UAE condemns Iran attack targeting Kuwait as US strikes drones near Hormuz

Israel Defense Forces said it carried out an air strike in Beirut on Thursday targeting a Hezbollah missile commander, marking the first Israeli attack on the Lebanese capital since a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah took effect.

“A short while ago, the IDF struck in Beirut. Details to follow,” the military said in a brief statement. No immediate reports of casualties or damage were released following the strike.

The attack comes amid heightened regional tensions despite the ceasefire agreement aimed at halting months of cross border hostilities between Israel and the Iran backed Hezbollah group.

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei said on Thursday that the United States and Israel were seeking to destabilise the Islamic republic in a written message read on state television.

"The enemy's blind plan, after the imposed war, the economic pressure, and the political and propaganda siege, is to create divisions and disintegration in order to compensate for military defeats and bring the nation to its knees," said Khamenei, who has not appeared in public since before he took office in March.

The Israeli attorney general's office said Thursday that it would indict a senior adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on charges of "transmitting classified information with the intent to harm state security".

The case concerns the leak of a classified document regarding the war in Gaza to German newspaper Bild in 2024, in violation of military censorship.

In a letter addressed to the lawyers of Netanyahu aide Yonatan Urich, the attorney general said an indictment would be filed with a Tel Aviv court.

In addition to "transmitting classified information with the intent to harm state security", the charges include possession and transmission of classified information, and destruction of evidence, according to a copy of the document seen by AFP.

The leaked document reportedly aimed to support Netanyahu's claim that Hamas was not interested in a ceasefire deal and that hostages captured by Palestinian militants during their October 7, 2023 assault on Israel could only be freed through military pressure.

Two other former advisers to Netanyahu, Eli Feldstein and Ari Rosenfeld, have also been indicted in the case.

The UAE on Thursday issued a strong condemnation of Iran's use of missiles and drones against Kuwait, labelling the strikes as acts of terrorism.

In a statement, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said, "The UAE strongly condemned the Iranian terrorist attacks targeting the sisterly State of Kuwait with missiles and drones." The Ministry further affirmed that "these terrorist attacks constitute a blatant violation of Kuwait's sovereignty and a threat to its security and stability." The UAE also expressed its full solidarity with Kuwait, pledging support for all measures aimed at preserving its security and stability.

The Israeli military early Thursday pounded Lebanon's fourth-largest city, killing at least 14 people across the south of the country in its ongoing military escalation against the Hezbollah group ahead of crucial talks in Washington.

Among those killed in the flurry of strikes were five women and children and a Lebanese soldier. Dozens of others were wounded, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry and the state-run National News Agency.

An Israeli soldier meanwhile was killed in a Hezbollah drone attack in northern Israel, the Israeli military said.

The intensification comes after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced an expansion in the Israeli military's attacks in Lebanon, apparently sparked by Hezbollah's use of fiber-optic exploding drones that have struck Israeli troops in Lebanon and reached some of Israel's northern border towns.

Iran's football federation expects FIFA to facilitate multiple-entry visas for the United States for the Iranian national team ahead of the 2026 World Cup, its president said in a video broadcast by Iranian media Thursday.

"FIFA is expected to deliver a multiple-entry visa so that the players can enter (the United States) and return (to Mexico)," federation president Mehdi Taj said.

Known as "Team Melli", the Iranian squad had initially planned to base itself in Tucson in Arizona during the tournament, but later moved its training camp to Tijuana in Mexico, which will co-host the World Cup alongside the US and Canada.

Taj previously said the move was intended to avoid complications related to US visas and to allow the squad to travel directly to Mexico aboard Iran Air flights.

Iran are scheduled to play all three of their Group G matches in the United States.

World shares declined Thursday following more of what the U.S. military said were defensive strikes against Iran.

Oil prices gained more than $2 a barrel after having dropped sharply a day before.

In early European trading, Germany's DAX was nearly unchanged at 25,175.63 and the CAC 40 in Paris lost 0.4% to 8,172.84. Britain's FTSE 100 slumped 0.9% to 10,416.62.

The futures for the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average edged 0.1% lower.

U.S. officials said Central Command forces shot down four Iranian one-way attack drones that posed a threat near the Strait of Hormuz. The U.S. military also hit an Iranian ground control station in Bandar Abbas that was about to launch a fifth drone. Those attacks followed others earlier in the week.

During Asian trading, Japan's Nikkei 225 lost 0.5% to 64,693.12, while the Kospi in South Korea lost 0.5% to 8,185.29.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng index shed 1.3% to 25,006.16, while the Shanghai Composite index edged 0.1% higher to 4,098.64.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 1.4% to 8,592.90, while Taiwan's Taiex dropped 1.4%.

"Conflicting reports on the contours of a U.S.-Iran deal dampened risks sentiments as markets grow increasingly wary about the possibility of a deal," Tan Boon Heng of Mizuho Bank in Singapore said in a commentary.

"While there is desire to maintain the ceasefire with both Iran and (asterisk)the) U.S. toning down language on renewed attacks and persisting with indirect channels of communication, it remains remarkably hard to envisage how a compromise can be reached on key issues," he said.

Iran's foreign ministry condemned on Thursday what it called violations by the United States after its strikes on the southern port city of Bandar Abbas and expressed solidarity with Oman after President Donald Trump threatened to "blow them up".

The ministry's spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said Iran would "take all necessary measures to defend its national sovereignty" and condemned what he called "the threatening rhetoric of American officials against Iran and several regional countries."

The Israeli military said on Thursday that a soldier was killed the day before by a Hezbollah drone near the Lebanon border, taking to 24 the number of its troops killed in the war with the Iran-backed group.

A military statement named her as 20-year-old Sergeant Rotem Yanai, who "fell during operational activity in northern Israel".

It added that one reservist soldier was severely injured and another moderately so in the same incident. 

The military told AFP that Yanai was killed by a Hezbollah explosive drone.

A total of 24 Israelis have been killed since hostilities began on March 2, including 23 soldiers and one civilian contractor.

The Israeli military on Wednesday declared all areas south of Lebanon's Zahrani River - an area roughly 40 kilometres (25 miles) from the border - as "combat zones" and told residents to evacuate ahead of attacks against Hezbollah.

The sweeping warning was the first of its kind since an April 17 ceasefire.

EU top diplomat Kaja Kallas warned Thursday that it was in no one's interest for the US war with Iran to continue, as the two sides traded fire in the worst clashes since an April ceasefire began.

"They are right now in between this very dangerous zone of war and peace, and it is not in anybody's interest that this war continues," Kallas told reporters at a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Cyprus.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guards targeted an American base on Thursday in retaliation for US strikes on the country's south, Iran's state broadcaster IRIB reported.

"Following this morning's aggression by the invading U.S. military against a location on the outskirts of Bandar Abbas Airport using aerial projectiles, the American air base that served as the source of the attack was targeted at 4:50 am (0120 GMT)," the Guards said, according to IRIB.

It did not provide details of the location of the base, though Kuwait, a US ally, said it was responding to missile and drone attacks on Thursday morning.

Kuwait's General Staff of the Army has announced that air defence systems were intercepting hostile missile and drone attacks targeting the country’s airspace early on Thursday.

In a statement, the General Staff of the Kuwaiti Army said air defence systems were currently responding to a wave of hostile missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles attempting to penetrate Kuwaiti airspace.

 Israel's military said on Thursday it had begun striking Hezbollah infrastructure around Tyre after issuing an evacuation warning for residents of the southern Lebanese city.

"The IDF is compelled to take forceful action against it," the Israeli military's order said, in reference to the Iran-backed group.

It added that residents of the zone around certain buildings should leave and travel north of the Zahrani River, and that remaining in the area "places you at risk".

"The IDF has begun striking Hezbollah infrastructure in the area of Tyre," the military posted in a later statement on Telegram.

Lebanon's state-run National News Agency reported two sets of Israeli strikes had taken place on the city and an area to its east on Thursday morning, hitting a building and sparking a fire in Tyre.

Iranian forces fired at four ships attempting to cross the Strait of Hormuz, state broadcaster IRIB reported on Thursday, the same day Washington carried out fresh strikes on southern Iran.

"Four vessels attempted to cross the Strait of Hormuz and enter the Persian Gulf without coordination with the security forces," IRIB posted on Telegram, saying the incident took place at around 12:35 am local time (2105 GMT Wednesday) but without providing details on the ships.

"They were warned, but after they ignored the warning, warning shots were fired at them, forcing them to return," it added.

The United States Treasury announced sanctions Wednesday against Iran's Persian Gulf Strait Authority, Tehran's new agency that collects fees for traveling through the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

"The Iranian military's latest attempt to extort global maritime trade is proof that Economic Fury has left the regime desperate for cash," Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement.

The statement extended the threat of sanctions to anyone paying the fees, because they "may be providing support to and receiving services from" Iran's Revolutionary Guards, and therefore may "be exposed to sanctions risk." 

Israel's military issued an evacuation warning for residents of the city of Tyre in southern Lebanon on Thursday, saying it would operate against Iran-backed group Hezbollah in the area.

"The IDF is compelled to take forceful action against it," the Israeli military's order said, in reference to Hezbollah.

It added that residents of the zone around certain buildings should leave and travel north of the Zahrani River, and that remaining in the area "places you at risk".

 The US military shot down four Iranian drones and struck a control center in the southern city of Bandar Abbas, an American official said Wednesday, describing the actions as "purely defensive."

"Today, US Central Command Forces shot down four Iranian one-way attack drones that posed a threat around the Strait of Hormuz," the official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said in a statement to AFP.

"US forces also struck an Iranian ground control station in Bandar Abbas that was about to launch a fifth drone," the official said.

The new strikes come just days after the US military attacked several missile sites and mine-laying boats in the same area, in what US officials described at the time as taken in "self-defense."

Those strikes were seen as a significant test of the US-Iran ceasefire, but did not ultimately precipitate in a large-scale return to fighting.

The US official on Wednesday described the latest actions as "measured, purely defensive, and intended to maintain the ceasefire."

The Trump administration on Wednesday placed additional sanctions on Iran as part of a sprawling economic pressure campaign during the war, this time targeting the country's newly created agency that is trying to control shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.

The move, first reported by The Associated Press, is the latest U.S. effort to use economic leverage on top of military action to push Iran's leadership into an agreement to end the war and open the waterway where a fifth of the world's oil and natural gas normally passes. President Donald Trump has said a deal is imminent, but talks are ongoing.

It comes as rising energy prices and other costs stemming from Iran's effective closure of the strait have heaped political pressure on Trump and other Republicans ahead of the midterm congressional elections.

"The Iranian military's latest attempt to extort global maritime trade is proof that Economic Fury has left the regime desperate for cash," Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement.

The sanctions target Iran's PGSA and any person or entity cooperating with the agency, announced earlier this month, that approves transit in the strait and charges tolls that could reach as high as $2 million per vessel.

Hamas's armed wing confirmed on Wednesday that its chief, Mohammed Odeh, was killed a day earlier in an Israeli strike in Gaza, after Israel had earlier announced his death.

In a statement naming him as the "Chief of Staff of the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades", Hamas's armed wing said Odeh died "on Tuesday evening... in a cowardly assassination operation that resulted in the martyrdom of him, his wife and his children".

US President Donald Trump said Wednesday he was not yet satisfied with Iran's offers to make a deal, after Iranian state television reported details of what it claimed was a draft agreement.

Speaking at a cabinet meeting in the White House, Trump added that he was in no rush to reach an accord despite saying at the weekend that one was close.

"Iran is very much intent, they want very much to make a deal. So far they haven't gotten there. We're not satisfied with it, but we will be," Trump said.

"Either that or we'll have to just finish the job," he said, referring to threats to resume the military operations that the United States and Israel launched on February 28 and paused in April.

Iranian state TV said earlier Wednesday that a draft outline of a memorandum of understanding with Washington included a commitment to lift the naval blockade on Iran, restore traffic in the Strait of Hormuz and withdraw US forces from the Gulf.

The White House called the report a "complete fabrication."

US President Donald Trump said he wouldn’t be content to see Russia or China take shipment of Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium, and insisted there was no discussion of financial relief for the country before it fulfills its commitments, reported CNN.

The remarks offer harder-line positions on two key points that are central to the ongoing negotiations with Iran.

“No I wouldn’t be comfortable,” he said when asked about the prospect of Moscow or Beijing taking the near-bomb-grade uranium, which is currently believed to be buried deep underground.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio says: "The bottom line is Iran is never going to have a nuclear weapon. If recent events have done anything, it’s to remind us once again that they are the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism. They can never have a nuclear weapon."

Day 89: Trump says 'not satisfied' yet on Iran deal

Day 88: Iran condemns US attacks as violation of ceasefire

Day 87: 'Proceeding nicely': US-Iran talks intensify, oil drops

Day 86: US-Iran talks: Trump says 'I don’t make bad deals'

Day 85: Trump: Iran deal ‘largely negotiated’, Hormuz to open

Day 84: UAE backs WHO move against Iran's attacks on civilians

Day 83: Trump rejects tolls in Hormuz: 'We want it free'

Day 82: Trump says US-Iran talks are ‘right on the borderline’

Day 81: Iran’s position 'unclear', deal 'uncertain': VP Vance

Day 80: Trump says 'holding off on attack on Iran tomorrow'

Day 79: Trump says 'clock is ticking' for Iran

Day 78: Iran plans new Strait of Hormuz toll system

Day 77: Israel and Lebanon extend ceasefire by 45 days: US

Day 76: World leaders call for security in Strait of Hormuz

Day 75: Trump arrives in Beijing for summit with Xi

Day 74: Iran signals potential 90% Uranium enrichment

Day 73: Trump calls Iranian response 'totally unacceptable'

Day 72: 'As of today, Tehran’s restraint is over': Iran official

Day 71: Iran keeps US waiting on response to peace plan

Day 70: US fires on Iran tankers as talks hang in balance