Houthis Enter Iran Conflict as US Marines Arrive in Region

A widening Middle East conflict moved closer to a broader confrontation with Iran yesterday after Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis launched their first attacks on Israel since the war began, even as more US forces arrived in the region.

Washington has sent thousands of Marines to the Middle East during the month-old conflict.

The first of two contingents arrived on Friday aboard an amphibious assault ship, the US military said yesterday.

The Washington Post reported that US officials said the Pentagon was preparing for weeks of ground operations in Iran, potentially including raids by Special Operations forces and conventional infantry troops.

A missile launched from Lebanon over Israel

Reuters has reported that the Pentagon was weighing military operations that could include the deployment of ground troops in Iran.

Series of explosions heard in Iranian capital: AFP journalist

A string of loud explosions echoed across the Iranian capital this morning, according to an AFP journalist.

The blasts were heard in northern Tehran, with smoke rising from struck areas in the city’s northeast. It was not immediately clear what had been hit.

Lebanese journalists, rescue workers hit

The war, which began on 28 February with US and Israeli strikes on Iran, has rippled across the Middle East, killing thousands and jolting the global economy with the biggest-ever disruption to world energy supplies.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday that the US could meet its objectives without ground troops, but added that some were being deployed to the region to give Trump “maximum” flexibility to adjust strategy.

The Pentagon was also expected to send thousands of soldiers from the US Army’s 82nd Airborne Division.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian spoke to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif of Pakistan, which is hosting talks from Sunday with the Turkish and Saudi foreign ministers on ways to ease regional tensions.

Israel launched a fresh wave of attacks on Tehran on Saturday, targeting what its military described as Iranian government infrastructure.

It also struck targets in Lebanon, reopening its war against Iran-backed Hezbollah. Lebanon’s Al Manar TV reported that three Lebanese journalists were killed in a strike on a media vehicle, along with a Lebanese soldier.

A follow-up strike on rescue workers sent to help them also caused fatalities.

Israel’s military said it had targeted one of the journalists, alleging he was part of a Hezbollah intelligence unit and had reported on the locations of Israeli soldiers.

Destroyed vehicle that was used by crew of journalists who were killed in Israeli strike

Iran maintained its attacks on Israel and several Gulf states after striking an air base in Saudi Arabia on Friday and wounding 12 US military personnel, two of them seriously, in one of the gravest breaches of US air defences so far.

Air defences shot down a drone near the residence of Masoud Barzani, leader of the Iraqi Kurdish ruling party, in Erbil, security sources told Reuters early this morning.

Security sources said yesterday that another drone attack had targeted the home of the president of Iraq’s Kurdistan region.

Israel, which had regularly come under Houthi missile fire before the war, confirmed that a missile had been launched at it from Yemen. There were no reports of casualties or damage.

Houthi strikes may mean new threat to shipping

The attack underscored a possible new danger to global shipping, already battered by the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a waterway that had previously carried about a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas supplies.

The group carried out a second strike on Israel, Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said, while vowing more attacks.

The Houthis have demonstrated an ability to hit targets far beyond Yemen and to disrupt shipping lanes around the Arabian Peninsula and the Red Sea, as they did in support of Hamas during the Gaza war.

With US midterm elections due in November, the increasingly unpopular war has become a drag on Mr Trump’s Republican Party.

He has appeared keen to bring it to a close quickly, even while warning of further escalation.

Demonstrators filled city streets across the US on Saturday in anti-Trump rallies that organisers described as a call to action against the war on Iran.

The No Kings marches also highlighted the unpopularity of the war in the US

Mr Trump has threatened to strike Iranian power stations and other energy infrastructure if Iran does not open the Strait of Hormuz.

But he extended a deadline he had set for this week, giving Iran another 10 days to respond.

Iranian threats to attack ships in the strait have kept most oil tankers from attempting the passage.

Iran has agreed to allow an additional 20 Pakistani-flagged vessels through the strait, with two ships permitted to transit each day, Pakistani Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar said.

Israel has targeted Iran’s nuclear infrastructure.

The head of Russia’s state nuclear corporation Rosatom, which has evacuated staff from the Bushehr nuclear power plant on the Gulf coast, said the attacks posed a threat to nuclear safety.

Mr Pezeshkian said Iran would “retaliate strongly if our infrastructure or economic centers are targeted”.

Iranian attacks were reported across several parts of the Gulf, including Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Oman.

Israel has targeted Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant, Iran’s only nuclear power plant

An Iranian airstrike hit the Israeli village of Eshtaol, near Jerusalem. Seven people were hospitalised, Israel’s ambulance service said. Aluminium Bahrain ALBH.

BH said its facilities were targeted in an Iranian attack on Saturday, Bahrain’s state news agency reported.

In Iran, media reported that at least five people were killed in a US-Israeli attack on a residential unit in the northwestern city of Zanjan, while in Tehran, the Iran University of Science and Technology was struck.