Trump says US’s mission in Iran ‘substantially ahead’ and could last 4-5 weeks<\/p>\n
Lucy Campbell<\/p>\n
US president Donald Trump goes on:<\/p>\n
An Iranian regime armed with long range missiles and nuclear weapons would be an intolerable threat to the Middle East, but also to the American people.<\/p>\n
Our country itself would be under threat, and it was very nearly under threat.<\/p>\n
He says the US is already \u201csubstantially ahead\u201d of its time projections.<\/p>\n
They projected four to five weeks at the beginning, but adds they have \u201ccapability to go far longer\u201d, Trump says.<\/p>\n
He adds that the US had predicted four weeks to terminate Iran\u2019s military leadership, \u201cand \u2026 that was done in about an hour, so we\u2019re ahead of schedule there, by a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n
Further, Trump claims the objectives of the operation in Iran are \u201cclear\u201d.<\/p>\n
They include \u201cdestroying Iran\u2019s missile capabilities\u201d and \u201cannihilating their navy\u201d, as well as preventing them from ever having nuclear weapons.<\/p>\n
He adds that the country \u201ccannot continue to arm, fund and direct terrorist armies outside their borders\u201d.<\/p>\n
Trump then goes on to cite the apparent lack of progress in diplomatic negotiations as further justification for the strikes.<\/p>\n
And we thought we had a deal. But then they backed out and they came back and we thought we had a deal and they backed out. I said, you can\u2019t deal with these people. You got to do it the right way.<\/p>\n
Share<\/a><\/p>\n Updated at\u00a014.17 EST<\/p>\n Key events<\/p>\n Show key events only<\/p>\n Please turn on JavaScript to use this feature<\/p>\n The Kuwaiti army said a sailor with its naval forces was killed during an \u201coperation\u201d by its armed forces. The army did not elaborate on the circumstances of his death.<\/p>\n Share<\/a>Israel’s UN envoy says Iran operation will last ‘as long as it takes’<\/p>\n Israel and the US will not stop their military campaign against Iran until its objectives are achieve, Israel\u2019s ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, said earlier.<\/p>\n Speaking at UN headquarters in New York, Danon said the US and Israel would do everything necessary to \u200bensure that \u2060Tehran does \u2060not have nuclear capabilities.<\/p>\n He said of the operation\u2019s objectives are \u201cclear\u201d:<\/p>\n double quotation markNo nuclear weapons, no ballistic missile threat, destroy their navy and crash the regime\u2019s proxy network.<\/p>\n The joint operation, he said, will last \u201cas long as it takes\u201d and Israel will do \u201cwhatever is necessary to protect our people and borders\u201d.<\/p>\n double quotation markWe will not stop until we achieve our objectives.<\/p>\n Danon also accused Iran<\/a> of \u201clashing out in desperation\u201d. He said he \u2060believed freedom for the \u2060Iranian people \u201cwill come sooner \u200bthan later\u201d, and he hoped for a new leadership.<\/p>\n Danny Danon speaks to the press at UN headquarter in New York. Photograph: Jeenah Moon\/ReutersShare<\/a><\/p>\n Iran\u2019s president Masoud Pezeshkian has condemned US -Israeli strikes on Iranian schools and hospitals.<\/p>\n He said in a post<\/a> on X:<\/p>\n double quotation markAttacks on hospitals strike at life itself. Attacks on schools target a nation\u2019s future. Targeting patients and children blatantly violates humanitarian principles. The world must condemn it. I stand with my grieving nation. Iran will not remain silent or yield to these crimes.<\/p>\n A devastating strike on a girls\u2019 elementary school in Minab, southern Iran<\/a>, on Saturday killed 165 people and injured 96 others.<\/p>\n Share<\/a><\/p>\n Updated at\u00a014.29 EST<\/p>\n Iranian state media earlier confirmed that Mansoureh Khojaste Bagherzadeh, the wife of Iran\u2019s supreme leader Ali Khamenei, had also been killed \u201cat home\u201d.<\/p>\n Iranian outlets had previously reported that Bagherzadeh had slipped into a coma after suffering injuries in the US-Israeli attacks on Tehran on Saturday.<\/p>\n Khamenei\u2019s daughter, grandchild and son-in-law were also killed, state media confirmed previously. Khamenei and his wife had six children, four sons and two daughters.<\/p>\n Share<\/a>UK ‘doesn’t believe in regime change from the skies’, says Starmer<\/p>\n Earlier, UK prime minister Keir Starmer said that his government does not \u201cbelieve in regime change from the skies\u201d as he set out to parliament why Britain will not join its closest military partner in offensive action against Iran \u2013 suggesting that to do so would be unlawful.<\/p>\n He told the House of Commons:<\/p>\n double quotation markThis government does not believe in regime change from the skies. The lessons of history have taught us that it is important when we make decisions like this, that we establish there is a lawful basis for what the United Kingdom is doing.<\/p>\n Last night, Starmer announced that the UK had agreed to a US request to use British military bases <\/a>for \u201cdefensive\u201d strikes on Iranian missile sites.<\/p>\n Per my colleague Andrew Sparrow, the UK PM has been under pressure from the left and the right for first saying the UK would not get involved in the US-Israeli strikes on Iran and then allowing the US to use UK bases in their operations after criticism from Donald Trump.<\/p>\n Addressing that criticism before parliament on Monday afternoon, he said that Iran\u2019s \u201coutrageous actions\u201d could not be ignored and that the UK would continue engaging in defensive actions while still not joining in on the strikes.<\/p>\n \u201cI am not prepared to commit our military service people to action unless I am sure that what they\u2019re doing is lawful,\u201d Starmer added.<\/p>\n Keir Starmer making a statement in the House of Commons after allowing the US to strike Iranian missile sites from British bases. Photograph: House of Commons\/UK Parliament\/PAShare<\/a><\/p>\n Updated at\u00a014.09 EST<\/p>\n US Central Command said in a post<\/a> on X that last night, U.S. B-1 bombers \u201cstruck deep inside Iran to degrade Iranian ballistic missile capabilities\u201d.<\/p>\n double quotation markAs the President stated, \u2018we\u2019re going to destroy their missiles and raze their missile industry to the ground\u2019.<\/p>\n Share<\/a><\/p>\n Updated at\u00a013.57 EST<\/p>\n A fire ignited at a fuel storage station in Abu Dhabi after it was targeted by a drone was \u201cpromptly contained\u201d today, the Abu Dhabi Media Office said.<\/p>\n \u201cNo injuries were reported and there was no impact on operations\u201d after the fire at the Musaffah fuel tank terminal, according to the agency.<\/p>\n Share<\/a>The day so far<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a brief recap of the developments so far, on the third day of US and Israel<\/a> attacks on Iran, and of Tehran continuing retaliatory strikes against US allies across the Gulf after the killing of its supreme leader on Saturday.<\/p>\n At least 555 people have been killed in Iran<\/a> by the Israel-US attacks across 131 cities since Saturday, according to the Iranian Red Crescent Society. US Central Command also said a fourth US service member has been killed.<\/p>\n Speaking at the White House for the first time since attacking Iran, Donald Trump said the US military is continuing to carry out large-scale operations in Iran and said the campaign could continue for four to five weeks or more. The US president claimed his objectives in Iran are \u201cclear\u201d. They include \u201cdestroying Iran\u2019s missile capabilities\u201d and \u201cannihilating their navy\u201d, as well as preventing them from ever having nuclear weapons; he said that Tehran \u201ccannot continue to arm, fund and direct terrorist armies outside their borders\u201d. He also cited the apparent lack of progress in diplomatic negotiations as further justification for the strikes.<\/p>\n The US president earlier did not rule out the possibility of boots on the ground in Iran if necessary, in an interview with the New York Post. \u201cI don\u2019t have the yips with respect to boots on the ground \u2013 like every president says \u2018there will be no boots on the ground.\u2019 I don\u2019t say it,\u201d Trump said. \u201cI say \u2018probably don\u2019t need them,\u2019 [or] \u2018if they were necessary.\u2019\u201d His defense secretary Pete Hegseth had earlier said there weren\u2019t plans to have service members on the ground in Iran, but had also been reluctant to say whether this was the administration\u2019s lasting stance. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to go into the exercise of what we will or will not do,\u201d he told a Pentagon press conference earlier.<\/p>\n Trump also told CNN that the \u201cbig wave\u201d of strikes against Iran is yet to come. \u201cWe haven\u2019t even started hitting them hard,\u201d the US president said. \u201cWe\u2019re knocking the crap out of them.\u201d<\/p>\n Hegseth said earlier that the US \u201cdidn\u2019t start this war but we\u2019re finishing it\u201d, while also claiming that the US\u2019s goal was not regime change in Iran (even though Trump has pushed for this and Hegesth himself then urged Iranians to \u201ctake advantage\u201d of this opportunity for just that). Hegseth also indicated that the US did not plan to effect a democratic transition in Iran \u2013 and refused to establish a clear timeline for how long the US operation will continue. We have a story on that here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Israeli strikes have killed at least 52 people in Lebanon, the Lebanese health ministry said, and wounded more than 150. Israel argued that its strikes were necessary after Tehran\u2019s ally Hezbollah fired rockets into northern Israel (which Israel intercepted) in response to the Israeli killing of Iran\u2019s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday.<\/p>\n Share<\/a><\/p>\n Updated at\u00a014.23 EST<\/p>\n Israeli strikes kill over 50 in Lebanon<\/p>\n Lebanon\u2019s health ministry has said more people have been killed in Israeli airstrikes.<\/p>\n It said the death toll is now at 52, with 154 wounded.<\/p>\n The Lebanese armed movement Hezbollah, one of Tehran\u2019s principal allies in the Middle East, had earlier launched rockets towards Israel.<\/p>\n Israel then responded with sweeping airstrikes, which it said targeted the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs of Beirut and struck senior militants.<\/p>\n The Lebanese state news agency NNA earlier had an initial tally of 31 people killed and 149 injured.<\/p>\n Joseph Aoun, the Lebanese president, condemned both attacks launched from Lebanon and Israel\u2019s counterstrikes.<\/p>\n He warned that \u201cpersisting in using Lebanon once again as a platform for wars we have no part in will expose the country to new risks.\u201d<\/p>\n Share<\/a><\/p>\n The spiralling war in the Middle East is putting civilians in \u201cgrave danger\u201d, the head of the Red Cross warned Monday, saying a large-scale conflict would outstrip any ability to help.<\/p>\n The war launched by the United States and Israel<\/a> against Iran has spread across the Middle East and beyond, with Lebanon\u2019s Hezbollah entering the fray and a British military base in European Union member Cyprus coming under attack.<\/p>\n \u201cWidening hostilities across the Middle East are putting civilian lives in grave danger,\u201d said Mirjana Spoljaric, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross.<\/p>\n \u201cThe scale of major military operations flaring across the Middle East risks embroiling the region \u2013 and beyond \u2013 into another large-scale armed conflict that will overwhelm any humanitarian response.\u201d<\/p>\n