Airstrikes by the United States and Israel have killed at least 787 people in Iran since the start of the war, the Iranian Red Crescent Society said Tuesday.
The conflict has also spread to Lebanon, where the Iranian-supported militant group Hezbollah fired missiles at Israel on Monday, prompting Israel to retaliate. On Tuesday, the Israeli military hit Beirut with more airstrikes and said it had moved additional troops into southern Lebanon and taken new positions on several strategic points close to the border.
Here is the latest:
Trump claims oil prices will drop once Iran conflict ends
The president acknowledged that oil and gas prices were going to rise as the U.S. remains engaged in the ongoing Middle East conflict — yet argued that prices would drop once the war ends.
“We have a little high oil prices for a little while, but as soon as this ends, those prices are going to drop, i believe, lower than even before,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.
The average price for a gallon of gasoline jumped 11 cents overnight Tuesday to about $3.11 in the United States, according to the American Automobile Association.
Democrats question Iran war’s cost, justification and planning
Ahead of a briefing by Trump administration officials to Congress, senior House Democrats are questioning what the costs of the Iran strikes will be and what impact they will have on the U.S. stockpile of munitions.
“The American people are entitled to clear answers including why this conflict began, what objectives justify continued military engagement, and what guardrails are in place to prevent a broader or protracted regional war,” said the five Democrats, who hold top positions on committees overseeing national security, in a letter to the Trump administration.
Lawmakers will receive a briefing later Tuesday as Trump tries to win over support for his campaign.
Trump says ‘we don’t want anything to do with Spain’
Trump said he wants to “cut off all trade with Spain” over NATO spending, adding “we don’t want anything to do with Spain.” Trump cited his ability to impose an embargo on Spain, based on the recent Supreme Court decision over the president’s ability to impose tariffs.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent agreed with the president’s claim that he could end trade with Spain.
Bessent told the president, “I agree that the Supreme Court reaffirmed your ability to implement an embargo.”
Trump says the US has ‘massive amounts of ammunition’
He said his predecessor, former President Joe Biden, “gave away a lot,” but said “we have plenty.”
He added that the U.S. had an “unlimited” supply of “middle and upper ammunition, which is really what we’re using in this war.”
Merz hopes Iran war will end soon
The German chancellor says that “we are hoping that the Israeli and the American army are doing the right things to bring this to an end and to have really a new government in place.”
Trump refutes that Israel forced hand on timing of Iran strike
“If anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand,” Trump told reporters at the start of the Oval Office meeting with Merz.
The Trump administration’s shifting rationale for launching joint strikes with Israel against Iran is spurring criticism, including some from Trump’s MAGA base, that the White House was dragged into the conflict by Israel.
Some prominent allies of Trump stepped up their criticism that the U.S. was following Israel’s lead after Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Monday that the U.S. decided to strike because, “we knew that there was going to be an Israeli action.”
“And we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties,” Rubio added.
Merz says he’s very happy to speak with Trump during these challenging times
“We are, on the same page in terms of getting this terrible regime in Tehran away,” Merz said
during a visit at the White House on Tuesday.
The German chancellor said he also wants to talk with Trump about “our trade agreement, which I would like to be in place as soon as possible,” and the Ukraine war.
“There are too many bad guys in this world, actually,” Merz added.
Dispute over Iran disrupts US presidency of UN Security Council, diplomats say
Russia and China have blocked approval of the Trump administration’s program of work as it took over the rotating presidency of the U.N. Security Council for March because it included a meeting on Iran, three diplomats familiar with the negotiations said Tuesday.
Traditionally, ambassadors from the 15 council nations meet on the first day of the presidency to approve work planned for the month and the president then holds a press conference to present it. That hasn’t happened.
The diplomats spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private council negotiations.
The dispute was over a U.S.-proposed meeting on sanctions on Iran, which Russia and China claim were illegally reimposed last year, one diplomat said.
As the U.S. and Israel struck Iran, U.S. first lady Melania Trump presided over an approved Security Council meeting Monday on children in conflict.
Trump says the US has ‘knocked out’ some of Iran’s forces and systems
The president made the comment at the White House while meeting with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.
“They have no navy. It’s been knocked out. They have no air force. It’s been knocked out,” Trump said.
He added about Iran: “They have no air detection, that’s been knocked out. Their radar has been knocked out. And, just about everything has been knocked out.”
Governments worldwide scramble to get their citizens home
From Romanian religious pilgrims to tourists and diplomats’ families, tens of thousands remain stranded across the Middle East as the war spreads and continues to disrupt air travel.
Gulf airspace is largely closed, cruise ships can’t pass through the Strait of Hormuz and major airlines have canceled flights.
The U.S. State Department says it has evacuated nonemergency personnel and families in six nations, adding the United Arab Emirates to its list on Tuesday, while governments from Russia to Germany and France also scrambled to run repatriation flights.
Some evacuees described fear and relief.
“We called our children at 3 a.m. to ask forgiveness because we might die,” Romanian pilgrim Mariana Muicaru said.
In Germany, after landing Tuesday in Frankfurt following a flight from Dubai, Wassim Mahlas said he was happy to be home: “I’m breathing German air again.”
US Embassy in Lebanon closes ‘until further notice’
The embassy says it is closed to the public “due to ongoing regional tensions.”
The U.S. State Department has advised Americans to leave Lebanon and avoid travel to the tiny Mediterranean nation on Israel’s northern border.
The Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group fired rockets into Israel late Saturday in solidarity with Iran, sparking ongoing retaliatory strikes across the Lebanon.
Elsewhere in the Mideast, U.S. bases and diplomatic missions have been targeted in attacks by Iran and its proxies in Iraq.
U.S. embassies and consulates in conflict zones often close to the public for consular services like visa and passport applications and renewals, but they remain operational even after non-essential staffers are ordered to leave for security reasons or remaining personnel work remotely.
Since the onset of the war with Iran, only the U.S. consulate in Karachi, Pakistan, has completely suspended operations.
Britain is sending a warship and helicopters to Cyprus after a drone hit a UK base there
Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Tuesday that Britain is sending a warship and helicopters to Cyprus after a drone hit a U.K. base on the eastern Mediterranean island.
Starmer said he told the president of Cyprus that the U.K. is deploying helicopters with counter-drone capabilities and the air-defense destroyer HMS Dragon to the region.
It comes after an Iran-made drone hit RAF Akrotiri base over the weekend, causing minor damage and no injuries.
Trump has lambasted the British prime minister over his reluctance to join the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.
Iranian drone damaged part of the US Embassy’s roof in Saudi Arabia
According to an internal State Department memo, the strike on the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh caused part of its roof to collapse, although there were no reported deaths or injuries to staff.
In Kuwait City, there were also no deaths or injuries after the vicinity of the embassy was hit by two drone strikes that caused no damage to the facility, it said.
US senators are grilling a top defense official over Iran war plans
Sen. Angus King, an independent from Maine, said it’s “very disturbing” that Trump took the U.S. to war because Israel wanted to bomb Iran.
Netanyahu has been “egging for an invasion of Iran for 20 years,” the senator said, and past U.S. presidents “have consistently said no.”
Senators grilled Defense official Elbridge Colby during an Armed Services committee hearing on the administration’s shifting rationale for the attack and warned against sending U.S. boots on the ground.
Colby told senators the president has directed the military campaign to destroy the missile threat from Iran and deny the country a nuclear weapon.
“The president made the decision,” Colby said.
Satellite images show damage to Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility
The satellite images taken on Monday show several damaged buildings at Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility, compared with imagery from the previous day, along with additional damage across the complex.
Vantor, an imaging company based in Colorado formerly known as Maxar Technologies, released the images showing the damage that it said affected buildings that house the personnel and vehicle entrances to the underground fuel enrichment complex.
Earlier Tuesday, the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog said that Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment site sustained “some recent damage” amid a U.S.-Israeli airstrike campaign.
It said “no radiological consequence expected,” from it.
The nuclear facility at Natanz is located nearly 220 kilometers (135 miles) southeast of Tehran, and is Iran’s main enrichment site. It had been targeted by airstrikes in the 12-day war between Iran and Israel in June.
Netanyahu threatens further strikes against Iran and Hezbollah
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his military plans to respond with even more force against projectiles from Iran and Lebanon on Tuesday during a visit to an Israeli air force base.
“Our pilots are over the skies of Iran and Tehran, and over the skies of Lebanon. Hezbollah made a very big mistake when it attacked us,” he said.
He added that the Lebanese government and Lebanese people should understand that Iran-backed Hezbollah is “dragging them into a war that is not theirs, just because of the death of that mass murderer that they have nothing to do with.”
A senior Hezbollah official has said that after more than a year of abiding by a ceasefire while Israel launched near-daily strikes in Lebanon, the group’s patience has ended.
US Embassy in Israel tells Americans they must find their own way home
If you’re an American in Israel looking for a way to leave the country, get a bus to Egypt or if you must, to Jordan. But don’t expect the U.S. Embassy to help.
That’s according to Mike Huckabee, the U.S. ambassador to Israel. In a lengthy post on X Tuesday, Huckabee said the U.S. embassy is directing all U.S. government employees and their family members in Israel to shelter in place “until further notice” as Iran fires missiles into the country.
“The U.S. Embassy is not in a position at this time to evacuate or directly assist Americans in departing Israel,” he wrote, adding information about bus service as a courtesy “as you make your own security plans.”
The Israeli Ministry of Tourism, he said, began running shuttles to the Taba Border Crossing with Egypt and requires prospective passengers to register via the ministry’s evacuation form.
Passengers who wish to cross to Jordan, he said, shuttle to Eilat in southern Israel and continue by taxi to the Yitzhak Rabin Border Crossing. Flights out of Jordan are harder to get than those out of Cairo, Huckabee wrote.
Bulgaria is evacuating people from the UAE and Oman
Foreign Minister Nadezhda Neynsky said that the first evacuation flights for Bulgarians from airports in the Middle East will take place early Wednesday.
“We have already organized the evacuation of some 300 people on the first flight from Oman,” she said adding that the repatriation of Bulgarians from Abu Dhabi and Dubai in the United Arab Emirates is also forthcoming.
Bulgaria’s government said that up to eight aircraft of varying capacity were on standby to carry out evacuation flights for its citizens from the Middle East at short notice.
There are currently more than 10,000 Bulgarians in the region.
The Tourism Ministry said that around 1,400 organized tourists with tour operator programs are currently in countries in the Middle East. The largest number of them are in Dubai, followed by Jordan.
“Ensuring the safety of Bulgarian citizens and creating conditions for their timely return at the first safe opportunity remains the leading priority,” the ministry said.
Tehran resident describes growing fears as the capital comes under heavy bombardment
Communications into Iran remain unstable, with the internet largely blocked. The resident of north Tehran messaged The Associated Press before dawn on Tuesday and spoke on the condition of anonymity because of security concerns.
He said a major blast rattled his building on Monday. “I was by the window and felt the shockwave. Pretty scary, then saw the smoke,” he said.
Most stores in the normally bustling area of Tajrish were closed, he added. Iran has declared an official mourning period following the killing of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in the first wave of joint U.S.-Israeli strikes.
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By Amir-Hussein Radjy
Thailand will evacuate 300 nationals from Iran, including diplomats, overland via Turkey
Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul said Tuesday that the evacuees were expected to be transported to a border city in Turkey as soon as possible before flying in back to Thailand.
Thai officials say there are about 100,000 Thai nationals living and working in the Middle East, including 60,000 Thai citizens in Israel.
The prime minister said about 1,000 Thai citizens in United Arab Emirate had registered to be repatriated and they could fly back on normal commercial flights. However, the government would also prepare to transport its citizens to other countries if the airspace is closed.
China’s foreign minister warns of ‘great repercussions’ of attack on Iran in phone call with Israel’s top diplomat
Beijing condemns the military strikes on Iran and calls for an immediate cessation of military operations to prevent the conflict from spiraling out of control.
That’s the message from Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi to Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, according to a readout of their call Tuesday published by the state-run Xinhua news agency.
The call was at Sa’ar’s request, Xinhua said.
Wang said China had always advocated for a political settlement of the Iran nuclear issue and that recent talks between Iran and the U.S. had been making clear progress before being disrupted by the military strikes.
Wang asked Sa’ar to ensure the safety of Chinese citizens in Israel.
Oil-rich Iraq to cut production after Strait of Hormuz closure
Iraq’s Ministry of Oil says it will stop its production in a key oil field as the ongoing war in Iran disrupted a key waterway into the oil-rich Persian Gulf.
The widening war between Iran with the United States and Israel has ground tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz to a halt, causing crude oil prices to surge worldwide. About a fifth of the world’s oil passes through the strait, carrying oil and gas from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Qatar, Bahrain, the UAE and Iran.
The ministry cited a shortage of tankers entering the gulf, forcing them to “stop production and pumping” from the southern Rumaila fields near the city of Basra. That tanker shortage caused “storage levels at our oil warehouses rising to critical levels.”
The strait is about 33 kilometers (21 miles) wide at its narrowest point. It connects the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman. From there, ships can then travel to the rest of the world.
Iran-backed Iraqi militants make a veiled threat to several Arab states
An Iranian-backed militant group in Iraq has issued a veiled threat against Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates amid the widening war in the Middle East.
Kataib Hezbollah, one of the most powerful militant groups in Iraq, claimed that American aircraft that hit their camps earlier this week took off from an airbase in Jordan which houses U.S. forces.
The group also lashed out at Saudi Arabia and the UAE apparently for their criticism of Iranian missile and drone attacks in their territories.
It warned the two Gulf countries to “adjust their statements according to their true size … since their territories and capabilities are harnessed to serve the Zionist-American project.”