US warplanes transit through UK as Trump considers striking Iran
Flight tracking data shows extensive movement of US military aircraft towards the Middle East in recent days, including via the UK.
Fifty-two US military planes were spotted flying over the eastern Mediterranean towards the Middle East between Monday and Thursday.
That includes at least 25 that passed through Chania airport, on the Greek island of Crete – an eight-fold increase in the rate of arrivals compared to the first half of June.
The movement of military equipment comes as the US considers whether to assist Israel in its conflict with Iran.
Of the 52 planes spotted over the eastern Mediterranean, 32 are used for transporting troops or cargo, 18 are used for mid-air refuelling and two are reconnaissance planes.
Forbes McKenzie, founder of McKenzie Intelligence, says that this indicates “the build-up of warfighting capability, which was not [in the region] before”.
Sky’s data does not include fighter jets, which typically fly without publicly revealing their location.
An air traffic control recording from Wednesday suggests that F-22 Raptors are among the planes being sent across the Atlantic, while 12 F-35 fighter jets were photographed travelling from the UK to the Middle East on Wednesday.
A US air tanker seen flying over Suffolk, accompanied by F-35 jets. Pic: Instagram/g.lockaviation
Many US military planes are passing through UK
A growing number of US Air Force planes have been passing through the UK in recent days.
Analysis of flight tracking data at three key air bases in the UK shows 63 US military flights landing between 16 and 19 June – more than double the rate of arrivals earlier in June.
On Thursday, Sky News filmed three US military C-17A Globemaster III transport aircraft and a C-130 Hercules military cargo plane arriving at Glasgow’s Prestwick Airport.
Flight tracking data shows that one of the planes arrived from an air base in Jordan, having earlier travelled there from Germany.
What does Israel need from US?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on 15 March that his country’s aim is to remove “two existential threats – the nuclear threat and the ballistic missile threat”.
Israel says that Iran is attempting to develop a nuclear bomb, though Iran says its nuclear facilities are only for civilian energy purposes.
A US intelligence assessment in March concluded that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon. President Trump dismissed the assessment on Tuesday, saying: “I think they were very close to having one.”
Forbes McKenzie says the Americans have a “very similar inventory of weapons systems” to the Israelis, “but of course, they also have the much-talked-about GBU-57”.
A GBU-57, or the Massive Ordnance Penetrator bomb, at Whiteman Air Base in Missouri in 2023. File pic: US Air Force via AP
The GBU-57 is a 30,000lb bomb – the largest non-nuclear bomb in existence. Mr McKenzie explains that it is “specifically designed to destroy targets which are very deep underground”.
Experts say it is the only weapon with any chance of destroying Iran’s main enrichment site, which is located underneath a mountain at Fordow.
Map showing the Fordow enrichment plant
Air-to-air refuelling could allow Israel to carry larger bombs
Among the dozens of US aircraft that Sky News tracked over the eastern Mediterranean in recent days, more than a third (18 planes) were designed for air-to-air refuelling.
“These are crucial because Israel is the best part of a thousand miles away from Iran,” says Sky News military analyst Sean Bell.
“Most military fighter jets would struggle to do those 2,000-mile round trips and have enough combat fuel.”
The ability to refuel mid-flight would also allow Israeli planes to carry heavier munitions, including bunker-buster bombs necessary to destroy the tunnels and silos where Iran stores many of its missiles.
Satellite imagery captured on 15 June shows the aftermath of Israeli strikes on a missile facility near the western city of Kermanshah, which destroyed at least 12 buildings at the site.
Seven of the 12 destroyed buildings at Kermanshah missile facility, Iran, 15 June 2025. Pic: Maxar
At least four tunnel entrances were also damaged in the strikes, two of which can be seen in the image below.
Damaged tunnel entrances at Kermanshah missile facility, Iran, 15 June 2025. Pic: Maxar
Writing for Jane’s Defence Weekly, military analyst Jeremy Binnie says it looked like the tunnels were “targeted using guided munitions coming in at angles, not destroyed from above using penetrator bombs, raising the possibility that the damage can be cleared, enabling any [missile launchers] trapped inside to deploy”.
“This might reflect the limited payloads that Israeli aircraft can carry to Iran,” he adds.
Penetrator bombs, also known as bunker-busters, are much heavier than other types of munitions and as a result require more fuel to transport.
Israel does not have the latest generation of refuelling aircraft, Mr Binnie says, meaning it is likely to struggle to deploy a significant number of penetrator bombs.
Israel has struck most of Iran’s western missile bases
Even without direct US assistance, the Israeli air force has managed to inflict significant damage on Iran’s missile launch capacity.
Sky News has confirmed Israeli strikes on at least five of Iran’s six known missile bases in the west of the country.
On Monday, the IDF said that its strategy of targeting western launch sites had forced Iran to rely on its bases in the centre of the country, such as Isfahan – around 1,500km (930 miles) from Israel.
Among Iran’s most advanced weapons are three types of solid-fuelled rockets fitted with highly manoeuvrable warheads: Fattah-1, Kheibar Shekan and Haj Qassam.
The use of solid fuel makes these missiles easy to transport and fast to launch, while their manoeuvrable warheads make them better at evading Israeli air defences. However, none of them are capable of striking Israel from such a distance.
Iran is known to possess five types of missile capable of travelling more than 1,500km, but only one of these uses solid fuel – the Sijjil-1.
On 18 June, Iran claimed to have used this missile against Israel for the first time.
Iran’s missiles have caused significant damage
Iran’s missile attacks have killed at least 24 people in Israel and wounded hundreds, according to the Israeli foreign ministry.
The number of air raid alerts in Israel has topped 1,000 every day since the start of hostilities, reaching a peak of 3,024 on 15 June.
Iran has managed to strike some government buildings, including one in the city of Haifa on Friday.
And on 13 June, in Iran’s most notable targeting success so far, an Iranian missile impacted on or near the headquarters of Israel’s defence ministry in Tel Aviv.
Most of the Iranian strikes verified by Sky News, however, have hit civilian targets. These include residential buildings, a school and a university.
On Thursday, one missile hit the Soroka Medical Center in Beersheba, southern Israel’s main hospital. More than 70 people were injured, according to Israel’s health ministry.
Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said that Iran had struck a nearby technology park containing an IDF cyber defence training centre, and that the “blast wave caused superficial damage to a small section” of the hospital.
However, the technology park is in fact 1.2km away from where the missile struck.
Photos of the hospital show evidence of a direct hit, with a large section of one building’s roof completely destroyed.
A general view of Soroka hospital following a missile strike from Iran on Israel.
Pic: Reuters
Iran successfully struck the technology park on Friday, though its missile fell in an open area, causing damage to a nearby residential building but no casualties.
Israel has killed much of Iran’s military leadership
It’s not clear exactly how many people Israel’s strikes in Iran have killed, or how many are civilians. Estimates by human rights groups of the total number of fatalities exceed 600.
What is clear is that among the military personnel killed are many key figures in the Iranian armed forces, including the military’s chief of staff, deputy head of intelligence and deputy head of operations.
Key figures in the powerful Revolutionary Guard have also been killed, including the militia’s commander-in-chief, its aerospace force commander and its air defences commander.
On Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that US assistance was not necessary for Israel to win the war.
“We will achieve all our objectives and hit all of their nuclear facilities,” he said. “We have the capability to do that.”
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How close is Iran to producing a nuclear weapon?
Forbes McKenzie says that while Israel has secured significant victories in the war so far, “they only have so much fuel, they only have so many munitions”.
“The Americans have an ability to keep up the pace of operations that the Israelis have started, and they’re able to do it for an indefinite period of time.”
Additional reporting by data journalist Joely Santa Cruz and OSINT producers Freya Gibson, Lina-Sirine Zitout and Sam Doak.
The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open source information. Through multimedia storytelling we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.
The US has intercepted and seized a sanctioned oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, Donald Trump has said.
President Trump confirmed the operation at a meeting with business leaders at the White House on Wednesday.
“We’ve just seized a tanker on the coast of Venezuela, a large tanker, very large, largest one ever seized, actually,” he said at the start of the meeting.
It marks the latest escalation from the Trump administration, which has in recent months ramped up pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
The US accuses Mr Maduro of presiding over a narcotrafficking operation in Venezuela, which he denies
Pics: X/@AGPamBondi
Tanker ‘used to transport sanctioned’ oil, US claims
Later, Attorney General Pam Bondi shared a video of the operation, confirming that the FBI, Homeland Security, US Coast Guard, and Department of Defence were involved.
She said on X that the US forces “executed a seizure warrant for a crude oil tanker used to transport sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran”.
“For multiple years, the oil tanker has been sanctioned by the United States due to its involvement in an illicit oil shipping network supporting foreign terrorist organisations,” she added.
“This seizure, completed off the coast of Venezuela, was conducted safely and securely-and our investigation alongside the Department of Homeland Security to prevent the transport of sanctioned oil continues.”
She did not name the vessel, what flag the vessel sailed under, or exactly where the incident took place.
UK maritime risk management group Vanguard said that the tanker Skipper – which the US sanctioned for alleged involvement in Iranian oil trading under the name Adisa – was believed to have been seized.
Trump on seized oil: ‘We keep it’
Without giving additional information on the operation, Mr Trump added during the White House meeting with business leaders that “other things are happening”.
Later, Mr Trump said that the tanker was “seized for a very good reason,” and when asked what will happen to the oil on board the vessel, he added: “Well, we keep it, I suppose”.
He also suggested that Colombian President Gustavo Petro, who angered the Trump administration by speaking at a pro-Palestinian demonstration outside the UN in September, could “be next” if his country doesn’t “wise up” on alleged drug trafficking.
The US has escalated military deployments against the Latin American country over the last few months, with Mr Trump suggesting that American forces could launch a land attack on Venezuela.
On 2 September, the White House posted on X that it had conducted a strike against so-called “narcoterrorists” shipping fentanyl to the US, without providing direct evidence of the alleged crime.
Sky’s Data & Forensics unit has verified that in the past four months since strikes began, 23 boats have been targeted in 22 strikes, killing 87 people.
Read more: Is this what the beginning of a war looks like?
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Are US strikes on Venezuela about drugs or oil?
Geoffrey Corn, director of the Centre for Military Law at Texas Tech University, told Sky News’s Mark Austin on The World that Mr Trump’s remarks on land strikes “ostensibly” refer to drug cartel members.
Formerly a senior adviser to the US army on warfare law, Mr Corn added: “That could very easily provide the pretext for some confrontation between Venezuelan armed forces and US armed forces.
“And then that would open the door to a broader campaign to basically negate the power of the Venezuelan military.”
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Most advanced US aircraft carrier close to Venezuela
Venezuela ‘prepared to break the teeth’ of US
Speaking to Politico on Tuesday, Mr Trump declined to comment on whether US troops would enter Venezuela, but said that Mr Maduro’s “days are numbered”.
According to Bloomberg, the Maduro government describes US actions as a grab for Venezuela’s oil reserves – among the biggest in the world.
Meanwhile, at a rally before a ruling-party-organised demonstration in Caracas, Mr Maduro did not address the seizure, but told supporters that Venezuela is “prepared to break the teeth of the North American empire if necessary”.
Flanked by senior officials, he said that only the ruling party can “guarantee peace, stability, and the harmonious development of Venezuela, South America and the Caribbean”.
All tourists – including those from Britain – will have to undergo a social media screening before being allowed entry into the US under new plans being considered by the country’s border force.
At the moment, Britons are among those who can visit for up to 90 days without a visa. They just have to obtain an electronic travel authorisation, known as an ESTA, for $40 (£30).
The potential social media mandate being proposed by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) would apply to anyone visiting, whether they require a visa or not.
According to a notice published in America’s federal register on Tuesday, foreign tourists would need to provide their social media from the last five years.
Pic: iStock
It will be “mandatory” to hand over the information, and other details – including email addresses and telephone numbers used in the last five years, as well as the names, addresses, numbers, and birthdays of family members – will also be required.
Currently, as part of the ESTA application process, a tourist from Britain would have to provide an email address, home address, phone number, and emergency contact details. If approved, the ESTA lasts for two years.
CBP is proposing that moving forward, ESTA applications would require a selfie.
It further wants to collect biometrics – face, fingerprints DNA and iris – as part of the ESTA application. It currently only records face and fingerprints upon arrival at the US border.
The proposed changes are open for public consultation for 60 days.
An ESTA application form. Pic: iStock
So much for free speech?
There have been several reports of travellers already having been denied entry into the US over social media posts and messages found on their personal devices after President Donald Trump took office in January.
This includes a French scientist who was turned away at the US border in March after messages “that reflect hatred toward Trump and can be described as terrorism” were found on his phone.
Despite Mr Trump vowing to “restore freedom of speech” on online platforms and end “federal censorship” when he took office, he has found himself at the centre of various free speech rows since.
In September, talk show host Jimmy Kimmel was taken off-air by Disney-owned ABC over comments he made about the assassination of the right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk.
Mr Kimmel accused the Trump administration and its allies of “working very hard to capitalise on the murder of Charlie Kirk”, with the president among those to pin it on left-wing extremism.
President Donald Trump has been at the centre of several free speech rows. Pic: AP
At the time, Mr Trump suggested certain networks should have their licenses revoked over a lack of support for him.
Mr Kimmel’s show was reinstated less than a week after his suspension following widespread backlash from celebrities and viewers.
Read more from Sky News:
This is the reality of Trump’s trade war
Trump’s verdict on America’s traditional allies
And in April, Harvard University sued the Trump administration for seeking “unprecedented and improper” control of the school, after it froze $2.6bn (£1.9bn) of its federal funding.
Harvard’s lawsuit accused the government of waging a retaliation campaign against the university after it rejected a list of 10 demands from a federal antisemitism task force, which included sweeping changes related to campus protests, academics and admissions.
A judge ruled in September that the Trump administration’s freeze of billions in research funding to Harvard was unconstitutional and retaliatory, a decision the US government vowed to appeal.
An agreement has not yet been reached, so the fight between the Ivy League university and Mr Trump rages on.
US
Egypt and Iran complain to FIFA after World Cup match scheduled to coincide with Seattle Pride event
Iran and Egypt have complained after FIFA scheduled a World Cup match between the two nations in Seattle to coincide with the city’s LGBTQ+ Pride festival.
Seattle’s PrideFest 2026, which organisers say regularly sees more than 200,000 participants, takes place on 27 and 28 June – immediately following the match.
Local organisers have said the 26 June game at the Seattle Stadium will include a “once-in-a-lifetime moment to showcase and celebrate LGBTQIA+ communities in Washington”.
Iran players pose for a team group photo before a match against North Korea in June 2025. Pic: Reuters
In Iran, where gay couples can face the death penalty, the president of Iran’s Football Federation, Mehdi Taj, condemned the decision to use Seattle as a venue and the timing of the match.
Mr Taj told Iranian state TV: “Both Egypt and we have objected, because this is an unreasonable and illogical move that essentially signals support for a particular group, and we must definitely address this point.”
He said Iran would bring up the issue at a FIFA Council meeting in Qatar next week.
The Egypt players line up during the national anthems before the match against Jordan. Pic: Reuters
The football federation in Egypt, where Human Rights Watch says people from LGBTQ+ communities face persecution, said in a statement that it had written to FIFA “categorically rejecting any activities related to supporting homosexuality during the match between the Egyptian national team and Iran.”
The letter also stated: “Information had circulated indicating the local organising committee’s decision and plans to hold some activities related to supporting homosexuality during that match” and the federation “completely rejects such activities, which directly contradict the cultural, religious and social values in the region, especially in Arab and Islamic societies”.
The Seattle Pride festival takes place in late June, attracting hundreds of thousands of people every year, like in 2023. File pic: AP
In Seattle, the local organising committee said it was “moving forward as planned with our community programming outside the stadium during Pride weekend and throughout the tournament,” having already promoted an art contest ahead of the match.
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It added: “We get to show the world that in Seattle, everyone is welcome.”
Seattle PrideFest has been organised in the city since 2007 by a nonprofit group which designated the 26 June match for celebration before FIFA carried out the World Cup draw on Friday.
On Saturday, FIFA announced the Egypt-Iran game had been allocated to Seattle instead of Vancouver, where the teams’ group rivals Belgium and New Zealand will play at the same time.
FIFA has been asked for a comment.
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