In an escalating move to exert pressure on the United States and Israel, Iran is aiming to disrupt the global economy, hoping to halt the bombings that ignited the conflict on February 28.
On Thursday, the newly appointed and enigmatic leader of Iran made his first public pronouncements from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. With a steadfast resolve, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei vowed to continue fighting, warning of further repercussions for Gulf Arab states. He hinted at potentially opening “other fronts” in a conflict that has already sent shockwaves through energy markets, the global economy, and international travel.
This hard-line position comes as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed that ongoing military actions by Israel are setting the stage for Iranians to overthrow their government. “It is in your hands,” Netanyahu urged the Iranian people during a press briefing. “We are creating the optimal conditions for the fall of the regime.”
Since the conflict’s onset, military strikes by the U.S. and Israel have specifically targeted Iran’s security checkpoints. These actions are aimed at crippling the government’s ability to quell domestic dissent, according to ACLED, a U.S.-based organization that independently monitors armed conflicts.
Early Friday, intense airstrikes were reported in and around Tehran, Iran’s capital. The precise targets of these strikes remain unclear, but the attacks underscore the volatile and dangerous nature of the current situation.
Intense airstrikes hit early Friday around Iran’s capital, Tehran, as well as outlying areas. It was not immediately clear what had been targeted.
Trump issues new threat online to Iran
U.S. President Donald Trump issued a new threat online to Iran, writing: “Watch what happens to these deranged scumbags today.”
Trump made the post Friday on his Truth Social website, saying that “Iran’s Navy is gone, their Air Force is no longer, missiles, drones and everything else are being decimated, and their leaders have been wiped from the face of the earth.”
“They’ve 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,” Trump wrote. “What a great honor it is to do so!”
Netanyahu denounces Iranian leader
Netanyahu denounced Khamenei as a “puppet of the Revolutionary Guards.”
Khamenei is close to Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard and is widely seen as even less compromising than his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Khamenei said in a statement read by a state TV news anchor that he was keeping a “file of revenge.” He did not appear on camera and has not been seen since his father and wife were killed in the war’s opening salvo, which also wounded him, according to an Iranian ambassador.
Oil prices spiral again and stocks sink
The war continued to escalate on its 13th day as oil prices spiraled up again to $100 per barrel, and stocks sank worldwide over fears that the conflict could drag on longer than hoped.
To relieve the surge in prices, the U.S. Treasury Department announced it was further easing sanctions on Russian oil by granting a license that authorizes the delivery and sale of some Russian crude oil and petroleum products for the next month.
Trump signaled earlier this week that he would take more action to address the squeeze on oil flows. The move follows the administration’s decision to grant temporary permission for India to buy Russian oil.
The new exemption applies only to Russian oil already at sea. Last week, analysts estimated there were about 125 million barrels loaded on tankers. To put that in perspective, about 20 million barrels of oil per day usually pass through the Strait of Hormuz, according to the International Energy Agency.
Iran has made clear it plans to keep up attacks on energy infrastructure across the region and use the effective closure of the strait as leverage against the United States and Israel. A fifth of the world’s traded oil flows through the waterway leading from the Persian Gulf toward the Indian Ocean.
At a news conference Thursday, Iran’s ambassador to Tunisia, Mir Masoud Hosseinian, said Iranian naval forces “have established full control” over the strait and “carried out precise strikes in response to attacks on our oil infrastructure.”
“Global energy security is contingent on respect for Iran’s sovereignty,” he said.
The pinch was being felt worldwide. South Korea reinstated government-set caps on oil prices for the first time in three decades as it sought to calm soaring fuel costs. The two-week caps, which took effect Friday, set maximum prices for petroleum products supplied by refiners to gas stations and other businesses.
Iranian leader calls for the shutdown of U.S. bases
Hosseinian told The Associated Press that the new supreme leader was wounded in the attack on his family’s home, but “it is not serious.” The hope is he will attend the massive, state-organized Eid prayer next week that his father traditionally led. However, Khamenei remains a target for the Israelis, who have vowed to kill him.
Hosseinian said Iran’s strikes on Gulf nations have been strategic.
“Even when we targeted hotels, we had precise information that they were hosting American and Israeli soldiers,” he said.
Khamenei called on Gulf Arabs to “shut down” U.S. bases in the region, saying protection promised by Washington was “nothing more than a lie.”
He also said Iran has studied “opening other fronts in which the enemy has little experience and would be highly vulnerable” if the war continues. He did not elaborate, but Iran has been linked to previous attacks on U.S., Israeli and Jewish targets around the world.
Attacks on Gulf states continued Friday with Saudi Arabia’s defense ministry saying its air defenses downed more than three dozen drones headed toward the kingdom’s Eastern Province over the span of a few hours, marking an unusually large barrage.
Iran’s nuclear program takes more hits
Trump said in a social media post Thursday that ensuring Iran does not develop a nuclear weapon was a higher priority than soaring oil prices.
Hours later, Netanyahu announced Israeli attacks had killed a top Iranian nuclear scientist and hit others but gave few details.
Israel said earlier it struck a nuclear facility in Iran in recent days that it had destroyed with an airstrike in October 2024. Earlier this year, satellite photos raised concerns that Iran was working to restore the facility.
France says soldier killed in attack in Iraq
The U.S. military said American forces have now struck more than 6,000 targets since the operation against Iran began, including more than 30 minelaying vessels.
On Friday, French President Emmanuel Macron said a French soldier was killed in an attack targeting Irbil in Iraq’s northern Kurdish region. France earlier said six soldiers had been hurt in a drone strike in Irbil, where French troops are deployed as part of a multinational counterterrorism mission supporting Iraqi forces in their fight against Islamic State militants.
In the same region, British officials said several U.S. personnel suffered minor injuries Wednesday when drone strikes hit a base in Irbil that houses both British and American troops.
And on Thursday in western Iraq, rescue efforts were underway after an American military refueling plane went down. U.S. Central Command, which oversees the Middle East, said in a statement that two aircraft were involved, including one that landed safely, and that the cause was not related to friendly or hostile fire.
Israel targets heart of Beirut in fight with Hezbollah militants
Israeli warplanes pummeled Lebanon, targeting even the busy heart of Beirut, in response to missiles from Iran-backed Hezbollah fighters launched into Israel. One strike hit in a neighborhood that is close to Lebanon’s parliament, United Nations offices and international embassies.
Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee said forces were targeting a “facility affiliated with Hezbollah.”
An Israeli strike hit in the vicinity of Lebanon’s only public university, killing a professor and the director of the science faculty at the campus in Hadath, on the outskirts of Beirut’s southern suburbs. There was no immediate comment from Israel.
Israeli strikes also killed 15 other people, including five children, in southern Lebanon, the Lebanese Health Ministry said. An AP photographer saw several buildings flattened in one village where rescue workers searched through the rubble.
Ben Mbarek reported from Tunis, Tunisia. El Deeb reported from Beirut. Watson reported from San Diego. Associated Press writers from around the world contributed to this report.
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