LIVE: Iranian missile strike sets Bahrain hotel on fire

Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of the US-Israel war with Iran as the conflict enters its seventh day.

Here are your main developments:

• Donald Trump told the Iranian regime’s besieged military force to surrender or face ‘guaranteed death’ as his Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth warned the US has ‘only just begun’.
• Trump added he was not currently considering sending US ground troops into Iran after saying he would ‘have to be involved’ in choosing Iran’s next leader
• US forces sent a massive Iranian drone carrier up in flames last night as part of its effort to sink the entire Iranian Navy
• Israel has declared a ‘next phase’ in the conflict with more airstrikes in Tehran while its military issued an unprecedented warning in Beirut, telling residents ‘save your lives and evacuate your residences’ immediately
• Iranian missiles struck two hotels in Bahrain with footage showing one on fire in the capital Manama
• Saudi Arabia said it destroyed three drones east of Riyadh today as Iran presses on with attacks across the Gulf
• The first government chartered repatriation flight leaving from the Middle East arrives back in the UK after the first attempt was delayed because of pilot working hours

by James Tapsfield

UK forces carrying out strikes on Iranian missile sites would be legal, David Lammy insisted today.

The Deputy PM fuelled speculation that the RAF could step up involvement in the US-Israeli operation – despite initially barring the use of UK bases.

Mr Lammy also blundered by wrongly stating that Cyprus, where a crucial military site is located, is a member of Nato.

The comments came after Defence Secretary John Healey refused to rule out direct attacks, saying the government was willing to ‘adapt’ to circumstances on the ground.

Keir Starmer has ruled out joining ‘offensive’ action despite facing the public wrath of Donald Trump – who has dismissed him as ‘no Churchill’.

US B-2 stealth bombers are among the planes getting ready to strike Iran

by Martin Robinson

The US Air Force’s heaviest bombers are expected to arrive at British bases within hours, suggesting that Donald Trump’s mega-attack on Iran that he dubbed the ‘big one’ is imminent.

America’s stealth air fleet including its B-1s, B-2s and B-52s are said to be on their way to Diego Garcia in the Chagos Islands and RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire.

The strategic bombers, costing up to $2billion each, can carry out long-range missions without detection while carrying the world’s most devastating missiles.

Sources have suggested that Saturday could be D-day for a new gigantic bombardment – exactly a week after America and Israel first attacked Iran as part of ‘Operation Epic Fury’.

The US President warned Iran this week that the ‘big one’ was coming, adding: ‘We haven’t even started hitting them hard. The big wave has not even happened’.

Azerbaijan has declared it is withdrawing diplomatic staff from Iran, a day after Iranian drones targeted an airport and a school in an Azerbaijani border region.

‘Azerbaijan is evacuating its diplomatic personnel from Iran. The process applies to both the embassy in Tehran and the consulate in Tabriz,’ Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov said, adding: ‘Work in this direction is currently underway.’

Yesterday Azerbaijan vowed to retaliate after four civilians were injured in the drone attack.

President Ilham Aliyev accused Iran of carrying out ‘a groundless act of terror and aggression,’ and said his military has been told to prepare and implement retaliatory measures.

The Caspian Sea nation halted truck traffic across the nearly 700-kilometer (over 400-mile) border with Iran.

The Middle East has been plunged into chaos after a joint US and Israeli strike on Iran killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday.

In the days since, Tehran and its allies have retaliated across the region, targeting Israel, US bases in neighbouring Gulf states and sites critical to global oil and gas production.

Governments, including the UK’s Foreign Office and the US State Department, have updated travel advice, warning citizens to avoid travel or limit it to essential journeys across large parts of the region.

The US government assigns threat levels used to assess risk range from Level 1, meaning exercise normal precautions, to Level 7, meaning do not travel.

Several countries now fall into the highest categories as the conflict continues.

Kuwait’s defence ministry has announced 67 soldiers have been injured since Saturday – the highest number by far of any Gulf military.

Colonel Saud Al-Atwan, the defence ministry spokesman, did not specify where the soldiers were injured.

Kuwait had identified and ‘dealt with’ 212 ballistic missiles and 394 drones since Saturday, he added.

Kuwait also has the highest death toll in the region so far, with eight out of 13 people killed in the Gulf having died in the tiny country.

This includes four US service members and two Kuwaiti army personnel as well as two civilians.

The United States is not in a position to provide enough missiles to the Gulf states and Ukraine to defend themselves, European defence and space commissioner Andrius Kubilius has said

He said following the US-Israel war on Iran, ‘Americans really will not be able to provide enough of those missiles, both for the Gulf countries, for American army itself and also for Ukrainian needs’.

It comes after reports the Pentagon is in talks to buy Ukrainian drone interceptors because stocks of Patriot missiles used by Gulf states to counter Iran’s Shahed drones are said to be running low.

Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch said she would support Royal Air Force jets striking Iranian missile launch sites.

Speaking on BBC Breakfast, she said: ‘That is the right thing to do. Otherwise, we are allowing our service personnel to be put in danger. We have to think about them.’

Ms Badenoch added: ‘If this was a nuclear attack, God forbid, it would be too late.

‘You can’t always wait for people to attack you. Sometimes you have to make sure that you get there first to stop their ability to hurt your citizens.’

She said she would like to see a ‘de-escalation’, but said: ‘We are in this war whether we like it or not because we have put bases in other people’s countries and we need to protect them.

‘And what I’m worried about is that our Government looks afraid to do anything and just wants to sort of make it go away, and we need to be stronger than that.’

Sri Lanka has begun transferring more than 200 sailors from an Iranian vessel to shore today as tensions mount in the Indian Ocean.

Navy spokesman Cmdr. Buddhika Sampath said the sailors of the IRIS Bushehr were being brought first to the port of Colombo and the ship will later be moved to an eastern port on the island.

‘The disembarkation is in progress,’ he said, adding the sailors would be taken to the naval base at Welisara, about 12 miles north of Colombo, after medical exams and immigration procedures.

The move by the Sri Lankan government to take over the vessel came after the US sank the Iranian warship IRIS Dena off Sri Lanka’s coast Wednesday.

The strike marked one of the rare instances since World War II in which a submarine sank a surface warship, and highlighted the expanding scope of the US-Israeli military campaign against Iran.

Israeli airstrikes have caused huge destruction in Beirut’s southern suburbs today after the military claimed it had destroyed Hezbollah targets

The attacks came after the Israel issued an unprecedented evacuation warning for the area where hundreds of thousands of people live.

The Israeli military said that it carried out 26 waves of strikes on the area since Lebanon was dragged into the war four days ago, including overnight’s raids against ‘command centres and multi-storey structures in which were terror sites’.

It said forces struck ‘an executive council’s command centre and a facility storing UAVs (drones) utilised by Hezbollah for conducting attacks against the State of Israel’.

Here’s a picture of an Iranian missile with cluster munitions heading towards Israel after it was fired by Tehran last night.

Residents of Dubai have this morning received an alert on their phones urging them to shelter from potential missile threats, the AFP news agency is reporting.

According to reporters, Emirtati officials have instructed: ‘Due to the current situation, potential missile threats, seek immediate shelter in the closest secure building and steer away from windows, doors and open areas.’

Yesterday, alerts were issued across the UAE after it confirmed it was struck with an Iranian ballistic missile and six drones following a barrage of 131 suicide drones in a furious ‘revenge’ attack by Iran.

Influencers had been captured posting videos of alarms ringing out of the city from rooftop bars, inside bomb shelters and even from a bubbling jacuzzi amid the deadly strikes