War returns to Iran with Israel, US strikes

Hezbollah says on Telegram that it has bombed the Tel Hashomer base southeast of Tel Aviv with a “specialised missile”, Al Jazeera reports.

It adds that it attacked a group of Israeli army vehicles at the Hounin gate, opposite the Lebanese village of Markaba.

Around a dozen blasts have been heard in Jerusalem, after air raid sirens sounded in several areas of Israel and the occupied West Bank following warnings of missiles fired from Iran, AFP journalists report.

Emergency responders say there are no immediate reports that anyone is hurt.

Explosions have been heard in Iraq’s capital, Baghdad and in the city of Erbil in the autonomous Kurdistan region, AFP journalists report.

The cause of the loud bangs in Baghdad remains unknown, but a witness near the fortified Green Zone, which houses the US embassy, has reported seeing air defences activated over the area.

In Erbil, the capital of the Kurdistan region, an AFP journalist reports hearing the sound of a drone followed by at least three loud bangs.

A round of massive explosions has rocked the Iranian capital of Tehran, an AFP journalist reports.

The journalist has seen a fireball and smoke rising from southern Tehran.

Iranian media has reported the explosions, while air defence has been engaged over the capital.

The Dubai Media Office, citing authorities, reports that debris from an intercepted drone fell onto a car and killed an Asian driver in the Al-Barsha area.

The Israeli army continues to pound Lebanon, claiming it is hitting Hezbollah targets, while the country’s health ministry says more than 330 people have been killed since Monday, Al Jazeera reports.

Meanwhile, the entire southern suburbs of Beirut, home to hundreds of thousands, have once again been threatened by the Israeli army.

In the past several minutes, the Israeli army has reportedly carried out air strikes on the Jennata Heights area in eastern Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, as well as the towns of Doueir, Ansar and Jebchit in southern Lebanon.

The US embassy in Baghdad has been targeted by Katyusha rockets and sirens have sounded, Reuters reports citing security sources and witnesses.

It is not immediately clear whether the rockets have caused any damage or casualties.

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has warned Iran against firing any more missiles towards Turkiye, after Nato air defences destroyed a missile heading into Turkish airspace several days ago, Reuters reports.

Speaking at a press conference in Istanbul, Fidan has also said that Turkiye opposes all scenarios aiming to create ethnicity-based civil war in Iran, adding that such scenarios could lead to migrant waves.

More than 150 Iranian nationals, including diplomats and their families, have left Lebanon, a senior Lebanese security source tells Reuters, after an Israeli military spokesperson threatened “representatives” of Iran in Lebanon.

The security source says they are being flown to Russia on a Russian plane, and that another 20 Iranians left on Friday following the start of a new war between Hezbollah and Israel.

The development comes after an Israeli military spokesperson on Tuesday told representatives of the Iranian government “still in Lebanon to leave immediately before they are targeted”.

Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi has said that Iran’s openness to de-escalating the ongoing conflict was almost immediately killed by [US] President Trump’s misinterpretation of our capabilities, determination and intent”.

In a statement, Araghchi has said, “If Mr Trump seeks escalation, it is precisely what our powerful armed forces have long been prepared for, and what he will get.”

He warns that responsibility for any intensification of Iran’s self-defence will lie squarely with the Trump administration, adding that the “week-long misadventure” has led to the deaths of American personnel and cost the US military $100 billion.

“When markets reopen, that cost will balloon and directly be transferred to ordinary Americans at pumping stations,” Araghchi says, referring to rising fuel prices.

“Mr Trump’s own National Intelligence Council, representing input from the 18 intelligence agencies of the US, determined that war on Iran is destined to fail. I also warned Mr Trump’s envoys that war will not improve their bargaining position. Were these warnings conveyed?”

Araghchi says the American public voted to end involvement in military quagmires in the Middle East, but ended up with an administration that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has “finally managed to dupe into fighting Israel’s wars” after decades of failed attempts.

“This is a war of choice pursued by a small cabal of ‘Israel Firsters’, and ‘Israel First’ always means ‘America Last’,” Araghchi says.

The Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) says it is continuing to use its export capacity that bypasses the Strait of Hormuz as well as its international storage facilities to ensure supply continuity to global markets, Reuters reports.

It says it is managing offshore production levels to address storage needs and is in touch with impacted customers. ADNOC adds that onshore operations continue.

The Dubai Media Office says that debris from an intercepted drone has fallen onto the facade of a building in the city’s marina, but no injuries have been reported as a result of the incident.

The UAE’s defence ministry says its air defences are again intercepting drones and missiles fired from Iran.

“The Ministry of Defence confirms that the sounds heard in scattered areas of the country are the result of the air defence systems intercepting ballistic missiles, and fighter jets intercepting drones and loitering munitions,” the ministry has said in a statement.

A member of Iran’s Assembly of Experts says the body will meet within a day to choose the country’s next supreme leader, AFP reports citing Iranian media.

“With divine assistance, this session will occur within the next 24 hours,” Hossein Mozafari, one of the assembly’s 88 members, has said, cited by the Fars news agency.

The statement comes a week after the assassination of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in a US-Israeli attack.

Mozafari has also urged Iranians to “refrain from any speculation and the spreading of rumours regarding this matter” as the assembly has not yet convened for a session.

Qatar’s Hamad International Airport remains temporarily closed due to the “current situation”, the airport has said in a statement.

“Passengers are reminded not to proceed to the airport at this time and to contact their respective airlines directly,” the statement reads.

It notes that flights are still operating, but due to the opening of a limited corridor for passenger repatriation.

“Scheduled flights will resume once the relevant authority confirms the safe reopening of Qatari airspace,” Hamad International Airport says.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps says it struck the US’ Juffair base in Bahrain, adding that it had been used to attack an Iranian desalination plant earlier in the day, AFP reports.

“In response to the aggression of American terrorists from the Juffair base against the Qeshm desalination plant, this American base was immediately struck by precision-guided solid-fuel and liquid-fuel missiles of the IRGC,” the Guards said on their website.

Saudi Arabia says a missile that targeted one of its airbases fell “in an uninhabited area”, as Iran continues its strikes across the Gulf, AFP reports.

“A ballistic missile fell in an uninhabited area after being launched towards Prince Sultan Airbase,” the defence ministry said.

Iran’s foreign ministry has said in a statement that responding to the US and Israel’s “brutal military aggression” is the country’s inherent right to self-defence, Al Jazeera reports.

It says that Tehran will continue to take action “until the aggression stops or until the United Nations Security Council fulfils its duty by identifying the aggressors.”

The statement adds that under international law, “states are prohibited from allowing their territory to be used, directly or indirectly, to inflict harm and damage on other states.”

The ministry says Iran has undertaken “necessary and proportionate defensive operations” against US bases, and that warnings have been issued continuously.

This should “in no way be construed as enmity or hostility toward regional countries,” the statement said.

Iranian parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf has warned that the US-Israeli strike on a desalination plant on Iran’s Qeshm island would invoke “a proportionate response”.

“The American-Zionist (Israeli) coalition’s breach of the Qeshm desalination plant was carried out with support from one of the air bases in the southern neighbouring countries,” Ghalibaf has written on X, terming the strike a “blatant crime”.

He adds that US military bases in the region have “become platforms for operations against Iran”.

“The origin of any attack will be the destination of our response,” he warns.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has confirmed that Israeli forces carried out an attack on the town of Nabi Chit in the Bekaa Valley overnight, which killed at least 41 people, Al Jazeera reports citing Lebanese health authorities.

In a statement on X, Netanyahu says Israeli soldiers conducted a special mission in the area aimed at locating the remains of Ron Arad, an Israeli airman captured in Lebanon about 40 years ago.

He adda that the attack “did not bring the findings we were looking for”.

Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health also said that at least 40 were wounded in Israeli air and ground raids on the town.

Hezbollah said its fighters observed four Israeli military helicopters entering the area from the direction of Syria and said advancing Israeli troops were engaged near the town’s cemetery.

Bahrain’s interior ministry says that Iranian strikes caused a fire and material damage to a house and surrounding buildings in the capital, Manama.

“The civil defence [body] is initiating its procedures to control the fire,” the ministry said on X.

A loud explosion has been heard in Dubai, AFP journalists report, while Iran continues to launch missiles and drones at targets across the Gulf.

The UAE had earlier reported “incoming missile and drone threats from Iran”.

The Israeli military claims it has attacked the “central air defence command centre” of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Air Force “in the heart of Tehran”, Al Jazeera reports.

It claims it struck air defence systems, headquarters, warehouses and other structures near the centre, adding that it also hit a site used to produce and launch ballistic missiles, which it claimed included warehouses for Quds Force combat equipment.