2 hours ago
Key events of the day so far
It is about to be 11pm in Tehran, and 10.30pm in Tel Aviv and Beirut. Here is a quick recap of events:
The US president, Donald Trump, used expletive-laden language to call on Iran to let ships through the strait of Hormuz as he threatened to further attack Iranian energy and transport infrastructure. Writing on Truth Social, Trump said: “Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell.”
Iran’s parliament speaker responded with a warning that the US president’s “reckless moves” would mean “our whole region is going to burn”. Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, added in a social media post: “Make no mistake: You won’t gain anything through war crimes. The only real solution is respecting the rights of the Iranian people and ending this dangerous game.”
The US president was sharply rebuked by US politicians, including Republican former ally Marjorie Taylor Greene, who called on the administration to “intervene in Trump’s madness”, adding the president “has gone insane, and all of you are complicit”. Top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer wrote “the President of the United States is ranting like an unhinged madman on social media”. Schumer added: “He’s threatening possible war crimes and alienating allies. This is who he is, but this is not who we are. Our country deserves so much better.”
The second crew member of a downed F-15E fighter jet was rescued by the US overnight, ending a two-day search after the warplane crashed in south-west Iran. Trump said the crew member was “seriously wounded” but “safe and sound” after a mission that was reportedly made possible with the help of CIA subterfuge.
At least five people were reported to have been killed in US-Israeli attacks in south-west Iran during the rescue operations.
On Sunday, Iran said it struck a petrochemicals complex in Bahrain. Video footage showed thick black smoke rising from the site.
The Kuwait Petroleum Corporation said a number of its facilities had been targeted by Iranian drone attacks, resulting in fires and “significant material losses”. Kuwait also reported that two power and water desalination plants sustained “significant material damage” after being attacked by Iranian drones.
Israel has launched deadly airstrikes on Lebanon and Gaza as its assault on both countries continues. An Israeli airstrike on southern Lebanon’s Kfar Hatta killed at least seven people, including a four-year-old girl, according to Lebanon’s state-run News Agency.
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An Iranian missile hit a building in Haifa, Israel, on Sunday, seriously wounding an 82-year-old man and lightly injuring 24 others – including a 10-month-old baby, Israeli media reported.
Three or four people were still believed to be missing and rescuers searched the partially collapsed seven-storey building into the night. Local police commander Boaz Smocha told Haaretz that those missing were a couple in their 60s and their son. A foreign worker may have also been in their apartment with them. “No one from this family is responding. We really hope we can locate them,” he said.
The Israeli emergency service Magen David Adom said a number people were wounded when the building sustained a direct hit.
A military spokesperson told Agence France-Presse the building was hit by the “direct impact of a missile” minutes after a military warning was issued in the early evening.
Katie McQue
A man employed by the US defense contractor V2X has been killed in a drone attack on Erbil airbase, amid concerns from colleagues that they are being placed in harm’s way and pressured to remain in Iraq despite security risks, five sources said.
The worker, from Kenya, died in a night attack in his sleeping quarters on the base on 24 March. Another five workers were injured. They are from Kenya and India, and are among a group of about 45 workers employed by V2X who have remained on the base. One of the workers is in a critical condition with severe burns, sources said.
“The company has messed up here bad,” said a source speaking on the condition of anonymity. “He didn’t have to die. The company thought it was more important to keep the mission going rather than get people to safety.”
Key events of the day so far
It is about to be 11pm in Tehran, and 10.30pm in Tel Aviv and Beirut. Here is a quick recap of events:
The US president, Donald Trump, used expletive-laden language to call on Iran to let ships through the strait of Hormuz as he threatened to further attack Iranian energy and transport infrastructure. Writing on Truth Social, Trump said: “Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell.”
Iran’s parliament speaker responded with a warning that the US president’s “reckless moves” would mean “our whole region is going to burn”. Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, added in a social media post: “Make no mistake: You won’t gain anything through war crimes. The only real solution is respecting the rights of the Iranian people and ending this dangerous game.”
The US president was sharply rebuked by US politicians, including Republican former ally Marjorie Taylor Greene, who called on the administration to “intervene in Trump’s madness”, adding the president “has gone insane, and all of you are complicit”. Top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer wrote “the President of the United States is ranting like an unhinged madman on social media”. Schumer added: “He’s threatening possible war crimes and alienating allies. This is who he is, but this is not who we are. Our country deserves so much better.”
The second crew member of a downed F-15E fighter jet was rescued by the US overnight, ending a two-day search after the warplane crashed in south-west Iran. Trump said the crew member was “seriously wounded” but “safe and sound” after a mission that was reportedly made possible with the help of CIA subterfuge.
At least five people were reported to have been killed in US-Israeli attacks in south-west Iran during the rescue operations.
On Sunday, Iran said it struck a petrochemicals complex in Bahrain. Video footage showed thick black smoke rising from the site.
The Kuwait Petroleum Corporation said a number of its facilities had been targeted by Iranian drone attacks, resulting in fires and “significant material losses”. Kuwait also reported that two power and water desalination plants sustained “significant material damage” after being attacked by Iranian drones.
Israel has launched deadly airstrikes on Lebanon and Gaza as its assault on both countries continues. An Israeli airstrike on southern Lebanon’s Kfar Hatta killed at least seven people, including a four-year-old girl, according to Lebanon’s state-run News Agency.
Analysis: fighter jet crew rescue is propaganda coup - but also shows Iran can still fight back
Dan Sabbagh
Donald Trump will inevitably claim the rescue of the second crew member of the downed F-15 fighter as a propaganda triumph, though the 48-hour drama is a reminder that an undefeated Iran is able to fight back and inflict costs on the US.
It also ought to be a caution for a White House still contemplating whether to launch a ground operation in Iran to seize an island in the Persian Gulf – particularly if there a serious ambition to extract Iran’s highly enriched uranium from deep underground.
The US-Israeli bombing of Iran has been so heavily skewed in the attackers’ favour that a single shoot-down, five weeks into the war, immediately became a significant problem for the Americans because it is so rare – and memorable. The last time a US warplane was shot down by hostile forces was in 2003, during the Iraq war.
Though it is not exactly clear how the F-15E was brought down, the fact that it was is a reminder that the air superiority achieved by the US and Israeli air forces is not entirely absolute, even as they bomb Iran about 300 to 500 times a day.
An Israeli strike targeted an apartment in a residential building in Ain Saadeh on Sunday, a town east of Beirut in the hills overlooking the city, the state-run News Agency reported.
The area had until now been spared clashes between Hezbollah and Israel, which on Sunday stepped up its strikes on the Lebanese capital’s southern suburbs, including an attack that killed four people near the main public hospital.
Kalyeena Makortoff
Members of Opec+ said on Sunday that repairing energy facilities damaged in recent attacks would be costly and take a long time, and would potentially hit global oil supplies well into the future. They also stressed the “the critical importance of safeguarding international maritime routes to ensure the uninterrupted flow of energy”.
The group, which consists Opec members and other oil-producing countries, reportedly agreed in principle to raising output by 206,000 barrels a day in May, according to Reuters. However, the agreement remains largely symbolic while Iran continues to effectively block the strait of Hormuz.
The strait is a vital trade artery though which about 100 tankers would typically pass each day. Approximately 20% of the world’s total crude oil goes through the narrow waterway and Iran’s blockade has severely constrained distribution.
The conflict has now resulted in the largest disruption to oil supplies in history.
The price of Brent crude has soared, rising more than 50% since the start of the year in response to the war and hitting a peak of $119.50 a barrel in March. It is now trading at about $109 a barrel.
Edward Helmore
In a significant escalation of the US-Israel war in Iran, Iranian forces shot down two US military jets in recent days. Three pilots involved in the loss of an F-15 Strike Eagle and an A-10 Warthog ground attack plane have been rescued, but the incidents put the US on notice that Iranian air defenses may not be as degraded as the Trump administration has broadly claimed.
Here’s a timeline of what we know so far:
The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) has reported multiple splashes from projectiles in close proximity to a container ship in the United Arab Emirates, in a warning issued Sunday.
The UAE Sharjah government said that Khor Fakkan port was targeted and that no casualties were reported so far, according to a statement on social media by the government’s media office.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) denounced Trump for “mocking Islam” and invoking Allah in his Truth Social post threatening Iran. CAIR released the following statement on Sunday:
“President Trump’s deranged mocking of Islam and his threats to attack civilian infrastructure in Iran are reckless, dangerous, and indicative of a mindset that shows indifference to human life and contempt for religious beliefs.
“These statements are not made in a vacuum. They follow a long pattern of anti-Muslim rhetoric and policies that have dehumanized Muslims at home and abroad. The casual use of ‘Praise be to Allah’ in the context of violent threats reflects a disturbing willingness to weaponize religious language while simultaneously denigrating Islam and its followers.
“Congress must not remain on vacation while the President openly promises to commit war crimes that could trigger even more regional and global conflict. Lawmakers have a duty to reconvene and to reassert their authority over matters of war and peace, and to ensure that no president can unilaterally drag our nation into war.”
Mehdi Tabatabaei, deputy for communications at the Iranian president’s office, has said Iran will open the Strait of Hormuz only after receiving compensation for war damages, paid via a “new legal regime” based on transit fees.
Tabatabaei also said Trump has resorted to profanity “out of sheer desperation and rage” and accused the US president of sparking an “all-out war in the region.”
“The Strait of Hormuz will reopen only when, under a new legal regime, the damages from the imposed war are fully compensated from a portion of the transit toll revenues,” Tabatabaei posted on social media.
Donald Trump said his deadline for Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz or face attacks on critical infrastructure is Tuesday evening, according to an interview he gave to the Wall Street Journal published on Sunday.
“If they don’t do something by Tuesday evening, they won’t have any power plants and they won’t have any bridges standing,” Trump told the Journal. In a social media post earlier on Sunday, Trump had said Iran would face infrastructure attacks and the country will be “living in Hell” if it did not open the strait by Tuesday.
Trump also cryptically posted “Tuesday, 8:00 P.M. Eastern Time!” on Truth Social on Sunday afternoon, probably referencing his new deadline for Iran.
Iran's parliament speaker says 'our whole region is going to burn' due to Trump's actions
Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, the speaker of the Parliament of Iran, responded to Trump’s threats in a social media post.
“Your reckless moves are dragging the United States into a living HELL for every single family, and our whole region is going to burn because you insist on following Netanyahu’s commands,” he wrote.
“Make no mistake: You won’t gain anything through war crimes. The only real solution is respecting the rights of the Iranian people and ending this dangerous game.”
Former Iranian foreign minister Ali Akbar Velayati also warned that “if the White House repeats its foolish mistakes, it will quickly realize that the flow of energy and global trade can be disrupted with a single signal.”
Velayati further criticized Washington’s strategies, stating that while “the United States has learned history from Iran, it has yet to learn the geography of power.”
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy is concerned that a prolonged US-Israeli war on Iran could erode America’s support for Ukraine as Washington’s global priorities shift.
Zelenskyy told the Associated Press that Ukraine urgently needs more Patriot air defense systems from the US as Kyiv tries to fend off relentless Russian aerial attacks. He says he fears there will be reduced deliveries as resources are diverted to the Middle East.
“We have to recognize that we are not the priority for today,” Zelenskyy said. “That’s why I am afraid a long (Iran) war will give us less support.”
He also said that Russia benefits economically from the war and is sharing intelligence with Iran. Zelenskyy has offered Ukraine’s expertise in countering Iranian drones and defense cooperation with Gulf Arab states.
Top Senate Democrate condemns Trump for 'threatening possible war crimes'
Senator Chuck Schumer, the Senate Democratic Leader responded to Trump’s rant by writing: “Happy Easter, America. As you head off to church and celebrate with friends and family, the President of the United States is ranting like an unhinged madman on social media.
“He’s threatening possible war crimes and alienating allies. This is who he is, but this is not who we are. Our country deserves so much better,” Schumer wrote.
House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries, meanwhile, posted his gratitude for the rescue of the second US crew member. “Thankful that the second Air Force officer whose fighter jet was shot down in Iran has been heroically rescued by US Special Operations. What a blessing on Easter Sunday morning. May God continue to watch over our troops.”
Democrats are responding to Trump’s expletive-laden rant on Truth Social this morning.
Senator Bernie Sanders called it “dangerous and mentally unbalanced,” writing on his X account: “One month after starting the war in Iran, this is the statement of the President of the United States on Easter Sunday. These are the ravings of a dangerous and mentally unbalanced individual. Congress has got to act NOW. End this war.”
Senator Chris Murphy called it completely unhinged, posting on social media: “If I were in Trump’s Cabinet, I would spend Easter calling constitutional lawyers about the 25th Amendment. This is completely, utterly unhinged. He’s already killed thousands. He’s going to kill thousands more.”
Representative Becca Balint said during an appearance on MS Now: “If President Biden or President Obama had said anything remotely like this, it would be nonstop coverage on every single channel and everyone on the other side of the aisle would be howling about it and demanding that they step down.”
A US official has told investigative journalist Michael Weiss some interesting details about the high-stakes rescue mission of the weapon systems officer from the F-15E aircraft shot down over Iran:
In a post on X this morning, Oman’s foreign ministry said Oman and Iran held talks at the deputy foreign minister level to discuss options for ensuring the smooth transit of vessels through the strait of Hormuz, which in normal times carries about a fifth of the world’s oil and gas supplies.
“During the meeting, experts from both sides presented a number of visions and proposals that will be studied,” the ministry said in a post.
Iran has allowed a trickle of ships through from nations it deems “non-hostile”, such as Thailand, China, Pakistan and India.
An Iranian parliamentary committee last week approved a proposal to collect a toll on vessels travelling through the strait of Hormuz but said ships from the US, Israel and countries that imposed sanctions on Iran would not be permitted.
Iran and Oman are reportedly drafting a protocol to “monitor transit” through the strait of Hormuz. Donald Trump claims the US is unaffected by its closure because it doesn’t rely heavily on oil imports via the vital waterway. However, this ignores the fact that oil is an internationally traded commodity and that US consumers are being directly hit by a surge in energy prices resulting from the effective closure of the strait (you can read about the rising cost of gas here).
Map of the strait of HormuzTrump says deal with Iran possible by Monday - report
In an interview with Fox News, the US president, Donald Trump, said he believes he can reach a deal with Iran by Monday. We will bring you quotes from the interview on this when we have them.
Trump has threatened Iran that he would begin bombing its infrastructure Tuesday morning if the vital strait of Hormuz, which Tehran has effectively closed as leverage in the war, is not reopened.
Its closure is having a crippling effect on the global economy and has sent the price of energy soaring, including in the US. This fact is likely to hurt the Republicans in the midterms in November.
Trump has previously boasted of diplomatic progress in talks with Tehran, although Iran has denied any direct negotiation has taken place, only mediation efforts undertaken by intermediaries.
In the interview with Fox News, Trump also said the US sent guns to the Iranian demonstrators during the nationwide protests against the rising cost of living and the government in January.
The protests posed a major threat to the Iranian regime and an estimated 7,000 people were killed by security forces in a brutal crackdown, according to HRANA.
“We sent guns to the protesters, a lot of them,” Trump told Fox News’ chief foreign correspondent Trey Yingst. “And I think the Kurds took the guns.”
Former Trump ally Marjorie Taylor Greene condemns latest social media threat
Former Trump ally Majorie Taylor Greene has said everyone in the Trump administration who claims to be a Christian needs to “beg forgiveness from God” and intervene in the president’s “madness”.
In a lengthy post on X, which came after the US president again threatened Iran’s infrastructure if the strait of Hormuz remains closed, the former congresswoman wrote:
I know all of you and him and he has gone insane, and all of you are complicit. I’m not defending Iran but let’s be honest about all of this.
The Strait is closed because the US and Israel started the unprovoked war against Iran based on the same nuclear lies they’ve been telling for decades, that any moment Iran would develop a nuclear weapon.
You know who has nuclear weapons? Israel. They are more than capable of defending themselves without the US having to fight their wars, kill innocent people and children, and pay for it. Trump threatening to bomb power plants and bridges hurts the Iranian people, the very people Trump claimed he was freeing.
After years of loyalty, Greene broke from Trump last year as she questioned his strikes on Iran last June. She has said Trump, who campaigned on an “America first” slogan, has concentrated too much on foreign policy at the expense of domestic issues, such as those around affordability.
