- Missiles launched from Iran early Wednesday trigger air raid sirens across large parts of Israel, with the military saying it was “operating to intercept the threat”
- Hundreds of stranded Irish citizens expected to board a flight from UAE to Dublin
- Successor to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is close to being chosen.
- Iranians to bid farewell to late supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in a ceremony on Wednesday at 10pm (6:30pm Irish time)
US president Trump has said his military is doing “a fantastic job”, and is warning of more intense strikes to come.
Former US national security official, Javed Ali, said: “Because the regime is in tact, so politically, and because the IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps), despite the fact they’ve lost dozens if not more senior leaders, as an opeartional organisation, they are still in the fight and this will probably continue for the next several days.”
An Irish man who is currently stranded in the United Arab Emirates with his wife, who is 17 weeks pregnant, and extended family has cautioned the public, “Don’t believe everything you see on the internet.”
Aaron Bannon Whelan also said he and his family felt they were stuck in no-man’s land as the consular responses they have received so far “were kind of copy and paste”.
He described as “absolutely mental” the suggestion that his pregnant wife and her 91-year-old grandfather should be expected to get on a lengthy bus journey to get to Oman for a chartered flight back to Ireland.
The European Union has told its member countries it does not see any immediate effect from the conflict in Iran on the security of natural gas supply, EU officials told Reuters on Wednesday.
No response measures are currently planned at national or EU level, the officials added.
The CEO of Adidas said on Wednesday that one of the company’s stores in the Middle East has been bombed, speaking at a press conference.
“We have people currently sitting in shelters,” chief executive Bjorn Gulden said.
The Syrian land and sea ports authority said on Wednesday it has closed its border crossing with Lebanon for departures after it received a warning from Israel that forces may target the crossing.
Arrivals remain open as long as Syrians are fleeing from Lebanon, according to the media official at the Jdeidet Yabous border crossing.
At least 101 people were missing and 78 wounded after a submarine attack on an Iranian ship off Sri Lanka’s coast, sources in Sri Lanka’s navy and defence ministry told Reuters on Wednesday.
Members of Iran’s assembly of experts tasked with choosing a new supreme leader said they are close to a decision.
The New York Times previously reported that supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba Khamenei, has emerged as the frontrunner to replace his father.
A committee of UN experts said on Wednesday it was “deeply disturbed” by the deaths of children amid escalating violence across the Middle East, particularly the bombing of a girls school in Iran.
The Shajareh Tayyebeh girls’ school in Minab in southern Iran was hit on Saturday, the first day of U.S. and Israeli attacks against the country. It killed 160 children, UN experts stated.
Reuters reports that Greek F-16 fighter jets took off from a Cyprus air base earlier on Wednesday to intercept a suspect object that was detected close to the island’s airspace, according to two security sources.
Two aircrafts that were preparing to land at Cyprus’ Larnaca airport were diverted while the jets were scrambled, the government source said.
The incident followed a strike by an unnamed Iran-made drone on a British RAF base in Akrotiri in Cyprus on Monday as the US and Israeli air war against Iran continued, and two other drones were intercepted by Cyprus later that day.
Cypriot officials said they believed the drones were fired by Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi, who headed the Iranian delegation during nuclear talks with US officials before this recent bout of fighting began, said Trump has “betrayed diplomacy” by launching attacks in the middle of negotiations.
In a post on X, he said: When complex nuclear negotiations are treated like a real estate transaction, and when big lies cloud realities, unrealistic expectations can never be met. The outcome? Bombing the negotiation table out of spite. Mr Trump betrayed diplomacy and Americans who elected him.
The New York Times reports that supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba Khamenei, has emerged as the frontrunner to replace his father as Iran’s supreme leader, citing Iranian officials.
Donald Trump has said he does not care if Iran participate in this summer’s World Cup.
The United States and Israel began attacking targets in the country on Saturday, with the conflict in the Middle East since spreading to the wider region.
Iran have qualified for the finals of the World Cup, which will take place in the US, Canada and Mexico in June and July, for a fourth consecutive edition but their presence is now potentially in doubt.
Ten flights are to depart the UAE for the UK, with one repatriation flight organised by the UK government.
Emirates is operating seven flights from Dubai to the UK while Etihad has two Abu Dhabi departures.
Virgin Atlantic will operate a flight from Dubai to London Heathrow.
British Airways has not restarted its usual flying programme from the region, but will run an evacuation flight to Heathrow from Oman’s capital Muscat, which it does not usually serve.
The UK Government has said it will charter a repatriation flight from Muscat “in the coming days”, but it has been reported there will be no major evacuation of the 130,000 British nationals who have registered their presence in the Middle East.
That means most stranded people are reliant on getting a seat on a commercial flight.
Experts believe it could take weeks to clear the backlog of passengers.
Meanwhile, several repatriation flights are planned for French nationals today.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said several repatriation flights for French nationals in the Middle East were planned for Wednesday.
“One will depart from the United Arab Emirates, another from Egypt to repatriate vulnerable ones from Israel,” Barrot told France 2 TV.
Barrot declined to say how many people would be on the flights. Around 400,000 French nationals are in the region.
Barrot also confirmed that French Rafale fighter jets had taken out Iranian drones targeting the UAE as part of Iran’s strikes on Gulf countries following US and Israeli attacks.
Israel’s defence minister Israel Katz threatened on X on Wednesday to assassinate any Iranian leader picked to succeed supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in US-Israeli strikes on Tehran.
Any leader selected by the Iranian terror regime to continue leading the plan for Israel’s destruction, threatening the United States, the free world and countries in the region, and suppressing the Iranian people, will be a certain target for assassination, no matter his name or where he hides, his post said.
More than 470 Chinese citizens have been evacuated since the conflict in Iran broke out, Mao Ning, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson, told reporters on Wednesday.
Hundreds of Irish citizens who have been stranded in the Gulf states since the US and Israel attacked Iran on Saturday are expected to be on board an Emirates flight from the United Arab Emirates to Dublin on Wednesday night.
The airline announced on Wednesday morning that it will schedule a flight from Dubai to Dublin.
Welcoming the development, Minister for Foreign Affairs Helen McEntee said on X that, “Emirates have decided to run a flight from Dubai to Dublin later today. We are in close touch with the airline.
“They will be in direct contact with passengers whose flights were cancelled.”
The planes have a capacity of more than 250 passengers.
It is the first commercial flight to fly to Ireland from the Gulf states since last Friday.
Separately, the Government is in the process of arranging a chartered flight from the region to help evacuate some of the estimated 2,000 Irish citizens.
Iranians will bid farewell to late supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at a ceremony in Tehran late on Wednesday, a senior Iranian official told state media.
Hojjatoleslam Mahmoudi, head of Iran’s Islamic Propagation Council, said the farewell ceremony would continue for three days, and the funeral procession will be announced later.
The official said the public will be able to pay their respects to the body of the late leader at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Prayer Hall starting at 10pm (6.30pm Irish time).
“The Mosalla (prayer hall) will be receiving visitors and the dear people can attend and take part in the farewell ceremony and mark a strong presence once again,” he said in comments carried by Iranian media.
The UK government has chartered a repatriation flight from Oman on Wednesday for UK nationals seeking to escape the Middle East amid the conflict in the region.
The foreign office said the flight will depart the country’s capital, Muscat, at 7pm and is available for British nationals, their partners and children under 18 with a valid travel document.
According to the British foreign office, priority for the evacuation flight will be given to the most vulnerable and they will contact British nationals in Oman.
Anyone who registered their presence in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and is now in Oman is asked to register for a place on a flight.
The department asked people not to travel to Muscat International Airport in Oman unless they are contacted by officials, while dependants who are not British nationals will require a valid visa or permission to enter or remain granted for more than three months.
Some 130,000 Britons have registered their presence in the Middle East, as the foreign office said it was working with airlines on more routes.
Explosions sounded in Iran’s capital city on Wednesday as its war with the US and Israel entered a fifth day.
The latest attacks followed earlier strikes on an Iranian nuclear site and retaliatory strikes by the Islamic Republic across the Gulf region.
Iranian state television reported explosions around Tehran as dawn broke while Israel said its air defences were activated due to incoming missile fire from Iran.
The Israeli military said on Wednesday it conducted a series of strikes across Iran’s capital targeting its security forces.
The Israeli military also said it hit buildings associated with Iran’s internal security command, which has also suppressed demonstrations in the past.
Overnight Israeli strikes on towns near Beirut have killed at least six people, Lebanon’s Health Ministry said early on Wednesday.
Israel struck the towns of Aramoun and Saadiyat just south of Beirut’s international airport, killing six and wounding eight others.
US-Israeli strikes have killed at least 787 people in Iran, according to the Red Crescent Society.
In Lebanon, where Israel launched retaliatory strikes on the Iranian-supported militant group Hezbollah, 50 people were killed before the latest strikes, including seven children, the country’s health ministry said.
Lebanon’s state-run media reported that at least five people were killed in an Israeli strike that hit a residential complex in the city of Baalbeck.
Kuwait, which had previously reported a single death, said on Wednesday that an 11-year-old girl was killed by falling shrapnel as Kuwaiti forces were intercepting “hostile aerial targets”.
In addition, three people were killed in the United Arab Emirates and one in Bahrain.