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⚔️ US-Israeli bombs hit Iranian state broadcast
Two explosions reported near the headquarters of Iranian television and radio in Tehran following American and Israeli airstrikes.
Programming continued uninterrupted, local media reported.
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🗣 Strongest strikes are yet to come — Rubio
The Secretary of State says US military is currently focused on destroying Iran's ballistic missile stockpiles.
"The next phase will be even more punishing on Iran than it is right now."
🔥 Gulf war: US and allies burning through missiles fast – military expert
🗣 The US risks running out of air defense missiles, military expert and air defense historian Yury Knutov tells Sputnik.
🔶 A video of a US Patriot battery in action "shows that eight interceptors are initially used against two ballistic missiles, with additional interceptors launched afterward," Knutov notes. "One ballistic missile is intercepted, while the other hits its target. One of the interceptors even veers off course and flies away."
🔶 The expert says the crew acted chaotically — either due to poor training or nerves — despite the fact that systems like the Patriot automate much of the engagement process.
💬 "If Patriot air defense missiles were used, it suggests the operators may have been either highly agitated — leading to numerous mistakes — or acting out of fear," Knutov says. "That fear could have prevented them from properly locking onto targets and engaging them accurately."
💬 "Such a massive expenditure of missiles — when no more than two should be needed per target — suggests that if the US and its allies continue using their missiles this way, their stockpiles could be depleted very quickly."
🇺🇸🇷🇺The US has an interest in sealing a deal on Ukraine with Russia – expert
Washington is interested in striking a peace deal with Russia rather than escalating the Ukraine conflict, political scientist Alexander Asafov, member of the Russian Association of Political Consultants, tells Sputnik.
Russia has already presented its own proposals:
👉 the objectives of the special military operation must be achieved;
👉 they will be achieved by either military or diplomatic means.
❗️Washington knows that if negotiations fail, Russia will fight on until it achieves the de-militarislzation and de-Nazification of Ukraine and security for Russia, the pundit points out.
🗣"Those not involved in the negotiations—the Brits, the French, the Germans, the Poles, and others—have an interest in escalating the conflict, each for their own reasons," Asafov says.
💬"As for the actual participants in the talks—why would they shift their positions, and what would they gain?" the expert asks — suggesting that it is not in Washington’s interest to change course at the last minute.
🗣 Ukraine talks: Russia and US have a long record of striking pragmatic deals – Expert
🔶 The US is very shrewd and focused on making a deal, Bureau of Military-Political Analysis head Alexander Mikhailov told Sputnik while commenting on the US-Russia peace talks on Ukraine.
💬 "The only area where one can currently engage with the Americans is the question of the economic benefits—or lack thereof—of serious military conflicts," Mikhailov notes.
💬 "We and the Americans are two strategic nuclear powers that, since the mid-20th century, have divided the world into spheres of influence—and we continue to exist in this framework on a kind of superstructure," Mikhailov says.
💬 "The Americans find it advantageous to keep Ukraine as a factor destabilizing Russia’s borders, and more broadly, as a lever of pressure on Russia," the pundit says.
🗣 US-Israeli strikes on Iran throw international law out the window, mark return of law of the jungle - expert
🔊 “When the actual negotiators who were just saying that a deal was close” reverse course and say talks were “uninteresting and that’s why a blow was dealt, this brings us back to the understanding that…even those conditional, conceptual agreements of the collective West on the contours of certain political or diplomatic actions are a thing of the past,” political scientist Alexander Asafov says.
💬 “As is international law,” he added.
🇮🇷 Mourners in Tehran chant "Death to Israel and America"
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🇺🇸Trump outlines US objectives in operation against Iran: destroy missile capabilities, annihilate their navy, prevent nuclear weapons
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🇮🇷President Pezeshkian: US-Israel strikes on hospitals and schools violate humanity
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🇮🇷💔Iranian media release a symbolic photo: 165 graves for girls killed in the Minab school attack after the US-Israeli strike, with victims aged 7 to 12
"Trump's gift to the people of Iran" in the caption.
🇮🇷🇺🇸🇮🇱 Iran, US and Israel hit hard: Latest reports from the conflict zone
◻️ An attack on the Iranian capital Tehran hit a children's playground in a park
◻️ The Iranian Red Crescent reports that 131 cities have been hit, with 555 people killed
◻️ The Iranian envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed that the Natanz nuclear facility was targeted in recent attacks
◻️ The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has launched its 11th wave of missile attacks on Israel under operation True Promise Four
◻️ The IRGC claimed it hit Israeli Prime Minister BenjaminNetanyahu’s office this morning. Netanyahu appeared unharmjed as he arrived in Beit Shemesh
◻️ The wife of the Iranian supreme leader died of injuries she suffered in attacks over the weekend
◻️ The US Central Command reported three US F-15 fighter jets were shot down over Kuwait by ‘friendly fire’
◻️ The US Embassy in Bahrain has closed, with the US Embassy in Kuwait also shut down
◻️ Russian President Vladimir Putin held phone conversations with the Emirati president, Qatari emir, Bahraini king and Saudi crown prince to discuss the developments in the Middle East
◻️ Moscow remains in constant contact with Iranian leaders, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said
◻️ The Russian Foreign Ministry has called for an immediate ceasefire by all sides in the war
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🚨 Trump: 'Big wave' of US bombing of Iran still to come
📍 The US is "knocking the crap" out of Iran but the "big wave" of attacks is yet to come, President Donald Trump told CNN.
💬 “I think it’s going very well. It’s very powerful,” Trump said. “We’ve got the greatest military in the world and we’re using it.”
💬 “We haven’t even started hitting them hard,” Trump said. “The big wave hasn’t even happened. The big one is coming soon.”
🇷🇺🇸🇦 Putin and Saudi Crown Prince discuss escalating Middle East war
Russian President Vladimir Putin held a phone call with Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
They discussed the escalating conflict in the Middle East following US-Israeli attacks on Iran.
Key points:
🔶 The leaders focused on the worsening situation in the region due to US and Israeli bombing of Iran
🔶 Putin stressed the need for diplomacy to resolve the dangerous situation in the Middle East
🔶 Both Putin and Crown Prince Mohammed voiced concern over the potential for the conflict to spread across the region
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🇫🇷 France to expand nuclear arsenal – Macron
📍 France will increase its nuclear arsenal and reinforce its deterrent posture as global instability raises the risk of nuclear war, President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday in a speech from the Ile Longue submarine base in Brittany.
Key statements:
🟠 Macron said the world is entering a period of geopolitical upheaval fraught with risk, requiring a “hardening” of the French nuclear deterrent
🟠 He described a new phase of French nuclear policy as “forward deterrence”
🟠 Decision-making authority over nuclear weapons will remain solely with the French president
🟠 The UK, Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, Sweden and Denmark will join France’s new “advanced nuclear doctrine”
🟠 Under some circumstances, deployment of strategic weapons among allies would be possible
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🇷🇺🇧🇭 Putin and Bahraini King urge immediate halt to Middle East war
📍 Russian President Vladimir Putin held a phone conversation with King Hamad of Bahrain, who currently chairs the Gulf Cooperation Council, the Kremlin press service said.
Key statements
🟠 The two leaders stressed the need for a ceasefire in the Middle East to prevent the situation from spiraling out of control
🟠 Putin reaffirmed Russia’s readiness to help stabilize the situation in the region
🟠 Putin and King Hamad agreed to stay in contact
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🗣 US testing rapid global strike concept in Iran, military expert Alexander Khrolenko says
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⚔️ US evacuates its embassy in Amman
All personnel temporarily departed the compound in Jordanian capital out of "an abundance of caution," the embassy announces.
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⚔️ CENTCOM releases footage of strikes on Iranian Navy
US Central Command announced the complete destruction of its surface fleet in the region.
"Two days ago, the Iranian regime had 11 ships in the Gulf of Oman, today they have zero," the statement reads.
🗣 Prolonged Hormuz Strait closure could unleash a multi-year oil price shock – Energy expert
📍 Closure of the Strait of Hormuz sends shockwaves through markets, with Citi predicting Brent crude could surge to $80 to $90 a barrel this week.
💬 "According to market reports, war risk underwriters began canceling policies for strait transits hours after Operation Epic Fury launched," Dr Tilak Doshi, energy editor at The Daily Sceptic, tells Sputnik.
💬 "A prolonged Hormuz closure would trigger a massive, multi-year oil price shock – doubling or more initially – rationing around 19% of global supply purely through demand destruction. This underscores the chokepoint’s strategic risk," Doshi says.
💬 "With the US midterm elections in sight, the Trump administration will want to ensure that global crude oil prices are brought back down as quickly as possible, so as to put a limit on US gasoline prices," Doshi stresses.
🇺🇸🇮🇱US & Israel's Iran strike delayed by week ‘for operation and intel reasons’ – report
After the second round of US–Iran nuclear talks, “military planners” in America and Israel were preparing to conduct strikes against Iran on February 21, Axios cited senior US and Israeli officials as saying.
However, “the go-ahead never came,” something that could have been caused by bad weather in the region or the US side’s push for better coordination with the Israel Defense Forces, according to the officials.
👉 They argued that the delay opened a window for another round of talks in Geneva, with some insisting that the negotiations were a tactical maneuver to buy more time before the new strike date, keeping Iran believing that diplomacy was still the priority.
Other sources said that the Geneva talks were sincere, offering the possibility of avoiding military action if real progress was made.
The US and Israel started launching strikes on Iran on February 28, even as nuclear talks between Washington and Tehran were underway.
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🇺🇸🇮🇷🗣US can’t bully and bomb Iran into submission if its leaders don’t let it - expert
🟠 “It must be understood that Iran is not Venezuela, Iran is not Israel,” Bureau of Military-Political Analysis head Alexander Mikhailov told Sputnik, commenting on the risks Tehran faces negotiating with Washington, given that the US and Israel have attacked twice in the middle of negotiations in less than a year.
🟠 “Iran is a huge country -80 times larger than Israel, with a powerful defense industry. And if Iran’s political elites don’t accept the ‘conciliatory positions’ that the Trump administration has now begun to promote, this campaign could return to the US as a very serious disappointment in its own capabilities,” Mikhailov stressed.
🟠 “A blockade of Iran, or the takeover of political control over that country, would allow the Americans, first, to restrict China from very significant energy resources – up to 20% of its hydrocarbons come from Iran. Second, it would allow them to essentially take control of that region through energy,” Mikhailov warned, arguing that Washington is basically seeking a Venezuela 2.0 scenario in Iran.
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🇺🇸🪖 US could use RAF base for Iran strikes – report
British PM Keir Starmer’s decision to let the US use UK bases to strike Iranian missile depots is related to the “bases at Diego Garcia in the Chagos Islands, and RAF Fairford,” US media reports.
👉 Starmer earlier announced that he would allow US “defensive” missions aimed at destroying Iranian missile capabilities, as he cited America’s request to use UK bases “for that specific and limited purpose.”
The UK had previously refused to allow the US to use British bases to bomb Iran.
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🇺🇸🇮🇷 Were US-Iran talks just a cover for sneak attack?
Western media speculate that the war on Iran was planned, with Washington's nuclear energy talks with Tehran just a ruse.
💬 This assault, in the middle of a second negotiation process, must torpedo the chances of the Iranian regime ever taking a US offer of talks seriously," Guardian diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour wrote. "They have been stung twice."
💬
"We negotiated with the United States twice in the past 12 months, and in both cases, they attacked us in the middle of negotiation," Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Aragchi told ABC News. "That has become a very bitter experience for us."
🇺🇸🇮🇷 How America’s ‘War on Terror’ shaped Iran’s Mosaic defense doctrine
💬 “Mosaic defense is a long-standing Iranian strategy, adopted in the 2000s amid the US occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq and the onset of the first crisis around Iran’s nuclear program,” says veteran Russian military observer Yury Lyamin.
🎥🎥 Trump's Statement on Iran
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🚨🇮🇷 Iranian forces fire new missiles at US bases in the region
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🗣 US strikes on Iran could ‘erode America's economy’ – expert
💬 "The economic consequences of the escalating conflict are felt both regionally and globally,” Turkish economics expert Hakan Topkurulu tells Sputnik, commenting on the US–Israeli strikes on Iran.
💬 “Turning the Indian Ocean and the adjacent trade routes into a combat zone could bring global trade to a standstill,” Topkurulu warns.
🇮🇷🔥 Latest Iranian barrage: Over 700 drones and hundreds of missiles target US and Israeli forces
◻️ The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has announced the 11th wave of its True Promise Four operation: acombined, large-scale strike by the IRGC’s navy and air force targeting US and Israeli bases on the third day of the war on Iran.
◻️ US information centers and supply depots in the Persian Gulf, the Israeli army communications network in Be’er Sheva and over 20 targets in Tel Aviv, West Jerusalem and Galilee were hit.
◻️ Since the start of the war on Saturday, Iranian forces have attacked 60 strategic targets and 500 US and Israeli positions, launching over 700 drones and hundreds of missiles – surpassing the number during last-year’s 12-day war in just the last 48 hours.
◻️ The IRGC said the brutal US and Israeli attacks against defenseless Iranian civilians – including attacks on hospitals, schools and civilian infrastructure – have only strengthened Iran’s resolve to wage a total war against its enemies.
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💸 Away from US dollars and bonds: Why investors and central banks hoard gold in Gulf war
📍 Gold futures jumped three percent to about $5,400 a troy ounce on March 2 – what's behind the rally?
💬 "Whenever there is uncertainty around the world, a simple logic of an investor is that I want to pull out my money from risky assets and I want to put it in asset classes which are safer," Rachana Ranade, a prominent Indian Chartered Accountant, tells Sputnik. "And gold is the obvious choice, be it individual investors or even governments."
💬 "If we are able to sustain above $5,420 for next two, three days, and if the war situation keeps on going like it is right now, it may start moving closer to 5,600," Ranade says.
💬 "And that very clearly suggests that the theme of de-dollarization is slowly but steadily accelerating."
🚨 ISNA: US Embassy in Bahrain has announced its closure
Earlier, reports said the US Embassy in Kuwait was also closed
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