Donald Trump has said Iran will be hit \u201cvery hard\u201d in the coming days, describing leaders of the regime as \u201cderanged scumbags\u201d who it was a \u201cgreat honor\u201d to kill, as Tehran residents reported relentless bombing and violence continued to spiral across the Middle East.<\/p>\n
The US president\u2019s comments, which signaled an intensification of the US-Israeli campaign, came as Israeli and US warplanes launched successive waves of attacks on the Iranian capital and elsewhere on Friday. One strike reportedly hit close to a square near Tehran University where crowds were gathered in support of Iran\u2019s regime. The area is home to many government buildings.<\/p>\n
Video published by the semiofficial Tasnim news agency showed a plume of grey smoke rising as demonstrators screamed \u201cDeath to Israel!\u201d and \u201cDeath to America!\u201d<\/p>\n
Across the region, there was more chaos, bloodshed and destruction, with further Israeli strikes in Lebanon<\/a>, where 800,000 people have been displaced; new missile and drone attacks by Hezbollah and Iran on targets in Israel; and fresh Iranian attacks on civilian infrastructure in Gulf states.<\/p>\n map of strikes<\/a><\/p>\n The US said six servicemen were killed in an accident involving a tanker plane used for mid-air refuelling, which crashed in Iraq<\/a>. Also in Iraq, a French soldier was killed in a drone strike by a pro-Iranian militia group.<\/p>\n In a post on social media, Trump wrote: \u201cWatch what happens to these deranged scumbags today \u2026 They\u2019ve been killing innocent people all over the world for 47 years, and now I, as the 47th President of the United States of America, am killing them. What a great honor it is to do so!\u201d<\/p>\n Pete Hegseth, the US defence secretary, told a press conference in Washington on Friday that Iranian leaders were \u201cdesperate and hiding, they\u2019ve gone underground\u201d.<\/p>\n Iran damage chart<\/a><\/p>\n Hegseth said Iran\u2019s new supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei, who issued a defiant statement<\/a> on Thursday pledging to continue fighting, had been \u201cwounded and likely disfigured\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cHe put out a statement yesterday \u2013 a weak one actually \u2013 but there was no voice and there was no video. It was a written statement. He called for unity \u2026 apparently killing tens of thousands of protesters is his kind of unity,\u201d Hegseth said.<\/p>\n Iranian media published videos showing some of the members of the country\u2019s regime at the demonstration in Tehran, including Ali Larijani, who heads the Supreme national security council, and Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei, the hardline cleric who heads the country\u2019s judiciary. The foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, was seen walking in the city\u2019s streets.<\/p>\n The Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian (on the back of a motorbike), is mobbed by supporters as he attends the al-Quds Day rally in Tehran on Friday. Photograph: Anadolu\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Residents of Tehran said there had not been a \u201cday without the explosions\u201d since the war began with an Israeli strike that killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran\u2019s ruler for 37 years.<\/p>\n \u201cThe buildings are shaking \u2026 There\u2019s rubble everywhere and people are still risking their lives to go to work,\u201d a 66-year-old retired professor, said. \u201cPlease stop this. I am begging the world to act now before the entire city is destroyed. I can\u2019t leave the city, and have sick family members. Even those who want to flee, can\u2019t. They are not giving us enough petrol to even drive far enough. We are trapped.\u201d<\/p>\n A shopkeeper from the centre of Tehran said she had counted six explosions within the past hour.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve taped the windows with newspapers. I am hardly even sleeping. They have bombed all night. I am scared to step out. These are some powerful bombs because I don\u2019t even hear the drones any more. That\u2019s how continuous today\u2019s explosions have been. It\u2019s cold and the power keeps going off and on. We won\u2019t have electricity soon I fear,\u201d the 42-year-old said.<\/p>\n Israel had earlier announced another wave of strikes in Iran targeting infrastructure, and said its air force had hit more than 200 targets in the past 24 hours, including missile launchers, defence systems and weapons production sites.<\/p>\n Hegseth said that more than 15,000 \u201cenemy targets\u201d had been struck, which is more than 1,000 a day since the war began.<\/p>\n A fireball errupts from the site of an Israeli airstrike on a building in the southern Lebanese village of Abbasiyyeh on Friday. Photograph: Kawnat Haju\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n After steep drops on Thursday, stock markets rallied as oil prices fell slightly. About a fifth of the world\u2019s oil and gas supplies travel through the narrow strait of Hormuz<\/a>, which Iran has now in effect blocked by attacking shipping there.<\/p>\n The US is \u201cdealing with\u201d Iran\u2019s attacks in the strait of Hormuz, Hegseth said, claiming Iran had not yet mined the crucial waterway.<\/p>\n