red Sea today … resulting in minor damage to the vessel’s hull”.

The ship resumed its course, the SPA added.

Red Sea access has become vital for Saudi Arabia to keep shipping oil as traffic in Hormuz is disrupted.

‘Tipping point’

The escalation came after Trump said he would hold off on a major operation as Tehran was now getting “serious” in talks with Washington.

“No I haven’t,” Trump told journalists in the Oval Office when asked if he had made a decision on hitting Iran hard, for now dialing back reports that he was increasingly frustrated with the war and mulling a large-scale military operation.

“Look, we’re talking to them right now. I think they’re getting more and more serious as the days go by, for maybe the obvious reason.”

Trump said Iran had a choice between making a deal or facing a “much higher level” of strikes, after nearly two weeks of US attacks that have left a ceasefire in tatters.

The war that Trump once predicted would last four or five weeks is now nearing its fifth month, and is weighing on the Republican’s approval ratings ahead of crucial US midterm elections in November.

Trump added that he did not know what the “tipping point” would be for a decision, but reiterated that his red line would be if Iran was close to developing a nuclear weapon.

The United States says it is carrying out the strikes to stop Iran closing the crucial Strait of Hormuz. Iran has responded with strikes on US bases that have killed four service members.

The Iranian military said on Friday it had carried out attacks targeting US military assets in Bahrain, Jordan and Kuwait.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, meanwhile, said they had targeted an Amazon data center in Bahrain, according to state media, though neither the US tech giant nor Bahrain has commented on the claim.

There was also no confirmation from the United States of any targeting of its facilities or personnel. In Bahrain, sirens sounded again early on Saturday, the interior ministry said, urging residents to take shelter.

The Houthi rebels, who control northern and western Yemen, said this week they were imposing a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia, which has diverted millions of barrels of oil per day by pipeline to the Red Sea to get around Iran’s blockade of Gulf oil through the Strait of Hormuz.

Now, attacks in the Red Sea have extended the Middle East war to a second major shipping chokepoint. Fears that the disruption could widen to block another sea route sent global oil prices surging in one of the steepest rises of the war, which began with US-Israeli attacks on Iran in late February.

Brent crude rose more than six per cent on Thursday, piercing the level of $100 a barrel for the first time since May. Early on Friday, Brent futures eased 72 cents, or 0.72pc, to $99.97 a barrel as of 0126 GMT, but remained on course for a 13.5pc advance this week.

Houthi attacks could close the strait known as the Bab el-Mandeb or “Gate of Tears” which controls access from the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean, the second most important route for energy shipments after the Strait of Hormuz at the mouth of the Gulf.

In the days since they unveiled their blockade in the Red Sea, several tankers have changed course to avoid the Bab el-Mandeb.

Instead, they have headed north through the Suez Canal, potentially using a much longer and more expensive route to reach Asian customers by sailing around Africa.

The number of tankers crossing the Strait of Hormuz fell to just one on Thursday, its lowest since May 7, shiptracking data showed.

Fresh wave of strikes

Two weeks since the effective collapse of an interim truce meant to end the war, the US military launched air strikes on Iran late on Thursday and early on Friday, for a 13th consecutive night of attacks.

US Central Command (Centcom) said the latest strikes lasted more than two hours.

“Centcom targeted Iranian military command centres, drone storage facilities, communication networks, coastal surveillance sites and maritime capabilities to further diminish the threat Iran poses to civilian mariners and commercial vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz,” it said in a statement.

On both Thursday and Friday, Iranian state media said missiles struck Qeshm Island on the Strait of Hormuz, the virtually closed waterway that is the focus of a war well into its fifth month that has killed thousands and fanned fears of a global economic downturn.

Four people were killed and five injured in a US missile attack on the Iranian city of Ahvaz, Iranian state broadcaster IRIB said. Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency reported that two people were injured following an early morning drone attack on Khorramabad.

After the US strikes on Friday, Iran’s military said it had launched a new wave of drone attacks targeting US military facilities in Bahrain and Jordan.

In a statement carried by Iran’s Mehr news agency, the Iranian army said it used drones to target fuel storage tanks, equipment warehouses, and troop living quarters at Sheikh Isa Air Base in Bahrain.

The military added that aircraft hangars, maintenance facilities, and accommodation sites at the Al-Azraq base in Jordan were also hit.

On Thursday, Iran said it attacked US missile systems, weapons and fuel storage sites in Jordan, as well as US military posts in Kuwait in retaliatory strikes.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they struck a US electronic warfare unit at Al-Adiri base in Kuwait, causing unspecified casualties, in response to an overnight strike on Iran’s Shalamcheh border crossing with Iraq.

Neither the United States nor Kuwait has reported casualties at the base.

Iranian military spokesperson Brigadier General Mohammad Akraminia said Iran would keep retaliating as long as the US continued to attack its infrastructure and coastal areas, Iranian state TV reported.

Since the US and Israel began the war in February, Iran has demonstrated that it can hit US targets in the region, despite Trump claiming early on that the US had wiped out Iranian military capabilities.

Trump says Iran hasn’t ‘received enough pain yet’

After the Houthis said they had struck the two tankers on Thursday, Trump said he would hold Iran accountable for any further attacks by the fighters.

“If they do this again, the US will hold Iran responsible, in that the Houthis are a surrogate and/or proxy of Iran, and major military punishment will be inflicted upon Iran and, of course, the Houthis, themselves,” Trump wrote on social media.

He told US news website Axios he was considering re-launching major combat operations in Iran and was close to a decision.

“They haven’t received enough pain yet,” the news outlet quoted Trump as saying.

On social media, Trump later said “any and all damages done” to cargo ships would be paid for with “Iranian Money,” referring to frozen Iranian assets held by the United States, but without saying how.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Arachi responded with a warning on X, saying, “Seizing another nation’s assets to pay for unrelated future claims is an incendiary precedent.”

No one’s assets were safe once governments normalised such confiscation, he added on Friday. “Ensuing chaos will not be pretty or peaceful.”

Rebuke by Congress

High oil prices are stoking inflation globally, putting Trump’s Republican allies under pressure ahead of congressional elections in November.

The Republican-led US House of Representatives backed legislation on Thursday directing Trump to halt US military action against Iran, for the latest rebuke by Congress, which has the exclusive power to “declare War” under the US Constitution.

Repeated similar resolutions passed in recent months have not led to cessation of the war. The Senate voted hours later to block a separate, similar measure.

“Such actions are unacceptable, violate international law, threaten freedom of navigation and undermine regional peace and security,” PM Shehbaz said in a post on the social media platform X.

Hostilities in the Middle East flared on Thursday as Yemen’s Houthis said that they attacked two Saudi Arabian oil tankers in a military operation. A Saudi news agency confirmed one of the two vessels was ablaze after an assault while sailing in the Red Sea.

In his post on X, PM Shehbaz said that he reaffirmed Pakistan’s solidarity with Saudi Arabia during the call with the crown prince.

The premier said he conveyed that he, Chief of Defence Forces and Chief of the Army Staff Field Marshal Asim Munir and the nation “stand firmly and resolutely with the Saudi leadership and the brotherly people of the kingdom at this critical time”.

PM Shehbaz said that the two agreed to “continue working very closely to maintain regional peace, security, stability, and the uninterrupted flow of lawful maritime commerce through the Red Sea as well as the Strait of Hormuz and the wider region”.

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) described the conversation between the two as “most cordial”. It added that the Saudi crown prince appreciated “Pakistan’s steadfast support and the close fraternal ties between the two countries”.

The conversation comes a day after Pakistan condemned continued threats by the Houthis against Saudi Arabia and commercial shipping in the Red Sea, warning that it had the right to take all necessary measures in self-defence if its “maritime interests” were targeted in “any hostile act”.

The warning had come after the Houthis announced a maritime embargo against Saudi Arabia and threatened to close the Bab al-Mandeb strait, one of the world’s busiest maritime chokepoints, in retaliation for what they described as the longstanding Saudi blockade of Yemen and a recent attack on Sanaa airport.

The Bab al-Mandeb strait, which connects the Red Sea with the Gulf of Aden, is a critical artery for Pakistan’s trade and energy supplies. A significant share of the country’s oil imports transits the Red Sea route, although no Pakistani vessels have so far been reported stopped or targeted.

Pakistan’s statement on Wednesday was by far the strongest issued by any non-Arab country on the Houthi threats.

Unlike most countries, which have confined themselves to expressing concern over freedom of navigation, Islamabad explicitly warned that any hostile act against Pakistani vessels could invite a response in self-defence.

The unusually forceful response also marks Pakistan’s strongest public warning to the Houthis since the group began attacking commercial shipping in the Red Sea in late 2023.

It also comes less than a year after Pakistan and Saudi Arabia signed the Strategic Mutual Defence Agreement in September 2025, under which aggression against one country is regarded as aggression against the other.

A Saudi news agency confirmed one of the two vessels was ablaze after an assault while sailing in the Red Sea.

The Saudi Arabian state news agency SPA, citing an official source at the General Transport Authority, said an attack caused a fire on the bow of the tanker Encelia but all crew members were safe. SPA did not say who had targeted the vessel.

Authorities have secured the vessel and its crew and taken measures to protect the marine environment, describing the attack as a violation of international law, SPA reported, citing the source.

In their statement, the Houthis said they attacked two tankers, the Encelia and Layla, saying the vessels had violated a naval blockade imposed by the group on Saudi Arabia in the Red Sea. The Houthis said they targeted the tankers with a number of ballistic and cruise missiles as well as drones.

A maritime security source said earlier on Thursday that the Encelia had transmitted a distress call via VHF radio, reporting it had been struck by a missile while operating at the outer port limits of Saudi Arabia’s Jizan, in the Red Sea, and was on fire.

The British maritime risk-management group Vanguard also said the Saudi-flagged tanker Encelia was struck by an unknown projectile on its starboard side about 130 km southwest of Saudi Arabia’s Al Shuqaiq at 2000 GMT.

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations agency (UKMTO) also said it had received a report of an incident in the same area, saying the master of a tanker reported being struck by an unknown projectile that caused a fire onboard, which the crew were fighting. UKMTO said no casualties or environmental impact had been reported.

It was not immediately clear whether the UKMTO report referred to the Encelia, though the location and details matched the Vanguard report.

Vanguard said the Houthis had reportedly claimed the attack, as well as saying they had hit a second vessel, the Layla, which it said remained unconfirmed.

In the same statement announcing their attack on the two tankers, the Houthis also said they had forced around 10 ships to retreat and return.

US continues to strike Iran

Meanwhile the US military carried out a new round of strikes on Iran at US President Donald Trump’s direction, marking a 12th successive night of American attacks.

“US forces struck Iranian military targets including maritime capabilities, missile and drone storage facilities, coastal surveillance sites, and air defense assets. The strikes further degrade Iran’s ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial vessels,” the US Central Command (Centcom) said.

“This month, American forces have targeted dozens of Iranian military sites on land while resuming a blockade against Iran at sea. As of today, Centcom has redirected nine commercial vessels and disabled one to prevent ships from entering or departing Iranian ports,” it said.

Before the Red Sea flare-up, Trump vowed on Wednesday to destroy an Iranian bridge or power plant every time Iran shoots at a ship in the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran’s joint military command in turn warned that if Trump’s threat against infrastructure was carried out, Iranian forces would target regional oil, gas, electricity and economic infrastructure and prevent the export of “even a single drop of oil,” Iranian state media reported.

Hours later, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards reported an explosion in what it called a mined route south of the Strait of Hormuz, saying one of three oil tankers had caught fire while the other two turned back.

The Guards said the strait was under their control and “completely closed,” warning that no tanker would be allowed to enter or leave without coordination with Iran.

In 12 straight days of attacks since a June ceasefire fell apart, American strikes have widened from the south to western and central areas of Iran. The US military said it would continue to “further degrade” Iran’s ability to threaten ship traffic.

Iranian media reports said the US twice on Thursday attacked a military target in Bushehr, near the country’s only operating commercial nuclear power reactor, marking three strikes there in two days.

State TV reported two people were killed and 11 wounded in what a Khuzestan provincial official described as a US missile attack on the Shalamcheh border crossing with Iraq.

In a post on Truth Social, Trump said the deal only pertained to the civilian use of nuclear facilities “such as the ones that Iran and [the] UAE (and others) already have”.

He added that the deal “will be approved, but is totally subject to Saudi Arabia joining the very respected and successful Abraham Accords”.

The Abraham Accords are a set of agreements brokered under Trump in 2020 and govern the normalisation of diplomatic relations between Israel and countries that have historically been hostile to it. They, however, remain unpopular among the public in many parts of the region, not least because they do not tackle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The move comes as the United States under President Donald Trump fights a war with Iran that began in large part over concerns with Tehran’s nuclear programme — an issue that remains a key point of contention during now-stalled peace talks.

Two agreements — one on “peaceful nuclear cooperation” and another on “bilateral safeguards” — were signed by US Energy Secretary Chris Wright and his Saudi counterpart Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, the US Energy Department said.

The text of the deals was not immediately made public.

“Together, these two agreements lay the legal foundation for a decades-long, multi-billion-dollar partnership that advances several priority economic and strategic objectives, including nuclear non-proliferation,” the department said in a statement.

A provision in the deal would potentially see US companies build a uranium enrichment facility in Saudi Arabia, the Wall Street Journal reported. The Energy Department statement made no mention of such a provision and did not offer comment when asked about it by AFP.

The deal will be submitted to Congress for review, but the Republican-controlled legislature is unlikely to block its implementation.

US lawmakers from both parties and Israeli officials have previously voiced opposition to such a project over fears Saudi Arabia could eventually convert it to develop nuclear weapons.

Saudi Arabia, like Tehran, has long been adamant about its right to pursue a civilian nuclear programme.

Washington has sought in recent years to include any deal concerning a nuclear agreement in a wider strategic effort that would see Saudi Arabia normalise ties with Israel, along with the signing of a US-Saudi defence pact.

Pakistan and Saudi Arabia signed a mutual defence pact in September 2025.

Proliferation concerns

The US signed a nuclear agreement with the kingdom’s neighbour, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), in 2009, although the country does not enrich its own uranium.

A drone struck a generator in May near the UAE’s Barakah nuclear plant, the Arab world’s only such facility, causing a fire.

Policymakers have long feared that if Iran produced a nuclear weapon, the move would set off an arms race across the Gulf.

US Energy Secretary Wright dismissed concerns about proliferation, insisting the deal was in Washington’s economic and strategic interest.

“Rest assured, these agreements uphold the highest standards of nuclear safety and non-proliferation, while relying on the world’s best nuclear technology and scientists, designed right here in the United States,” he said in a statement.

The US-Saudi deal was signed under Section 123 of the US Atomic Energy Act.

The US has agreements governing nuclear cooperation with more than 50 countries, although the extent varies.

Experts said such a deal had been in the works for a considerable period, but some raised concerns about the potential for enrichment on Saudi soil.

“It would be a mistake to allow Saudi Arabia the capability for enrichment,” said Matthew Kroenig of the Atlantic Council in comments made before the deal was formally announced.

“Washington is right to strengthen its relationship with Riyadh, but it should not do so at the expense of its effective nuclear weapons non-proliferation standards.”

Jennifer T. Gordon, director of the Atlantic Council’s Nuclear Energy Policy Initiative, lauded the agreement as a “win for the US over Russia and China”.

“Saudi Arabia has made it clear that it will purchase nuclear energy technologies and begin a civil nuclear program; the only question has been whether the kingdom would choose to work with the US and its allies, or whether it would turn to Russia or China,” she said.

The posts on X by Saudi Minister of Media Salman Al-Dosary and Abdulla bin Mohammed Alhamed, chairman of the UAE National Media Authority, were both released at 7pm Riyadh time.

“Emirati-Saudi relations are an extension of a shared history and deep-rooted fraternal ties between two brotherly peoples, united by a single destiny,” Alhamed wrote.

“The relationship between the Kingdom and the Emirates is a relationship between two peoples united by a shared history and heritage and wise leadership in both countries,” Al-Dosary’s post said.

Both posts said media should reflect those aspects of the relationship and avoid undermining them.

The two Gulf heavyweights have seen their interests diverge for years on everything from oil quotas to geopolitics, with the disagreements coming into the open late last year over support for opposing sides in the war in Yemen.

That culminated in a Saudi airstrike on what it said was a shipment of UAE military equipment to the Yemeni faction Abu Dhabi backed.

Since that time, influential Saudi and Emirati social media accounts, pundits and some media organisations have engaged in unusually open debate and criticism.

In March, the UAE banned Saudi TV Al-Arabiya’s X accounts.

Their divergence continued during the war on Iran, which threatened Gulf security, with Saudi Arabia and the UAE often differing on what they saw as the right response to the conflict.

In May, the UAE left Opec, the oil producers’ group effectively led by Riyadh.

“I think what we witnessed was a storm in a cup. We have seen worse before but it was never strategic,” said Mohammed Baharoon, director general of the Dubai Public Policy Research Center.

“I am sure there has been adaptation from both parties but the reality remains that what we have in common far outweighs our divergences,” he said of the Saudi-UAE relationship.

Gulf officials have in recent weeks called for unity among the six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council in the face of Iranian attacks and, most recently, threats by Houthis against Red Sea shipping.

Saudi officials did not respond to texted questions on what had led to Tuesday’s posts.

‘Brotherly relations’

One hour ahead of the posts by senior media officials, Turki Alalshikh, a close confidant of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), shared a photo on X that he said had been taken days earlier.

It showed Saudi Defence Minister Khalid bin-Salman, MBS’ brother, and UAE Vice President Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, their arms over each-others shoulders and smiles on their faces.

He captioned it: “Saudi Arabia and the UAE: a story of brotherly relations and a deeply rooted partnership.”

Commenting on the post, Anwar Gargash, diplomatic adviser to the United Arab Emirates UAE president, said: “Spears, when together, refuse to be broken … and break if they part.”

After the foes’ fighting over the strategic Strait of Hormuz led to the collapse of a preliminary deal, the Middle East war has expanded to include the region’s other key chokepoint for global oil supplies.

The US military said its latest attacks hit targets such as “military logistics infrastructure” while Iranian state media reported strikes around the country, including Bushehr, which hosts a nuclear power plant.

“News sources reported minutes ago that air defence activity was heard in the west, east and northeast of Tehran,” state TV posted on Telegram.

As the war nears the five-month mark and November legislative elections approach, Trump has faced intense political pressure to end the conflict, which is unpopular even with segments of his base.

Critics have pointed to the cost of the war that Pentagon Chief Pete Hegseth said on uesday had soared to $37.5 billion, defending a request for tens of billions in additional funding for the military.

The US military said on Tuesday it had launched an eleventh consecutive night of strikes against Iran, saying it targeted military sites to further degrade Iran’s ability to threaten commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz.

Trump said on Tuesday that the next US target could be an underground complex known as Pickaxe Mountain, a subterranean nuclear site near Natanz where Western intelligence suspects Iran is building an undeclared enrichment facility.

Iran threatened reprisals, with the Khatam Al-Anbiya military command saying it would “consider it as an expansion of war in the region” if such an attack were carried out, threatening strikes on “all the interests of America, the allies and supporters”, state-run broadcaster IRIB reported.

The warning came as Tehran broadened its offensive against US-allied Gulf states after its Houthi allies threatened to blockade Saudi ports.

Two weeks after fighting resumed between the decades-old foes, Trump said Iran would need more than 20 years to recover from the damage inflicted in the Middle East war.

“If we left right now, it would take Iran 20, 25 years to rebuild,” he said. “We’re not finished at all … we’re not leaving right now.

Houthi threat

Kuwait’s army said on Wednesday its air defences were engaging with drone attacks from Iran, the latest round of Tehran’s reprisals.

US ally Bahrain said on Tuesday it intercepted Iranian attacks as sirens sounded repeatedly, while Kuwait and Jordan said they had intercepted drone and missile strikes.

The Iranian army had said it targeted US assets in Kuwait and Bahrain, including air defence systems, radar installations and administrative buildings.

“With this radar sweep, the enemy should prepare for even more decisive and powerful waves of drone and missile attacks,” the Guards said in a statement carried by state news agency IRNA.

Trump said he would “take care of” Yemen’s Houthi rebels if they followed through on a threat on Monday to blockade Saudi Arabia’s ports.

“If something like that happens, we take care of it,” Trump said. “We’ve done that with the Houthis before, and we haven’t heard from them in a while since we did what we did originally.”

Saudi Arabia strongly condemned the threat from what it called the “terrorist Houthi militia”.

It remains unclear how the Houthis would enforce such a blockade.

But maritime intelligence provider Vanguard Tech said a Singapore-flagged tanker and a Liberia-flagged tanker both “reversed course” in the Red Sea after loading crude at the Saudi port of Yanbu.

If the Houthis make good on the threat, they could endanger Riyadh’s ability to bypass the Strait of Hormuz for some oil exports, with major repercussions for the global economy.

The Revolutionary Guards said on Tuesday that two tankers attempting to transit the strait “were hit by explosions, resulting in massive fires that brought them to a standstill”.

The UK Maritime Trade Operations agency earlier reported that an “unknown projectile” struck a tanker off the coast of Oman.

Despite the fighting, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said diplomatic exchanges with Washington through mediators were continuing.

With Pakistan leading mediation efforts, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif also called for restraint during a meeting with Iran’s Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni on Tuesday. He urged all sides to “refrain from actions that could further destabilise the region”, the PM’s Office said.

Citing two unnamed US officials, the New York Times reported on Tuesday the Trump administration plans to formally sign and announce the deal with the Saudis on Wednesday.

President Donald Trump’s administration said the deal will provide billions of dollars for the US nuclear industry.

A provision in the deal, which would last 30 years, would have American companies build a uranium enrichment facility in Saudi Arabia if a joint study determined it warranted, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The deal is expected to be submitted to Congress in the coming days, but their approval is not required for it to go through.

Two sources also told Reuters that the Trump administration plans to submit the agreement to Congress. The sources said the administration would submit to Congress within days a document known as a 123 Agreement that will be signed by US Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Saudi energy minister Abdulaziz bin Salman.

The two signed a preliminary agreement in Riyadh last year.

The agreement refers to Section 123 of the US Atomic Energy Act of 1954 and is required to permit the US government and American companies to work with entities in the kingdom to develop a multibillion-dollar civil nuclear industry.

The agreement does not include the “Gold Standard” that would block the kingdom from enriching uranium and reprocessing spent nuclear fuel, both of which are potential pathways to nuclear weapons, said the sources familiar with the agreement.

The agreement also does not include the “Additional Protocol” which grants the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency broad and more intrusive oversight of a country’s nuclear activities, such as the power to carry out snap inspections at undeclared locations, said the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive issues.

One of the sources said the administration would submit the agreement as soon as Wednesday and another said it would be submitted in a week or so. A third who did not say whether the agreement lacks safeguards said it would be submitted soon.

Wright had said the preliminary agreement was not about enrichment and contained all the nonproliferation standards in the Atomic Energy Act, which are among the strongest in the world.

One of the sources said the agreement provides a legal pathway for cooperation on the nuclear fuel cycle, which includes uranium enrichment, but does not obligate the United States to transfer any related capabilities or technology to Saudi Arabia.

Proliferation concerns

Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has long said if Iran developed a nuclear weapon, Saudi Arabia would too, fueling concern among arms control advocates and some US lawmakers over a civil nuclear deal.

The crown prince told CBS in 2018 that “Saudi Arabia does not want to acquire any nuclear bomb, but without a doubt if Iran developed a nuclear bomb, we will follow suit as soon as possible”.

The kingdom has also said it wants to reserve the right to enrich uranium.

The United Arab Emirates agreed to the “Gold Standard” in 2009 when it signed a 123 Agreement with Washington.

Once 123 agreements are submitted to Congress, they go into a review period of about 90 days of continuous congressional sessions for lawmakers to object, or they go into force.

To block the agreement, Congress would need to pass a joint resolution and have a two-thirds majority to override any presidential veto.

Many Democrats and some Republicans, including President Donald Trump’s Secretary of State Marco Rubio when he served in the Senate, have insisted any agreement include guardrails.

A so-called ceasefire agreed in October remains in place between Israel and Palestinian group Hamas, as it has failed to halt Israeli attacks.

“Nine months after the announcement of a ceasefire, still, nowhere is safe for Palestinians in Gaza,” UN rights office spokesman Thameen Al-Kheetan told reporters in Geneva.

He decried, “the Israeli military has intensified its attacks in Gaza in recent days, killing and injuring dozens of Palestinians”.

Fresh Israeli strike leaves family of six dead

The Israeli attacks had killed “at least 57 Palestinians, including six children and eight women” from July 13 to 20, he said.

According to him, the strikes had targeted residential buildings, at least one tent sheltering internally displaced people, and other crowded areas, with 34 of the victims “killed far away from the Israeli-imposed yellow line”.

In attacks on July 17 and 18, for instance, he said the UN rights office had determined that 10 Israeli attacks in Gaza City, middle Gaza, north Gaza and Khan Younes had killed at least 21 Palestinians.

“In one of these attacks, on an apartment in Gaza City, five members of one family were killed together: both parents and three siblings, reportedly aged eight, 15, and 17,” he said.

The UN official stressed that “the killing of civilians in these attacks raises concerns of continuing violations of international humanitarian law, war crimes and other possible atrocity crimes in Gaza”.

“Under international law, deliberately attacking civilians is a war crime.” The spokesman also warned that the Israel’s constant moving of the “yellow line” westwards had left the Palestinian population in Gaza “trapped in an ever-shrinking area”.

This, he stressed, presents “a continuous threat to life as the Israeli military appears to routinely fire on Palestinians for mere presence in the vicinity of that line, in violation of international human rights law and international humanitarian law”.

More than 1,100 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the truce took effect in October, according to Gaza’s health ministry, which operates under Hamas authority and whose figures are considered reliable by the United Nations.

The UN rights office has so far verified the killing of 685 Palestinians between last October and April, the UN official said.

Family of six killed by Israel

An Israeli airstrike on Tuesday killed a father, his wife and their four children in Gaza City, while setting their home ablaze, health officials said, in the latest deadly attack.

Medics said the Israeli strike on the family house in the Sabra neighbourhood killed the man, Firas Al-Masri, his wife, Salsabeel, and their three daughters and son.

A video which went viral on social media showed rescue workers struggling to put out fires in the house and bring out bodies in white shrouds.

Masri’s father, Abu Yusuf Al-Masri, said the explosion took place as they were asleep, as he lamented the loss of his son, daughter-in-law and grandchildren.

“We were unable to save our grandchildren and children from the flames and the devastation. Around five or six (people) were martyred, most of them children and women, without mercy and without any prior warning,” he said, standing outside the family house.

“There is no relative calm and there is no safe place, at all,” the grey-bearded man added.

In four separate strikes since Friday, the Israeli military said it had killed four Hamas and Islamic Jihad men, three of whom it claimed had taken part in the October 7, 2023, attack on Israel. Later on Tuesday, an Israeli airstrike targeted a vehicle in central Gaza Strip, killing two people and wounding others, Palestinian medics said.

The truce halted full-scale fighting but has not stopped near-daily Israeli strikes.

Ban on Israeli settler products

The Netherlands government announced on Tuesday it would ban imports from Palestinian territories occupied by Israeli settlers from September 22.

The Netherlands will join Ireland, Belgium and Spain among European Union countries that have imposed restrictions on trade with territories occupied by Israeli settlers.

Published in Dawn, July 22nd, 2026

As per the conditions of the visa, each visit would require the purchase of a service package from an approved provider on the Nusuk platform — a digital platform that lists several Umrah packages for various economic tiers.

The report added that the packages’ durations should not exceed the “remaining days available on the visa”.

“Entry is also contingent on issuing an Umrah permit via the Nusuk application prior to arrival,” the report added.

It further detailed that the visa would be deactivated after each departure and reactivated upon meeting regulatory requirements for the next visit.

However, the report said, the visa cannot be availed during the Haj season, from the first of Ziqad to the 13th of Zilhaj.

The SPA reported that the Haj ministry “affirmed that the visa enhances flexibility in planning visits and supports the integration of digital and operational services throughout the pilgrim’s journey”.

Nearly 43 million pilgrims performed Umrah in 2025, according to Saudi Arabia’s General Authority for Statistics.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they had attacked and stopped two “non-compliant oil tankers” attempting to transit the Strait of Hormuz, part of an effort to tighten its grip on the vital waterway while the war reignited.

Following the deaths of at least three US soldiers in the past several days, the United States launched a new round of attacks against Iran late on Monday which it said were “designed to further degrade Iranian military capabilities used to attack commercial shipping” in the strait.

It later said that it had completed the strikes during which US forces “struck Iranian military command centres, maritime capabilities, missile and drone launch sites, and air defence systems to degrade Iran’s ability to continue attacking commercial vessels flowing through the Strait of Hormuz”.

“Commercial vessel transits through the vital international maritime corridor continue,” it said.

“American forces remain postured and prepared to hold Iran accountable for unwarranted aggression toward civilian mariners seeking to freely and openly transit the strait,” it added.

Hours after the first statement, the Iranian army said it had targeted US assets in Kuwait and Bahrain, including air defence systems, radar installations and administrative buildings.

“With this radar sweep, the enemy should prepare for even more decisive and powerful waves of drone and missile attacks,” the Guards said in a statement carried by state news agency IRNA.

The Guards also said they they targeted infrastructure belonging to US company Amazon in Bahrain.

US President Donald Trump warned Monday that Iran would pay “many times over” for every American soldier killed, while Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said the conflict had become “a full-scale war”.

Nearly 100 US servicemembers have been wounded since July 7, the Pentagon said on Monday, most with minor concussions.

Diplomatic exchanges

In the Strait of Hormuz, meanwhile, the Revolutionary Guards said on Tuesday two tankers attempting to transit the strait “were hit by explosions, resulting in massive fires that brought them to a standstill”.

The UK Maritime Trade Operations agency (UKMTO) earlier reported that an “unknown projectile” struck a tanker off the coast of Oman.

On Tuesday, UKMTO reported another tanker off the coast of Oman had been struck by a projectile.

Despite the latest fighting, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said diplomatic exchanges with Washington via mediators were ongoing.

Iran’s Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni is in Islamabad for a two-day visit during which he will meet with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Chief of Defence Forces and Chief of Army Staff Field Marshal Asim Munir, according to the interior ministry.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun is set to meet with Trump in Washington on Tuesday as pressure builds for Beirut to disarm Hezbollah, Israel’s key condition before withdrawing from south Lebanon.

Red Sea threat

Yemen’s Houthi rebels entered the fray on Monday, announcing an immediate maritime embargo on Saudi Arabia, opening a new front in the conflict.

Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree declared the embargo effective immediately, framing it as retaliation on an “eye-for-an-eye” basis against Saudi Arabia.

The naval blockade, if enforced, could further strain Saudi Arabia’s economy by cutting off access to its Red Sea ports, which have been vital for oil exports as renewed fighting limits passage through the Strait of Hormuz.

The blockade is also expected to hurt global markets that rely on Saudi Arabia — the world’s leading crude exporter, producing over 10 million barrels per day — for their energy imports.

The announcement follows an excha­nge of fire between the Houthis and Saudi forces last week, the first direct clash between the two sides in years.

The Houthis have previously tried to cut off shipping through the Red Sea, leveraging the Bab al-Mandab Strait, a chok­epoint at its southern tip which vessels must navigate when travelling to or from the Suez Canal and the Mediterranean.

They previously launched drone and missile attacks on ships transiting the strategic waterway beginning in Nove­mber 2023 during the Gaza war, forcing vessels to take lengthy detours around Afr­ica instead of travelling directly from Europe.

Yemen shares a border and coastline with Saudi Arabia, whose Red Sea port of Yanbu has been crucial for exporting oil, bypassing Iran’s effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz during its war with the US.

Saudi’s foreign ministry condemned the Houthi maritime blockade and a reasserted Riyadh’s backing for Yemen’s Aden-based government.

The US State Department said operations had started in “pilot zones” in Froun, Srifa and Zawtar al-Gharbiya “in accordance with the Trilateral Framework and under the auspices of the Military Coordination Group for Lebanon.”

State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott described the step as “a direct outcome” of talks held between Israeli and Lebanese delegations in Rome last week, adding that Washington would keep working with both sides “to implement the framework to a successful conclusion.”

The framework, signed by Lebanon, Israel and the United States on June 26 after several rounds of direct negotiations, envisions a phased Israeli pullback from positions in south Lebanon.

Rubio hails peace efforts after meeting President Aoun

In exchange, the Lebanese Armed Forces are to assume sole security control of vacated areas and certify that they have been cleared of Hezbollah weapons and infrastructure.

The pilot zones are intended to trial the approach in a handful of villages straddling the Litani River before it is extended to other areas. Hezbollah has rejected the framework, with the Iran-backed group insisting any arrangement in Lebanon be linked to wider negotiations between Washington and Tehran. It has not said whether it will resist implementation in the designated areas.

The agreement does not set a timetable for Israel’s withdrawal. Israeli officials have also vowed that their forces will remain in a “security zone” 10 kilometres (six miles) deep along the frontier for as long as Hezbollah remains armed.

Lebanon and Israel, which have no formal relations, started negotiations after Iran-backed Hezbollah drew Lebanon into the broader Middle East war by attacking Israel in March.

Lebanon’s military said last week that troops had begun intensifying patrols in several villages adjacent to areas occupied by Israeli forces in southern Lebanon, including Froun. Israeli forces are however present on the outskirts of Zawtar al-Gharbiya.

In a statement shared following the state department’s announcement, the Lebanese military said troops “continue to carry out their missions in the southern regions, including the towns of Froun and Srifa.”

“In parallel, coordination is underway with the Military Coordination Group for Lebanon (MCG4L) to begin deployment in the town of Zawtar al-Gharbiya,” awaiting Israel’s withdrawal from there, the army added, warning citizens against heading to the town. The framework agreement was reached following a fragile ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war.

Israel still launches occasional strikes in southern Lebanon and carries out detonations in villages it occupies near the border.

Rubio hails peace efforts

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun in Washington on Sunday, praising the country for its “move towards peace” after the latest round of Lebanon-Israel talks.

It was the first trip to the US capital by a Lebanese head of state since Michel Sleiman was received by Barack Obama in 2009. Aoun and Rubio held talks at the State Department, and Lebanese officials said Aoun is due to meet with US President Donald Trump on Tuesday.

Published in Dawn, July 21st, 2026

“The Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) announces the election of brother mujahid Khalil al-Hayya as head of the movement’s political bureau, succeeding the martyred leader Yahya al-Sinwar,” Hamas said in a statement.

Sinwar, whom Israel accused of being one of the principal architects of the October 7, 2023, attacks, was killed by Israeli forces in Gaza a year later.

Since his death, Hamas has been led by a five-member leadership council headed by long-time senior official Mohammed Darwish.

Born in 1960, Hayya survived an Israeli assassination attempt in Doha last year, though one of his sons was killed in the strike.

Hayya defeated former Hamas chief and veteran leader Khaled Meshaal in the leadership contest.

“Khalil al-Hayya was elected by an overwhelming majority,” a senior Hamas official told AFP, adding that he is expected to formally assume the role next week.

“The political bureau will meet in Istanbul within days to form committees and begin restructuring Hamas’s leadership bodies.”

The official said the current five-member leadership council will be dissolved, with its members submitting their resignations to the group’s Shura Council.

“The election process was conducted through a highly complex and secretive mechanism because of the difficult security situation and the occupation’s assassination of several political and military leaders,” a source in Hamas said.

Representatives of Hamas’s armed wing, the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, also declared their “full support” to Hayya.

Hailing from the Gaza Strip, Hayya has lost several close relatives, including his eldest son, to Israeli strikes in the Gaza Strip, and is a veteran member of the group.

Regarded as having good ties with Iran, he has been closely involved in the group’s efforts to broker several truces with Israel, playing a key role in ending a 2014 conflict and again in attempts to secure an end to the current Gaza conflict.

Hayya has been part of Hamas since it was set up in 1987. In the early 1980s, he joined the Muslim Brotherhood, the movement from which Hamas emerged, sources say.

In Gaza, he was detained several times by Israel.

In 2007, an Israeli air strike hit his family home in Gaza City’s Sejaiyeh quarter, killing several of his relatives, and during the 2014 fighting between Hamas and Israel, the house of Hayya’s eldest son, Osama, was bombed, killing him, his wife and three of their children.

Hayya was not there during the attacks. He left Gaza several years ago, serving as a Hamas point person for ties with the Arab and Islamic worlds and basing himself in Qatar for the role.

The group did not say how it planned to impose the embargo, whose declaration came as Iran said it was back to a “full-scale war” with the United States, and as Washington and Tehran battled to control the strait.

Saudi Arabia and the Houthis traded fire last week for the first time in years, threatening a 2022 truce that has held despite expiring.

The exchange of strikes was set off when an Iranian plane attempted to land in Sanaa, challenging Saudi Arabia’s hegemony over Yemeni skies.

The Houthis’ naval blockade, if enforced, could further strain Saudi Arabia’s economy by cutting off access to its Red Sea ports, which have been vital for oil exports as renewed fighting limits passage through the Strait of Hormuz.

The blockade is also expected to hurt global markets that rely on Saudi Arabia — which produces over 10 million barrels of crude per day — for energy imports.

The rebels declared “a maritime embargo against the criminal Saudi enemy, based on the equation of ‘an eye for an eye’, effective immediately”, military spokesman Yahya Saree said.

Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for the UN secretary-general, warned that the threat from the Houthis risked an “even wider” regional conflict.

“A simultaneous crisis at Hormuz and Bab al-Mandab would produce a much larger shock than either blockade alone,” the King’s College London academic told AFP.

“Hormuz disruption constrains Gulf oil and liquefied natural gas exports, while Bab al-Mandab disruption interrupts the principal maritime connection between Asia, the Gulf and Europe.”

The Houthis previously launched attacks on ships transiting the waterway beginning in November 2023 during the Gaza conflict, forcing vessels to take lengthy detours around Africa instead of travelling directly from Europe.

Yemen shares a border and coastline with Saudi Arabia, whose Red Sea port of Yanbu has been crucial for exporting oil, bypassing Iran’s effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz during its war with the US.

Earlier, Iran’s president said the country is fighting a “full-scale war” with the US as Washington expanded its strikes across the Islamic republic, including a city hosting a nuclear power plant.

Iran kept up its own attacks across the region in response, with its Revolutionary Guards announcing they had hit targets in Bahrain, Jordan and Syria, while Bahrain said Tehran had targeted its air navigation systems.

“The reality is that today the Islamic Republic of Iran is engaged in a full-scale war,” said President Masoud Pezeshkian, according to a presidency statement.

He added that “we must be realistic and accept the natural consequences of this resistance”.

His comments came after state media and local authorities reported US strikes on Monday in the north and centre of the country, further than areas near the blockaded Strait of Hormuz waterway through which a fifth of world oil supplies transited prior to the war.

The Middle East war resumed after a weeks-long lull prompted by an agreement signed in June, and oil prices surged to a one-month high as the foes battled to control the vital Strait of Hormuz.

As its truce with the US collapsed, Tehran reimposed its blockade of the waterway, while Washington hit back by again blockading Iran’s ports.

All of the Iranian provinces hit on Monday host military bases and air defence systems.

In Bushehr, home to the country’s only operational civilian nuclear power plant, governor Mohammad Mozaffari told state news agency IRNA: “A few minutes ago, several locations in Bushehr city were hit by American enemy’s projectiles.”

In East Azerbaijan province in the north, the head of the local crisis management unit Majid Farshi told IRNA that “one person was martyred and several others injured” in an attack there.

Despite the latest attacks, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said diplomatic exchanges with the United States via mediators were ongoing.

“Ideas have been conveyed to us by certain mediators,” he told a press conference in Tehran attended by AFP.

Ship on fire

In Hormuz, meanwhile, sailors abandoned a vessel set on fire in an attack, according to the UK Maritime Trade Operations agency.

The Revolutionary Guards had earlier said that two oil tankers trying to transit the strait “exploded and were brought to a halt”, according to a statement reported by Tasnim news agency.

On Sunday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called on countries around the world to share the burden of protecting global shipping.

But Baqaei said on Monday that Tehran would not allow the strait to be used by its foes “to threaten Iran’s security and national interests”.

US Central Command (Centcom) said on Sunday that it successfully completed the ninth consecutive night of strikes against Iran, while Rubio said he would “continue to try” to reach a diplomatic solution.

The fresh fighting came after a weekend in which the US announced three new US military fatalities and one service member missing in action.

Two were killed during Iranian missile and drone attacks on Jordan on Friday, while another service member died in northern Iraq during the controlled detonation of unexploded ordnance from a downed Iranian drone, Centcom said.

President Donald Trump said US strikes on Iran “hit them very hard” in honour of the American fatalities.

The deaths brought to 17 the confirmed number of American military fatalities since the conflict began with a massive US-Israeli strike on the Islamic republic.

On Friday, Iran’s health ministry reported that 50 people had been killed in recent fighting and more than 500 wounded.

Iran strikes neighbours

Meanwhile, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards announced on Monday that they had hit targets in Syria, Jordan and Kuwait overnight.

In Syria, Iranian forces launched “a surprise attack on the enemy special operations command centre in the Al-Tanf region”, according to a Guards statement carried by state media.

The US withdrew its troops from Al-Tanf in February.

In Jordan, the Guards said it targeted US military aircraft stationed at Aqaba Airport “with ballistic missiles, causing severe damage to a number of them”.

The Guards also said they hit US military targets based in Kuwait, including an early-warning radar system that was “completely destroyed”.

Kuwaiti air defences were “engaging hostile drone attacks following Iranian aggression”, its army said on Monday.

Bahrain’s interior ministry also said that its air raid sirens had sounded and urged citizens and residents to head to “the nearest safe place”.

Later, Iran’s army said it had targeted two US bases in Kuwait with drones in response to American attacks on Iranian territory.

The Islamic republic’s army said it carried out “large-scale attacks with kamikaze drones against the US military’s ammunition depot at Camp Udairi and the Patriot radar system and air surveillance radar at Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait”, according to a statement carried by the state broadcaster.

Before the US strikes, Iran’s supreme leader said Washington would pay for “seeking to escalate the conflict”.

US Central Command said in a statement that the airstrikes began at 6pm ET (2200 GMT), at President Donald Trump’s direction.

“The strikes are designed to further degrade Iran’s ability to threaten commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and swiftly punish Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) forces who launched attacks against American service members in Jordan last night,” it said, without providing further details.

Central Command later said it had completed its wave of attacks, hitting Iranian military coastal surveillance and air defence facilities.

Iran’s Mehr news agency said the US carried out an attack near Sirik in southern Iran, adding that no casualties or damage to infrastructure have been reported. The Tasnim news agency said the U.S. military also targeted a location near Shadegan, close to the border with ​Iraq, and that at least six missiles hit Qeshm Island.

The US and Iran have intensified attacks since an interim ceasefire deal signed a month ago fell apart last week, raising the possibility of a return to all-out war.

Centcom said the deaths of two US troops occurred on Friday and that a third US service member was missing in action.

The announcement brought the number of US service members killed since the US-Israeli war on Iran began to 16, while more than 420 have been wounded.

US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth posted on X: “Their sacrifice only stiffens our resolve.”

Iran targeted US Gulf allies and Jordan on Saturday after US attacks on Iranian bridges, power facilities and other infrastructure.

In a written statement carried by the official social media accounts of Iran’s supreme leader and Iranian state media, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei said US actions have shown that Trump’s signature was “utterly worthless and devoid of credibility.”

The statement warned of “even heavier costs and further humiliation” for the United States.

Major General Mohsen Rezaei, a senior military adviser to Khamenei, warned that Tehran would resume “full-scale offensive operations” if US strikes continued in the coming days.

“Iran will no longer limit itself to retaliatory, like-for-like responses,” the general said, according to state media.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The conflict, which began when the US and Israel launched strikes on Iran at the end of February, both hoping to disable Tehran’s missile programme, has led to major disruption to energy supplies, fears over global inflation and a battle for control of the Strait of Hormuz.

Iranian strikes reported in Kuwait, Bahrain, Jordan

On Saturday, Kuwait came under sustained attack, with the armed forces saying they had intercepted Iranian ballistic missiles and drones, and that some firefighters and oil sector workers had been injured while responding to the attacks.

Iran’s IRGC said it had struck a US military support centre at Kuwait’s Camp Arifjan and destroyed a radar facility at Ali Al Salem Air Base.

Kuwait Petroleum Corporation later said one of its oil facilities had been hit in “repeated Iranian attacks”, causing significant damage and some injuries, according to the state news agency.

The IRGC also targeted a site in Bahrain where US combat aircraft were gathered at Sheikh Isa Air Base and an intelligence data centre, Iranian media said.

The Guards also destroyed at least two US fighter aircraft and three other aircraft during a missile and drone attack early on Saturday on the US base in Al Azraq, Jordan, according to Iranian state TV.

Saudi Arabia’s early warning system issued alerts early on Saturday urging residents of Al-Kharj and Yanbu to seek shelter. Al-Kharj, east of Riyadh, is home to a military base that hosts US troops, while Yanbu, on the Red Sea, has a key oil export terminal.

The IRGC made no mention of any attack on Saudi Arabia.

The US State Department issued a worldwide travel alert for Americans abroad on Saturday, citing heightened tensions in the Middle East “with the potential for unforeseen escalation”.

The advisory said flight cancellations and periodic airspace closures could disrupt travel.

Battle for control of Hormuz

Earlier, US Central Command said it had hit Iranian surveillance sites, military logistics infrastructure, underground weapons storage and maritime capabilities. US airstrikes early on Saturday killed three people and wounded eight others in the southern Hormozgan province, which borders the Strait of Hormuz, while two bridges and a road tunnel were damaged, Iranian state TV reported.

Iran’s Health Ministry said on Saturday that 50 people had been killed and more than 500 wounded in US strikes on the country over the past three weeks.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei accused the United States of seeking control over the Strait of Hormuz, which usually handles around one-fifth of the world’s oil supply.

Both sides have taken aim at shipping traffic, with the US saying it is enforcing a naval blockade and Iran saying it targets vessels violating its rules on navigating the strait.

Additional input from AFP

DUBAI: Iran launched more attacks on Washington’s Gulf allies and Jordan on Saturday after a seventh straight night of US strikes on Iranian military targets, while US military said two of its personnel were killed in Jordan and another was missing after an Iranian attack.

Iran’s supreme leader said Washington would pay for “seeking to incite war” as Tehran threatened a “full-scale offensive”.

The US and Iran have intensified attacks since an interim ceasefire deal signed a month ago fell apart last week, raising the possibility of a return to all-out war.

US Central Command said the deaths of the two US personnel occurred on Friday. It said a third US service member was missing in action.

In a written statement carried by the official social media accounts of Iran’s supreme leader and Iranian state media, Mojtaba Khamenei said repeated US breaches of the interim deal had shown that President Donald Trump’s signature was “utterly worthless and devoid of credibility”.

“Now that the American enemy is seeking to escalate the conflict thereby incurring even heavier costs and further humiliation, it should know that the noble nation of Iran and the Resistance Front have unforgettable lessons in store for it,” the statement said.

Kuwait came under sustained attack, with a desalination plant hit and operations at Kuwait International Airport suspended due to repeated missile and drone threats.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it had struck a US military support centre at Camp Arifjan and destroyed a radar facility at Ali Al Salem Air Base. Kuwait Petroleum Corporation later said one of its oil facilities had been hit in “repeated Iranian attacks”, causing significant damage and some injuries, according to the state news agency.

Kuwait’s armed forces said they had intercepted Iranian ballistic missiles and drones early on Saturday, adding that a number of firefighters and oil sector workers had been injured while responding to the attacks.

“Iran will no longer limit itself to retaliatory, like-for-like responses… and no political border will be safe,” said Major General Mohsen Rezaei, a senior military adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, according to state media.

He said Tehran would resume “full-scale offensive operations” if US strikes continued in the coming days.

‘Savagery of the US military’

Iran was responding to US attacks on bridges, power facilities and other infrastructure.

“Since there is no international institution to prevent the savagery of the US military, we have no path before us except the Quranic command: ‘Whoever attacks you, attack them in the same manner’,” the IRGC said in a statement warning US allies in the region to expect more strikes.

Iran’s health ministry said on Saturday that 50 people had been killed and more than 500 injured in US strikes on the country over the past three weeks.

US air strikes early on Saturday killed three people and wounded eight others in the southern Hormozgan province, which borders the Strait of Hormuz, while two bridges and a road tunnel were damaged, state TV reported.

The US carried out further air strikes in the same province on Saturday afternoon, the semi-official Fars news agency said, quoting provincial authorities, but there were no reports of civilian casualties.

Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei accused the United States of seeking control over the strait.

He also stressed that the US broadcasting images of destroyed Iranian infrastructure erodes its moral standing.

Earlier, the US military’s Central Command said it had completed its seventh consecutive day of strikes by hitting Iranian surveillance sites, military logistics infrastructure, underground weapons storage and maritime capabilities.

Strikes in Bahrain, Jordan, S. Arabia

As well as hitting Kuwait, the IRGC targeted a site in Bahrain where US combat aircraft were gathered at Sheikh Isa Air Base and an intelligence data centre, Iranian media said.

The Guards also destroyed at least two US fighter aircraft and three other aircraft during a missile and drone attack early on Saturday on the US base in Al Azraq, Jordan, according to Iranian state TV.

The secretary general of the Gulf Cooperation Council, Jasem Mohamed Albudaiwi, condemned the latest attacks, saying they constituted “war crimes requiring international accountability and prosecution, given the deliberate targeting of infrastructure and civilian facilities”.

Saudi Arabia’s early warning system issued alerts early on Saturday urging residents of Al-Kharj and Yanbu to seek shelter. Al-Kharj, east of Riyadh, is home to a military base that hosts US troops, while Yanbu, on the Red Sea, has a key oil export terminal.

Two people briefed on the matter said an Iranian missile attack, the first on Saudi Arabia in more than three months, had triggered the alerts. Saudi state media did not say what had prompted the alerts. The IRGC also made no mention of any attack on Saudi Arabia.

Published in Dawn, July 19th, 2026

Dozens of mourners dressed in black carried the body of Fadi Hamdallah al-Nassan — a player for Al-Mughayyir Club and a member of the Palestinian national youth team — from the Palestine Medical Complex in Ramallah to his village for burial.

The Palestine Football Association accused Israeli forces of shooting Nassan while settlers were attacking the village on July 11.

The young player was reportedly shot in the thigh during the attack. His leg was amputated, and he later died from his injuries, the association said.

The Israeli military did not immediately respond to an AFP request for comment Saturday.

“He loved football,” his father, Hamdallah Al-Nassan, told AFP.

“When the settlers attacked, he heard the screams of the girls and women,” he said. “He went to the scene of the attack and was killed.”

The teenager’s mother, Hanan al-Nassan, said her son was well-liked in the village.

“He was a good student, good in sports, and loved playing football.
Everyone loved him,” she said.

“May God accept him as a martyr.”

The Palestinian official news agency Wafa also reported that Nassan was wounded and his leg amputated, adding that two other residents were hit by rubber bullets fired by Israeli forces, while a 10-year-old boy was hit on the head by a stun grenade.

Since the start of the war in Gaza in October 2023, the United Nations has reported a sharp increase in violence attributed to Israeli settlers in the West Bank.

Israeli soldiers or settlers have killed at least 1,088 Palestinians in the West Bank since October 2023, according to an AFP tally based on Palestinian health ministry data.

Earlier this week, Israel’s security cabinet approved a budget of $434 million for establishing 34 new settlements in the occupied West Bank, right-wing Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said.

UN bodies, Palestinians and most countries view the settlements as illegal under international conventions and a primary obstacle to peace.

Smotrich , who has long opposed Palestinian statehood, is head of the Reli­gious Zionism party that draws much of its support from settlements and is running in the upcoming legislative election on Oct 27.

The planned settlements would bring the total established under his four-year tenure to 103.

The call from former Ireland president Mary Robinson and ex-New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark came after they visited Israel, the occupied Palestinian territories, Jordan and Lebanon.

They said in a statement that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government was seeking “to make Palestine disappear physically, economically, culturally and politically”.

Speaking to journalists in Jerusalem, they said the international community must do more to end Israeli impunity in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, which Palestinians seek as the future capital of a sovereign state.

“I think if we were to summarise the key message that we’ve heard across civil society, both in the West Bank and here, as to what are they looking for, it’s accountability and no impunity,” said Clark.

Robinson said she was “ashamed” that the European Union had not taken a firmer stance on the issue, calling for Brussels to suspend the trade component of its association agreement with Israel and to ban the trade of products from Israeli settlements.

The pair said they had observed a deterioration of the situation in occupied West Bank since a previous mission in 2023, and warned that continued settlement expansion would result in “Palestine disappearing before our eyes”. Since taking office, Netanyahu’s government has approved the establishment of 102 settlements in the occupied territory, according to Israeli anti-settlement group Peace Now.

And since the Gaza conflict began in 2023, the United Nations has reported a sharp rise in settler violence, while some Israeli ministers call for the annexation of all or part of the occupied West Bank.

Excluding east Jerusalem, more than 500,000 Israelis live in settlements in the occupied territory, among some three million Palestinians.

All Israeli settlements are illegal under international law.

During their visit, the former leaders met Israeli President Isaac Herzog.

“We disagreed on a number of points,” said Robinson.

Israeli parliament dissolved in run-up to elections Israel’s parliament voted to dissolve itself on Friday as the country gears up for October elections, wrapping up a last-minute legislative blitz by the government aimed at pleasing allies.

The vote, endorsed by 62 of the Knesset’s 120 members, cleared the way for polls on Oct 27 in which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is seeking another term despite waning popularity.

His government has pushed through a number of contentious bills in recent days aimed at shoring up its position and satisfying allies in the ultra-Orthodox community.

The ruling coalition passed a ream of bills in a marathon final session, including legislation stripping powers from the attorney general, freezing arrests of draft dodgers, and expanding government oversight of the media.

With the bill that gave the green light to its dissolution, it also approved an increase in funding for political parties.

Published in Dawn, July 18th, 2026

The US military said it completed another night of strikes on Iran “to further degrade Iranian military capabilities”, including on Qeshm Island and near Bandar Abbas, home to Iran’s largest port and key navy and Revolutionary Guards facilities.

“US forces, including fighter jets, aerial drones, and warships, launched precision munitions that hit dozens of Iranian military targets such as coastal surveillance and air defense sites, military logistics infrastructure, and maritime capabilities,” the US Central Command said in a statement.

Iran has fired missiles and drones at US military bases in neighbouring states, including an air base in Jordan.

In the early hours of Friday, Iran’s military said it had attacked US facilities in Bahrain and Kuwait. Several explosion-like sounds were heard in the Qatari capital Doha, according to a witness, and the Ministry of the Interior said a child was injured by shrapnel.

Iranian media reported that five bridges were hit in the latest round of US strikes, as well as the train station in coastal Bandar Khamir and Iranshahr Airport in southeastern Iran.

Seven people were killed in US attacks on bridges in Bandar Khamir, a port city in southern Iran, state news agency IRNA reported.

Shipping halted again in Strait of Hormuz

The escalation has once again largely halted traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most important shipping route for oil and gas, pushing up global energy prices.

Tehran resumed its blockade of the strait and Washington again blockaded Iranian ports from Wednesday.

Iran has signalled it could prod the Houthi’s in Yemen to close another key strait: the Bab al-Mandeb at the mouth of the Red Sea, sources told Reuters, if Washington attacks Iran’s infrastructure.

Iran last week hit ships moving through a corridor in the strait.

Karoline Leavitt, White House press secretary, told a briefing on Thursday that US President Donald Trump would not “sit by and allow these active acts of terrorism to take place in the strait without ensuring Iran pays consequences for that”.

But she added the president was “always open to diplomacy at the very same time”.

Iran keeps grip on strait

Iran wants all ships using the Strait of Hormuz to travel through a channel close to its shores, and intends to charge passage fees at the end of a 60-day negotiation period set in last month’s memorandum.

Washington had encouraged ships to use an alternative route to the south, along the Omani coast.

US forces said their airstrikes have hit military targets along the coast to cripple Iran’s ability to control the strait.

Iranian Army spokesperson Brigadier General Mohammad Akraminia said on Thursday this would not work because Iran could strike the strait from anywhere on its territory.

Trump has not ruled out the possibility of using ground forces, including to seize Kharg Island, the site of Iran’s main oil export terminal.

He has repeated threats to hit Iranian power plants and bridges next week unless Tehran resumes negotiations.