WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump said on Saturday that Tehran had 48 hours left to cut a deal or face “all Hell”, as US and Iranian forces scrambled to find a downed American airman.
While Iran warned the US and Israel that ‘entire region will become a hell for you’ if escalation continues, Iranian media reported.
Trump’s latest threat came after a strike near an Iranian nuclear power plant prompted evacuations, and as Tehran announced fresh attacks in the region, with the Revolutionary Guards saying they hit a commercial ship in Bahrain allegedly linked to Israel.
“Remember when I gave Iran ten days to MAKE A DEAL or OPEN UP THE HORMUZ STRAIT,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, referring to an ultimatum issued on March 26. “Time is running out -- 48 hours before all Hell will reign (sic) down on them.”
Tehran said on Friday it had shot down an F-15 warplane and US media reported United States special forces had rescued one of its two crew members, with the other still missing. Iran’s military also said it downed a US A-10 ground attack aircraft in the Gulf, with US media saying the pilot of that plane was rescued.
The local Mehr news agency on Saturday quoted the deputy governor of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province, Fattah Mohammadi, as saying the search for the missing pilot involved “presence of popular forces and tribesmen alongside military forces and is still ongoing”. He added that “last night, people fired at enemy helicopters with rifles and did not allow them to land”.
Images posted on social media and verified by AFPTV showed Iranian police firing at a US helicopter in southwestern Iran as US forces searched for the airman.
Iran used a new air defence system on Friday to target a US fighter jet, Iran’s Khatam al-Anbiya joint military command said on Saturday. A spokesperson for the joint military command said the country would “definitely achieve full control” over its airspace, according to Iranian state media.
Mohammad Ghalibaf, the speaker of Iran’s parliament, mocked the Trump administration, saying the “war they started has now been downgraded from ‘regime change’ to ‘Hey! Can anyone find our pilots?’” “What incredible progress. Absolute geniuses.”
Retired US brigadier general Houston Cantwell, who has 400 hours of combat flight experience, said a pilot’s training would likely kick in before he or she parachuted to the ground. “My priority would be, first of all, concealment, because I don’t want to be captured,” he told AFP.
A strike near Iran’s Bushehr nuclear plant on Saturday killed a guard and led Russia, which partly constructed the facility and helps operate it, to announce it was evacuating 198 workers.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi warned that continued attacks on the plant on the southern coast could eventually lead to radioactive fallout that would “end life in GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) capitals, not Tehran”.
Bushehr is considerably closer to Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar than it is to the Iranian capital.
Rafael Grossi, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency wrote on X that no increase in radiation levels had been reported at the site, but nonetheless voiced “deep concern” at what he said was the fourth such strike in recent weeks. “NPP (nuclear power plant) sites or nearby areas must never be attacked,” he said.
Strikes by all sides have increasingly targeted economic and industrial sites, raising fears of wider disruption to global energy supplies.
US-Israeli strikes on Saturday hit a petrochemicals hub, a cement plant and a trade terminal on the Iran-Iraq border, where one person was reported killed.
Iran has retaliated with missile and drone attacks on Israel and US allies in the Gulf. An Iranian official said five people were killed after US-Israeli strikes targeted petrochemical hub.
Shrapnel from intercepted drones injured four people in Bahrain on Saturday, and two buildings in Dubai were hit by debris, including one housing the US cloud computing firm Oracle, authorities said. On their Sepah News website, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards also said they had targeted a commercial vessel, the MSC Ishyka, “owned by the Israeli regime and flying the flag of a third country” at the Khalifa Bin Salman port in Bahrain.
Iran attacked an Israel-affiliated vessel with a drone in the Strait of Hormuz, setting the ship on fire, Iran’s state media said on Saturday, citing the commander of the Revolutionary Guards navy.
Israel is preparing to attack Iranian energy facilities but is awaiting a green light from the United States, a senior Israeli defense official said on Saturday, adding that any such attacks would likely come within the next week.
US President Donald Trump is considering a broader cabinet shake-up in the wake of Attorney General Pam Bondi’s removal this week, as he grows increasingly frustrated with the political fallout from the war with Iran, five people familiar with internal White House discussions said.
Any potential reshuffling could serve as a reset for the White House as it confronts a politically challenging stretch: The five-week-old war has driven up gas prices, dragged down Trump’s approval ratings and intensified anxiety about the consequences for Republicans heading into November’s midterm elections.
Some allies said his televised speech to the nation on Wednesday - which one senior White House official described as an attempt to project a sense of control and confidence about the direction of the war - fell flat, adding to the sense that changes in messaging or personnel were needed. “A shake-up to show action is not a bad thing, is it?” another White House official said.
Three White House officials and two other sources with knowledge of administration dynamics spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive personnel matters.
The sources did not consistently describe any single cabinet member as certain to lose their job in the near term. But multiple officials are in some degree of danger, they said.
Several of the sources said Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s director of national intelligence, and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick are among those potentially on the chopping block, after Trump ousted Bondi and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in recent weeks.
Some high-profile Trump allies, meanwhile, are privately pushing for the removal of Lutnick, a close personal friend of the president who has faced renewed scrutiny in recent months for his relationship with late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
White House spokesman Davis Ingle said Trump maintained “total confidence” in Gabbard and Lutnick.
Trump could ultimately decide, however, not to make any changes to his administration’s senior ranks. One of the White House officials said to expect a “targeted churn,” rather than a “big, dramatic reset.”
Israeli emergency services said its crew treated five people who were injured Saturday in Tel Aviv and surrounding areas after Iran fired several rounds of missiles toward Israel. Since midnight, seven waves of Iranian missiles have been launched towards Israel, according to the Israeli military. According to several local media outlets, including The Times of Israel, a cluster munition missile fired from Iran on Saturday morning landed near the Kirya military base in Tel Aviv, not far from the defence ministry.
Shrapnel from intercepted drones injured four people in Bahrain, authorities said on Saturday, as Iran pressed its attacks on its Gulf neighbours.
Separately, two buildings in Dubai were hit by debris, including one housing the US cloud computing firm Oracle, authorities in the United Arab Emirates said.
Iran will allow Iraqi shipping to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, despite its broader blockade of the key sea lane at the mouth of the Gulf, its military command said Saturday. ”We announce that our brotherly country of Iraq is exempt from any restrictions we have imposed on the Strait of Hormuz, and these restrictions only apply to enemy countries,” spokesman Ebrahim Zolfaghari told state television.
An Indian-flagged tanker carrying LPG has safely passed through the Strait of Hormuz, India’s government said on Saturday. While a second Turkish-flagged ship has crossed the war-torn Strait of Hormuz, Turkiye’s Transport Minister Abdulkadir Uraloglu said Saturday.
Iran’s oil exports from the key island of Kharg have increased even as the war with the United States and Israel rages, Iranian media reported on Saturday.
Iran has authorised the passage of vessels carrying essential goods to its ports through the Strait of Hormuz, according to a letter cited by Iran’s Tasnim news agency on Saturday. The letter indicates that ships heading to Iranian ports, including those currently in the Gulf of Oman, must coordinate with authorities and comply with established protocols to transit the strait, Tasnim said.
US-Israeli strikes have hit more than 30 universities across Iran since the war broke out in late February, Iran’s science minister said on Saturday.
Two family members of slain Iranian general Qassem Soleimani have been arrested in the United States after their residency permits were rescinded, the US State Department said Saturday. “Last night, the niece and grand niece of deceased Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps Major General Qassem Soleimani were arrested by federal agents following Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s termination of their lawful permanent resident (LPR) status,” a department statement said. It identified the niece as Hamideh Soleimani Afshar. Her daughter was not named.
Both “are now in the custody of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE),” the statement said, without specifying their whereabouts. “As identified by both press reporting and her own social media commentary, Soleimani Afshar is an outspoken supporter of the totalitarian, terrorist regime in Iran,” the State Department said. It also said she had “praised the new Iranian Supreme Leader” Ali Khamenei and “denounced America as the ‘Great Satan.’” Soleimani Afshar’s husband has also been barred from entering the United States, the statement said. The daughter and son-in-law of another slain Iranian official, security chief Ali Larijani, have also had their legal status terminated.
Both “are no longer in the United States and are barred from future entry,” the statement said.
Turkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the war in the Middle East had led to a “geostrategic impasse”, during a telephone conversation with Nato chief Mark Rutte, his office said Saturday. “President Erdogan said the process started by the intervention against Iran had led to a geostrategic impasse and that the international community had to redouble its efforts to bring an end to this war,” said the statement.
Passenger movement has returned to normal at the Shalamcheh border crossing between Iraq and Iran after it was closed following air strikes on the Iranian side that killed an Iraqi citizen, security sources and state news agency said on Saturday.
Spain and four other European Union nations have called for a tax on windfall profits of energy companies in response to rising fuel prices due to the Middle East war, Spanish Economy Minister Carlos Cuerpo said Saturday.
A blast hit a pro-Israeli centre in the Netherlands causing minimal damage and no injuries, police said Saturday, as the targeted group pointed to a spate of similar incidents across Europe.
The Israeli military said Saturday it had detected a missile launched from Yemen towards Israeli territory, the fifth time it has detected such an attack since the start of the Middle East war.
Iran’s central military command on Saturday rejected US President Donald Trump’s threat to destroy the country’s vital infrastructure if it does not accept a peace deal within 48 hours.
General Ali Abdollahi Aliabadi, in a statement from the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, said Trump’s threat was a “a helpless, nervous, unbalanced and stupid action”. And, echoing the religious language of Trump’s social media post, he warned that “the simple meaning of this message is that the gates of hell will open for you”. Iranian media quoted two daughters of slain former Iranian covert operations chief Qassem Soleimani denying that two Iranian women arrested in the United States were their relatives.
