US Iran war news highlights: Trump says oil prices ‘small price to pay’, Iran names new leader

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it will retaliate if US-Israel attacks on its energy infrastructure don’t let up.

In a statement carried by Iranian state media, the unnamed spokesperson accused the United States and Israel of targeting civilians and fuel and energy facilities, and claimed the IRGC has “refrained from any similar action”.

Gulf countries should tell the US and Israel to stop, the spokesperson added, or else “similar actions will be taken in the region”.

“If you can tolerate oil at more than $200 per barrel, continue this game.”

US President Donald Trump said Sunday that Iran's next supreme leader "is not going to last long" if Tehran does not get his approval first.

"He's going to have to get approval from us," Trump told ABC News. "If he doesn't get approval from us he's not going to last long."

His comments came as the Iranian clerical body responsible for choosing the successor to slain supreme leader Ali Khamenei was reported to have voted and would soon announce a name.

A retired Lebanese security officer vanished in December after going to meet a possible buyer for a plot of land.

Lebanese officials and the family of retired General Security Directorate Captain Ahmed Shukr believe he was abducted and spirited away to Israel in an intelligence operation aimed at getting information on the fate of an Israeli airman who disappeared in Lebanon four decades ago.

The family believes Shukr was taken because of his brother's possible links to the disappearance of Israeli navigator Ron Arad. The family says Shukr was never part of a militant group and played no role in Arad's disappearance.

Nearly three months after Shukr disappeared — and after the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran, triggering a war in the Middle East — Israel carried out a deadly commando operation in Nabi Chit, Lebanon, this weekend in search of Arad's remains.

Residents said the commando team began digging in the Shukr family cemetery in Nabi Chit before being confronted by fighters from the Hezbollah militant group and armed civilians. Intense clashes and airstrikes left 41 people dead and dozens wounded, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry. No Israeli casualties were reported.

It was not immediately clear if the Israeli operation came as a result of information extracted from Shukr.

(AP)

India's ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Suhel Ajaz Khan, on Sunday held a virtual interaction with representatives of the Indian community and reassured them of assistance following joint US-Israel strikes on Iran.

Khan was accompanied by Deputy Chief of Mission, Abu Mathen George, and Counsellor (Community Welfare), Y Sabir.

The Ambassador reassured the community of the Embassy's readiness to extend all necessary assistance to Indian nationals in need, India in Saudi Arabia said in a post on X.

Two people were killed and 12 were injured after a projectile fell on a residential location in Saudi Arabia's Al-Kharj city on Sunday, the Saudi Civil Defence said.

The two people killed were of Indian and Bangladeshi nationalities, it added in a post on X.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards said earlier on Sunday that they targeted radar systems in locations including Saudi Arabia's Al-Kharj.

The Saudi civil defence said in a statement on X that a military munition fell on a residential site in Al-Kharj Governorate, resulting in two deaths and 12 injuries among residents.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer spoke with US President Donald Trump on Sunday, Starmer's office said in a statement.

"The leaders began by discussing the latest situation in the Middle East and the military cooperation between the UK and US through the use of RAF (Royal Air Force) bases in support of the collective self-defence of partners in the region," a spokeswoman from Starmer's office said in a statement.

"The Prime Minister also shared his heartfelt condolences with President Trump and the American people following the deaths of six US soldiers.

"They looked forward to speaking again soon."

Israel struck a hotel in central Beirut on Sunday, the first attack on the city centre since the start of the new war with Hezbollah, AFP reported, as Lebanon said nearly 400 people were killed over the past week.

The United States will spare Iran's energy infrastructure as it wages war with Israel against the Islamic Republic, Energy Secretary Chris Wright said Sunday.

With oil prices rising dramatically, he told CNN that disruptions to the petroleum and gas industry will be short-lived -- "worst case, that's a few weeks. That's not months."

Israel attacked oil storage facilities Saturday in and around Tehran, sparking huge fires in the first such attacks reported since the war started last weekend. Wright seemed to downplay them.

"These are Israeli strikes, these are local fuel depots to fill up the gas tank," Wright said.

He added, "The US is targeting zero energy infrastructure. There are no plans to target Iran's oil industry, their natural gas industry, or anything about their energy industry."

Iraqi oil production from its main southern oilfields has fallen by 70% to just 1.3 million barrels per day as the country is unable to export oil via the Strait of Hormuz due to the Iran war, 3 industry sources quoted by Reuters said on Sunday.

Production from the fields stood at around 4.3 million bpd before the war.

The Israeli military said on Sunday it had struck what it described as the "space force headquarters" of Iran's Revolutionary Guards in Tehran.

"As part of the strikes, the IDF targeted and dismantled the Iranian terror regime's IRGC Space Force headquarters," the military said.

"The headquarters served as a reception, transmission and research centre for the Iranian Space Agency, which is affiliated with the regime's military," it said.

The military said the site included research facilities as well as the command-and-control centre for the "Khayyam" satellite, which was used to "monitor the State of Israel and its residents".

Israel struck the Palestinian refugee camp of Ain al-Hilweh in southern Lebanon on Sunday, Lebanese state media reported, amid the new war between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah.

The state-run National News Agency said that "enemy warplanes launched two raids on the Ain al-Hilweh camp in Sidon".

Heavy explosions have been heard in different parts of Tehran, Reuters reported, citing Iranian state media.

US Central Command has urged civilians in Iran to stay inside their homes, alleging Iranian forces are using heavily populated areas to launch drones and missiles.

“This dangerous decision risks the lives of all civilians in Iran since locations used for military purposes lose protected status and could become legitimate military targets under international law,” it said in a statement.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi says Tehran’s attacks on US targets in the Middle East are a response to the war “imposed” by the US and Israel.

In an interview with NBC, the minister said Iran did not choose the conflict and is acting in self-defence.

“This is not the war of our choice. This is imposed on us by the United States and by Israel,” he said, describing the conflict as “unprovoked, unwarranted and illegal”.

Iran’s retaliatory military actions are directed at US bases, installations, and assets in the region, even if they are located on the territory of neighbouring countries, said Araghchi.

The US military has accused Iran of using ‘crowded places’ to launch missile, drone attacks, Reuters reported.

On Tel Aviv's beach promenade, people jog and stroll in the sunshine and play ball on the sand. It seems like any ordinary day -- until sirens wail, warning of incoming missiles from Iran.

Everyone heads calmly to the nearest shelter, almost resigned.

One week after the start of the Israeli-US offensive against Iran, the days and nights of millions of Israelis are interrupted by repeated sirens, especially in the country's north and centre.

"I feel tired, mostly tired," said Gabrielle, a 32-year-old medical student.

The Tel Aviv resident has to run down two flights of stairs and cross the street to reach a shelter.

"After a while, the tiredness just builds up -- you lose a lot of sleep," she told AFP.

Israel has built a network of public shelters over the decades, integrated in recent years with "mamads" -- safe rooms built inside new or renovated homes.

The country has also developed a sophisticated alert system that warns residents over their mobile phones to take shelter when incoming missiles are detected.

(AFP)

The United Arab Emirates says it’s acting in self-defence following what it described as a large-scale Iranian attack involving ballistic missiles and drones.

In a statement, the Foreign Ministry said more than 1,400 missiles and drones were launched towards infrastructure and civilian sites, resulting in an unspecified number of casualties.

The ministry described the attack as “brutal and unjustified”, saying it constituted a serious violation of international law and the UN Charter, as well as an infringement on the UAE’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

The UAE doesn’t seek escalation or to be drawn into a wider conflict, but it said it retains the right to take “all necessary measures” to protect its sovereignty.

Hezbollah said it carried out several attacks on Israeli military sites and northern cities today, according to statements issued by the group.

In one statement, the Lebanese group said it fired a rocket barrage at the Misgav base in northern Israel, which it described as a logistics facility. The group said the attack was in response to what it called Israeli strikes on dozens of Lebanese towns and cities, including Beirut’s southern suburbs.

In a separate statement, Hezbollah said its fighters launched “sophisticated missiles” at the Haifa naval base. It comes after it also claimed to attack the same target yesterday.

Iraq’s oil production has collapsed by about 60% as the Iran war means there aren’t enough tankers to load the nation’s crude.

The country is now pumping about 1.7 million to 1.8 million barrels of oil every day, down from about 4.3 million a day before the conflict began, according to people with knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be identified because the output levels aren’t public.

Iraq was the first major gulf producing country to have to cut output because of the conflict, a step that has since been followed by the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait.

The war has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, meaning an ever-dwindling number of tankers to export the region’s barrels. With insufficient ships, producer nations have to pump into storage, and space is running down.

(Bloomberg)

The Arab League's secretary-general said Sunday that Iranian attacks on several member states were "reckless", urging Tehran to reverse what he called a "massive strategic mistake".

In response to a US-Israeli air campaign that began on February 28, Iran has launched retaliatory strikes on Israel and Gulf states, which house American bases.

Addressing an emergency videoconference of Arab foreign ministers from Cairo, Ahmed Aboul Gheit said the strikes "cannot be justified under any pretext or excuse", accusing Tehran of responding to Gulf peace efforts with "treacherous rockets and drone attacks".

He said Arab states were "not parties to the ongoing war" and had made it clear they would not allow "their territory or airspace to be used" to launch attacks.

Several Arab countries, including Oman -- until recently the mediator of US-Iran nuclear talks -- as well as Qatar and Egypt, had put in "earnest, sincere and serious efforts to spare the entire region, including Iran, the ravages of war", Aboul Gheit added.

Israel's military said Sunday that two of its soldiers were killed in combat in southern Lebanon, the first Israeli troops to have died since fighting flared with the armed group Hezbollah.

"Master Sergeant Maher Khatar, aged 38, from Majdal Shams, a soldier from the Combat Engineering Corps in the 91st division, fell during combat in southern Lebanon," a military statement said, adding that a second soldier was killed in the same incident.

The Israeli rescue service said in a statement that they are providing assistance to three people injured by shrapnel due to the latest Iranian missile attacks.

According to the statement, the injured include a 40-year-old man in serious condition, a 25-year-old man in moderate condition, and a 56-year-old man in mild condition.

There were no further details on the location and the circumstances of the incident.

In a separate statement, the Israeli military said rescue forces were operating at a “crash scene” in central Israel.

Two Israeli soldiers were killed in combat in southern Lebanon, the Israeli army said in a statement.

The war in Iran has dealt a blow to one of Wall Street’s favourite trades — emerging markets.

Stocks and currencies have seen steep losses, with the MSCI equity index posting its biggest weekly drop in six years, and bond yields have jumped. Even so, money managers at firms including Pacific Investment Management Co., Barings LLC and T. Rowe Price Group Inc. argue the longer-term case for emerging markets remains intact. While some are tweaking portfolios at the margins, most are holding off on major shifts for now.

(Bloomberg)