Iran US War News Highlights: Tehran yet to respond to US proposal after attacks on nuclear infra, says official

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Rescue and emergency teams have been sent to the scene after an Iranian attack struck an area in Israel, according to local authorities.

Israel’s Home Front Command said its rescue and salvage units were deployed following reports of an impact.

Local broadcaster Channel 14 reported that one person has been killed in the strike on Tel Aviv.

The development comes amid an ongoing escalation between Iran and Israel, with repeated missile attacks targeting key areas, including Tel Aviv.

Elon Musk reportedly joined the phone call between US President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday, 24 March, about US' ongoing conflict with Iran, mentioned a report by New York Times.

Tehran has agreed to ‘facilitate and expedite’ humanitarian aid through the Strait of Hormuz, the Iranian ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva said Friday, reported AP.

A senior Iranian official said that US attacks on Iran while simultaneously calling for talks were "intolerable," adding Tehran had yet to decide whether to respond to a US proposal due to attacks on industrial and nuclear infrastructure, reported Reuters.

Iran's nuclear facilities came under attack, state media reported, just hours after Israel threatened to “escalate and expand” its campaign against Tehran. Israel claimed responsibility for the attacks and Iran quickly threatened to retaliate, as per a report by AP

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has warned workers at industrial companies in the region with US shareholders or allied with Israel to leave immediately, citing retaliatory operations underway, according to Iranian state media, IRNA.

Seyed Majid Moosavi, IRGC’s Aerospace Force commander, issued a warning on X, threatening retaliatory responses meant to harm the interests of the United States and Israel in the region.

“You tested us once before; the world has once again seen that you yourselves started playing with fire and attacking infrastructure. This time, the equation will no longer be ‘an eye for an eye’, just wait,” he wrote on X.

Iran’s judiciary has threatened to seize the property of soccer player Sardar Azmoun and other critics of the regime. According to the Fars news agency, judicial authorities in the northern province of Golestan are planning to confiscate the assets of 16 individuals, including Azmoun and Iranian musician Mohsen Yeghaneh. Azmoun was dropped from Iran’s national team after a posting on his Instagram account showed a photo of him with leaders of the UAE. After security forces shot thousands of anti-government protesters in early January, Yeghaneh posted a message on his Instagram saying “every compatriot whose blood is spilled on the ground waters the tree of hatred for the oppressor.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said ensuring the Strait of Hormuz remains open to shipping is likely to pose an “immediate challenge” even after the US accomplishes its military objectives in Iran.

Rubio said Iran may seek to set up a toll on the strait, an act that he said could cause significant economic damage to many nations around the globe.

He said the US would seek international cooperation on a plan to keep the strait open after hostilities end.

“Not only is this illegal, it’s unacceptable. It’s dangerous to the world,” Rubio said of the possibility that Iran would seek to restrict traffic through the strait. “And it’s important that the world have a plan

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that the US expects its operation in Iran to conclude in “weeks, not months”. Rubio, who is in France for the G7 foreign ministers, also said Iran may decide to set up a tolling system for the Strait of Hormuz.

The Central Board of Secondary Education has issued a notification outlining the alternative assessment scheme for the declaration of Class XII results in West Asian countries (Bahrain, Iran, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE), due to the ongoing conflict.

Iran’s response to a US proposal aimed at ending the war in the Middle East is expected later today, Reuters reported.

US President Donald Trump and top White House officials have been told via interlocutors that Iran’s counter-proposal will likely arrive today, a source told Reuters.

Israel has reportedly carried out airstrikes in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital on Friday. The Israeli military said it has begun a wave of strikes targeting Hezbollah infrastructure in Beirut.

At least one person has been killed, and two others were wounded after a US-Israeli attack on the Mobarakeh steel factory in Isfahan, Iran’s Tasnim news outlet reported.

Iran would be "well advised" to negotiate with the United States after almost a month of the US-Israeli war against the Islamic republic, Germany's foreign minister said, reported AFP.

"The Iranian regime would be well advised to enter into serious negotiations with the United States now," Johann Wadephul said, after meeting G7 counterparts in France

Russia’s Emergencies Ministry said Friday that it has delivered a batch of medicines to Iran.

The ministry said that 313 metric tons of medicines were carried by rail to Azerbaijan’s border with Iran, where they were handed over to Iranian representatives. It said the supplies have been sent on President Vladimir Putin’s order.

The United States can only determine with certainty that it has destroyed about a third of Iran’s vast missile arsenal, Reuters reported.

The status of around another third is less clear but bombings likely damaged, destroyed or buried those missiles in underground tunnels and bunkers, sources told Reuters.

Joint airstrikes by the US and Israel targeted steel factories in southwestern Iran and the city of Isfahan, reports Mehr News Agency.

Lebanon is facing a deepening humanitarian crisis that now risks teetering over into a catastrophe, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees has said.

“The situation remains extremely worrying and the risk of a humanitarian catastrophe… is real,” Karolina Lindholm Billing, the agency’s representative in Lebanon, said.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Friday said the UK is not going to join the war in the Middle East, citing clear difference between him and US President Donald Trump on the conflict.

"I have been clear I'm not going to join the war," Keir Starmer told Sky News.

"My own view is that a lot of what is said and done has been to put pressure on me to change my mind, but I'm not going to do so," Starmer added.

General Ahmad Vahidi, the newly appointed Commander of the IRGC has reportedly been killed by Israel. General Vahidi was appointed as commander-in-chief of the IRGC on March 1, following the death of his predecessor Hossein Salami during the June 2025 Israeli strikes on Iran.

US has used more than 850 Tomahawk cruise missiles against Iran. According to reports, this is more than what the US used during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, when just over 800 were launched. A Washington Post report said that the most recent versions of the Tomahawk missile can cost as much as $3.6 million a piece and require up to two years to build.

German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul on Friday accused Russia of helping Iran identify potential strike targets. Wadephul made the comments while speaking to reporters at a G7 meeting in France.

“Putin cynically hopes that the escalation in the Middle East will divert our attention from his crimes in Ukraine,” Wadephul said. “This calculation must not succeed. We see very clearly how closely the two conflicts are intertwined. Russia is evidently supporting Iran with information about potential targets.”

Israel has struck an area in southern Lebanon with what appears to be white phosphorus, The Associated Press has reported. According to AP, its journalists near the coastal city of Tyre on Friday saw smoke plumes resembling white phosphorus, which is banned under international law when used in civilian areas.

“This image clearly shows the use of artillery-delivered white phosphorus being dispersed over a wide area,” Rich Weir, senior adviser at Human Rights Watch’s crisis, conflict, and arms division, told AP. “While the legality of its use here is difficult to ascertain without more information, its incendiary effects can cause devastating injuries.”

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) said it air defences engaged 6 ballistic missiles and 9 UAVs on Friday. Since the start of the blatant Iranian attacks, UAE air defences have engaged 378 ballistic missiles, 15 cruise missiles and 1,835 UAVs, the UAE Ministry of Defence said.

Saudi Arabia has urged the US to ramp up attacks on Iran, a Saudi source told The Guardian. The source also confirmed previous reports of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman asking US President Donald Trump not to cut short his war against Iran.

According to the Saudi intelligence source, Riyadh was not just calling for the military campaign to be continued, but to be intensified.

Iran has said that at least 120 cultural and historical sites have been damaged in US-Israeli strikes.

Ahmad Alavi, head of Tehran city council’s cultural heritage committee, told Reuters that multiple locations across the country were directly hit and suffered significant structural damage.

“At least 120 museums, historical buildings, and cultural sites across various provinces were directly targeted and sustained serious structural damage,” he said.

The IRGC said on Friday that they had turned back three ships trying to transit the Strait of Hormuz, adding the route was closed to vessels travelling to and from ports linked to its "enemies".

"This morning, following the lies of the corrupt president of America regarding the openness of the Strait of Hormuz, three container ships of different nationalities moved toward the designated corridor for the transit of ships with permits, which were turned back with a warning from the IRGC Navy," it said.

According to the Iranian Red Crescent, 17 Red Crescent centres have been struck, and nearly 100 ambulances were damaged or destroyed.

The charity also said that 289 medical, pharmaceutical, and healthcare facilities have been damaged, along with 600 schools and educational institutions.

UK-based Royal United Services Institute has warned that the war against Iran is entering a potentially decisive logistical phase as interceptor inventories begin approaching critical depletion thresholds. According to its analysis, Israel’s Arrow ballistic-missile interceptors could be fully exhausted within days, while the United States faces a comparable strain on its THAAD interceptor inventory if the current operational tempo continues.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz in a statement said that he and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “warned the Iranian terrorist regime to stop firing missiles at the civilian population in Israel.”

“Despite the warnings, the firing continues — and therefore attacks in Iran will escalate and expand to additional targets and areas that assist the regime in building and operating weapons against Israeli citizens,” Katz said.

“They will pay heavy, increasing prices for this war crime.”

France’s Minister of Armed Forces Catherine Vautrin has said that France’s strategy in the Middle East is based on a diplomatic approach to avoid any escalation in the region.

“The goal, I repeat, is truly to facilitate the diplomatic path,” she said. Referring to the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, Vautrin said “the aim is truly this diplomatic approach, which is the only one that can guarantee a return to peace. Many countries are concerned, and it is absolutely essential that we find a solution.”

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on Friday urged civilians in the region to leave areas where US troops are stationed. According to the IRGC, it “has a duty to target enemy forces wherever they are found”.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday said his country has reached an arrangement with the Ministry of Defense of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia on defense cooperation. The deal comes at a time when Saudi Arabia, like other Gulf states, is struggling to intercept drones and missiles fired at US-linked targets by Iran. Since the Russian invasion in 2022, Ukraine has emerged as one of the most advanced countries in drone warfare.

UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper has called for a “swift resolution” to the war in the Middle East and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.

Speaking at a meeting of G7 foreign ministers on the outskirts of Paris, Cooper said Iran is undermining the global economy by blocking international shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most important waterway for oil shipments.

“Frankly, Iran cannot be allowed to hold the global economy hostage as a result of a strait that is vital to international shipping routes and the freedom of navigation,” she said.

Volker Turk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, has said that “the bombing of the Shajareh Tayyebeh Elementary School in Minab evoked a visceral horror”. The girls’ elementary school in the city of Minab, south of Iran, was struck on February 28, on the first day of the US-Israeli attack on Iran. More than 170 people, mostly children, were killed in the attack, for which both the US and Israel have denied responsibility. However, US officials told The New York Times that it was the result of outdated intelligence.

“The onus is on those who carried out the attack to investigate it promptly, impartially, transparently and thoroughly,” Turk said.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Friday said the US-Israeli attack on a girls’ school in Minhab was “a war crime and a crime against humanity”. Speaking at the emergency session of the UN Human Rights Council called by Iran, China and Cuba, Araghchi said: “The attack on school in Minhab was not a mere incident, nor a miscalculation.”

“The United States’ contradictory remarks aimed at justifying their crime could not in any manner [hide] their responsibility,” he added.

Iran on Friday announced that its air defense forces have intercepted an incoming Tomahawk cruise missile and shot down a US-Israeli reconnaissance drone in the country’s Western region.

"The air defense systems of the western region of the Islamic Republic of Iran Army identified and destroyed this missile before it reached its target," Kazem Kazemi, the governor of Bijar in Kordestan Province, said on Friday. According to Iranian authorities, since the US-Israeli attacks began on February 28, its forces have shot down more than 130 ‘enemy’ drones.

The Norwegian Refugee Council, a humanitarian organisation working in Iran, has warned that millions, especially civilians, could be displaced if the war continues. According to Jan Egeland, the secretary-general of NRC, the NGO’s staff have reported to him that “countless homes, hospitals and schools have been damaged or destroyed,” and that nearly every neighborhood in Tehran has sustained damage.

“Civilians are paying the highest price for this war — it must end” he said in a statement.

“If this war continues, we risk a far wider humanitarian disaster,” he added. “Millions could be forced to flee across borders, placing immense pressure on an already overstretched region.”

According to estimates by various humanitarian groups, around 3,500 people have been killed in Iran since US and Israel began bombing the country on February 28.

A group of Israeli women, whose sons are serving in the military, has written a letter to IDF Chief Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, urging him to end the ongoing ground operation in Lebanon.

The letter said the military was receiving orders from politicians who are ready to “sacrifice” its children, and urged Zamir to focus on a political solution.

“Four soldiers have already been killed in Lebanon, how many more will sacrifice their lives in vain?” the letter by Parents of Combat Soldiers, which includes 600 military parents, said.

Authorities in Kuwait have said that the under-construction Mubarak Al Kabeer Port in Bubiyan Island came under attack by drones and cruise missiles on Friday. According to the Ministry of Public Works, preliminary assessments indicate that the attack caused material damage to port facilities, with no reported human casualties. The port was being built by China under its Belt and Road Initiative.
This is the second attack on a port in Kuwait on Friday. Earlier, the Shuwaikh port was hit by drones, causing material damage with no injuries reported.

Iran has claimed that as many as 250 students and teachers were killed in the strikes launched by the US and Israel since 28 February, , including attacks that it says hit educational institutions in and around Tehran.

Several drones 'intercepted and destroyed' over Riyadh and Eastern province, says Saudi Ministry of Defence.

UN Rights chief Turk calls on US and Israel to end their attacks on Iran. He also calls on Iran to stop attacking its neighbours.

Iranian authorities on Friday said they had arrested 15 people in Isfahan for allegedly sharing sensitive information.

Israel’s military says it has detected a wave of missiles from Iran heading towards the country.

The United States is weighing sending up to 10,000 extra troops to the Middle East, US media reported Friday, as speculation grows that Washington may be preparing a ground operation in Iran.

The deployment would mark a significant boost to Washington's military presence in the region, despite US President Donald Trump insisting that Tehran was taking part in peace talks with Washington to end the war.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the move would aim to provide Trump with "more military options" in the Middle East, engulfed by war since US-Israeli strikes on Iran

Germany’s Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul has said that US and Iran have already spoken indirectly and are now preparing for direct talks. Germany’s Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said the talks are likely to be held in Pakistan.

Delhi and Moscow are deepening their energy cooperation, with both sides agreeing to prepare for Russia to resume direct sales of liquefied natural gas for the first time since the start of the Ukraine war, according to Reuters citing people familiar with the knowledge of the matter.

If India decides to pursue the deal, negotiations could be concluded in weeks, one of the people said.