Deadly Iranian missile attack reported in Israel's Beit Shemesh
We are hearing reports of an Iranian missile hitting a residential neighbourhood in central Israel’s Beit Shemesh area.
Israel’s Magen David Adom (MDA) rescue service says at least eight people were killed in a strike there. In an update, the emergency rescue service said:
Additional MDA teams are treating and evacuating 28 casualties to hospital including: 2 in serious condition, 2 in moderate condition, and 24 in mild condition.
Workers are currently searching for people feared to be trapped under the rubble.
Emergency personnel work at the site of an Iranian strike in Beit Shemesh, Israel. Photograph: Ammar Awad/Reuters
Three US service members killed 'in action' as part of Iran operation - Centcom
The US has said three American service members have been killed in action as part of the Iran operation, according to the US military’s Central Command (Centcom).
As of 9:30 am ET, March 1, three U.S. service members have been killed in action and five are seriously wounded as part of Operation Epic Fury. Several others sustained minor shrapnel injuries and concussions – and are in the process of being returned to duty. Major combat operations continue and our response effort is ongoing.
These were the first casualties of any kind among US personnel to be announced since the US and Israel launched aerial attacks against Iran and killed its supreme leader on Saturday.
Selection of a supreme leader could happen 'in a day or two', Iranian foreign minister says
In an interview with Al Jazeera, Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said a new supreme leader could be chosen in a “day or two”.
“You may see the selection of a supreme leader in a day or two,” Araghchi said. “So everything is in order and everything is in line with our legal system and in line with the constitution.”
Araghchi also told Al Jazeera that Iran had no intention of closing the strait of Hormuz, criticised the US for attacking Iran “for the second time during negotiations” and said Iran’s retaliatory strikes were only aimed at American targets.
The Iranian foreign minister said Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s killing was “a very serious and unprecedented act and a blatant violation of international law.” He added that his country has “no restrictions or limits in defending” itself.
Abbas Araghchi says that Iran’s strikes are an act of self-defence. Photograph: Pierre Albouy/Reuters
UAE defence ministry says three people killed in Iranian attacks since yesterday
The UAE’s defence ministry has said three people have been killed in Iranian attacks since yesterday. In an update to X, the ministry said:
A total of 541 Iranian drones were detected, of which 506 were intercepted and destroyed, while 35 fell within the country, causing material damage.
The incidents resulted in three fatalities of Pakistani, Nepali and Bangladeshi nationalities, and 58 minor injuries among Emirati, Egyptian, Ethiopian, Filipino, Pakistani, Iranian, Indian, Bangladeshi, Sri Lankan, Azerbaijani, Yemeni, Ugandan, Eritrean, Lebanese and Afghan nationals.
The ministry indicated that some debris fell in various areas of the country as a result of air defence systems intercepting ballistic missiles and drones, leading to minor to moderate material damage to a number of civilian properties.
The ministry expressed its full readiness to address any threats and stressed that the safety of citizens, residents and visitors remains a top priority that cannot be compromised.
Deadly Iranian missile attack reported in Israel's Beit Shemesh
We are hearing reports of an Iranian missile hitting a residential neighbourhood in central Israel’s Beit Shemesh area.
Israel’s Magen David Adom (MDA) rescue service says at least eight people were killed in a strike there. In an update, the emergency rescue service said:
Additional MDA teams are treating and evacuating 28 casualties to hospital including: 2 in serious condition, 2 in moderate condition, and 24 in mild condition.
Workers are currently searching for people feared to be trapped under the rubble.
Emergency personnel work at the site of an Iranian strike in Beit Shemesh, Israel. Photograph: Ammar Awad/Reuters
Aisha Down reports that several users on US-based prediction market platform Polymarket have made substantial sums of money betting on when the US strikes on Iran would take place:
At least seven different accounts on the platform Polymarket appear to have collectively made over $1.5m on bets that the US would strike Iran this weekend. Five of these accounts are new accounts that have made no other bets; one more appears to have only also bet on strikes last weekend.
One more, “Magamyman”, has previously bet mostly on US and Israeli strikes against Iran over the past year.
All of these accounts are anonymous. A crypto analytics platform has called six of them “suspected insiders”, noting that their bets were funded in the past few days and timed specifically for this weekend. These accounts collectively made roughly $1.2m.
Polymarket received investment last summer from a venture firm backed by Donald Trump Jr., who sits on its advisory board. Months after this investment, US regulatory authorities ended ongoing investigations into the platform for operating an unregistered derivatives trading platform and possible violations of money laundering laws.
Earlier this year, a similarly new account on Polymarket appeared to make nearly half a million dollars betting on Maduro’s capture.
Polymarket has posted a statement: “Note on Middle East Markets: The promise of prediction markets is to harness the wisdom of the crowd to create accurate, unbiased forecasts for the most important events to society. That ability is particularly invaluable in gut-wrenching times like today. After discussing with those directly affected by the attacks, who had dozens of questions, we realized that prediction markets could give them the answers they needed in ways TV news and X could not.”
Three dead, 58 injured in UAE since start of Iran strikes: defence ministry
Three people have been killed and 58 others injured in the United Arab Emirates since Iran began its retaliatory campaign in the Gulf in response to US and Israeli attacks, AFP reports, citing local authorities.
The UAE has detected 165 ballistic missiles, destroying 152, and intercepted two cruise missiles, its defence ministry said. A total of “541 Iranian drones were detected, 506 of which were intercepted and destroyed”, the ministry added in a statement.
The attacks resulted in the deaths of three people of Pakistani, Nepalese and Bangladeshi nationality, it said.
Emma Graham-Harrison, the Guardian’s chief Middle East correspondent, provides a report from the scene of an Iranian strike on Tel Aviv last night:
The blast from an Iranian missile ripped apart the front of Tel Aviv restaurant Flor on Saturday night, but left rows of wine bottles strangely untouched on shelves now open to the street.
Ben Sommerfield was there minutes afterwards, to survey the ruins of a space that is much more than a business for him and two partners. “This is our life,” he said. “In war everyone loses. We are not for all of this.”
The bomb hit an apartment block on the other side of a small park, killing one woman in her 40s – the first death reported from Iranian attacks – and injuring 25 others.
It also damaged dozens of buildings in the area, testament to the destructive power of the Iranian missiles that do make it through Israel’s sophisticated multi-layer air defence system.
Tom Yakoov, a 30-year-old tech worker, was sheltering in the reinforced safe room of his newly built apartment block, when he felt the whole building shake.
“There was a loud noise, the smell of explosive smoke. I couldn’t tell if the bomb fell right here, or 200 metres away,” he said.
When he emerged after half an hour, he found some windows blown out, but hopes to move back in soon, and fully backs the joint US-Israeli assault on Iran.
“Its like an Israeli story I can tell my children, the tyrant was down and my building was hit,” he said, hours after Iran confirmed supreme leader Ali Khamenei had been killed. “The only thing I’m sorry is that we didn’t do it earlier in last June.”
His neighbour Hen Shalom was less sanguine about surviving a near miss with a missile, and questioned why Israel was paying such a high price to attack a man in his 80s.
“I would prefer [Israel] had not done it,” he said of the attacks that unleashed Iranian retaliation on Tel Aviv. “The tyrant would have died in four years anyway.”
Tel Aviv municipality workers clean the rubble of the front part of the Flor restaurant in Tel Aviv. Photograph: Quique Kierszenbaum/The Guardian
China said it “strongly condemns” the US and Israel’s killing of Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, calling again for a halt to military actions, AFP reports.
The killing was “a serious violation of Iran’s sovereignty and security, a trampling on the aims and principles of the UN Charter and the basic norms of international relations”, Beijing’s foreign ministry said in a statement.
“China firmly opposes and strongly condemns this,” it added, calling for an “immediate halting of military operations”.
The condemnation came just after Chinese state media reported a phone call between Beijing’s top diplomat Wang Yi and Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov.
During the conversation, which state news agency Xinhua said was initiated by Lavrov, Wang said the “blatant killing of a sovereign leader and the incitement of regime change” by the US and Israel was “unacceptable”.
Israel says it is hitting targets “in the heart of Tehran” on the second day of attacks to overthrow Iran’s government with the US.
The American president, Donald Trump, said on Sunday that the US would strike Iran “with a force that has never been seen before” if Tehran carried out threats to retaliate after the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed yesterday. Trump has urged Iranians to “take back their country”.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said the killing of Khamenei, who ruled Iran since 1989, was “a cynical violation of all norms of human morality and international law”.
Other senior figures in the Iranian regime who were killed in Saturday’s strikes reportedly include the commander of the Revolutionary Guards, Gen Mohammad Pakpour, and defence minister Aziz Nasirzadeh. Israel says at least 40 Iranian “commanders” were killed in the “opening” strikes.
All three members have now been appointed to Iran’s temporary leadership council, which fulfils the role of the supreme leader until a successor is chosen.
It means the Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, the judiciary chief, Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, and senior cleric Alireza Arafi will reportedly lead Iran in the transitional period following Khamenei’s death.
The death toll from a US-Israeli missile strike on a girls’ school in southern Iran has risen to almost 150, according to Iranian state media.
At least 133 civilians have been killed and 200 civilians injured during US-Israel strikes on Iran on Saturday, according to the US-based organisation HRANA (Human Rights Activists News Agency).
Iran has launched retalitory missiles and drones targeting Israel. Strikes have also been reported in Dubai, Qatar’s capital Doha, Bahrain and Kuwait.
Officials in Tel Aviv said about 40 buildings were damaged by retaliatory Iranian ballistic missile strikes, with two peoplereportedly killed.
The UK’s defence secretary, John Healey, said Iranian missiles and drones had landed within “a few hundred yards” of about 300 British troops at a base in Bahrain.
Hundreds of thousands of travellers were stranded or diverted to other airports after Israel, Qatar, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait and Bahrain closed their airspace.
Ships have reported hearing a radio broadcast purporting to come from the Iranian navy announcing that transit through the vital strait of Hormuz was banned, raising expectations of a sharp jump in oil prices. But there’s been no formal announcement from Tehran about the status of the strait, one of the world’s most important shipping routes.
Analysis: 'Trump’s unprovoked attack on Iran has no mandate – or legal basis'
Experts have said the attacks by Israel and the US on Iran – which came days after talks on Tehran’s nuclear programme ended without a deal – were illegal, as they were in violation of the ban on the use of force under the UN charter and international law.
Here is an extract from my colleague Julian Borger’s analysis on why the US strikes had no sound legal basis:
The attack on Iran is a clear violation of the UN charter, in any absence of any credible, imminent Iranian threat to the US. In an attempt at justification, Trump spoke in generalities, denouncing the Tehran leadership as “a vicious group of very hard, terrible people” and 47 years of enmity between the US and the Islamic Republic.
Over that half century, Iran has arguably never posed less of a threat than now, weakened both by the joint attack by the US and Israel last June that degraded its defences, and decades of sanctions combined with economic migration that brought mass protests on to the street.
Why is the strait of Hormuz so important and will Iran shut it in retaliation to US-Israeli attacks?
Jillian Ambrose
The strait of Hormuz is one of the world’s most important arteries for global trade. About 20% of global oil supplies and about 20% of seaborne gas tankers pass through it.
The strait lies between Oman and Iran. It links the Gulf to the north with the Gulf of Oman to the south and the Arabian Sea beyond. It is 20 miles (33km) wide at its narrowest point, with the shipping lanes just 2 miles (3km) wide in either direction.
This location makes it a crucial choke point for oil deliveries from countries within the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) to customers in Asia. Options to bypass the strait are limited.
For years, Tehran has warned that it could use its location to shut the strait in retaliation to military aggression against Iran, but has stopped short of a prolonged block on the trade route. Experts believe this time may be different. You can read more in this explainer:
