US President Donald Trump says he ‘may or may not’ strike Iran as Israel’s air war continues
US President Donald Trump says he has yet to decide whether the US will join Israel militarily in its campaign against Iran.
Asked whether the US was getting closer to striking Iran’s nuclear facilities, Mr Trump said: “I may do it. I may not do it.”
Speaking outside the White House on Wednesday, he added: “Nobody knows what I’m going to do…Iran’s got a lot of trouble, and they want to negotiate.
“And I said, ‘why didn’t you negotiate with me before all this death and destruction?'”
Mr Trump said Iran had reached out to Washington, a claim Tehran denied, with Iran’s mission to the UN responding: “No Iranian official has ever asked to grovel at the gates of the White House.”
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Iran would not surrender and warned “any US military intervention will undoubtedly cause irreparable damage” to US-Iranian relations.
Read more:
Why did Israel attack Iran?
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
The families caught up in Iran-Israel attacks
Strikes continue
Hundreds have reportedly died since Iran and Israel began exchanging strikes last Friday, when Israel launched an air assault after saying it had concluded Iran was on the verge of developing a nuclear weapon, a claim Tehran denies.
Israel launched three waves of aerial attacks on Iran in the last 24 hours, military spokesman Brigadier General Effie Defrin has said.
Israel deployed dozens of warplanes to strike over 60 targets in Tehran and western Iran, including missile launchers and missile-production sites, he said.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Can Iran’s leadership be toppled?
“The aim of the operation is to eliminate the existential threat to the State of Israel, significantly damage Iran’s nuclear programme in all its components, and severely impact its missile array,” he said.
Early on Thursday Israel issued an evacuation warning to residents of the Iranian Arak and Khandab regions where Iran has heavy water reactor facilities. Heavy water is important in controlling chain reactions in the production of weapons grade plutonium.
Meanwhile Iran says it has arrested 18 people it describes as “enemy agents” who it says were building drones for the Israelis in the northern city of Mashhad.
Iran also launched small barrages of missiles at Israel on Wednesday with no reports of casualties. Israel has now eased some restrictions for its civilians.
Listen to The World with Richard Engel and Yalda Hakim every Wednesday
Read more:
Trump’s words designed to stoke tension, confuse and apply intense pressure on Iran
MAGA civil war breaks out over Trump’s potential decision to join conflict with Iran
The US is working to evacuate its citizens from Israel by arranging flights and cruise ship departures, the US ambassador to the country has said.
In the UK, Sir Keir Starmer chaired a COBRA emergency meeting on the situation in the Middle East, with a Downing Street spokesperson saying: “Ministers were updated on efforts to support British nationals in region and protect regional security, as well as ongoing diplomatic efforts”.
Donald Trump has agreed to send “top of the line weapons” to NATO to support Ukraine – and threatened Russia with “severe” tariffs if it doesn’t agree to end the war.
Speaking with NATO secretary general Mark Rutte during a meeting at the White House, the US president said: “We’ve made a deal today where we are going to be sending them weapons, and they’re going to be paying for them.
“This is billions of dollars worth of military equipment which is going to be purchased from the United States,” he added, “going to NATO, and that’s going to be quickly distributed to the battlefield.”
Weapons being sent include surface-to-air Patriot missile systems and batteries, which Ukraine has asked for to defend itself from Russian air strikes.
Pic: Reuters
Mr Trump also said he was “very unhappy” with Russia, and threatened “severe tariffs” of “about 100%” if there isn’t a deal to end the war in Ukraine within 50 days.
The White House added that the US would put “secondary sanctions” on countries that buy oil from Russia if an agreement was not reached.
It comes after weeks of frustration from Mr Trump against Vladimir Putin’s refusal to agree to an end to the conflict, with the Russian leader telling the US president he would “not back down” from Moscow’s goals in Ukraine at the start of the month.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Trump says Putin ‘talks nice and then bombs everybody’
During the briefing on Monday, Mr Trump said he had held calls with Mr Putin where he would think “that was a nice phone call,” but then “missiles are launched into Kyiv or some other city, and that happens three or four times”.
“I don’t want to say he’s an assassin, but he’s a tough guy,” he added.
Earlier this year, Mr Trump told Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy “you’re gambling with World War Three” in a fiery White House meeting, and suggested Ukraine started the war against Russia as he sought to negotiate an end to the conflict.
After Mr Trump’s briefing, Russian senator Konstantin Kosachev said on Telegram: “If this is all that Trump had in mind to say about Ukraine today, then all the steam has gone out.”
Read more:
Trump announces 30% tariff on EU imports
Trump threatens to revoke US comedian’s citizenship
Two women killed after shooting at US church
Listen to The World with Richard Engel and Yalda Hakim every Wednesday
Meanwhile, Mr Zelenskyy met with US special envoy Keith Kellogg in Kyiv, where they “discussed the path to peace” by “strengthening Ukraine’s air defence, joint production, and procurement of defence weapons in collaboration with Europe”.
He thanked both the envoy for the visit and Mr Trump “for the important signals of support and the positive decisions for both our countries”.
At least 30 people have been killed in the Syrian city of Sweida in clashes between local military groups and tribes, according to Syria’s interior ministry.
Officials say initial figures suggest around 100 people have also been injured in the city, where the Druze faith is one of the major religious groups.
The interior ministry said its forces will directly intervene to resolve the conflict, which the Reuters news agency said involved fighting between Druze gunmen and Bedouin Sunni tribes.
It marks the latest episode of sectarian violence in Syria, where fears among minority groups have increased since Islamist-led rebels toppled President Bashar al Assad in December, installing their own government and security forces.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
In March, Sky’s Stuart Ramsay described escalating violence within Syria
The violence reportedly erupted after a wave of kidnappings, including the abduction of a Druze merchant on Friday on the highway linking Damascus to Sweida.
Last April, Sunni militia clashed with armed Druze residents of Jaramana, southeast of Damascus, and fighting later spread to another district near the capital.
But this is the first time the fighting has been reported inside the city of Sweida itself, the provincial capital of the mostly Druze province.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reports the fighting was centred in the Maqwas neighbourhood east of Sweida and villages on the western and northern outskirts of the city.
It adds that Syria’s Ministry of Defence has deployed military convoys to the area.
Western nations, including the US and UK, have been increasingly moving towards normalising relations with Syria.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
UK aims to build relationship with Syria
Listen to The World with Richard Engel and Yalda Hakim every Wednesday
Read more from Sky News:
UK restores diplomatic ties with Syria
Church in Syria targeted by suicide bomber
Concerns among minority groups have intensified following the killing of hundreds of Alawites in March, in apparent retaliation for an earlier attack carried out by Assad loyalists.
That was the deadliest sectarian flare-up in years in Syria, where a 14-year civil war ended with Assad fleeing to Russia after his government was overthrown by rebel forces.
The city of Sweida is in southern Syria, about 24 miles (38km) north of the border with Jordan.
The man convicted of the murder of British student Meredith Kercher has been charged with sexual assault against an ex-girlfriend.
Rudy Guede, 38, was the only person who was definitively convicted of the murder of 21-year-old Ms Kercher in Perugia, Italy, back in 2007.
He will be standing trial again in November after an ex-girlfriend filed a police report in the summer of 2023 accusing Guede of mistreatment, personal injury and sexual violence.
Guede, from the Ivory Coast, was released from prison for the murder of Leeds University student Ms Kercher in 2021, after having served about 13 years of a 16-year sentence.
Listen to The World with Richard Engel and Yalda Hakim every Wednesday
Since last year – when this investigation was still ongoing – Guede has been under a “special surveillance” regime, Sky News understands, meaning he was banned from having any contact with the woman behind the sexual assault allegations, including via social media, and had to inform police any time he left his city of residence, Viterbo, as ruled by a Rome court.
Guede has been serving a restraining order and fitted with an electronic ankle tag.
The Kercher murder case, in the university city of Perugia, was the subject of international attention.
Ms Kercher, a 21-year-old British exchange student, was found murdered in the flat she shared with her American roommate, Amanda Knox.
The Briton’s throat had been cut and she had been stabbed 47 times.
(L-R) Raffaele Sollecito, Meredith Kercher and Amanda Knox. File pic: AP
Ms Knox and her then-boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were placed under suspicion.
Both were initially convicted of murder, but Italy’s highest court overturned their convictions, acquitting them in 2015.
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Sports2 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike