The US and Israel on Feb 28 launched what they described as a “pre-emptive” joint strike against Iranian targets, with Trump announcing start of “major combat operations”
Human Rights Watch has warned that continued tit-for-tat strikes on energy infrastructure by Iran, Israel and the United States “risk causing economic and environmental catastrophe to civilians” in Iran, across the Gulf and economically marginalised people worldwide.
A statement from the group’s Middle East and North Africa Deputy Director, Michael Page, has called for an end to any attacks targeting civilian energy infrastructure.
Drone attacks have hit Kuwait’s Mina Al-Ahmadi oil refinery, causing several fires but no casualties, state media has said citing the national oil company, AFP reports.
“The Mina Al-Ahmadi refinery … was subjected early today to several hostile drone attacks, causing fires in some of its units,” the official Kuwait News Agency said, adding that “several refinery units were shut down”.
The Kuwaiti army later said that the fire was brought under control without any casualties.
“Two drones targeted one of the units in a refinery of the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation, resulting in a fire that was brought under control by the specialised teams, without any injuries,” it said on X.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei has said the enemies of the Islamic republic are being defeated in the war against the US and Israel in a written message for the Persian New Year, Nowruz, reports Reuters.
“At the moment, due to the particular unity that has been created between you our compatriots — despite all the differences in religious, intellectual, cultural and political origins — the enemy has been defeated,” said Khamenei.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei has released a message on marking the start of Persian New Year, which he has named the year of a “resistance economy under national unity and national security.”
In the statement, released on his Telegram channel, Khamenei said that attacks against Turkey and Oman were not carried out by Iran or its allied forces, reports Reuters.
Israel’s foreign ministry has accused Iran of an “attack on the holy sites” of Jerusalem after an impact near the walls of the Old City following a missile warning, AFP reports.
“The Iranian attack on the holy sites sacred to all three religions reveals the madness of the Iranian regime, which claims to be religious,” Israel’s foreign ministry has written on X.
It was unclear whether the impact was from a missile or was caused by an interception.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has rejected US claims about causing major destruction to Iran’s air defences and navy, saying such a message is “detached from reality”, Al Jazeera reports.
“US government says one thing, reality says another,” Araghchi has written in a post on X. “Right as US authorities claim Iran’s air defences are gone, an F-35 gets hit. As they declare Iran’s navy finished, USS Gerald Ford turns back, and USS Abraham Lincoln drifts farther away.”
The top Iranian diplomat went on to compare the US’s framing of its war achievements to its framing of the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 1970s. “Different decade, same ‘we’re winning’”, he wrote.
The gymnastics World Cup event scheduled to take place in Doha in April has been cancelled due to the war in the Middle East, AFP reports, quoting the sport’s governing body.
“World Gymnastics reports that, following an urgent online vote and in light of the current situation in the Middle East, its executive committee has decided to cancel the 2026 edition of the Artistic Gymnastics Apparatus World Cup in Doha (QAT), scheduled to take place from April 15 to 18,” World Gymnastics said in a statement.
Nato has evacuated its personnel from Iraq, Saeed al Jayashi, advisor at Iraq’s national security advisory, has told Al Jazeera.
He said the withdrawal was temporary and that Nato personnel would return to Iraq once the US-Israeli war with Iran ends, and the situation in Iraq stabilises.
Dozens, if not hundreds, of ships are anchored at the entrance of the Strait of Hormuz, stopped from passing further due to the threat of Iranian attack, Al Jazeera reports citing Inzamam Rashid, a journalist reporting from near the waterway.
While the US and Israel had carried out overnight operations near Iran’s coast in an effort to secure the strait, Iran says it has set up an approved shipping corridor through the strait, he says.
“They have said that [they are] allowing select vessels to pass through the waters alongside the Iranian coast. What they have to do is get prior approval from the IRGC,” he adds.
Data shows that at least nine ships have passed through this route where the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps are verifying vessels, Rashid says.
Iran’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee of the Parliament says that oil exports from Kharg Island are continuing uninterrupted, Al Jazeera reports.
“Security is fully established in Kharg Island, and oil export is going on without any problem and without any interruption,” its spokesperson has said in a statement carried by Iran’s Tasnim news agency.
Iran’s armed forces “are at the peak of their defence readiness and will give a decisive and crushing response to all the evils and attacks of the enemy”, the spokesperson has said.
Kharg Island, around 30 kilometres off Iran’s mainland, is a hub for roughly 90 per cent of the country’s crude oil exports. It was hit in US strikes last weekend, but no casualties were reported.
Israeli television has shown smoke rising from an impact site near the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City, after AFP journalists heard loud blasts following a warning of Iranian missiles.
The Israeli media showed footage of a crater in a road that appeared to be close to the Jewish and Armenian quarters of the historic Old City.
Police said they were “conducting searches to locate the impact sites of weapons and munitions or interception fragments within the Jerusalem District”.
Britain’s Foreign Minister Yvette Cooper has warned her Iranian counterpart in a phone call “against targeting UK bases, territory or interests directly”, a foreign office statement says, reports AFP.
The statement was a response to one issued by Iran’s foreign ministry in which it said Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told Cooper in the call on Thursday that any US use of British bases would be seen as “participation in aggression” against the Islamic republic.
Cooper told Araghchi “the defensive UK operations in the region were a response to the Iranian aggression against Gulf partners”, the UK foreign office said, adding: “She made clear that the UK wants to see a swift resolution to this conflict. “
The United States military is deploying thousands of additional Marines and sailors to the Middle East, Reuters reports quoting three US officials.
The sources, who were speaking on the condition of anonymity, did not say what the role of the additional troops would be.
One of the officials said that the USS Boxer, along with the Marine Expeditionary Unit aboard, were departing the West Coast of the United States about three weeks ahead of schedule.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has reiterated Tehran’s warning that no restraint will be shown if infrastructure is attacked, claiming they had intelligence on “ Israeli plans to strike infrastructure”.
“We are men and women of principles. Iranians do not sneak [an] attack adversaries while engaged in dialogue. Only when attacked do we powerfully respond.
“We have intelligence on Israeli plans to strike infrastructure. Once again: ZERO restraint if our infrastructure is attacked,” he said in a post on X.
Iranian authorities have arrested 45 people accused of acting as “mercenaries and separatists”, including several, it says, who were plotting an attack, Al Jazeera reports citing Iran’s IRIB broadcaster, which cited the intelligence ministry.
The ministry said the arrests in the provinces of Qazvin and West Azerbaijan included 16 people accused of sharing military coordinates with what it described as a hostile network. It claimed that six others were members of separatist groups allegedly plotting an attack in the northwestern city of Bukan.
Hezbollah has denied that it has a presence inside the United Arab Emirates, after Emirati authorities announced they had arrested at least five members of a “terrorist network” linked to Hezbollah and Iran, AFP reports.
In a statement, the Lebanese militant group said it “denies the fabricated accusations made against it by the security authorities in the United Arab Emirates… Hezbollah has no presence inside the UAE or in any other country under any cover or commercial designation or otherwise”.
The US president has lashed out at fellow members of the Nato military alliance, saying they are “cowards” for failing to join the Iran war or deploy forces to help secure the Strait of Hormuz, Al Jazeera reports.
“Without the USA, Nato is a paper tiger!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. “They didn’t want to join the fight to stop a nuclear-powered Iran.”
He added: “Now that [the] fight is militarily won, with very little danger for them, they complain about the high oil prices they are forced to pay, but don’t want to help open the Strait of Hormuz, a simple military manoeuvre that is the single reason for the high oil prices.”
“So easy for them to do, with so little risk. Coward, and we will remember!,” Trump said.
China’s top diplomat Wang Yi told French presidential adviser Emmanuel Bonne that both countries should work together towards resolving the crisis in the Middle East, AFP reports.
“Despite the difficulties, the right way out of the crisis remains dialogue and negotiation,” Wang said in a call with Bonne, adding “China and France should work together to that end”.
US Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller has said he was concerned about the impact of the US-Israel war on Iran on inflation due to the prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz, AFP reports.
Waller, who has since last year backed interest rate cuts over labor market concerns, said he changed his mind in the last two weeks on the pace of interest rate cuts due to concerns about inflation.
“Since that time the Strait of Hormuz was closed, this is looking like it’s going to be a much more protracted conflict, and oil prices are going to stay high for a longer time,” he told US broadcaster CNBC on Friday.
“So that suggested inflation was more of a concern than I was putting it.”
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot has said, during a visit to Israel, that Iran must make major concessions as part of any long-term political solution following the Middle East war, AFP reports.
“Whatever the outcome of the ongoing military operations, it must be complemented by a political solution that produces lasting results,” Barrot has told journalists in Tel Aviv. “In this regard, the Iranian regime must be prepared to make major concessions — a radical change of stance.”
Barrot repeated a European call for a moratorium on strikes against energy infrastructure after an Israeli bombardment of Iran’s key gasfield pushed up energy prices.
France’s Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot has said that he did not see an obvious end to the conflict in the Middle East in the short-term, but that France and its allies would continue to work towards trying to find a lasting solution, according to Reuters.
“There is no obvious short-term way out of the ongoing regional escalation, which has in some ways been unfolding since October 7, 2023. But this must in no way serve as a pretext for inaction,” Barrot told reporters after meeting with Israeli counterpart Gideon Saar in Tel Aviv.
Barrot said he had outlined Paris’ reservations about a possible Israeli ground operation in southern Lebanon, but said the Lebanese army had to do everything possible to disarm Hezbollah as demanded by the Lebanese government.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot addresses a press briefing at the Ben Gurion Airport in Lod, near Tel Aviv on March 20, 2026. — AFP
Scottish police have arrested two people accused of attempting to enter the UK’s nuclear submarine base in the country, Al Jazeera reports.
Police say they arrested a man and a woman, aged 34 and 31, respectively, but did not comment on their nationality, adding in a statement that inquiries are ongoing.
The base on the west coast of Scotland also hosts the UK’s nuclear-armed submarine fleet.
