Today In Issues:
FDD Research & Analysis
The Must-Reads
Israelis celebrate Purim amid Iranian missile attacks Channel 12 News’s Amit Segal: The new Israeli rules of engagement WINEP’s Dana Stroul: America and Israel’s war to remake the Middle East U.S. sub torpedoes Iranian warship Iran’s underground ‘missile cities’ have become one of its biggest vulnerabilities Iran will target Israeli nuclear site if regime change is sought, Iranian official says ISIS’s David Albright, Sarah Burkhard, Spencer Faragasso, and the Good ISIS Team: Alleged Minzadehei nuclear weapons development compound Russia is big winner as Iran war drains supplies that Ukraine needs Pro-American Kurdish forces are preparing possible Iran incursion Near East Center for Strategic Studies’s Martin: An urgent need to contain Turkey Hezbollah's entry into Iran crisis deepens its isolation at home China to send envoy to Middle East for mediation, foreign minister saysIn The News
Israel
Not even sirens warning of incoming ballistic missiles from Iran could stop the ultra-Orthodox dancers celebrating the Jewish holiday Purim in a Jerusalem yeshiva, a religious school, on Wednesday, the fifth day of the war with Iran. – New York Times
For the U.S. military, going into combat alongside allies is nothing new. For Israel, it’s a novelty. But military leaders in both countries are speaking about their exceptionally close collaboration in their joint campaign against Iran. – New York Times
Germany plans to expand defense cooperation with Israel with a procurement package for NATO forces worth up to €6 billion ($7 billion) for as many as 500 multiple-rocket launchers and thousands of missiles. – Bloomberg
Israel is prepared for the war with Iran to continue until Passover, a senior Israeli official told public broadcaster KAN News on Monday. – Jerusalem Post
An Israeli F-35I downed an Iranian YAK-130 in the first fighter jet dogfight of the war, the IDF announced at 10:30 a.m. on Wednesday morning. The Russian-made YAK-130 started production in the 1990s. – Jerusalem Post
As the rate of Iranian ballistic missile fire on Israel slowed, the IDF Home Front Command on Wednesday said it will ease some restrictions that were imposed on the public at the start of the Iran war. – Times of Israel
The Haifa District Prosecutor’s Office has filed a serious indictment with the Haifa District Court against five Bedouin suspects accused of smuggling goods worth millions of shekels into the Gaza Strip during the war. – Arutz Sheva
Amit Segal writes: Contrary to the isolationist instincts of parts of the MAGA movement, Mr. Trump understood that Iran is a danger to regional and world peace. Iran’s attacks on peaceful Gulf states and Cyprus show what they would have done had they been allowed to develop nuclear weapons. This war will save us from the necessity of many others. The entire world now sees what happens to those who spent 47 years shouting “Death to America” and “Death to Israel,” only to discover suddenly that America and Israel were finally listening—and taking notes. – Wall Street Journal
Ahmed Obali writes: At the time, I asked for opposing views and kept going, in order to preserve balance. However, not a single South Azerbaijani person came forward with anything to say against Israel. Not only did the ones I interviewed support Israel, but they called Israel their brothers. I was stunned given the IRGC surveillance that not a single person called in to say a word against Israel. Therefore, the South Azerbaijani nation must be taken into account when considering the future of Iran. – Jerusalem Post
Dana Stroul writes: Trump and Netanyahu have shown themselves to be particularly unwilling to reach beyond their bases and engage broad swaths of their societies to build consensus. And because each man is politically vulnerable and facing a critical upcoming election, neither is likely to take up the mantle of leadership needed to put the U.S.-Israeli relationship back on solid footing—or to clearly communicate what kind of Iran strategy would leave the world safer after the guns fall silent. A failure of political leadership may accelerate the breakdown of an effective military collaboration, undermining the deeper partnership that teamwork could have bolstered. That would not just be a bitter irony. It would be a tremendous loss. – Foreign Affairs
Iran
A torpedo from an American submarine sank an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said, while the U.S. also shot down an Iranian missile that was heading toward a key Turkish military base. – Wall Street Journal
Iran spent decades constructing underground bunkers to shield its vast missile arsenal from destruction. Less than a week into the war with its two most powerful adversaries, the strategy is beginning to look like a blunder. – Wall Street Journal
President Trump’s promise to protect the Strait of Hormuz with naval escorts and provide government-backed marine insurance underscores the urgent need to restore flows of energy from the Middle East before soaring prices rip through the world economy. – Wall Street Journal
The U.S. sinking of an Iranian ship in the Indian Ocean reflects Washington’s determination to destroy Tehran’s navy—even hundreds of miles from the Middle East—and safeguard the flow of oil through the Persian Gulf. – Wall Street Journal
On Iran’s official television networks and through a network of affiliated or sympathetic social media accounts, the country is striving to present a resolute image despite thousands of strikes from Israel and the United States that have hammered its cities, military bases and political leadership. – New York Times
Top Trump administration officials said on Wednesday that they were still investigating whether it was a U.S. airstrike that hit a girls elementary school in Iran on the opening day of the war. – New York Times
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is scheduled to headline a “Top Gun”-themed political fund-raiser next week for a Republican congressman whose constituent was among the four American soldiers killed in the opening hours of the war with Iran. All four service members had been stationed in the district before deployment. – New York Times
A devastating air campaign is pounding the Iranian military and leaving it nearly incapable of mounting any resistance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters on Wednesday. “They are toast, and they know it, or at least soon enough, they will know it,” Mr. Hegseth said of the Iranian government and military. – New York Times
Iranian drone attacks could disrupt the Strait of Hormuz for months, but how long the Islamic Republic could sustain its missile barrage is less clear, according to intelligence sources and military analysts. – Reuters
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have tightened their grip on wartime decision‑making despite the loss of top commanders, senior sources say, driving a hardline strategy that is propelling Tehran’s drone‑and‑missile campaign across the region. – Reuters
Ayatollah Alireza Arafi has emerged as a central figure in Iran’s power structure at a moment of unprecedented turmoil, propelled into a leadership role from the ranks of top clerics after the killing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. – Reuters
Iran will target the Israeli nuclear site of Dimona if Israel and the U.S. seek regime change in the Islamic Republic, semi-official ISNA news agency reported on Wednesday, citing an Iranian military official. – Reuters
Operatives from Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence signalled openness to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to talks on ending the war, the New York Times reported on Wednesday, citing officials briefed on the matter. – Reuters
A United Nations panel of experts said on Wednesday it was “deeply disturbed” by the deaths of children, after the bombing of the Shajareh Tayyebeh girls’ school in southern Iran, which it said killed more than 160 children, citing reports. – Reuters
Iran launched a new wave of attacks Thursday morning at Israeli and American bases and threatened that the United States would “bitterly regret” torpedoing an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean and a religious leader called for “Trump’s blood,” while Israel said it had begun a “large-scale” attack on Tehran. – Associated Press
President Donald Trump expressed confidence in the US military campaign against Iran even as the timeline for operations remained deeply unclear on the fifth day of the Middle East war. – Bloomberg
The US has a massive stock of easy-to-produce, air-dropped precision bombs — as President Donald Trump implied in a social media post this week — but has been using costly and less-numerous standoff weapons in its attacks on Iran, sapping supplies meant for more formidable enemies. – Bloomberg
Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei’s death is “historically significant” but will not “automatically” lead to the fall of the Iranian system, the widow of the country’s last shah told AFP in an interview Tuesday. – Agence France Presse
Senior Iranian Shiite Muslim cleric Naser Makarem Shirazi published a religious ruling calling on Muslims to launch a Jihad (struggle) following the elimination of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in an Israeli airstrike. – Arutz Sheva
Editorial: A worse outcome is also possible, such as a long civil war that creates refugees that destabilize some neighbors. Wars always lead to surprises, and Mr. Trump took a risk in choosing to bomb again. We wish he had prepared the country better before the war. But now that the war is underway, and our troops are in harm’s way, our perhaps old-fashioned view is that we ought to hope for American success, both military and strategic. The world will be safer if there is a better regime in Tehran that isn’t bent on the mission of “death to America.” And maybe, before anticipating or cheering failure, we could wait and see how it goes. – Wall Street Journal
Editorial: Both US President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have called on the Iranian people to reclaim their country when the war concludes. Heavy strikes across Iran are beginning to make that possibility real. The next phase of the war will test America’s and Israel’s resolve to see it through. Any off-ramp taken will only serve to keep the regime intact, allow it to regroup, and rebuild. The oppression of the Iranian people under Islamic rule would continue. Therefore, Israel and the United States must go all the way: The war cannot truly end until the regime does. – Jerusalem Post
Kevin Cohen writes: The strike in Qom demonstrates that the ritual of continuity itself is vulnerable to intervention. Once regimes understand that their most guarded moment—the moment after power breaks—can be observed and interrupted, they govern more cautiously, more suspiciously, more slowly. Wars used to be fought over territory. Increasingly they are fought over time—over who can see the hinge moment and move inside it. – Wall Street Journal
Seth Cropsey and Joseph Epstein write: Finally, the United States should champion this coalition’s moderate ethos as the ideological alternative to both Iranian theocracy and Sunni radicalism. In the contest for hearts and minds that will define the post-Islamic Republic order, this alliance offers a credible vision of tolerance, prosperity and coexistence. It could even lay the groundwork for integrating a free Iran into the regional architecture. – Washington Post
Azadeh Moaveni writes: The reality of Iran’s past is the triumph of one dictatorship over another, forced secular authoritarianism, followed by forced Islamism. That is the destructive cycle that needs to be broken, the cycle of land grabbing and score settling, in which leaders are more concerned with erasing their predecessors than improving the lives of their citizens. No one doubts that Iranians wish to build a better future. Doing that requires reconciling with the past, with each era’s follies, and refusing to repeat them. – New York Times
Marc Champion writes: The Iranian goal would be to reshape the war into one for the future of the wider Muslim Middle East, tapping into the sympathies of Sunni Islamist organizations such as the Muslim Brotherhood and calling for a wider Jihad against Israel, the US and their lackey governments across the region. That may seem farfetched, given the hostility between Sunni and Shiite Islamists and current anger at Iran in the Gulf. But if the choice is between backing Iran on one side, or the US and Israel on the other, for Islamists there’s no contest. None of this speaks to strength on the part of the Islamic Republic. It speaks of desperation. But as its otherwise senseless attacks on the UAE and other Gulf states indicate, the message is that Iran can and will set the region on fire if forced, even in its much reduced condition. – Bloomberg
James Stavridis writes: The Navy needs more minesweeping capacity around the globe. But for now, the situation in the Gulf is critical and calls for additional sweeps, aircraft and Littoral Combat Ships fitted for mine clearing. Both the sweeps and the aircraft can be loaded onto larger ships, and some are probably moving to the Gulf already. The LCS are fast-moving warships, and some will be in or headed to the region already. They can’t get there soon enough — the world’s energy supplies demand it. – Bloomberg
Richard Nephew writes: Trump embarked the United States on a risky path in his first administration when he rejected a nuclear deal that, although imperfect, had been working to limit Iran’s enrichment capabilities. Over the following eight years, sanctions and negotiations failed to bring about a new agreement. Last June’s U.S.-Israeli strikes set back Iran’s nuclear program but did not end it, and Trump’s inconsistent focus on and assessment of the issue since then have only made it harder to reach a successful outcome. He must now take responsibility for the nuclear risk the world is facing and lay out a clear plan for fixing a problem that, in his two terms as president, he has made manifestly worse. – Foreign Affairs
David Albright, Sarah Burkhard, Spencer Faragasso, and the Good ISIS Team write: Ambassador Leiter’s comment raises a nuclear warhead missile delivery issue. Was this site working on developing a nuclear warhead for a reentry vehicle of a ballistic missile? Before the June war, Israeli officials had stated that they had evidence that the nuclear weaponization team was going to meet with ballistic missile groups, indicating that Iran was moving forward on working on a nuclear warhead for a ballistic missile. Nonetheless, the IDF statements do not make clear what nuclear weapons component it is signaling out that was being developed/produced at this partially underground facility. – Institute for Science and International Security
Russia and Ukraine
Russia is one of the biggest winners in the early days of the largest U.S. military confrontation in decades, as Iranian missiles deplete stocks of Patriot interceptors that Ukraine needs for its defense. – Wall Street Journal
Ukraine’s F-16 fighter jets didn’t have enough missiles to shoot down Russian drones and missiles for more than three weeks after supplies from Kyiv’s partners dried up just as Moscow was preparing a massive winter air campaign, three sources said. – Reuters
A Russian drone damaged a civilian Panama-flagged vessel that was transporting corn near the Ukrainian port of Chornomorsk in the Black Sea Odesa region, the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority said late on Wednesday. – Reuters
Russia plans to release two ethnic Hungarian prisoners of war to Budapest, giving Prime Minister Viktor Orban a helping hand in his campaign ahead of April’s elections. – Bloomberg
The European Union will ask international partners for additional funding for Ukraine as the war-battered nation risks running out of money in the fifth year of Russia’s full-scale invasion. – Bloomberg
US-brokered peace talks between Kyiv and Moscow initially planned for this week are postponed indefinitely due to the war in Iran, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. – Bloomberg
Frederick W. Kagan and Kimberly Kagan write: U.S. pressure on Ukraine, to make territorial concessions and sue for peace, is encouraging Putin to keep fighting and refrain from making compromises necessary for an enduring peace. Pressuring Kyiv is not an act of mercy meant to avoid needless casualties in a hopeless defense. On the contrary, the Ukrainian defense is proving to be durable and it’s the Russian offensive that’s struggling. The way to end this war is not to rescue Putin from a failing campaign, but to help Ukraine make it fail faster. – Washington Post
Iraq
Pro-American, Iranian Kurdish forces based in Iraq are preparing armed units that could enter Iran, creating a potential new front in an already expanding conflict, according to Iraqi officials and senior members of Iranian Kurdish groups. – New York Times
A commander from Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group of Iran-backed armed factions, was killed in an airstrike on Wednesday, police sources said. – Reuters
Iraq’s electricity ministry said on Wednesday that all provinces were experiencing a power blackout, which the government attributed to a technical fault. – Reuters
A drone struck an arms depot in an attack on the headquarters of an Iranian Kurdish opposition group in the town of Dekala in Iraq’s Kurdistan region on Wednesday, wounding two fighters, security sources said. – Reuters
Turkey
Turkey said that NATO air defences destroyed an Iranian ballistic missile headed into Turkish airspace on Wednesday, marking the first time the alliance member has been drawn into the Middle East conflict and raising the possibility of a major expansion involving its bloc allies. – Reuters
Turkey said on Thursday that it was closely following the actions of the Iranian Kurdish PJAK militant group, which it said threatened Iran’s security and regional stability, amid reports of discussions between Iranian Kurdish militias and Washington about the U.S. and Israeli war against Iran. – Reuters
Bradley Martin writes: Turkey has also used the Syrian refugee crisis to extract concessions from the European Union. Examples include the 2016 EU-Turkey deal, under which the EU has agreed to provide €6 billion in aid to Turkey in exchange for Ankara’s commitment to stop irregular migration into the bloc, and the 2020 border crisis, in which Mr. Erdoğan announced that Turkey would no longer prevent refugees from entering Europe, an act the Greek government labeled “extortion diplomacy.” Should NATO continue its relationship with Turkey? What should its role be in the Middle East after the Iranian regime falls? When considering these questions, the U.S. shouldn’t forget that Turkey opposes U.S. foreign policy and is a headache for its allies. – Wall Street Journal
Lebanon
Britain’s Foreign Office said on Wednesday it advises against travel to all areas of Lebanon, which has been dragged into the Middle East conflict that has engulfed the region since the United States and Israel attacked Iran. – Reuters
Hezbollah’s decision to enter the Middle East war in support of its patron Iran has opened a rift with its main political ally at home in Lebanon, leaving the group deeply isolated as the country lurches into another devastating conflict with Israel. – Reuters
In a televised address, Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem on Wednesday said his terror group’s resumption of rocket attacks on Israel this week is a response to Israel’s continued presence and airstrikes in Lebanon since the November 2024 Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire deal. – Times of Israel
A short while ago, the Israeli Air Force completed a wave of intelligence-based strikes in Beirut against several command centers belonging to the Hezbollah terrorist organization. – Arutz Sheva
Assaf Orion writes: Lebanon must remove legislation prohibiting contacts between Lebanese and Israelis, enact reforms to dry up Hezbollah’s sources of mostly illegal funding, and—fundamentally—offer the Shia population a social, economic, and political alternative to that long provided by the group. Further, the reconstruction of villages in the south, or their replacement by economic development zones, must be conditioned on their complete and permanent demilitarization, without any opportunity for Hezbollah to remilitarize them. – Washington Institute
Middle East & North Africa
Iranian strikes across the Mideast are risking drawing in a raft of America’s NATO allies. The U.K. and France have in recent days both said they would send additional warships to the region after an Iranian drone targeted a British military base in Cyprus. – Wall Street Journal
Container shipping companies have begun halting bookings and diverting vessels as they respond to the increasing security risk in the Middle East. – Wall Street Journal
The first wave of Iranian drones and missiles arrived with no warning. So did the next several. Residents and tourists who were out shopping or tanning on the beach of this gleaming business hub of the United Arab Emirates watched with curiosity as missiles were intercepted above them like loud, daytime fireworks. – Wall Street Journal
Twenty-nine months later, the Middle East is almost unrecognizable. Israel stands indisputably as the military hegemon, its enemies demolished or decapitated. Saudi Arabia is emerging as a pivotal economic and political anchor, its Persian Gulf neighbors reeling under Iranian missile fire. Palestinians, mourning 75,000 dead in a shattered Gaza and losing territory in the West Bank, seem marginalized — by everyone, again. – Washington Post
Thousands of Syrians living in Lebanon have fled to their home country in recent days after Lebanon was dragged back into conflict, with Israeli airstrikes bombarding several cities. Earlier this week, Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group, fired rockets and launched drones toward Israel, in what it said was retaliation for the killing of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. – New York Times
The UAE’s years-long property boom faces its first real test after Iranian missile strikes shattered the Gulf’s safe-haven aura, rattling investors and exposing how heavily Dubai and Abu Dhabi rely on offshore money to sustain their building spree. – Reuters
Egypt’s petroleum ministry denied any connection with a Russian gas tanker that sank in the Mediterranean on Wednesday. – Reuters
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan on Wednesday and discussed the threats from Iran to regional stability and other developments in the region, the U.S. State Department said. – Reuters
Qatar will fully shut down gas liquefaction on Wednesday and won’t be able to return to normal production and export levels of super-chilled gas for at least a month, two sources familiar with the matter said. – Reuters
Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. Chief Executive Officer Sultan Al Jaber met with Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi in Tokyo on Thursday as the war in the Middle East chokes energy flows to Asia. – Bloomberg
Korean Peninsula
A day after the U.S. and Israel started bombing Iran, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un strolled through a cement factory draped with red banners that hailed the “great era” of his leadership. – Wall Street Journal
The U.S.-Israel war with Iran could disrupt supplies of key semiconductor manufacturing materials, a South Korean ruling party lawmaker said on Thursday, as the conflict in the Middle East entered its sixth day. – Reuters
A South Korean court held an appeals hearing on Wednesday in a case involving former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, who was sentenced to five years in jail by a lower court on charges including obstructing arrest after his attempt to impose martial law. – Reuters
China
China signaled that the world’s second-largest economy is entering an era of slower expansion, setting a target for gross domestic product growth of between 4.5% and 5% this year. – Wall Street Journal
Chinese air force activity around Taiwan has fallen sharply in recent weeks, with no flights at all in the past week, a sudden drop in what had been daily military manoeuvres that could signal Beijing is recalibrating its pressure on Taipei. – Reuters
China on Thursday vowed to deepen investment in high-tech industries and scientific innovation, framing them as essential to bolstering national security and self-reliance amid rising geopolitical tensions and an intensifying rivalry with the U.S. – Reuters
China will boost defence spending by 7% in 2026, it said on Thursday, the lowest rate in five years but still outpacing wider economic growth targets and the rest of Asia at a time of growing regional tension, including over Taiwan. – Reuters
China will ensure Hong Kong is more effectively governed in accordance with the law, in a copy of an official government report reviewed by Reuters on Thursday. – Reuters
China will send a special envoy to the Middle East for mediation, Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his Saudi Arabian and UAE counterparts on Wednesday according to statements from his ministry, as conflict in the region continued to escalate. – Reuters
Washington’s one-two punch capturing Venezuela’s leader and then killing Iran’s in coordination with Israel has put Beijing on the back foot, according to former US officials who have helped craft China policy. – Bloomberg
The number of delegates attending China’s National People’s Congress fell to the lowest level of this century, highlighting the churn inside the country’s top legislature as President Xi Jinping’s purge of officials expands. – Bloomberg
Karishma Vaswani writes: Washington and its allies should respond by further expanding joint exercises — a tall order while the US remains preoccupied in the Middle East. Meanwhile, Asian nations — from Japan to India to South Korea — are already stepping up military investments. For Taiwan, the most vulnerable target, the priority has to be preparing for a potential blockade or high-intensity strike campaigns while boosting resiliency at home. Underestimating China’s real spending risks missing how quickly the region’s security landscape is evolving. The true story is not the annual budget increase, but the transformation of Beijing’s military power. – Bloomberg
Yun Sun writes: The longer the regime holds out, the more China will have to step in and support it, which could prolong the war even further. But if the regime collapses quickly like that of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, or the situation quickly stabilizes like what transpired after the removal of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro, Beijing is unlikely to dwell on such an outcome. China has already lost faith in the leadership of the Islamic Republic. What matters now is figuring out how to work with the next power holders to keep oil flowing from the Middle East. – Foreign Affairs
South Asia
As a rapper, Balendra Shah tapped into the political disenchantment of Nepal’s young people with lyrics that called the country’s politicians “fools” and “looting thieves.” – Wall Street Journal
A Pakistani man accused of planning to kill President Donald Trump told jurors on Wednesday that he did not willingly work with Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps to devise the plot, media said. – Reuters
Iranian sailors who survived a U.S. submarine strike in the Indian Ocean were recovering at a hospital in the Sri Lankan port city of Galle, authorities said on Thursday, a day after at least 87 were killed in the attack. – Reuters
People living along Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan said they were considering fleeing their homes because of heavy shelling and explosions as fighting between troops from both sides entered a seventh day on Wednesday. – Reuters
Asia
The Sydney Jewish Museum in Australia opened three decades ago to commemorate victims of the Holocaust. Its collection has items like striped trousers from a concentration camp, faded identification papers and a worn guitar with a Star of David drawn on its body. – New York Times
Australia and Canada on Thursday signed a series of new agreements on critical minerals, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said, including Australia joining the G7 minerals alliance. – Reuters
Indonesia’s communications ministry has issued a “stern warning” to Meta Platforms Inc for failing to curb the spread of online gambling and disinformation, the ministry said on Thursday. – Reuters
Japan’s Space One said its Kairos rocket terminated its flight after lift-off on Thursday, failing to achieve the country’s first entirely commercial satellite launch on its third attempt in a row. – Reuters
The New Zealand government said on Wednesday that it would send two Defence Force C-130J Hercules aircraft to the Middle East in case they were needed for evacuating New Zealanders from the region. – Reuters
Australia said three more commercial flights were scheduled to depart the United Arab Emirates on Thursday as the first group of Australians stranded in the Middle East returned home overnight following the outbreak of the Iran conflict. – Reuters
The Philippine government said on Wednesday it had apprehended some of its citizens on suspicion of spying for China in a “serious national security matter” that underscores the need for stricter laws against espionage and foreign interference. – Reuters
The Canadian and Australian prime ministers on Thursday called for a de-escalation of the Iran war but added the Iranians must never gain a nuclear weapon. Canada’s Mark Carney and his Australian counterpart Anthony Albanese discussed the war during their meeting in Australia’s capital, Canberra. – Associated Press
Europe
For the past year, most European leaders took pains not to offend President Trump. The Iran conflict has brought a swift end to that honeymoon—for at least two leaders. – Wall Street Journal
The European Union’s top industry official proposed new rules designed to support companies manufacturing low-carbon technologies like wind turbines and electric-vehicle batteries in Europe, as the bloc’s industries compete with cheaper Chinese rivals. – Wall Street Journal
Spain’s prime minister reiterated his opposition to the war in Iran after President Trump said he would halt trade with the country for barring U.S. access to its bases as part of its military operation. – Wall Street Journal
The husband of a British lawmaker was one of three men arrested on Wednesday by the British police on suspicion of spying for China, deepening concerns about the possible extent of Chinese espionage in Western nations. – New York Times
Portuguese Prime Minister Luis Montenegro defended his decision to let the United States use the Lajes airbase on Portugal’s Azores Islands during the Iran bombing campaign, a position at odds with that of neighbour Spain which refused such requests. – Reuters
Ten nations across northern Europe have agreed to prepare for possible cross-border evacuations of civilians in the event of a crisis or military conflict in the region, in a bid to draw lessons from the war in Ukraine, Sweden said on Wednesday. – Reuters
The White House said on Wednesday that Spain has agreed to cooperate with the U.S. military after President Donald Trump threatened to cut off trade, but Spain denied making such a deal. – Reuters
Iran’s government is making a strong case for its demise by indiscriminately attacking its neighbours, EU’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas told reporters on Wednesday. – Reuters
Germany’s intelligence service on Wednesday accused Moscow of hiding the true cost of the war in Ukraine, saying Russia’s budget deficit in 2025 was more than 2.36 trillion roubles ($30.45 billion) higher than officially stated. – Reuters
Cyprus said a suspect object had been detected close to Lebanese airspace on Wednesday, and a government source said two Greek F-16 fighter jets had been scrambled to intercept it. – Reuters
Italy’s government is likely to provide military aid, including an air defence system, to Gulf nations that have requested help with equipment in the face of Iranian air strikes, two sources said on Wednesday. – Reuters
France’s historic move to bolster its atomic arsenal and offer nuclear arms cooperation to European partners has left the continent divided, with capitals eager for a deterrent separate from an erratic US but afraid of irking President Donald Trump. – Bloomberg
European Union leaders will direct the bloc’s executive arm to propose measures to lower power prices to aid local industries when they meet at a summit later this month. – Bloomberg
NATO plans to push Europe’s debate over security beyond spending increases at its July summit in Turkey to focus on how member states will target investments into technologies that define modern warfare, according to alliance officials. – Bloomberg
Europe is preparing for a potential rise in immigration from the Middle East due to the escalating conflict in the region, as countries try to avoid another wave of refugees to the continent, according to the UN’s top migration official. – Financial Times
Editorial: Mr. Vance and others in President Trump’s orbit talk up the need for Europe to hew more closely to American values, and this is a lesson about what that does and doesn’t mean. Europe often is too hostile to rights such as free speech, and Europe’s economic policies often are explicitly anti-American (and self-defeating), amid many other shortcomings. It doesn’t follow, however, that Europe’s insurgent parties of the right will always be better friends to America—or better stewards of European interests. Italy’s Giorgia Meloni and Britain’s Nigel Farage are good allies. The AfD, not so much. A smart U.S. policy toward Europe should be able to tell the difference. – Wall Street Journal
Barney Jopson and Amy Mackinnon write: But Sánchez — who is the EU’s most senior socialist leader and stands to the left of his British counterpart Keir Starmer — is the only one taking the fight to the US president. Conversely, Sánchez has become the perfect “wokeist” whipping boy for Trump’s Maga movement, the model of a European leftist perceived to be soft on defence, on China and on migration. After more than a year of simmering enmity, the war in the Middle East has now brought the conflict between Trump and Sánchez to a head. – Financial Times
Africa
A U.S. mining company backed by billionaires Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates is in a tangle with Belgium’s AfricaMuseum over who should digitise antique maps of what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo in the museum’s archive. – Reuters
More than 200 people died on Tuesday in a landslide triggered by heavy rains at the Rubaya coltan mine in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, the country’s mines ministry said on Wednesday. – Reuters
The International Monetary Fund completed a staff mission to Kenya and said that discussions with the East African country’s authorities would continue at the upcoming IMF-World Bank Spring Meetings. – Reuters
South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa said on Wednesday that the escalating conflict in the Middle East was already putting strain on the African continent’s supply chains and causing higher energy prices. – Reuters
The Americas
Ecuador has become the latest front in Washington’s expanded campaign against Latin American drug traffickers, launching a joint military operation this week against some of the most violent gangs in the small Andean country. – Wall Street Journal
Venezuela’s interim President Delcy Rodriguez said on Wednesday a reform of the country’s main mining law will be submitted in coming days to the country’s legislature, after a meeting in Caracas with U.S. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, where the two officials hailed cooperation on minerals and a shared desire to pave the way for investment. – Reuters
Brazilian lawmakers have finalized their approval of a free trade agreement between the South American economic bloc Mercosur and the European Union, following a favorable Senate vote on Wednesday. – Reuters
Ecuador declared Cuban Ambassador Basilio Gutierrez and his diplomatic staff “persona non grata,” the foreign ministry said on Wednesday, giving them 48 hours to leave the country. – Reuters
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that Venezuelan acting President Delcy Rodriguez was “doing a great job” and that oil was beginning to flow from Venezuela. – Reuters
The U.S. Transportation Department said on Wednesday it has approved American Airlines request to operate U.S. flights to Caracas and Maracaibo in Venezuela from Miami through its wholly owned regional carrier Envoy. – Reuters
U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum was meeting with Venezuelan acting President Delcy Rodriguez on Wednesday afternoon, after arriving in the South American country earlier in the day, in an encounter filmed briefly by media outlets. – Reuters
Nahuel Gallo, the Argentine military police officer who had been detained in Venezuela since December 2024, urged the international community on Wednesday to seek the release of 24 foreign nationals still held in the infamous Venezuelan prison Rodeo I. – Associated Press
North America
Australia and Canada said on Thursday they had signed new agreements on critical minerals as Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney made a landmark address to the Australian parliament, a sign of the developing bond between the “middle powers”. – Reuters
The Canadian government is working to repatriate citizens who are stranded in the Middle East by organizing seats on commercial flights, contracting charter flights and offering ground transportation options to neighboring countries, Canada’s foreign affairs minister said on Wednesday. – Reuters
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said on Thursday it was extending its prohibition on U.S. flights landing in Haitian capital Port-au-Prince through September 3, citing risks from armed groups to civil aviation. – Reuters
Three years after Honduras parted ways with Taiwan and forged diplomatic ties with China in hope of economic gain, shrimp farmers in the Central American country are in revolt. – Associated Press
More than 150 Cuban medical staff climbed aboard a plane in Honduras on Wednesday, leaving the Central American country after it’s newly elected right-wing government abruptly cancelled the agreement. – Associated Press
United States
In the hours after the U.S. and Israel began an attack on Iran on Saturday, Declan Coady texted from Kuwait that he was safe and his family shouldn’t worry. He later called his older brother, Aidan, who is stationed in Italy. “I just talked to him, he’s OK,” Aidan told the rest of the family back in West Des Moines. – Wall Street Journal
Sen. Steve Daines of Montana, a close ally of President Trump, said he wouldn’t run for re-election this year, formally exiting the race shortly before the filing deadline closed for candidates in his state on Wednesday. – Wall Street Journal
A federal trade-court judge on Wednesday ordered the Trump administration to start refunding the more than $130 billion it collected in the global tariffs invalidated by the Supreme Court last month. – Wall Street Journal
The GOP-controlled Senate rejected a resolution that sought to limit President Trump’s ability to conduct military operations against Iran without congressional approval, with nearly all Republicans officially throwing their support behind Trump’s open-ended mission against the Islamic Republic.- Wall Street Journal
The State Department is scrambling amid the fallout from President Donald Trump’s high-stakes military assault on Iran and Tehran’s blistering response, with at least three embassies in the Middle East shuttered as of Tuesday as violence worsened and U.S. citizens were left with limited means to escape. – Washington Post
US Treasury secretary Scott Bessent has said that the global tariff the White House imposed following its Supreme Court defeat will probably be lifted from 10 per cent to 15 per cent this week. – Financial Times
Karl Rove writes: This can’t be just left to the eight-minute Truth Social video the president posted early Saturday morning or to a few brief calls by him to journalists. Congressional Republicans did a credible job of supporting the president’s action on the Sunday morning talk shows. But the defense of the administration’s actions in Iran needs more comprehensive, persistent, credible explanations of the objectives from the president and his top people. These must be offered in all possible venues and channels if he’s to sway public opinion. That’s important. For what Abraham Lincoln said is still true: “Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; against it, nothing can succeed.” – Wall Street Journal
Cybersecurity
Microsoft says it has helped pull the plug on a massive criminal platform that sold ready-made online hacking kits for budding cybercriminals. – Wall Street Journal
Nvidia has stopped production of its second-most advanced artificial intelligence chips, known as H200 chips, intended for the Chinese market, the Financial Times reported on Thursday. – Reuters
Singapore police have announced arrests of three Singaporeans as part of investigations into alleged transnational scam syndicate Prince Group and its founder and chairman, Chen Zhi, who is in Chinese detention. – Reuters
Tech groups representing major companies including Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Apple Inc. are urging President Donald Trump to reconsider designating Anthropic PBC a national security risk, arguing the move would cause detrimental ripple effects for the rest of the industry. – Bloomberg
Authorities from 14 countries shut down LeakBase, seized its domains and arrested multiple people allegedly involved in the cybercrime marketplace for stolen data and hacking tools, the Justice Department said Wednesday. – Cyberscoop
Tycoon 2FA, a major phishing kit and platform that allowed low-skilled cybercriminals to bypass multifactor authentication and conduct large-scale adversary-in-the-middle attacks, was dismantled Wednesday by a global coalition of security companies and law enforcement agencies. – Cyberscoop
Defense
The Pentagon is rapidly burning through its stocks of precision weapons less than a week into the massive campaign of airstrikes against Iran, while also expending sophisticated air defense missiles at a rate that puts the U.S. military potentially “days away” from having to prioritize which targets to intercept, according to three people familiar with the matter. – Washington Post
The United States is dominating the skies above Iran. But math is not necessarily on America’s side. Iran is using low-cost drones for precision attacks in the Middle East. The United States and its allies have air defense systems capable of intercepting a vast majority of Iranian ballistic missiles and drones, which are sophisticated yet costly. – New York Times
Thomas Black writes: This second cold war is potentially more dangerous than the first one because China, which has supported both Iran, Russia and North Korea, has a much more developed manufacturing base than the old Soviet Union. In fact, China’s manufacturing prowess is unmatched in the world while the US has allowed its industrial base to be hollowed out over the years while supply chains splintered and moved overseas. A solution to deal with low-cost drones and increased production of all kinds of munitions is urgent for the next conflict, not this one. Large stockpiles act as a deterrent to hostilities. Right now, the thin inventories of missiles and interceptors could become an invitation for more aggression from adversaries. – Bloomberg