A channel affiliated with Iranian state television claimed Friday that a U.S. fighter pilot ejected from their aircraft over\u00a0southwestern Iran.<\/p>\n
It is not clear what may have happened to the plane, including whether Iran is claiming it was shot down or that there was another issue. If the claim is confirmed, it could lead to yet another dramatic escalation in the war, nearing the end of its fifth week. The U.S. did not respond immediately to requests for comment.<\/p>\n
The anchor on the Iranian channel urged residents to hand over any \u201cenemy pilot\u201d to police and promised a reward for anyone who did. The channel is in Kohkilouyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province, an intensely rural and mountainous region that spans over 15,500 square kilometres.<\/p>\n
An on-screen crawl earlier urged the public to \u201cshoot them if you see them,\u201d referring to social media footage circulating of what appeared to be U.S. aircraft in the area. <\/p>\n
The channel showed metal debris in the back of a pickup truck while making the announcement but provided no other immediate details.<\/p>\n
Throughout the war, Iran has made a series of claims about shooting down piloted enemy aircraft that turned out not to be true. Friday was the first time that Iran went on television urging the public to look for a suspected downed pilot.<\/p>\n
U.S. Central Command, the Pentagon and the White House didn\u2019t immediately respond to requests for comment. <\/p>\n
Iran targets a desalination plant and a refinery<\/p>\n
The claim came as Iran fired on targets across the region, setting Kuwait\u2019s Mina al-Ahmadi oil refinery one fire. The state-run Kuwait Petroleum Corp. said firefighters were working to control several blazes there.<\/p>\n
Kuwait also said that an Iranian attack caused \u201cmaterial damage\u201d to a desalination plant. Such plants are responsible for most of the drinking water for Gulf states, and they have become a major target in the war.<\/p>\n
Tehran has kept the pressure on Israel and its Gulf Arab neighbours, despite U.S. and Israeli insistence that\u00a0Iran\u2019s military capabilities\u00a0have been all but destroyed.<\/p>\n
Iran\u2019s attacks on Gulf energy infrastructure and its\u00a0tight grip on the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world\u2019s oil and natural gas transits in peacetime, have roiled stock markets, sent oil prices skyrocketing, and threatened to raise the cost of many basic goods, including food.<\/p>\n
![\"People](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1775231589_587_default.jpg\")
People line up at a gas station in Karachi, Pakistan, on Friday. The U.S.-Israel war on Iran has roiled global energy and equities markets. Oil prices have skyrocketed after Iran virtually closed the key Strait of Hormuz. (Rizwan Tabassum\/AFP\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Spot prices of Brent crude, the international standard, were around $109 Friday, up more than 50 per cent since the start of the war, when Iran began restricting traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n
Sirens also sounded in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia said it had destroyed several Iranian drones, and Israel reported incoming missiles.<\/p>\n
Authorities in the United Arab Emirates shut down a gas field after a missile interception reportedly rained debris on it and started a fire.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1775231590_303_default.jpg\")
More than one million people have been displaced in Lebanon, where Israel has launched a ground invasion in its fight with the pro-Iranian Hezbollah militant group. Above, a heavily damaged neighbourhood in Tyre, Lebanon. (Yara Nardi\/Reuters)Rising death toll<\/p>\n
Activists reported strikes around Tehran and the central city of Isfahan, but it wasn’t immediately clear what was hit. A day earlier, Iran said the U.S. hit a major bridge, which was still under construction,\u00a0killing eight people.<\/p>\n
More than 1,900 people have been killed in Iran during the war, while 19 have been reported dead in Israel. More than two dozen people have died in Gulf states and the occupied West Bank, while 13 U.S. service members have been killed.<\/p>\n
More than 1,300 people have been killed and more than one million displaced in Lebanon, where Israel has launched a ground invasion in its fight with the pro-Iranian Hezbollah militant group. Ten Israeli soldiers have also died there.<\/p>\n
WATCH | A look at Kharg Island:![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1775231590_470_default.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Is Kharg Island a death trap for U.S. forces? | About That<\/p>\n
Andrew Chang explains why a U.S. military takeover of Kharg Island \u2014 one of Iran’s most critical energy assets \u2014 could lead to heavy losses, with uncertain gains.<\/p>\n
Images provided by The Canadian Press, Reuters, Adobe Stock and Getty ImagesIran’s former top diplomat suggests terms to end war<\/p>\n
Former Iranian foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif \u2014 a diplomat with long experience negotiating with the West, who remains close to a pragmatic wing of Iran’s leadership \u2014 wrote on Friday that the time has come to end the suffering.<\/p>\n
“Prolonged hostility will cause a greater loss of precious lives and irreplaceable resources without actually altering the existing stalemate,” Zarif, who helped negotiate Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, wrote in Foreign Affairs magazine.<\/p>\n
The U.S. has presented Iran with a 15-point plan for a ceasefire that includes reopening the Strait of Hormuz, dismantling Iran’s nuclear facilities and limiting its missile production in exchange for sanctions relief. But no signs of progress were apparent in the diplomatic effort.<\/p>\n
Iran’s initial five-point counterproposal, aired by hardline state television, included recognizing Iran’s sovereignty over the strait, the removal of U.S. bases from the region, compensation for war damage and a guarantee against further aggression \u2014 all things likely unpalatable to the Trump administration.<\/p>\n
Zarif’s proposal included elements of both of the plans.<\/p>\n
Iran “should offer to place limits on its nuclear program and to reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for an end to all sanctions \u2014 a deal Washington wouldn’t take before but might accept now,” he wrote.<\/p>\n
Tehran and Washington were in talks about Iran’s nuclear program when the U.S. and Israel began bombing on Feb. 28 \u2014 the second time under President Donald Trump that the U.S. has attacked while in negotiations.<\/p>\n
It’s not clear how much to read into Zarif’s proposal. While he has no official position in Iran’s government, he helped get reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian elected and would likely not have published such a piece without at least some authorization from senior leaders.<\/p>\n
But it also remains unclear who in Iran has the authority to negotiate, since many leaders have been killed in the war. Immediately after the piece came out, Zarif wrote he had been “torn” about it \u2014 a sign he may already face pressure at home.<\/p>\n
What’s more, it’s not clear how Trump will respond. He has vacillated between saying the U.S. is negotiating an end to the war and threatening to expand it. Thousands of U.S. marines and paratroopers have been ordered to the region, raising speculation that there could be a ground offensive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A channel affiliated with Iranian state television claimed Friday that a U.S. fighter pilot ejected from their aircraft…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":579839,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-579838","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=579838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579838\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/579839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=579838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=579838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=579838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}