LIVE Iran targets bases and says US is ‘negotiating with yourselves’

Iran has warned it will strike USS Abraham Lincoln, one of the world’s biggest aircraft carriers, if it falls within range of its missiles.

The threat comes after a large-scale missile attack failed to hit the vessel.

Footage has emerged of the moment Iran launched a series of shore-to-sea cruise missiles at the Lincoln carrier, which was deployed to the Middle East to support Operation Epic Fury.

Speaking in the White House yesterday, Donald Trump said: ‘They shot 100 missiles at one of our aircraft carriers, one of the biggest ships in the world, actually. And of 101 missiles shot, every single one of them was knocked down.’

But Iranian Navy commander Shahram Irani warned the warship was under constant surveillance ahead of another possible attack.

‘The USS Abraham Lincoln carrier is under constant Iranian monitoring and will be targeted as soon as it comes within range of missile systems,’ he said, according to the SNN news agency.

Smoke rises from Kuwait international airport after a drone strike

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they had fired a fresh wave of missiles at Israel, as well as US bases hosting American troops in Kuwait, Jordan and Bahrain.

Tehran has kept up its retaliatory attacks on Israel and Gulf nations it accuses of serving as launchpads for US strikes.

Drones hit a fuel tank and sparked a fire at Kuwait International Airport, the Gulf state’s civil aviation authority said, causing ‘limited’ damage.

In Bahrain, the interior ministry said air raid sirens were activated, while Jordan’s public security directorate reported shrapnel fell near the capital Amman, resulting in no casualties or damage.

Saudi Arabia said it had intercepted at least four drones in the kingdom’s east.

The front page of today’s Javan newspaper

Iranian newspapers have mocked Donald Trump, accusing him of ‘lies’ and publishing cartoons of the US president styled as Pinocchio.

A caricature of Trump with an elongated nose looming over a map of the Strait of Hormuz appeared on the front page of the conservative daily Javan, under the headline, ‘The world’s most pathetic and dishonourable liar’.

Javan accused Trump of lying to calm the markets and push down oil prices, which have surged since Israel and the United States launched hostilities on February 28.

Since Iran’s denial, ‘oil and gas prices have risen once again”‘, the paper noted, comparing Trump to ‘a gambler in a slump’ in a war he believed he could win quickly, like a lucky hand of poker.

The Tasnim news agency also mocked Trump, showing him with dishevelled hair and a defeated expression.

‘The politics of lies,’ headlined Sobh-e No (New Morning), echoing other reactions and commentaries across Iranian media.

by Olivia Allhusen, Foreign News Reporter

Iran has rewarded Spain for its stance against Donald Trump by allowing Spanish ships to pass through the vital Strait of Hormuz, according to local media.

The move is said to be a ‘thank you’ to socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, who has been outspoken in his criticism of both the United States and Israel over the war.

Iran is allowing Spanish-flagged vessels through the key Gulf shipping route without restrictions or disruption, an Iranian source was quoted as saying by Majorca Daily Bulletin.

‘Iran allows the Kingdom of Spain to use the Strait of Hormuz with complete freedom without restrictions or barriers that impede the maritime navigation of Spanish ships and tankers,’ the source claimed, although this has not yet officially been confirmed.

The strait is one of the world’s most important energy chokepoints, with roughly a fifth of global oil and gas supplies passing through it each day.

How long will the Iran war last and what are the US goals?

President Donald Trump has issued a dizzying number of conflicting answers to these questions since launching the conflict which is now in its fourth week.

The stakes have risen as Iran has retaliated with drone and missile strikes across the Gulf after the United States and Israel started their attacks on February 28.

Watch our video on how the President has shifted his position:

The US Navy hopes to expedite the return to the Persian Gulf of two ships refitted for minesweeping now undergoing maintenance in Singapore, a senior official has said.

It comes amid mounting concerns over Iranian threats to mine the Strait of Hormuz.

The official acknowledged the United States had ‘not a lot of options’ in the Indian Ocean to maintain the two littoral combat ships based out of Bahrain, saying it hoped to minimise time spent laid up in Singapore, 6,300 km (3,915 miles) away.

The work would be completed as soon as possible to prepare the ships to get ‘back into the theatre’ where they were based, the official said, declining to provide a timeframe and speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Since the start of the US-Israeli war on Iran, Tehran has attacked countries that host US bases and effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, a conduit for a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural ​gas, causing the worst energy supply shock in history.

Iran has deployed mines in the strait, sources have said, and its Defence Council on Monday warned various types of mines, including floating mines deployed from the coast, could be used if the US were to blockade Kharg Island, Tehran’s main oil export hub.

Allies of Donald Trump are expressing concern he is not receiving a complete picture of the Iran war with military officials presenting a daily montage of the most successful trikes on Iranian targets, NBC News is reporting.

According to NBC, Trump is shown video updates which one official described as a series of clips of ‘stuff blowing up’.

The highlights package, which is usually around two minutes long, isn’t the only war briefing he receives on the war with the President also holding conversations with top military and intelligence advisers, foreign leaders as well as news reports.

‘We can’t tell him every single thing that happens,’ one official said and noted that Trump’s briefings tend to draw better feedback from his aides when they focus on US victories.

Overall, the official added Trump is being given information that emphasises US success with little detail about Iran’s actions.

The Pentagon has said it has reached agreements with BAE, Lockheed and Honeywell to boost production of defense systems and munitions as part of its shift to ‘wartime footing’.

Under the deals, Honeywell Aerospace will ‘surge production of critical components for America’s munitions stockpile,’ as part of a $500million multi-year investment, the Pentagon said.

BAE Systems and Lockheed Martin will also quadruple production of seekers for the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptor, while a new framework agreement with Lockheed will accelerate production of its Precision Strike Missile, the Pentagon added.

The announcements come more than three weeks after Donald Trump and Israel launched a war on Iran.

by John-Paul Ford Rojas, Deputy Business Editor

Mystery traders may have made tens of millions of dollars in mere minutes after betting on markets just before a surprise social media post by Donald Trump raising hopes of peace with Iran.

The bets on oil prices and stock markets were made 15 minutes before the US President said there had been ‘productive’ talks – sparking furious allegations of insider trading.

Traders stood to make fortunes from the bets placed on Monday morning amid sharp criticism from politicians on both sides of the Atlantic of ‘repugnant’ behaviour and ‘mind-blowing corruption’.

Oil prices had been soaring and stock markets plunging as the Middle East conflict threatened to escalate.

But when Mr Trump declared on his Truth Social platform that there had been talks ‘regarding a complete and total resolution of our hostilities’, those moves went into reverse.

by Imogen Garfinkel, Senior Foreign News Reporter

Radical Iranian army chiefs bent on continuing the war will start assassinating their own higher-level officials if they continue to negotiate on Donald Trump’s terms, an expert has claimed.

Iran’s veteran Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and a host of other top Revolutionary Guards commanders have been killed in US-Israeli strikes, but the ruling system has maintained its ability to operate in the conflict that began on February 28.

Hooshang Amirahmadi, the founder and president of the American Iranian Council, said that while around 150 members of the regime’s top brass have been eliminated, a new generation of younger officers have entered the scene and are ‘increasingly in charge’.

With Khamenei killed in one of the first strikes of the war, the ‘vertical power structure’ of the Islamic Republic has collapsed into a ‘horizontal structure’, giving more military agency to hardline second rank officers who are resistant to peace.

‘If until yesterday Israel or America was killing these big generals, from now on I would not be surprised if some of these generals or these establishment powers could be eliminated by these second rank revolutionary officers, that de facto have taken power in their hands,’ Amirahmadi told BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme.

Israel’s military says it has struck a submarine development facility in Isfahan, a day after its air force carried out a wave of strikes on the central Iran city.

‘As part of the strikes, the IDF, guided by Iraeli navy intelligence, targeted the Iranian terror regime’s Underwater Research Centre in Isfahan,’ the IDF said.

‘The centre is the only facility in Iran responsible for the design and development of submarines and support systems for the Iranian navy,’ it said, adding that the site also produced various types of ‘unmanned vessels’.

The military had announced on Tuesday it had conducted a ‘wide-scale wave of strikes’ in Isfahan.

Iran’s military has claimed it forced the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier to change position after firing cruise missiles at it.

In a statement, Iranian forces also reiterated it will target the warship again if it comes into range.

‘The Iranian Navy’s Qader cruise missiles (shore-based anti-ship missile) targeted the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier belonging to the US and forced it to change its position,’ the statement said.