War returns to Iran with Israel, US strikes

Scores of people have been killed across the Middle East since the US and Israel attacked Iran on February 28.

Here are the latest death tolls from the war, reported but not independently verified by Reuters.

• Iran: 787 people have died, including 165 schoolgirls and staff killed in a missile strike, according to the non-profit humanitarian group Iranian Red Crescent Society. It was unclear if the death toll included Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps military casualties.
• Isreal: 10 civilians have been killed, including nine people in an Iranian missile strike on Beit Shemesh near Jerusalem on March 1, according to Israel’s ambulance service Magen David Adom. The Israel Defence Forces has reported no military casualties.
• Lebanon: 40 people have been killed, according to Lebanon’s health ministry.
• Bahrain: One person was killed after fire broke out in Bahrain’s Salman Industrial City following a missile interception, according to the interior ministry.
• Oman: One person killed after a projectile hit the Marshall Islands-flagged product tanker MKD VYOM off the coast of Muscat.
• UAE: Three people killed, according to UAE’s defence ministry.
• US: Six US service members were killed in a strike on a facility in Kuwait, according to US Central Command.

Hezbollah has said it targeted northern Israel’s Haifa naval base, its 12th attack of the day as Israel continued to strike Lebanon, reports AFP.

In a statement, the group said that “in response to the criminal Israeli aggression that struck dozens of Lebanese cities and towns, including Beirut’s southern suburbs”, it targeted the base with “a barrage of high-quality missiles” at 8pm local time.

The Israeli military had said shortly after 8pm that several incoming projectiles were detected, and most were shot down.

Kuwait has said two of its army personnel who were killed on Monday fell as a result of Iran’s attacks, reports Reuters.

The government media office’s said this, relaying its letter to the secretary general of the UN and the Security Council president.

President Donald Trump has said he ordered US forces to join Israel’s attack on Iran because he believed Iran was about to strike first, reports Reuters.

Saying so, he contradicts the rationale offered a day earlier by his secretary of state for how the war began.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Monday that the US launched the attack because of fears that Iran would retaliate in response to planned Israeli action against Tehran.

“We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action; we knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties,” Rubio said.

Trump rejected suggestions that Israel pushed the US into the conflict, as his administration gave varying accounts and faced criticism from some supporters and Democrats who accused him of launching a “war of choice.”

“I might have forced their (Israel’s) hand,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office as he met with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. “We were having negotiations with these lunatics, and it was my opinion that they were going to attack first. If we didn’t do it, they were going to attack first. I felt strongly about that.”

British Foreign Minister Yvette Cooper has said that Iranian strikes on Riyadh, including on the US embassy, “are completely unacceptable”.

“We condemn these reckless and destabilising attacks that target innocent civilians. We stand with Saudi Arabia and our others partners across the region in the face of these attacks,” she posted on X.

Qatar has said it has arrested two cells affiliated with Iran’s revolutionary guards, reports Reuters.

Munitions debris have fallen late in the Tel Aviv area, where a woman suffered mild shrapnel injuries, AFP reports citing police, which claimed that Iran had launched two waves of missiles toward Israel within 30 minutes.

“A short time ago, reports were received by the Israel police regarding the fall of munition debris in the Tel Aviv District. Police officers and bomb disposal experts are operating to secure and isolate the affected areas,” the force said in a statement reporting the first wave of missiles.

Minutes later, the military claimed that a second wave of missile was launched from Iran, which were followed by blasts, AFP journalists reported.

Israel’s UN envoy Danny Danon has claimed that Israel and the United States now control almost all of Iran’s airspace and that superiority will be evident in the next few days, reports Reuters.

Danon told reporters at the United Nations in New York that the conflict with Iran would not be over in a day or a week.

“We knew it’s not going to be an easy war. We are aware of the abilities of the Iranian regime. They spent billions of dollars on the infrastructure of terror, and we knew it’s going to be a serious operation,” he said.

“But it will not last forever. We have superiority. Today we have control almost over all the airspace of Iran, and I’m sure we will be able to show that superiority in the next few days.”

Qatar’s defence ministry has said that Iran launched two missiles towards its territory, with one targeting US-run Al Udeid air base with no reported human loss, Reuters reports.

A drone has been shot down near Baghdad International airport, reports AFP, citing Iraqi authorities.

“A small drone was downed … on the outskirts of Baghdad International Airport, with no casualties or material damage reported,” the Iraqi government’s security media cell said.

Baghdad International Airport includes a military base that hosts American advisers and previously housed US-led coalition troops.

Israel’s UN envoy Danny Danon has said while speaking to reporters at the United Nations in New York that the Lebanese government should act now against Hezbollah members attacking Israel from Lebanese territory to prevent further escalation, reports Reuters.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that approximately 9,000 Americans had evacuated the Middle East since the start of US-Israeli strikes on Iran, reports Reuters.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio says that all personnel have been accounted for after a “drone struck” a parking lot adjacent to the US consulate in Dubai, reports Reuters.

The United Arab Emirates has said it has been exposed to over 1,000 attacks since Iran launched retaliatory strikes in the region, reports Reuters.

The UAE foreign ministry said it has not taken any decision to change its defensive stance towards Iran’s attacks, but reserves the right to defense itself.

Dubai authorities have confirmed that a fire resulting from a “drone-related incident” near the US consulate has been successfully contained, says the Dubai Media Office.

“Emergency teams responded immediately. No injuries have been reported,” it said on X.

Israel’s transport minister has said that the country will gradually reopen its airspace overnight between Wednesday and Thursday, reports AFP.

“The airspace will reopen gradually starting already on the night between Wednesday and Thursday, and of course subject to security developments,” Miri Regev said during a press conference at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport.

A spokesperson for the ministry told AFP that the airspace will initially reopen for repatriation flights only, and that people will not be allowed to fly out.

The United States has said that it has arranged charter flights to help Americans leave the Middle East, reports AFP.

US officials have helped arrange charter flights from Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates “and will continue to secure additional capacity as security conditions allow,” the State Department said.

It said that more than 9,000 Americans have returned from the Middle East since the United States and Israel started the war on Saturday, with more than 300 of them from Israel.

The Israeli military has claimed that its strikes have disabled around 300 missile launchers in Iran since the United States and Israel launched a joint attack on the Islamic republic over the weekend, reports AFP.

“Since the start of Operation ‘Roaring Lion’, the Israeli Air Force has dismantled approximately 300 Iranian missile launchers. This is the result of more than 1,600 sorties and a systematic, around-the-clock effort to locate and target launchers and missile stockpiles in order to reduce fire toward the Israeli home front,” the army claimed in a statement.

President Donald Trump says he has ordered the United States Development Finance Corporation to provide insurance and guarantees for the financial security of all maritime trade, including oil tankers, traveling through the Gulf region, reports Reuters.

He added that if necessary, the US navy will begin escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz.

He made the comments in a Truth Social post.

President Emmanuel Macron has said France is sending its aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle to the Mediterranean and working to build a coalition that will help secure maritime traffic imperiled by the escalating crisis in the Middle East, reports Reuters.

In a televised address to the nation, Macron said that action needed to be taken with the Straits of Hormuz closed and the Suez Canal and Red Sea shipping routes threatened by the widening conflict.

“We have economic interests to protect, because oil prices, gas prices and the international trade situation are being profoundly disrupted by this war.,” Macron said.

French President Emmanuel Macron has said that the United States and Israel’s military operations in Iran have been conducted “outside international law”, but he places primary blame on the Islamic republic, reports AFP.

“The United States of America and Israel decided to launch military operations, conducted outside international law, which we cannot approve of,” said Macron.

But “the Islamic Republic of Iran bears primary responsibility for this situation,” Macron added, citing their “dangerous” nuclear programme, alleged support for regional proxies, and purported orders to shoot “its own people” during protests in January.

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, assassinated on Saturday in US-Israeli strikes, will be buried in the holy city of Mashhad, Reuters has reports, citing he the Fars news agency.

No date for the burial was disclosed.

Smoke has been seen rising from an area near the US consulate in Dubai, two witnesses have told Reuters.

The US State Department did not immediately return a request for comment.