Iran updates: US bases, embassies attacked as Tehran steps up Gulf strikes

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If you’d like to read more about questions about the US decision to attack Iran, you can find our analysis here.

You can also find our investigation into a deadly strike on a girls’ school in Iran that has become a potent symbol of the human toll of the US-Israeli war here.

We will be closing this live page soon. Here’s a quick recap of the main developments today:

• Trump says he ordered US forces to join Israel’s attack on Iran because he believed Tehran was about to strike first – a rationale that contradicts the account offered by his state secretary, Rubio, on how the war began.
• Iran continues attacks on Israel and US targets in the Middle East for a fourth night, with strikes reported on Washington’s embassy in Dubai and a port in the city of Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates.
• The US and Israel keep up attacks on Iran, hitting the building of the Assembly of Experts in the city of Qom, as the death toll in the country since Saturday rises to at least 787.
• In Lebanon, Israel has bombed Beirut and Sidon and authorised troops to take additional positions in the southern parts of the country.
• Trump says the US is prepared to deploy the Navy to escort tankers through the Strait of Hormuz after the IRGC declared the vital waterway closed – a disruption already rippling through the region, with Iraq slowing or halting oil production at the Rumaila field and the West Qurna 2 project.
• Qatari authorities say they have busted two sleeper cells operating for the IRGC and arrested at least 10 suspects.

Canadian Foreign Minister Anita Anand says she has asked her Omani counterpart, Badr al-Busaidi, to use Oman’s airspace “if necessary” to evacuate Canadians from the Gulf region.

“Our top priority right now is the 100,000 Canadians that are in the region,” Anand said during an event in Toronto.

Anand said she was speaking with her counterparts from Gulf nations and the wider Middle East, and affirmed that Ottawa is “making sure that there are possibilities for Canadians” to receive the support they need in those countries.

However, Anand’s office said she is urging Canadians to leave the region by their own means, and there is no current plan for Ottawa to coordinate evacuations.

UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher has warned about the impact the war in the Middle East is having on civilians in nearly a dozen countries.

“First, civilians are paying the price across the region. Civilians must be protected – full stop. Yet, strikes are hitting homes, hospitals, and schools,” Fletcher said.

“Civilians and civilian infrastructure have been under attack in Iran, Lebanon, Syria, the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and beyond.”

Fletcher added that while contingency plans across Iran and other nearby countries have been activated, the already limited presence of international organisations in Iran has made aid workers’ challenges much greater.

World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has said that three paramedics were killed and six injured while working to recover people wounded by explosions in southern Lebanon, where Israel has been mounting continuous strikes.

“The expansion of the conflict in the Middle East is increasingly impacting health services throughout the region. I am saddened by the developments in Lebanon today where 3 paramedics were killed and another 6 injured while recovering people injured by explosions in the *southern Tyre district,*” Ghebreyesus said in a social media post.

“The risk that more health workers will count among the casualties is high. This must be avoided at all costs, so paramedics, doctors and nurses can be allowed to carry out their life-saving work, which is especially needed in times of crisis. Warring parties must abide by international humanitarian law and protect health workers, facilities and patients. I call for the utmost restraint and for voices of wisdom and peace to rise above sound of bombings,” he added.

The secretary of state insists President Trump made the decision to attack Iran because he was presented with what he called “a unique opportunity” for the mission to be successful.

“The president is determined we were not going to get hit first. It’s that simple,” Rubio said ahead of a closed-door briefing for lawmakers.

Rubio was revisiting his remarks from a day earlier, which have generated fierce blowback. At the time, he said Trump believed Israel was determined to act and wanted the US to go first with a preemptive strike on Iran to prevent retaliation on US bases in the region.

“We are not going to put American troops in harm’s way,” he said.

Amid the administration’s shifting reasons for the war with Iran, Rubio also returned to Trump’s initial rationale. “There is no way in the world that this terroristic regime was going to get nuclear weapons, not under Donald Trump’s watch,” said Rubio.

France has condemned Hezbollah’s attacks against Israel as “irresponsible”, in a call between French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot and Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam.

Barrot “expressed France’s solidarity in the face of the ordeal Lebanon is going through due to the irresponsible decision of Hezbollah to join the Iranian attacks against Israel”, the Foreign Ministry said in a post.

Barrot also spoke with his Israeli counterpart, Gideon Saar, and expressed “solidarity with the civilians affected by the Iranian attacks”.

Israeli authorities say they are working to address the impact of fallen munitions’ shrapnel at several sites around Tel Aviv.

“Tel Aviv district officers are currently handling several impact scenes involving fallen munition fragments within the district,” Israeli police services said in a social media post.

“Property damage has been reported. At this stage, no injuries are known.”

UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper has slammed the Iranian attacks on the Saudi capital, Riyadh, after the US Embassy was hit earlier.

“Iranian strikes on Riyadh, including on the US embassy, are completely unacceptable. We condemn these reckless and destabilising attacks that target innocent civilians,” Cooper said on social media.

“We stand with Saudi Arabia and our other partners across the region in the face of these attacks.”

This is the fourth night since the initiation of the US and Israeli strikes, and the scene here in the capital was dominated by the sound of aeroplanes and massive explosions across the city, and the smell of smoke drifting in the air. This is very massive, and this is heavier bombardment compared to the first days of the initiation of these strikes.

There are growing concerns about the fatalities, especially among civilians. I was downtown earlier in the evening, and one of the police stations near Enghelab Square, which is one of the most important places in the capital, politically speaking, was targeting in a very massive way.

And we have been receiving different reports from different cities across the country, small and big, including Isfahan and elsewhere, that this wave of strikes continues. Right now, I can say that escalation is the name of the game that we see here.

A drone has been shot down near Baghdad airport, with no damage or injuries reported, according to the Iraqi News Agency.

Meanwhile, Associated Press journalists reported explosions and smoke rising, but no casualties, after a new wave of drone and missile attacks was intercepted over Erbil, the capital of northern Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region.

Multiple drones targeted areas around the US consulate building on Tuesday, but did not hit it directly.

Debris from the intercepted drones caused fires and property damage.

President Trump said in a post on Truth Social that the US Navy will begin escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz “as soon as possible”.

“No matter what, the United States will ensure the FREE FLOW of ENERGY to the WORLD,” he added. “The United States’ ECONOMIC and MILITARY MIGHT is the GREATEST ON EARTH — More actions to come.”

The price of oil has shot up by more than 15 percent since the US and Israel began strikes on Tehran three days ago.

Costs are expected to rise even higher as oil supplies decrease as a result of Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz, as well as attacks on energy installations throughout the Gulf.

The Gulf kingdom has successfully destroyed 74 missiles and 92 drones since Iran began launching attacks on targets throughout the Middle East, Bahrain’s military says.

It didn’t give a figure for failed interceptions.

“The General Command states that the use of ballistic missiles and drones to target civilian infrastructure and private property constitutes a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law and the Charter of the United Nations, particularly the principles of distinction and proportionality,” an update shared on social media reads.

“These indiscriminate and heinous attacks represent a direct threat to regional peace and security.”

Attacks have disabled about 300 missile launchers in Iran since the US and Israel launched a war on the country over the weekend, the Israeli military says.

“Since the start of Operation ‘Roaring Lion’, the Israeli air force has dismantled approximately 300 Iranian missile launchers,” a statement said.

“This is the result of more than 1,600 sorties and a systematic, around-the-clock effort to locate and target launchers and missile stockpiles in order to reduce fire toward the Israeli home front.”

The United Arab Emirates says it sustained more than 1,000 attacks launched by Iran, exceeding the combined total of strikes suffered by all other targeted Gulf countries.

The UAE has not made a decision to change its defensive posture during Iran’s attacks, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement, adding that the country reserves the “right to defend itself”.

The UAE also said it has not participated in the US-Israeli war on Iran or permitted the use of its territory, territorial waters, or airspace in any attack.

The Israeli military has announced it struck an underground nuclear site in Iran, where it said scientists were “covertly” developing a key component for an atomic weapon.

“The [military] intelligence continued to follow the scientists’ activities and located their new location at this site in a manner that enabled a precise strike on the covert underground compound,” it said, displaying a map showing the facility on the western outskirts of Tehran.

At the site, “a group of nuclear scientists operated covertly to develop a key component for nuclear weapons”.

The scientists had been working at the underground location since Israel and the US struck several Iranian nuclear sites during their previous war in June, it said.