Iran launches new wave of attacks on Israeli and US bases while Israel begins new strikes in Lebanon

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran launched new wave of attacks Thursday morning at Israeli and American bases following a threat to destroy military and economic infrastructure across the region, which came after the U.S. and Israel intensified their bombardment of Iran and a U.S. Navy submarine sank an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean.

Israel announced multiple incoming missile attacks and air sirens sounded in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Iranian state television said additional strikes also targeted U.S. bases. The Israeli military said it launched targeted strikes in Lebanon at Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group in Beirut’s southern suburbs.

The U.S. and Israel launched the war Saturday, targeting Iran’s leadership, missile arsenal and nuclear program while suggesting that toppling the government is a goal. But the exact aims and timelines have repeatedly shifted, signaling an open-ended conflict.

The tempo of American and Israeli strikes on Iran was so intense Wednesday that state television announced the mourning ceremony for Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed at the start of the conflict, would be postponed. Millions attended the funeral of his predecessor, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, in 1989.

President Donald Trump praised the U.S. military for “doing very well on the war front, to put it mildly.” Fellow Republicans in the U.S. Senate stood with Trump on Iran as they voted down a resolution seeking to halt the war.

Iran fired on Bahrain, Kuwait and Israel as the conflict spiraled. Turkey said NATO defenses intercepted a ballistic missile launched from Iran before it entered Turkey’s airspace.

The war has killed more than 1,000 people in Iran, more than 70 in Lebanon and around a dozen in Israel, according to officials in those countries. It has disrupted the supply of the world’s oil and gas, snarled international shipping and stranded hundreds of thousands of travelers in the Middle East.

Countries around the region braced for potential dangers Thursday, a day after Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened “the complete destruction of the region’s military and economic infrastructure.”

Qatar’s Interior Ministry said authorities were evacuating residents near the U.S. Embassy in Doha as a temporary precaution, without providing further details.

Fighter jets could be heard overhead in the United Arab Emirates city of Dubai and Saudi Arabia said it destroyed a drone in its province bordering Jordan.

A new attack off the coast of Kuwait appeared to expand the area where commercial shipping was in danger.

An explosion rocked the area early Thursday, according to the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Center run by the British military. It said a tanker apparently came under attack, but the agency did not offer a cause. Iran in the past has attacked ships by attaching limpet mines to them.

Prior attacks since fighting began Saturday have happened in the Gulf of Oman and the Strait of Hormuz, which connects it to the Persian Gulf and through which about a fifth of the world’s oil is shipped.

Brent crude prices are up 15% since the start of the conflict as Iranian attacks have disrupted traffic through the strait, with the current price the highest since July 2024.

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said a torpedo from an American submarine sank an Iranian warship Tuesday night in the Indian Ocean.

Sri Lankan authorities said 32 crew members were rescued, while its navy recovered 87 bodies.

Israel said it hit buildings associated with Iran’s internal security command as well as the Basij, an all-volunteer force of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard whose bloody crackdown on protesters in January left thousands dead.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has said his country's forces have decentralized leadership, with units acting largely on their own, which could blunt the effect of attacks on top command and control hubs.

During his Pentagon briefing, Hegseth did not give a definitive timeline for U.S. operations, which Trump has said could last for a month or longer.

“You can say four weeks, but it could be six. It could be eight. It could be three,” Hegseth said. “Ultimately, we set the pace and the tempo. The enemy is off balance, and we’re going to keep them off balance.”

U.S. and Israeli military officials say launches from Iran have declined as their attacks have taken out ballistic missiles, launchers and drones. Israel's Homefront Command announced it was easing restrictions that closed workplaces nationwide. It said workplaces could reopen Thursday if there is a shelter nearby. Schools would remain closed.

Still, explosions sounded early Thursday in Israel, which said its defensive systems were moving to intercept at least three waves of Iranian missiles.

At least 1,045 people have been killed in Iran, the country's Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans Affairs said Wednesday. Eleven people have died in Israel. Six U.S. troops have been killed, including a major whose identity was released Wednesday.

Another eight people were killed in Lebanon, including two in a building struck by the Israeli military in the Beddawi refugee camp in the coastal city of Tripoli on Thursday and three on a coastal highway, authorities said. The Israeli military did not immediately say who it targeted in the strikes.

In two near-simultaneous Israeli drone strikes in Beirut's southern suburbs late Wednesday, two vehicles were hit, killing three people and wounding six, the health ministry said. The Israeli military said it targeted a Hezbollah member, adding that further details would follow.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said the offensive against Iran was originally planned for mid-2026, but “the need arose to bring everything forward to February.”

He listed events inside Iran, Trump's positions and the possibility of “creating a combined operation” as reasons.

The protests in Iran put unprecedented pressure on its leadership. Trump threatened military action in response to the crackdown before shifting his attention to Iran's disputed nuclear program.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Wednesday that the U.S. launched its operation partly out of concern Iran might strike U.S. personnel and assets in the region first. A phone call between Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before the airstrikes began also was “important with respect to the timeline,” she said.

Iran’s leaders are scrambling to replace Khamenei, who ruled the country for 37 years. It is only the second time since the 1979 Islamic Revolution that a new supreme leader is being chosen.

Potential candidates range from hard-liners committed to confrontation with the West to reformists who seek diplomatic engagement. Mojtaba Khamenei, Khamenei’s son, has long been considered among them, though he has never held a government position.

In a sign that Iran’s leadership will only seek to consolidate its power, the head of the judiciary warned that “those who cooperate with the enemy in any way will be considered an enemy.”

Israel's defense minister, Katz, said on X that Iran's next supreme leader “will be a target for elimination” if he continues to threaten Israel, the U.S. and others.

Rising reported from Bangkok, Becatoros from Athens, Greece, and Magdy from Cairo. Associated Press writers Sally Abou AlJoud in Beirut, Lebanon, Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Israel, Julia Frankel in Jerusalem and Giovanna Dell'Orto in Miami contributed to this report.

Smoke rises following an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburb, near Rafik Hariri International Airport, Lebanon, Wednesday, March 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

A cleric leads a group of volunteers in prayer next to a police facility struck during the U.S.–Israeli military campaign in Tehran, Iran, Wednesday, March 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

Israeli tanks maneuver near the Israel-Lebanon border, in northern Israel, Wednesday, March 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)

A shepherd boy walks away from an unexploded Iranian projectile that landed in an open field in the outskirts of Qamishli, eastern Syria, Wednesday, March 4, 2026.(AP Photo/Baderkhan Ahmad)

A man carries an Iranian flag to place on the rubble of a police facility struck during the U.S.–Israeli military campaign in Tehran, Iran, Wednesday, March 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

Iran launched more missiles at Israel and U.S. bases as war in the Middle East enters a sixth day. Israel announced multiple incoming attacks early Thursday and said it was intercepting the missiles.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military said it began new strikes against the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon. At least eight people were killed there late Wednesday into Thursday according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry and the state news agency.

Tehran has warned of the destruction of the Middle East’s military and economic infrastructure, and the war has rattled financial markets, with most taking their cues from what the price of oil is doing. Early Thursday, oil prices resumed their ascent.

Here is the latest:

Israel’s military said Thursday morning it had begun a “large-scale wave of strikes against infrastructure” in Iran’s capital, Tehran.

Oman’s top diplomat said Thursday that the sultanate was working with countries around the world to organize flights home for stranded foreigners.

Badr al-Busaidi wrote the message on X, just after Qatar Airways said it would start flights from Oman’s capital, Muscat.

“For everyone hoping to fly home from the Gulf, the Omani government is working with your governments and international airlines to organize flights to get you home,” he wrote. “We mean everyone, whatever passport you hold. The citizens of all countries have the human right to safety and security. People matter. Let’s stop the war now.”

Oman, on the eastern edge of the Arabian Peninsula, has come under attack off its coast and at its seaports, but has not seen a strike on Muscat International Airport in the war.

Qatar Airways said Thursday it will start operating a limited number of “relief flights” as the war in the Middle East goes on.

The airline said on X that the flights will include departures from Muscat, the Omani capital, to Amsterdam, Berlin, Copenhagen, London, Madrid and Rome. Another route will be from Riyadh to Frankfurt, Germany.

The flights will “support passengers who are stranded due to the current situation across the region.”

Airspace in Qatar remains closed over Iranian fire into the region.

Qatar Airways is a key East-West carrier.

Indonesian immigration authorities in Bali have granted emergency stay permits and waived overstay fines for foreign nationals stranded after air route closures in parts of the Middle East disrupted international flights from the resort island.

Nearly 6,000 of passengers traveling from Bali to Doha, Dubai and Abu Dhabi had their flights canceled over four days at Ngurah Rai International Airport, immigration officials said.

Ambassadors of Iran and Israel held separate news conferences Thursday in South Korea’s capital, trading sharp accusations as their countries continued an escalating war in the Middle East.

Speaking through an interpreter, Iran’s Ambassador to South Korea Saeed Koozechi demanded Seoul — a key U.S. ally — to be more vocal in demanding a halt to what he called an illegal aggression by U.S. and Israeli forces, which launched attacks despite active negotiations.

He said “many coffins would return to the United States” if it decides to deploy ground forces, and defended Iranian strikes on Gulf states hosting U.S. military bases as unavoidable.

The Israel ambassador in Seoul, Raphael Harpaz, said the joint U.S.-Israeli military operations aim both to destroy Iran’s nuclear development facilities and ballistic missile sites, and to help free Iranian people from oppression.

South Korea has supported U.S.-led diplomatic efforts to curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions but has not explicitly endorsed the U.S.-Israeli attacks, instead calling for a swift restoration of dialogue.

The Saudi Defense Ministry said it destroyed a drone in the kingdom’s al-Jawf province, which borders Jordan.

The Israeli military struck a building in the Beddawi Palestinian refugee camp in the coastal city of Tripoli, killing two people, Lebanon’s Health Ministry said.

The strike, which hit the area without prior warning and marked the northernmost strike so far, wounded another individual, the Health Ministry said.

The Israeli military did not immediately say who it targeted in the strike.

Located about 85 kilometers (53 miles) north of Beirut and more than 180 kilometers (112 miles) from the Lebanese-Israeli border, Beddawi was targeted during the 2024 war between Israel and Hezbollah.

Despite a ceasefire reached in November 2024, the Israeli military said in July it struck a Hamas figure in the camp.

An overnight Israeli drone strike targeted a vehicle on a coastal highway in southern Lebanon, killing three people, Lebanon’s state news agency said.

The highway connects the city of Tyre to Naqoura, a border town near Israel.

On Wednesday, the Israeli military warned residents to move north of the Litani River, which serves as a key buffer line with villages south of it lying closest to the Israeli border.

The number of people killed in Israeli strikes in Lebanon in the four days since the conflict between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah reignited has risen to more than 70, with over 430 people wounded, Lebanon’s Health Ministry said Wednesday.

It is not clear how many of those killed in Lebanon were civilians, but the Health Ministry said Tuesday that they included seven children.

Officials with Hezbollah and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad militant group were also killed.

Healthcare workers unload from a vehicle the bodies of Iranian sailors who died when their IRIS Dena warship sank outside Sri Lanka's territorial waters, in Galle, Sri Lanka, Wednesday, March 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Eranga Jayawardena)

Israeli tanks maneuver near the Israel-Lebanon border, in northern Israel, Wednesday, March 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)

Tracer rounds light the sky as people fire live rounds into the air during a televised speech by Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburbs, Lebanon, Wednesday, March 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)