Dubai, Mar 25: President Donald Trump says the United States is in talks with Tehran to end the war, even as both sides kept up intense barrages and Iran denied negotiations were underway.
The Islamic Republic fired a dozen missile salvos at Israel on Tuesday and rocket attacks by Lebanese militants killed a woman — the first death in Israel by fire from Lebanon during the war.
Israel said it carried out an extensive series of strikes on Iranian “production sites” without providing details.
Although the volume of Iranian missiles fired at Israel has decreased, Tehran has kept up and indeed increased the pace of its launches, sending millions of Israelis into shelters multiple times a day. Recent failed interceptions have caused deaths and injuries.
Trump has delayed his self-imposed deadline for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. The near-total closure of the crucial waterway has sent fuel prices skyrocketing and threatened the world economy. US stocks swung between losses and gains on Tuesday over uncertainty about the length of the war.
Pakistan has offered to host talks on ending the conflict but Iran remains defiant, with a top military spokesman vowing to fight “until complete victory.”
Here is the latest:
US to send around 1,000 troops from 82nd Airborne Division to the Mideast
The troops are to be sent in the coming days, a person with knowledge of the plans told The Associated Press.
The unit is considered the Army’s emergency response force and can typically be deployed on short notice. The force would include a battalion of the 1st Brigade Combat Team as well as Maj. Gen. Brandon Tegtmeier, the division’s commander, and division staff, according to the person, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military plans.
It’s the latest addition of troops after US officials said last week that thousands of Marines aboard several Navy ships would head to the region.
While the Marine units are trained in missions that include supporting US embassies, evacuating civilians and disaster relief, the soldiers of the 82nd Airborne are trained to parachute into hostile or contested territory to secure key territory and airfields.
The New York Times reported earlier that the deployment was being considered.
France’s Emmanuel Macron urges Iran to engage in good faith negotiations
In a phone call with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, the French president also called on Iran to end the “unacceptable attacks” against countries in the region, preserve energy and civilian infrastructure and restore freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz.
“I called on Iran to engage in good faith in negotiations, in order to open a path to de-escalation,” he said on the social platform X.
UN chief condemns Israeli settlement expansion and steps promoting West Bank annexation
Secretary-General António Guterres said the rapid pace of settlement expansion and proliferation of outposts is fuelling tensions, impeding Palestinians’ access to their land and threatening the viability of an independent and contiguous Palestinian state. It is also taking place in conjunction with a rise in settler attacks, he said.
UN deputy Middle East envoy Ramiz Alakbarov, delivered the findings from Guterres’ report to the UN Security Council, saying Israeli planning authorities advanced or approved over 6,000 housing units in the West Bank between December and March 13.
He said demolitions and seizures of Palestinian homes and other structures also accelerated, as well as inflammatory rhetoric from Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hamas and Israeli ministers and members of Parliament.
Eight of the 15 council members — Bahrain, Denmark, France, Greece, Latvia, Pakistan, Somalia and United Kingdom — delivered a joint statement just before the meeting reaffirming their “firm opposition to annexation” of any Palestinian territory and any forced displacements.
Pope Leo XIV repeats his appeal for a ceasefire in the Middle East
Speaking to reporters Tuesday evening outside his residence in Castel Gandolfo, the pontiff invited leaders to “work for peace” not with weapons but rather “with dialogue, truly seeking a solution for all”.
“Hatred is increasing, violence is worsening,” Pope Leo warned, saying more than a million people have been displaced and many others killed.
“We want to pray for peace,” he said, adding, “but I invite all authorities to truly work through dialogue to resolve this problem”.
Iran’s parliamentary speaker Qalibaf is floated as a possible US contact in talks as war rages
Long before he became Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf went on a charm offensive for almost two decades, portraying himself as a hard-liner the West could do business with in the Islamic Republic.
The 64-year-old pilot and former Revolutionary Guard commander has denied that there have been discussions with the United States amid reports that he was floated as Washington’s negotiating partner in talks.
Questions also remain as to what power Qalibaf has within Iran’s theocracy, shattered after the February 28 Israeli airstrike that killed 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba, now Iran’s new supreme leader, has backed Qalibaf through his repeated and failed presidential campaigns. Still, multiple centres of power within Iran’s theocracy now likely vie for control of the Islamic Republic — and uncertainties remain over Mojtaba Khamenei’s status as he has yet to be seen after reportedly being wounded.
Meanwhile, Qalibaf has been tied to the crackdown against protesters calling for change within Iran’s government and has seen corruption allegations swirl around him during his time in office.
Israel isn’t part of any reported Iran talks and will continue military operations with US, ambassador says
Israel’s UN ambassador Danny Danon says as far as he knows Israel isn’t part of any reported talks between the United States and Iran later this week in Pakistan.
“As we speak, Israel and the US, we continue to target military targets in Iran, and we will continue to do that,” he told UN reporters Tuesday.
He said the attacks have “accomplished a lot” but not everything.
Danon accused Iran’s foreign minister of saying just weeks ago that Iran didn’t have missiles with a range beyond 2,000 kilometres — then launching a missile that went nearly 4,000 kilometres toward Diego Garcia, a remote Indian Ocean island that hosts a major UK-US military base.
In negotiations at the end of the conflict, he said, Israel is determined to ensure that Iran has no nuclear or ballistic missile capability.
Iran says a projectile struck the area of Bushehr nuclear power plant
No casualties or technical damage was reported at the facility from the incident Tuesday night, which Iran’s atomic agency blamed on Israel and the United States.
The International Atomic Energy Agency posted on X that it “has been informed by Iran that another projectile hit the premises of the Bushehr”.
A similar event was reported last week by Iran and Russia who said a projectile had struck the grounds of the Russia-built Bushehr plant, raising the specter of a radiological incident as the war rages.
Latest Iranian missile attack on Israel hits apartments and injures at least 7 people
Images released by rescue authorities showed extensive damage to one floor of a residential building in Bnei Brak, east of Tel Aviv, where rescue services said a man was moderately wounded and six people lightly injured, including a seven-year-old boy and 80-year-old woman.
Impact sites with varying degrees of damage were reported in at least seven other locations in central Israel.
This was the 12th Iranian missile barrage fired at Israel on Tuesday, while rockets fired by militants in Lebanon also kept air raid sirens sounding for hours in Israel’s north and killed at least one woman.
Iran is firing an average of 10 missiles a day at Israel, military says
Israeli Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin, the military’s spokesman, said in a televised statement that Iran fired dozens of missiles on Israel in the war’s first and second days of the war but this number “dropped quickly”. He attributed that to Israel’s continued strikes on military headquarters, launch sites and missile production sites across Iran.
He said the military completed several more waves of strikes on targets in Iran on Tuesday.
Although the volume of missiles has decreased, Iran has kept up and indeed increased the pace of its launches, sending millions of Israelis into shelters multiple times a day. Recent failed interceptions have caused deaths and injuries.
In a cryptic comment, Trump says Iran has shared a present’ as show of faith
Asked if he trusts the Iranians said to be in talks with US representatives, Trump said he doesn’t trust anybody but alluded to receiving a “gift” that he said suggested “we’re dealing with the right people”.
“They gave us a present, and the present arrived today,” Trump said speaking at the White House on Tuesday. “It was a very big present worth a tremendous amount of money. And I’m not going to tell you what that present is, but it was a very significant prize.”
Pressed for more detail, Trump said it was “oil- and gas-related” but went no further. “It was a very nice thing they did. But what it showed me is that we’re dealing with the right people.”
A missile fired from Iran exploded over Lebanon, official says
A senior Lebanese military official said the cluster munition-equipped ballistic missile exploded earlier Tuesday over the Keserwan region north of Beirut, causing some material damage.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations, added that the missile was heading west when it exploded but it was not clear where it was headed. It marked the first time an Iranian missile was intercepted over Lebanese airspace during the current conflict.
It was not clear how the missile was intercepted. The Lebanese military lacks air defenses.
The Israeli military said following an assessment that alongside the Iranian launches toward Israel on Tuesday was a ballistic missile fired from Iran that fell in Beirut.
