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What began as US' pressure tactic against Tehran to halt uranium enrichment and pause attacks against Israel ended with the Donald Trump announcing strikes on three nuclear sites in Iran.
US President Donald Trump on Sunday said that the US struck three key Iranian enrichment facilities — Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan — in Iran, calling the attack a 'spectacular military success.'
The US move to directly intervene in the Iran-Israeli conflict has escalated tensions of a larger escalation in the Middle East, with Yemen's Houthi militants issuing threats and Tehran likely to retaliate. Iran Israel war news LIVE updates
Here's how the development unfolded in the Middle East in the last 24 hours and how the parties have responded:
- The missile and drone attacks between Israel and Iran continued on Saturday. The Isfahan nuclear research complex in Iran and the holy city of Qom were targeted by Israeli airstrikes. Meanwhile, Iran launched a wave of missile and drone strikes against Israel.
- Iran’s atomic energy agency described US strikes on three key nuclear facilities as a “savage assault.” The “lawless actions” won’t cause “the development of this national industry to be halted,” the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran said in a statement, according to the state-run IRNA news agency. Iran's foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran reserves all options to defend its sovereignty, interest, and people.
- The US also moved B-2 bombers to the Pacific island of Guam, raising speculations over US participation in Israel's strikes against Iran. There was no official word from the Pentagon on whether the bomber deployment was linked to the Middle East tensions or the number of aircraft being deployed.
- The US State Department also started the evacuation of Americans from Israel, US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee announced.
- The US military on Saturday (EDT) struck three sites in Iran- Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan- directly joining Israel’s war aimed at decapitating the country’s nuclear program.
- US President Donald Trump, in a post on Truth Social, said the US conducted "very successful" strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities and that all planes are now out of Iranian airspace.
- Iran's official news agency IRNA confirmed the attacks on Natanz and Isfahan. It also claimed that the "Islamic Republic had evacuated the three nuclear sites some time ago."
- Iran's foreign ministry said the US attacks showed that the US "will stop at no illegality or crime" to support Israel. "It has now become abundantly clear to all that the very regime which enjoys permanent membership in the Security Council is beholden to no principle or morality and will stop at no illegality or crime to serve the aims of a genocidal, occupying regime," the ministry said in a statement.
- Following the US attack, Iranian state TV presenters warned of the incoming consequences, with one presenter saying that every US civilian and military personnel in the region was now a "legitimate target."
- Trump, in a press briefing, said the US attacks were a "spectacular military success" and that the Iranian nuclear facilities have been "completely and totally obliterated". He also warned Iran that it "must now make peace", adding that the future attacks will be far "greater and a lot easier."
- Yemen military group Houthi said that the US strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities was the 'beginning of war'. Mohamed al-Farah, a member of Houthi's political bureau, said it is clear that Trump wants the hostilities to be quick and for the war to end. "Destroying a nuclear facility here and there is not the end of the war, but it’s the beginning," al-Farah said, according to Al Jazeera.
- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lauded the American strikes and said Trump’s "leadership today has created a pivot of history that can help lead the Middle East and beyond to a future of prosperity and peace."
