The latest:
- Trump says stealth bombers hit sites in Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan.
- Iran’s nuclear agency confirms attacks, says work will not be stopped.
- Iran said ‘no sign of contamination’ as a result of the attacks.
- Israeli airspace has been closed to inbound and outbound travel, but it’s not clear for how long.
- Israel’s prime minister praises U.S. decision that ‘will change history.’
- UN secretary general brands U.S. decision as ‘dangerous escalation.’
- Tehran previously said U.S. involvement ‘a recipe for an all-out war.’
The U.S. military struck three sites in Iran early Sunday, directly joining Israel ‘s war aimed at decapitating the country’s nuclear program in a risky gambit to weaken a longtime foe amid Tehran’s threat of reprisals that could spark a wider regional conflict.
Addressing the nation from the White House, President Donald Trump claimed Iran’s key nuclear sites were “completely and fully obliterated.” He also warned Tehran against carrying out retaliatory attacks against the United States, saying Iran has a choice between “peace or tragedy.”
Iran’s nuclear agency confirmed that attacks hit its Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz atomic sites but insisted that its work will not be stopped.
Iran said there were “no signs of contamination” at its nuclear sites after U.S. airstrikes targeted the facilities. Iranian state media quoted the country’s national nuclear safety system centre, which published a statement saying its radiation detectors had recorded no radioactive release after the strikes.
“There is no danger to the residents living around the aforementioned sites,” the statement added.
The decision to directly involve the U.S. comes after more than a week of strikes by Israel on Iran that have moved to systematically eradicate the country’s air defences and offensive missile capabilities, while damaging its nuclear enrichment facilities.
But U.S. and Israeli officials have said that American stealth bombers and a 30,000-pound bunker-buster bomb they alone can carry offered the best chance of destroying heavily fortified sites connected to the Iranian nuclear program buried deep underground.
“We have completed our very successful attack on the three Nuclear sites in Iran, including Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan,” Trump said in a post on social media. “All planes are now outside of Iran air space. A full payload of BOMBS was dropped on the primary site, Fordow. All planes are safely on their way home.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised Trump’s decision to attack in a video message directed at the American president.
“Your bold decision to target Iran’s nuclear facilities, with the awesome and righteous might of the United States, will change history,” he said. Netanyahu said the U.S. “has done what no other country on Earth could do.”
Israel Airports Authority announced Sunday it was closing the country’s airspace to both inbound and outbound flights in the wake of the U.S. attacks on Iranian nuclear sites. It did not say for how long.
A week after Israel’s initial strikes on nuclear and military targets across Iran, many are asking: What comes next? As deadly attacks and counterattacks between the two countries continue with no end yet in sight, Andrew Chang explores what Israel’s endgame might be in its war with Iran and why its ambitions could go well beyond preventing Iran from developing a nuclear bomb.
(Images provided by Getty Images, The Canadian Press and Reuters)
Meanwhile, United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres on Saturday branded the U.S. strikes on Iran as a “dangerous escalation in a region already on the edge,” adding that there is “no military solution” to the current conflict.
The White House and Pentagon did not immediately elaborate on the operation. But Fox News host Sean Hannity said shortly after 9 p.m. ET that he had spoken with Trump and that six bunker-buster bombs were used on the Fordow facility. Hannity said 30 Tomahawk missiles fired by U.S. submarines 400 miles (644 kilometres) away struck the Iranian nuclear sites of Natanz and Isfahan.
‘All-out war in the region’
The strikes are a perilous decision for the U.S. as Iran has pledged to retaliate if it joined the Israeli assault, and for Trump personally — having won the White House on the promise of keeping the U.S. out of costly foreign conflicts and scoffing at the value of American interventionism.
Trump told reporters on Friday that he was not interested in sending ground forces into Iran. He had previously indicated that he would make a final choice over the course of two weeks, a timeline that seemed drawn out as the situation was evolving quickly.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned the U.S. on Wednesday that strikes targeting the Islamic Republic will “result in irreparable damage for them.” And Iranian Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei declared that “any American intervention would be a recipe for an all-out war in the region.”
Trump has vowed that he would not allow Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon, and he had initially hoped that the threat of force would bring the country’s leaders to give up its nuclear program peacefully.
Israel ‘s military said Saturday it was preparing for the possibility of a lengthy war, while Iran’s foreign affairs minister warned before the U.S. attack that American military involvement “would be very, very dangerous for everyone.”
The prospect of a wider war threatened, too. Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen said they would resume attacks on U.S. vessels in the Red Sea if the Trump administration joins Israel’s military campaign. The Houthis paused such attacks in May under a deal with the U.S.
The U.S. ambassador to Israel announced the U.S. had begun “assisted departure flights,” the first from Israel since the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7, 2023, that sparked the war in Gaza.
Israel sought U.S. bunker-busting bomb
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said at Thursday’s news briefing that Trump had said: “I will make my decision whether or not to go within the next two weeks.” Instead, the U.S. president struck just two days later.
The Israelis say their offensive has already crippled Iran’s air defences, allowing them to significantly degrade multiple Iranian nuclear sites.
But to destroy the Fordow nuclear fuel enrichment plant, Israel appealed to Trump for a U.S. bunker-busting bomb, which uses its weight and sheer kinetic force to reach deeply buried targets and then explode. The penetrator is currently only delivered by the B-2 stealth bomber, which is only found in the American arsenal. If deployed in the attack, it would be the first combat use of the weapon.
The bomb carries a conventional warhead and is believed to be able to penetrate about 200 feet (61 metres) below the surface before exploding, and the bombs can be dropped one after another, effectively drilling deeper and deeper with each successive blast.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has confirmed that Iran is producing highly enriched uranium at Fordow, raising the possibility that nuclear material could be released into the area if the GBU-57 A/B were used to hit the facility.
Previous Israeli strikes at another Iranian nuclear site, Natanz, on a centrifuge site have caused contamination only at the site itself, not the surrounding area, the IAEA has said.
Failed negotiations
Trump’s decision for direct U.S. military intervention comes after his administration made an unsuccessful two-month push — including with high-level, direct negotiations with the Iranians — aimed at persuading Tehran to curb its nuclear program.
For months, Trump said he was dedicated to a diplomatic push to persuade Iran to give up its nuclear ambitions. And he twice — in April and again in late May — persuaded Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to hold off on military action against Iran and give diplomacy more time.
The U.S. in recent days has been shifting military aircraft and warships into and around the Middle East to protect Israel and U.S. bases from Iranian attacks.
The President’s disastrous decision to bomb Iran without authorization is a grave violation of the Constitution and Congressional War Powers.
He has impulsively risked launching a war that may ensnare us for generations.
It is absolutely and clearly grounds for impeachment.
—@AOC
All the while, Trump has gone from publicly expressing hope that the moment could be a “second chance” for Iran to make a deal to delivering explicit threats on Khamenei and making calls for Tehran’s unconditional surrender.
“We know exactly where the so-called ‘Supreme Leader’ is hiding,” Trump said in a social media post. “He is an easy target, but is safe there — We are not going to take him out (kill!), at least not for now.”
The military showdown with Iran comes seven years after Trump withdrew the U.S. in 2018 from an agreement brokered by the Obama administration, calling it the “worst deal ever.”
The 2015 deal, signed by Iran, the U.S. and other world powers, created a long-term, comprehensive nuclear agreement that limited Tehran’s enrichment of uranium in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions.
Trump decried the Obama-era deal for giving Iran too much in return for too little, because the agreement did not cover Iran’s non-nuclear malign behaviour.
The U.S. president has bristled at criticism from some of his MAGA faithful who have suggested that further U.S. involvement would be a betrayal to supporters who were drawn to his promise to end U.S. involvement in expensive and endless wars.
