White House: Trump to make a decision on whether to attack Iran ‘within two weeks’
The White House said that Donald Trump will “make a decision on whether to attack Iran within two weeks”.
Speaking to reporters on Thursday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt cited a message from Trump in which he said:
“Based on the fact that there’s a substantial chance of negotiations that may or may not take place with Iran in the near future, I will make my decision whether or not to go within the next two weeks.”
Leavitt added that “correspondence has continued with Iran”.
Key events
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Donald Trump set a two-week deadline to decide whether the US will join Israel’s war with Iran, allowing time to seek a negotiated end to the conflict, the White House has said. The decision to leave a window for diplomacy came after Israel’s defence minister openly embraced regime change in Tehran as a war aim.
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Israel Katz said on that Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei “can no longer be allowed to exist” after Soroka hospital in southern Israel was hit during an Iranian missile attack. The Israeli defence minister said that “Khamenei openly declares that he wants Israel destroyed – he personally gives the order to fire on hospitals … such a man can no longer be allowed to exist.” Israeli has routinely attacked hospitals in Gaza, claiming they are used as bases by Hamas.
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Foreign ministers from the UK, France and Germany are set to meet their Iranian counterpart Abbas Araqchi in Geneva on Friday aiming to create a pathway back to diplomacy over its nuclear programme. UK foreign secretary David Lammy, speaking after a meeting with his US counterpart Marco Rubio on Thursday, said there was a two-week window to “prevent a regional escalation that would benefit no one.”
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At least 22 Palestinians have been killed after Israeli forces opened fire on aid seekers near the Netzarim axis in central Gaza, Al Jazeera reported early on Friday, citing a source at al-Awda hospital in Deir al-Balah. On Thursday Israeli attacks on Gaza killed at least 72 people, including 21 who had gathered near food distribution sites set up by the “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation” (GHF). The dead included women and children, according to Al Jazeera reporter Anas al-Sharif, who posted footage of the bodies of children scattered in the street after an Israeli attack on tents housing displaced Palestinians near Gaza City.
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Israel carried out strikes on Iran’s Arak heavy water reactor, its latest attack on Iran’s sprawling nuclear program. Iranian state television said there was “no radiation danger whatsoever” and that the facility had been evacuated before the attack. Israel also targeted the Natanz site, which has been hit several times.
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A week of Israeli strikes on Iran have killed at least 657 people and wounded 2,037 others, a human rights group said. The Washington-based group Human Rights Activists said of those dead, it identified 263 civilians and 164 security force personnel being killed. Iran has not given regular death tolls during the conflict and has minimized casualties in the past. Its last update on Monday, it put the death toll at 224 people and 1,277 wounded.
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At least 240 people were wounded by Iranian missile strikes on Israel on Thursday morning, the AP reported. The outlet said that four individuals has been seriously wounded, citing Israel’s health ministry.
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Iran on Thursday accused the UN’s nuclear watchdog of acting as a “partner” in what it described as Israel’s war of aggression. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) accused Iran in a report prior to the start of the Iran-Israel war of non-compliance with its obligations in its nuclear programme.
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Iraq’s top Shia cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani warned against targeting Iran’s leadership and said that the Iran-Israel war could plunge the whole region into chaos. Sistani said in a statement on Thursday that any targeting of Iran’s “supreme religious and political leadership” would have “dire consequences on the region”.
At least 22 Palestinian aid-seekers killed in latest Israeli massacre – report
Israeli forces have opened fire on Palestinian aid seekers near the Netzarim axis in central Gaza, killing at least 22 people and injuring more, Al Jazeera reports citing a source at al-Awda hospital in Deir al-Balah.
As we reported earlier, Israeli forces killed another 72 people on Thursday, including 21 who had gathered near food distribution sites set up by the “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation” (GHF).
Violence against children reached ‘unprecedented levels’ last year, especially in Gaza and West Bank, UN says
Violence against children caught in multiple and escalating conflicts reached “unprecedented levels” last year, with the highest number of violations in Gaza and the West Bank, Congo, Somalia, Nigeria and Haiti, according to a UN report released late Thursday. AP reports:
Secretary-General António Guterres’ annual report on Children in Armed Conflict detailed “a staggering 25% surge in grave violations” against children under the age of 18 from 2023, when the number of such violations rose by 21%.
In 2024, the UN chief said, “Children bore the brunt of relentless hostilities and indiscriminate attacks, and were affected by the disregard for ceasefires and peace agreements and by deepening humanitarian crises.”
He cited warfare strategies that included attacks on children, the deployment of increasingly destructive and explosive weapons in populated areas, and “the systematic exploitation of children for combat.”
Guterres said the United Nations verified 41,370 grave violations against children – 36,221 committed in 2024 and 5,149 committed earlier but verified last year. The violations include killing, maiming, recruiting and abducting children, sexual violence against them, attacking schools and hospitals and denying youngsters access to humanitarian aid.
The UN kept Israeli forces on its blacklist of countries that violate children’s rights for a second year, citing 7,188 verified grave violations by its military, including the killing of 1,259 Palestinian children and injury to 941 others in Gaza. The Gaza health ministry has reported much higher figures, but the UN has strict criteria and said its process of verification is ongoing.
Guterres said he is “appalled by the intensity of grave violations against children in the occupied Palestinian territories and Israel,” and “deeply alarmed” by the increase in violations, especially the high number of children killed by Israeli forces.
He reiterated his calls on Israel to abide by international law requiring special protections for children, protection for schools and hospitals, and compliance with the requirement that attacks distinguish between combatants and civilians and avoid excessive harm to civilians.
The UN also kept Hamas, whose surprise 7 October 2023 attack in southern Israel sparked the ongoing war in Gaza, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad on the blacklist.
Israel’s UN Mission did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Blasts have been heard in the Safidrood industrial town near the Iranian town of Kolesh Taleshan, in the north-west of the country, Al Jazeera reports, shortly after Israel told people in the area to evacuate.
Iran’s air defences have also intercepted “hostile targets” in the central city of Isfahan – home to one of Iran’s biggest nuclear facilities – and shot down an Israeli drone in the Kahrizak area south of Tehran, the Qatar-based broadcaster reported.
The Israeli military says it has intercepted a drone launched by Iran in the Dead Sea area.
Here’s a selection of images from around Gaza on Thursday:
Israeli attacks kill 72 Palestinians in Gaza, including at least 21 aid-seekers
While the world focuses on its conflict with Iran, Israel has kept up its attacks on Gaza, killing another 72 people on Thursday alone, including 21 who had gathered near food distribution sites set up by the “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation” (GHF).
Israel has blocked the UN and other aid agencies from delivering aid and backed the GHF, which has resulted in the killing of at least 300 desperate civilians in recent weeks as Israeli forces open fire on crowds of hungry people.
AFP reports:
Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that six people were killed while waiting for aid in the southern Gaza Strip and 15 others in a central area known as the Netzarim corridor, where thousands of Palestinians have gathered daily in the hope of receiving food rations.
The Israeli army told AFP that its troops in Netzarim corridor – a strip of land militarised by Israel that bisects the Palestinian territory – had fired “warning shots” at “suspects” approaching them, but that it was “not aware of any injured individuals”.
The army did not comment on the incident reported in the south.
In northern Gaza, Bassal said that nine separate Israeli strikes killed another 51 people, updating earlier tolls provided by his agency.
Bassam Abu Shaar, who witnessed the shooting incident in the Netzarim area, said thousands of people had gathered there overnight in the hope of receiving aid at the US- and Israeli-backed distribution site when it opened in the morning.
“Around 1:00 am (2200 GMT Wednesday), they started shooting at us,” he told AFP by phone, reporting gunfire, tank shelling and bombs dropped by drones.
Abu Shaar said that the size of the crowd had made it impossible for people to escape, with casualties left lying on the ground within walking distance of the distribution point, which is run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
“We couldn’t help them or even escape ourselves,” he said.
Josh Butler
Australia’s embassy in Tehran has suspended operations and the government is ordering officials to leave Iran, the foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, has said, over concerns about “the deteriorating security environment”.
As alarm grows about the conflict between Iran and Israel, Wong said the Australian ambassador to Iran would “remain in the region to support the Australian government’s response to this crisis”, while consular staff are being deployed to neighbouring Azerbaijan, “including its border crossings, to support Australians departing Iran”.
The government is trying to assist Australians to leave Iran but Wong said options were limited.
“The Australian government has directed the departure of all Australian officials and dependents and suspended operations at our embassy in Tehran, based on advice about the deteriorating security environment in Iran,” Wong said this morning.
We urge Australians who are able to leave Iran to do so now, if it is safe. Those who are unable to, or do not wish to leave, are advised to shelter in place.
US secretary of state Marco Rubio has also been working the phones and spoke earlier with Australian foreign minister Penny Wong, according to state department spokesperson Tammy Bruce.
In a statement Bruce said that the pair had “agreed to continue to work together closely to commit to a path of peace and ensure that Iran never develops a nuclear weapon”.
Israel is the only Middle East state with nuclear weapons, but has never formally acknowledged its arsenal nor has it signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT).
After meeting with US secretary of state Marco Rubio in Washington on Thursday, UK foreign secretary David Lammy has said the pair discussed “how a deal could avoid a deepening conflict” and that a “window now exists within the next two weeks to achieve a diplomatic solution”. In a statement he added:
Now is the time to put a stop to the grave scenes in the Middle East and prevent a regional escalation that would benefit no one.
Lammy is set to meet Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi in Geneva on Friday, alongside his French and German counterparts.
The war last week began when Israel launched a surprise attack on Iran, as Tehran was in the middle of nuclear negotiations with Washington.
The UK’s minister for the Middle East and North Africa, Hamish Falconer, has condemned Iran’s strike on an Israeli hospital.
In a post on X, he wrote: “My thoughts are with the victims and their loved ones following the appalling Iranian strike on a hospital in Beer Sheba. Hospitals must never be targeted. This is a dangerous moment for the entire region. The UK and our allies are clear that diplomacy is the only solution.”
Dozens were injured in the strike on Soroka hospital in the southern city of Beersheba.
Reuters carrying quotes from Israel’s Washington embassy on the claims that Iran used a cluster munition above Israel:
“Today, the Iranian Armed Forces fired a missile that contained cluster submunitions at a densely populated civilian area in Israel,” the embassy said in an email to Reuters that did not identify the area.
“Cluster weapons are designed to disperse over a large area and maximise the chances of a harmful strike,” the email continued. “Iran unlawfully fired deliberately at civilian population centres, and seeks to maximise the damage to civilians in them by using wide-dispersal munitions.”
European foreign ministers will meet Iranian counterpart for talks tomorrow
Foreign ministers from the UK, France and Germany together with the EU’s top diplomat will hold nuclear talks with their Iranian counterpart in Geneva tomorrow, officials and diplomats said, AFP reports.
“We will meet with the European delegation in Geneva on Friday,” Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said in a statement carried by state news agency IRNA.
European diplomats separately confirmed the planned talks, set to involve French foreign minister Jean-Noel Barrot, British foreign secretary David Lammy and German foreign minister Johann Wadephul, as well as EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas.
Lammy was in Washington on Thursday, where he was due to meet US Secretary of State Marco Rubio for talks focused on Iran, the State Department said.
Israel has killed several top Iranian officials in its strikes and Araghchi’s advisor said that the minister was unfazed by fears he may be targeted next.
“Since it was announced that the Foreign Minister was heading to Geneva for negotiations with the European troika, I’ve received numerous messages expressing concern that the Zionist regime might target him,” Mohammad Hossein Ranjbaran said on X.
A grenade was thrown at the residence of the Norwegian ambassador to Israel on Thursday evening in Tel Aviv, Israeli foreign minister Gideon Saar said. No one was injured.
“I spoke a short time ago with the Norwegian ambassador to Israel, Per Egil Selvaag, in whose yard a grenade was thrown this evening,” Saar said on X. “I strongly condemn this serious and dangerous crime.”
In Oslo, the Norwegian foreign ministry said an explosion occurred at the residence.
“No staff with the embassy was injured during the incident,” it said in an emailed statement, which did not say what caused the explosion. Israeli police said in a statement “light property damage was sustained” and that it had opened an investigation.
Israel says Iran fired cluster bomb-bearing missile
Iran fired at least one missile at Israel that scattered small bombs with the aim of increasing civilian casualties, the Israeli military said, Reuters reports.
Israeli news reports quoted the Israeli military as saying the missile’s warhead split open at an altitude of about 4 miles (21,000ft) and released around 20 submunitions in a radius of around 5 miles over central Israel.
One of the small munitions struck a home in the central Israeli town of Azor, causing some damage, the Times of Israel reported. There were no reports of casualties from the bomb.
Cluster bombs are controversial because they indiscriminately scatter submunitions, some of which can fail to explode and kill or injure long after a conflict ends. The Israeli military released a graphic as a public warning of the dangers of unexploded ordnance.
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