Source : the age
Welcome to our rolling coverage of the war in the Middle East, as major developments continue to unfold across the region. If you’re just joining us, here’s what you need to know today.
- US President Donald Trump took questions for the first time from reporters in the Oval Office, reiterating numerous times his justification for launching the attack on Iran, saying “a nuclear war” was imminent.
- The head of the UN’s nuclear watchdog, Rafael Grossi, rejected this assertion telling CNN that Iran was not days or weeks away from acquiring a nuclear weapon and did not pose any imminent threat.
- During an address from the Élysée Palace this morning, French President Emmanuel Macron said the attacks on Iran by the US and Israel were not legal. Macron’s accusations came as he announced that France would deploy anti-missile and anti-drone systems to protect its own bases and military personnel, as well as its friends in the region, such as Cyprus.
- The first commercial flight from the Middle East to Australia since the outbreak of war between the US-Israel and Iran has taken off from Dubai as some flights out of the UAE resume today. The Emirates flight will be touching down in Sydney late this evening.
- A fire erupted at the US consulate in Dubai after it was hit by an Iranian drone strike this morning. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters at the White House that all US personnel were safe and accounted for.
- Trump vowed via social media that the US Navy would escort tankers through the Strait of Hormuz to enable the “free flow of energy to the world”, amid growing concerns over the conflict’s impacts on global oil supply. It followed a declaration by Iranian officials yesterday that they would shoot down any ships attempting to pass through the Strait, one of the world’s most critical energy choke points.
- The Albanese government is urging motorists not to panic over petrol supplies as long queues form at petrol stations and fears spread about global energy supply. Global markets tumbled this morning and the ASX toppled sharply in early trade.
- And Israel has deployed troops in Lebanon, beginning a ground offensive in a new escalation of its campaign against Hezbollah.
Read more on the US-Israel-Iran war:
An Israeli airstrike hit a hotel outside of Beirut, Lebanese state media reported.
Ambulances rushed to the scene in Hazmieh, about 5 kilometres south-east of Beirut.
Explosions have also been reported over Jerusalem.
Meanwhile in Bahrain, air sirens have sounded across the Kingdom.
AP
Iranian Kurdish militias have consulted with the United States in recent days about whether, and how, to attack Iran’s security forces in the western part of the country, three sources with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.
The Iranian Kurdish coalition of groups based on the Iran-Iraq border in the semiautonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan has been training to mount such an attack in hopes of weakening the country’s military, as the United States and Israel pound Iranian targets with bombs and missiles.
The goal would be to create room for Iranians opposed to the Islamic regime to rise up now that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other top officials have been killed since the US-Israeli attack began on Saturday, two of the sources said.
A final decision has not yet been made on the operation and its possible timing, added the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity to talk freely about sensitive military planning.
The groups have requested US military support and Iraqi leaders in Erbil and Baghdad have also been in touch with the Trump administration in recent days, they said.
The forces are in talks with the United States about CIA help to provide weapons, two of the sources said. Kurds are an indigenous ethnic group of Iran who have faced persecution in part due to their demands of autonomy.
Reuters
Sergeant 1st Class Nicole Amor was just days away from returning home to her husband and two children when a drone strike at a command centre in Kuwait killed her and five other US service members.
“She was almost home,” her husband, Joey Amor, said from their home in Minnesota, on Tuesday. “You don’t go to Kuwait thinking something’s going to happen, and for her to be one of the first – it hurts.”
Amor was one of four US soldiers killed in the Iran war on Sunday and identified Tuesday by the Pentagon; two soldiers haven’t yet been publicly identified. The members of the Army Reserve worked in logistics and kept troops supplied with food and equipment.
They died just one day after the U.S. and Israel launched its military campaign against Iran. Iran responded by launching missiles and drones against Israel and several Gulf Arab states that host U.S. armed forces.
Those killed also included Captain Cody Khork, 35, of Florida; Sergeant 1st Class Noah Tietjens, 42, of Nebraska; and Sergeant Declan Coady, 20, of lowa, who was posthumously promoted from specialist. No other names were released.
“These men and women all bravely volunteered to defend our country, and their sacrifice will never be forgotten,” Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll said.
AP
Queues at service stations continue to snake around the country as motorist fear shortages and price hikes.
The NRMA has accused service stations of price gouging. New data on Wednesday that shows more than half the petrol stations in Sydney and Melbourne have already hiked their prices for regular unleaded by 5¢ to 10¢ per litre, before any international price hikes flow through to local bowsers.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers said on Wednesday that service stations “cannot be taking people for mugs” and said the government had instructed the consumer watchdog to crack down on any price gouging.
“We take the, the views of the NRMA and other motorist groups very seriously, as does the [Australian Competition and Consumer Commission]… It has got an important role to play here and we’re making sure that they are as empowered as they can be to do that work.”
As well as halting oil tankers, the closure of shipping routes through the Persian Gulf has forced container vessels to anchor, leaving tonnes of goods stranded and indefinitely delaying arrival windows.
At least 100 container ships are stranded in the Gulf, and many more are waiting on the other side of the Strait of Hormuz to enter, logistics analytics firm Flexport says.
As a result, refrigerated shipping containers each carrying hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of Australian red meat and fresh produce are stuck on various sheltering vessels, said Tom Jensen, general manager of policy and operations at the Freight and Trade Alliance.
“There are containers already on the water. If they can’t get to their destinations, you’ve got to think of the fresh products not arriving in the Middle East,” Jensen said, adding complex processing rules meant much of the cargo could not simply be diverted to other ports.
“That’s hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth in a full container … It could be a write-off,” Jensen said.
High-end tenderloins as well as cheaper brisket and bolar cuts make up much of the contents of the containers stuck on ships, while the dramatic shutdown of airspace to passenger and cargo movements has meant chilled lamb carcasses and specialty grain-fed beef typically sent to the Middle East in the bellies of commercial jets have been unable to leave Australia, industry outlet Beef Central reported.
This morning we brought you news of Emirates flight EK414 from Dubai to Sydney, the first commercial flight out of the Middle East to Australia since strikes on Iran by the US and Israel.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has told the House of Representatives that more than 200 Australians are safely on board – a drop in the bucket of the 115,000 stranded in the region.
The flight is expected to arrive in Sydney shortly after 10.30pm (AEDT) tonight.
Iran has escalated its retaliation across the Gulf region, targeting embassies and disrupting energy supplies and travel. These are the US assets that have come under attack in the past 24 hours.
- An Iranian missile hit the US base at Al-Udeid in Qatar. The Qatar Defence Ministry said there were no casualties.
- A suspected drone strike caused a small fire in the car park at the US consulate in Dubai, according to a State Department alert reviewed by The Washington Post.
- A suspected Iranian drone attack hit the CIA’s station at the US embassy in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, causing a limited fire, according to the Saudi Defence Ministry.
Iran has also fired dozens of ballistic missiles at Israel, though most of the incoming fire has been intercepted. Eleven people in Israel have been killed since the conflict began.
Six US soldiers were killed in an Iranian drone strike on a temporary tactical command centre in Kuwait in the first 24 hours of the war. The Red Crescent reported 787 Iranians had been killed by late Tuesday.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has said there is a “very real prospect” that the war in Iran will raise the cost of everyday essentials like petrol, energy and food.
Chalmers said the government was closely monitoring developments in the key oil producing region of the Middle East.
He said the outcomes of the conflict were uncertain but there could be substantial economic consequences.
His key concerns are disruptions to global supply chains that have driven oil prices up about 10 per cent and threaten to raise the cost of other crucial commodities like gas and fertiliser, which influence the price of electricity and food.
“It depends very heavily on how much oil and gas infrastructure is damaged in the conflict,” Chalmers said in Canberra.
However, he said there was no current prospect of Australia running short of fuel supplies into the country.
Australia is deploying additional consular assistance to help Australians caught up in the “unprecedented” conflict in the Middle East, Foreign Minister Penny Wong said.
“We are deploying six crisis response teams into the region. This is additional consular support to help the people on the ground,” Wong told reporters in Canberra.
She said the Middle East conflict was unprecedented.
“We know that because … through the previous conflicts that we have seen in the Middle East … we have always had a situation where there has been reasonably contained and limited conflict.
“It is not limited, and it is not contained in the way that we have seen previously, which is why we see so many countries affected and so many travellers disrupted.”
Wong said dialogue and diplomacy was the way to achieve stability, and Australia was not considering sending troops into Iran.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong has warned that the conflict in Iran is “spreading and intensifying”.
“What we have seen is now Iran has hit 10 countries, and we have seen an attack on the US consulate,” she told reporters in Canberra.
She said the Australian consulate in Dubai is close to the targeted US outpost, but confirmed all Australian personnel were accounted for and safe.
Wong said she was pleased to see the first Dubai-to-Sydney flight depart this morning but there was more to do.
She hit back at the Coalition’s suggestions that Australia did not give citizens in the region enough warning.
“We certainly did not know that Iran was going to hit 10 countries in the region. And, for those who are criticising, if they think they knew that, then they probably should have told us,” she said.
“There were some 41 different warnings, updates on travel advice about the possibility of conflict or instability in the Middle East. What I would say to Australians is … please look at their travel advice.”
