News Desk

RUSSELL Brand has confessed he thinks about going to prison “every day” ahead of his rape trial and denies being a “grifter”.

The comedian and actor, 50, who now hosts a podcast is facing trial on three counts of rape, three of sexual assault and one of indecent assault against six women from 1999 to 2009.

He denies all the charges against him.

The star, who wore a crucifix around his neck, talked at length with Piers Morgan on his YouTube show Uncensored.

Asked if he thought about the reality of going to jail if he was found guilty, Brand said: “Yes… all the time, every day.”

He added: “I will be with God wherever I am. And of course, I would prefer to be with God with my wife and my kids… I’m not saying that that’s not a difficult image, you know, and a difficult thing to contemplate, of course it is.”

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Brand, who brought a Bible with him, continued: “We are going to find out the truth, and we’re going to deal with the truth.

“Because actually, I am not afraid of the truth and if the truth is I am going to prison, then I am. My job will be, do not be afraid of that truth, that is what you are going to do.”

The one-time Hollywood star claimed he would face being behind bars “with God” if he was found guilty of the charges against him.

He also strenuously defended his innocence.

Morgan put it to him that there were people who considered him “basically just a massive grifter”.

Brand immediately shot back: “No, that’s what they say about you.”

Morgan added: “You’re very eloquent, you can be very persuasive with the power of your words, but that actually when it comes to any of these issues, you don’t really have a personal principle.”

Brand said: “I do, I do.”

In an earlier interview for The Megyn Kelly Show podcast admitted he had sex with a 16-year-old when he was 30.

He said his relationships at the time were “exploitative” – but stressed his sex with the girl was legal.

Brand said: “In Europe and in the United Kingdom where I’m from, the age of consent is 16. And I did sleep with a 16-year-old when I was 30.

“But when I was 30, I was a very different person. I was a lot younger and I was an immature 30-year-old.”

Brand told host Megyn Kelly his relationships in the past were “selfish”.

He continued: “I did not apply enough consideration barely any I suppose really to how that sex was affecting other people.”

At the height of his fame, the actor starred in a number of Hollywood films, including Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Get Him to the Greek.

His trial at Southwark Crown Court is due to start on October 12.

April 24 (UPI) — Talks with Iran are set to resume with special envoy Steve Witkoff and President Donald Trump‘s adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner heading to Pakistan on Saturday to meet with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, the White House confirmed Friday.

Iranian state news agency IRNA said that no meeting has been scheduled, Axios reported.

“The Iranians want to talk. They want to talk in person, and the president is always willing to give diplomacy a chance,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Friday.

“We hope progress will be made, and we hope that positive development will come from this meeting. We have certainly seen some progress from the Iranian side in the last few days.”

Araghchi landed in Islamabad on Friday night for talks with Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar and Field Marshal Asim Munir, Axios reported.

A Pakistani official told Axios that the meeting was expected to focus on relaunching negotiations with the Trump administration.

“A trilateral meeting with the U.S. will be assessed after our meeting with Araghchi,” the Pakistani official said.

“We’ve certainly seen some progress from the Iranian side in the last couple of days. Again, the president has made the decision to send Steve [Witkoff] and Jared [Kushner] to hear the Iranians out, and so we’ll see what they have to say this weekend,” Leavitt said about the potential for a peace deal.

Araghchi is scheduled to travel from Islamabad to Muscat, Oman, and then on to Moscow, Axios said. It’s not clear when he will meet with Witkoff and Kushner. Two sources told Axios that the meeting could happen Monday, after Kushner and Witkoff have talks with Pakistani mediators.

Vice President JD Vance will not travel to Pakistan for these meetings.

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Judge had previously blocked move to end temporary legal status for those who entered US via Biden-era application.

The administration of President Donald Trump plans to again end the temporary legal status of hundreds of thousands of people who applied for asylum in the United States via the CBP One app.

The plan was detailed in a court filing in Boston, Massachusetts, and comes after a judge ruled that Trump’s earlier effort to terminate the legal status of those individuals was unlawful.

Under US President Joe Biden, individuals who registered for an appointment with US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) were preliminarily vetted and granted temporary legal status in the US as their asylum cases were adjudicated.

About 900,000 people were granted so-called humanitarian parole under the programme.

But in April of last year, just months after Trump took office for a second term, many of those individuals received emails saying their status had been terminated.

The message told its recipients it was “time for you to leave the United States”.

Federal Judge Allison Burroughs subsequently ruled that the Department of Homeland Security did not follow the proper procedures in terminating the legal status immigration status of CBP One users.

The US Department of Justice, in the new filings, told Burroughs that the Trump administration was complying with ⁠her order.

However, the department said the administration would begin issuing new parole termination notices, pursuant to a Tuesday memo from CBP’s head, Rodney Scott.

The memo is not public, but according to the Justice Department, Scott provided ‌an explanation for why, in his opinion, “parole is no longer appropriate for those aliens”.

Lawyers for Democracy Forward and Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, which represent the individuals whose status faces termination, urged Burroughs in a subsequent filing to prevent what they called a “deliberate attempt to evade compliance with the court’s order”.

The next hearing was set for May 6.

During his second term, Trump has pursued a hardline immigration policy that has included staunching nearly all asylum claims at the southern border.

Shortly after taking office, Trump’s officials also dissolved the CBP One app and relaunched it as CBP Home, a tool for self-deportation.

His administration has claimed there was an “invasion” at the border that constituted a “national emergency”, thereby allowing Trump to bypass legal requirements to allow individuals seeking asylum into the country.

Asylum, however, is a right enshrined both in domestic and international law, to protect people fleeing persecution on the basis of race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group.

Separately, on Friday, a federal appeals court ruled against the Trump administration’s ban on asylum at the southern US border, potentially clearing the way for applications to once again be processed.

The administration is expected to appeal the decision.

Sophy Romvari’s luminous debut feature “Blue Heron” is a loving and studious act of remembrance. Her protagonist and surrogate, Sasha (Amy Zimmer), attempts to understand her family’s past through a reverent process of recreation. While she finds that not everything can be understood, there is beauty and solace in the journey itself — and maybe a kind of catharsis.

“Blue Heron” is an autobiographical project, but it’s more apt to call it a memoir. Sasha admits she doesn’t remember much of her childhood and doesn’t even trust the fragments. But she will try anyway. As Sasha zooms in on her iPhone, standing at the bluff overlooking her hometown, Romvari rolls up the back of a moving truck to deliver a lush slice of ’90s childhood nostalgia, picking up the memory as her Hungarian immigrant family — two parents, three brothers and one sister — arrive at their new home on Canada’s Vancouver Island.

Father (Ádám Tompa) settles into work on the home computer; Mother (Iringó Réti) attempts to amuse the kids with trips to the beach and nature preserves. Snippets of summer filter through the eyes and ears of 8-year-old Sasha (Eylul Guven) and in the photos snapped by their parents.

But a disquieting presence looms: Jeremy (Edik Beddoes), the eldest son. Blond, light-featured and tall, he is visually distinct from the three other children and his silent rebellion permeates the atmosphere.

His misbehavior is minor — irritating but untenable when stacked together — like bouncing a ball against a wall, disappearing for fun or climbing on the roof. He mostly just seems like a moody, unsatisfied teen, drawing elaborate maps and sometimes playing with his siblings sweetly. It all seems like harmless mischief until it escalates.

The movie’s title refers to a key chain from a gift shop that Jeremy, who almost never speaks, presents to his younger sister. Like him, the film is quiet and meditative, bathed in the cool blues and verdant greens of the setting, captured in Maya Bankovic’s saturated cinematography. We are transported to a place of natural beauty and a period of seemingly unlimited time. But Jeremy-related tension simmers beneath the domestic surface, just as it does in Chantal Akerman’s 1975 landmark “Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles,” referenced in a shot of a mother and daughter peeling potatoes.

“Blue Heron,” though, is not just going to simply be a throwback family drama about a troubled boy and his younger sister. The film suddenly zooms out, linearly, to two decades later. Zimmer’s older version of Sasha is grappling with her brother’s void and she does so with her mind, her work, her actions. She conducts a focus group of social workers for a documentary in order to try to understand Jeremy’s behavior and the treatment he got at the time. She scrubs through video and photos and interviews a case worker. She escapes into old movies.

In Romvari’s award-winning 2020 short “Still Processing,” a companion piece to “Blue Heron,” she processes the loss of two brothers through photography, sifting through boxes of old photos and film negatives shot by her father, who trained as a cinematographer in Hungary. It seems natural for Romvari to access the emotional through artistic practice, to give her — and Sasha — something to do with their hands. The tactility of the photographs in “Still Processing” provide an access point to the past. Romvari weeps as she spreads them out on a table, saying “hi” softly to her brothers. But there’s a remove in the rigorous focus on the snapshots that perhaps also protects her from the full crushing weight of these emotions.

But in a film like “Blue Heron,” anything is possible, including time travel, and for Romvari, it’s the channel that she offers Sasha to achieve the closure that she needs: a visit to a time she doesn’t really remember, even as she’s building an archive of materials to bolster herself.

If young Sasha watches (and Guven is absolutely terrific at watching), the older Sasha speaks. Zimmer, a New York City comedian, is tasked with a heavy, grief-laden dramatic role, and she’s utterly convincing, entrancing in her stillness. But she also has a way with words, a clarity that rings with a rare kind of honest empathy, especially in a letter that Sasha reads to her parents.

That letter is what “Blue Heron” represents for its filmmaker — an attempt to re-create the past, to bring it back to life. Even if imperfect, the value is in the effort, in the ongoing practice of remembering, as an act of devotion to family and self.

Al Jazeera’s Rory Challands reports from the EU summit in Cyprus, where the leaders of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan met with European leaders to discuss the regional crisis caused by the US-Israeli war on Iran.

Judges say Trump’s order for swift removal at the border ‘cast aside federal laws affording’ right to seek asylum.

An appeals court has ruled that President Donald Trump’s ban on asylum applications in the United States is unlawful, dealing a setback to the administration’s immigration crackdown.

In a decision released on Friday, a three-judge panel from the US Court of Appeals in Washington, DC, found that existing laws — namely the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) — give people the right to apply for asylum at the border.

Trump had issued the asylum ban in a proclamation on January 20, 2025, on the first day of his second term.

But the appeals court questioned whether suspending asylum unilaterally was within the president’s power.

“Congress did not intend to grant the Executive the expansive removal authority it asserts,” the ruling said.

“The Proclamation and Guidance are thus unlawful to the extent that they circumvent the INA’s removal procedures and cast aside federal laws affording individuals the right to apply and be considered for asylum or withholding of removal protections.”

The decision validated a ruling by a lower court. While the judges blocked Trump’s order, it is unclear what its immediate impact will be. Already, the White House has signalled it plans to appeal.

Trump made immigration a major pillar of his 2024 re-election campaign, pledging to repel what he describes as an “invasion” of migrants by shutting down the southern border of the US.

Asylum in the US can be granted to people facing “persecution based on race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group”. Such protections have been recognised as a fundamental human right under international law.

But unauthorised border crossings reached record levels during the administration of President Joe Biden, which had itself imposed asylum restrictions.

Millions of migrants — many suffering from gang violence and political persecution in Central and South America — have claimed asylum upon reaching the US.

Nearly 945,000 filed for asylum in 2023, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

In his January 2025 decree, Trump suspended “the physical entry of aliens involved in an invasion into the United States across the southern border”.

The proclamation was quickly challenged in court, as other measures in Trump’s immigration crackdown have been.

But the appeals court panel concluded that the INA does not authorise the president to remove the plaintiffs under “procedures of his own making”.

Nor does it allow him to suspend the plaintiffs’ right to apply for asylum or curtail procedures for adjudicating claims of torture and persecution.

“The power by proclamation to temporarily suspend the entry of specified foreign individuals into the United States does not contain implicit authority to override the INA’s mandatory process to summarily remove foreign individuals,” wrote Judge J Michelle Childs, a Biden appointee.

The Trump administration will likely appeal the ruling to the full appellate court and subsequently to the Supreme Court.

The White House stressed after the court’s decision that banning asylum is part of Trump’s constitutional powers as commander-in-chief.

“We have liberal judges across the country who are acting against this president for political purposes. They are not acting as true litigators of the law. They are looking at these cases from a political lens,” White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt told reporters.

BEYONCE and hubby Jay-Z are looking to move to France — after ditching plans for a UK home.

The music power couple, who abandoned househunting in the Cotswolds due to concerns about flooding, are said to be eyeing up a stunning chateau near Bordeaux.

Crazy In Love singer Beyoncé, 44, and Jay-Z, 56, are already huge fans of the famous wine region – with the 99 Problems rapper celebrating his birthday there in 2023.

Sources say the US pair are looking at a 16th century estate boasting 10 bedrooms and eight bathrooms, nestled in a commune.

Locals have told how the area is abuzz with talk of the A-listers joining their community – which is described as the French equivalent to the Cotswolds.

Businesses have reportedly been sworn to secrecy about the couple’s potential arrival.

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One local said: “Everyone is talking about Beyonce and Jay-Z moving to the area.

“It’s all been shrouded in secrecy, with local businesses and tradespeople forced to sign non-disclosure agreements, but theirs are the names on everyone’s lips.”

Residents have reported a recent surge in private planes landing at the closest airport.

One source also told how a job description has gone on a local noticeboard for an experienced property manager working with VIP clients at an historic estate.

One of the requirements for the role is “absolute discretion”.

The superstar couple — worth a combined £1.5billion — were said to be buying a £7.5million 58-acre plot in the Cotswolds, following the footsteps of several celebrities.

Planning permission was secured for the seven-bedroom property.

But insiders said the pair, who have three children together, turned their backs on the area after learning it was prone to flooding.

A source told The Sun: “Beyonce and Jay-Z buying this plot of land was the talk of the Cotswolds, so many locals were excited about them moving in.

“But the plan appears to have fallen through.”

Despite their snub the Cotswolds have attracted a raft of celebrities including Ellie Goulding, James Blunt, Kate Moss, Amanda Holden, Tom Cruise, Liam Gallagher and Lily Allen.

TV host Ellen Degeneres and wife Portia de Rossi also moved to the area and renovated a farmhouse which they are selling for £22.5million.

As tensions ramp up amid fragile truce, US military says it ‘redirected’ 34 vessels as part of blockade on Iran’s ports.

The United States has three aircraft carriers in the Middle East for the first time in 23 years with the arrival of the USS George HW Bush, the US military has said, amid a fragile ceasefire with Iran.

The Middle East-based Central Command (CENTCOM) of the US military said on Friday that the carriers include 12 accompanying ships, more than 200 aircraft, and 15,000 soldiers.

“For the first time in decades, three aircraft carriers are operating in the Middle East at the same time,” CENTCOM said.

The last time the US amassed that amount of military assets in the region’s waters was in the lead up to the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

The other two US aircraft carriers in the region are USS Abraham Lincoln and USS Gerald R Ford, which is the largest in the world.

The show of force signals that the US is preparing to return to fighting should the fragile ceasefire between the US, Israel and Iran unravel.

Diplomacy between the two countries has been in limbo, with Iran setting the lifting of the US naval blockade against its ports as a condition for resuming the talks.

US President Donald Trump announced extending the truce on Wednesday, but he said the naval siege would persist.

For its part, Iran has reblocked the Strait of Hormuz in response to the US blockade after declaring the waterway completely open last week when the regional ceasefire was extended to Lebanon.

Trump has not set a deadline for the extended ceasefire and suggested that he is comfortable with the status quo, which he argues is depleting the Iranian economy at a low cost for the US.

“I have all the time in the World, but Iran doesn’t,” he wrote in a social media post on Thursday.

The US president was later asked how long he would be willing to wait before receiving a proposed deal from Iran. He said: “Don’t rush me.”

Iran has described the blockade – which has seen US forces seize at least two Iranian oil ships – as an “act of war”.

Iranian forces have also captured foreign commercial ships in the Hormuz Strait, accusing them of violating maritime regulations.

With negotiations on hold, Trump has shown no signs of willingness to lift the siege in order to facilitate talks.

On Friday, the US military said it has “redirected” 34 vessels in the region. “The blockade against ships entering or exiting Iranian ports continues,” CENTCOM said.

Trump has previously threatened to destroy Iran’s civilian infrastructure, including bridges, power and water stations.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Thursday that his country is awaiting the green light from Trump to return Iran to the “age of darkness”.

“Israel is prepared to renew the war against Iran. The [Israeli military] is ready in defence and offence, and the targets are marked,” Katz said, according to The Times of Israel newspaper.

The announcement on Friday is expected to clear the path for the confirmation of his successor, Kevin Warsh.

The United States Department of Justice has ended its probe into US Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell, clearing a major roadblock to the confirmation of his successor, Kevin Warsh.

US Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeannine Pirro said on X on Friday that her office was ending its probe into the Fed’s extensive building renovations because the Fed’s inspector general would scrutinise them instead.

Pirro, a Trump ally and the top federal prosecutor in Washington, DC, said she had instead asked the Fed’s internal watchdog, the Office of Inspector General, to examine cost overruns in renovations of the central bank’s Washington headquarters.

“The IG has the authority to hold the Federal Reserve accountable to American taxpayers,” Pirro said in a social media post. “I expect a comprehensive report in short order and am confident the outcome will assist in resolving, once and for all, the questions that led this office to issue subpoenas.”

The move could lead to a swift confirmation vote by the Senate for Warsh, a former top Fed official whom US President Donald Trump, a Republican, nominated in January to replace Powell. Powell’s term as chair ends May 15.

Senator Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican, had said he would oppose Warsh until the investigation was resolved, effectively blocking his confirmation.

The leadership transition at the world’s leading central bank could now proceed quickly.

Republicans praised Warsh during a Tuesday hearing even as Democrats questioned his independence from Trump, the lack of transparency around some of his financial holdings, and what they said was his flip-flopping on interest rates. Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, the ranking Democrat on the committee, questioned if Warsh will be a “sock puppet“.

Still, Trump’s previous appointment to the Fed’s board of governors, Stephen Miran, was approved by the full Senate just 13 days after his nomination.

No evidence

The investigation was among several undertaken by the Department of Justice into Trump’s perceived adversaries. For months, it had failed to gain traction as prosecutors struggled to articulate a basis to suspect criminal conduct.

A prosecutor handling the case conceded at a closed-door court hearing in March that the government had not yet found any evidence of a crime, and a judge subsequently quashed subpoenas issued to the Federal Reserve.

The judge, James Boasberg, said prosecutors had produced “essentially zero evidence” to suspect Powell of a crime. Boasberg branded prosecutors’ justification for the subpoenas as “thin and unsubstantiated”.

More recently, prosecutors made an unannounced visit to a construction site at the Fed’s headquarters but were turned away, drawing a rebuke from a defence lawyer in the case who called the manoeuvre “not appropriate”.

Warsh said during the Senate hearing on Tuesday that he never promised the White House that he would cut interest rates, even as the president renewed his calls for the central bank to do so.

“The president never once asked me to commit to any particular interest rate decision, period,” Warsh said during the hearing. “Nor would I ever agree to do so if he had … I will be an independent actor if confirmed as chair of the Federal Reserve.”

Warsh’s comments came just hours after Trump, in an interview on CNBC, was asked if he would be disappointed if Warsh did not immediately cut rates and responded, “I would.”

The decision to abandon the investigation represents a rare pullback for a Department of Justice that over the last year has moved aggressively, albeit unsuccessfully, to prosecute public figures the president does not like.

Robert Hur, an lawyer for the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, did not immediately respond on Friday to an email seeking comment.

KYLIE Jenner seductively pulled down her skimpy swimsuit as she cuddled her new kitty for a slew of sexy selfies.

The socialite, 28, has become a cat mom since her beloved 11-year-old Italian Greyhound, Norman, passed away last year.

And is seems that the stunning beauty mogul is enjoying the company of her new four-legged friend.

Taking to Instagram, Kylie posed up a storm in a seriously skimpy outfit, writing a caption which read: “me + my lip liner + and my kitty.”

She shared four photos to the platform, with each of the snaps being selfies of the star as she rocked a gray bathing suit.

The swimsuit was strapless and had cutout details, displaying her toned physique.

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The first image saw Kylie pulling her cut-out bikini down a little while applying lip gloss in a huge mirror.

Her cleavage was on full display as she pouted up a storm and applied the lip product with her long raven locks framing her face.

The second snap saw her standing up straight while holding her adorable fluffy friend.

Posing with her kitty, Kylie pouted while lifting the kitten up to her cheek.

The third photo was of Kylie posing with her hair all over her face, and the fourth was a video of her cradling the kitty and kissing it.

“Absolutely beautiful,” swooned one fan in the comments section.

“You’re perfect” swooned another.

“That cat makes me smile,” said someone else.

Meanwhile, on Reddit, one penned: “Her body is amazing. Go Kylie go. Love what she’s wearing. The kitten is adorable.”

“Why is she pulling on her bottoms in 1?” asked someone else.

A third Reddit fan then speculated: “Hmmm she’s looking extra toned lately in the abdominal area.I think she got sum fat removed or something?”

While a fourth said: “I honestly wonder how often these girls go under the knife? They always look different.”

This comes after The U.S. Sun revealed Kylie‘s former housekeeper, claimed she was forced to clean Timothee Chalamet’s mansion without being properly paid in an explosive new lawsuit.

Angelica Vasquez also said she was belittled over her race, religion and immigration status by fellow domestic staffers.

More than 130 public figures express support for the proscribed group as the UK prepares for another legal fight.

More than 130 public figures have written to the UK’s Court of Appeal expressing support for Palestine Action, days before a hearing to decide on the lawfulness of the government’s ban on the direct action group.

A letter released Friday, bearing 132 signatures and addressed to the UK’s Court of Appeal, read: “We oppose genocide, we support Palestine Action.”

The declaration came in advance of hearings scheduled for April 28 and 29, during which the court is slated to hear the government’s appeal to uphold its proscription of Palestine Action.

Internationally known figures, including the writer Sally Rooney, climate campaigner Greta Thunberg and American scholar Judith Butler are among those who signed the declaration.

Others include British musicians Nadine Shah and Brian Eno, writers China Mieville, Lina Meruane and Tariq Ali, along with dozens of professors at leading universities such as Cambridge, Oxford, Yale, Columbia and the London School of Economics.

The letter’s singular sentence has become a well-known slogan used to express support for Palestine Action, which the UK government proscribed as a “terrorist organisation” in July 2025.

That designation – which placed Palestine Action in the same category as Hezbollah and al-Qaeda – makes it illegal to be a member of or express support for the group, offences punishable by up to 14 years in prison.

In February, the UK’s High Court ruled that the government’s ban was unlawful and disproportionate, prompting London’s Metropolitan Police to say it would refrain from arresting demonstrators rallying in support of the group.

But with the government appeal pending, the Met reversed course, and officers arrested more than 500 people at a protest earlier this month.

Defend Our Juries, an activist group that has organised rallies and called for the government to drop its proscription, said in a statement accompanying Friday’s letter that the signatories were vulnerable to “terrorism charges”.

“If the police proceed to arrest these scholars on terrorism charges, the authoritarian nature of the ban will be further exposed,” the group wrote. “But if they don’t, the more than 3,000 previous arrests of people for saying precisely the same thing will be shown to be not just unlawful but arbitrary and discriminatory.”

In their own statements, several signatories expressed solidarity with Palestine Action and called on the government to halt its appeal.

The UK government is “silencing the messenger”, said Neve Gordon, an international law professor at Queen Mary University of London.

“The decision to appeal the ruling rendering the proscription unlawful is yet another sign of the government’s moral bankruptcy,” he added.

On April 20, the United States fired at and then seized an Iranian-flagged container ship close to the Strait of Hormuz in the northern Arabian Sea, amid its blockade of Iranian ports.

It was similar to a scene which played out in the 1980s during the so-called Tanker War between Iran and Iraq, during which both countries fired on each other’s tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, seeking to cripple each other’s economies.

As naval tensions rise again in the Strait of Hormuz – this time between Iran and the US – we break down what happened in the 1980s and examine the parallels and differences between the situations then and now:

How the 1980s Tanker War played out – a timeline

The war between Iran and Iraq began in 1980 when then-Iraqi President Saddam Hussein launched a full-scale invasion of Iran following Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution.

In 1984, this war reached the Gulf when Iraq attacked Iranian oil tankers, seeking to cripple its oil-revenue-dependent economy. Iran retaliated by firing at oil tankers belonging to Iraq and its allies in the Gulf.

According to a report by the University of Texas’s Robert Strauss Center for International Security and Law, Iran also threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz then, but did not do so since its own economy, already crippled by the war, was dependent on exporting oil to the rest of the world through it.

In November 1986, when Iran struck Kuwait’s ships, Kuwait asked for foreign help. The former Soviet Union was the first to respond and helped escort the nation’s ships in the Gulf.

The US, led by then-president Ronald Reagan, launched Operation Earnest Will in July 1987, also seeking to protect tankers in the Gulf and render more assistance than Moscow. The operation involved reflagging Kuwaiti tankers with the US flag so they could legally sail under US protection.

According to an article by the Veterans Breakfast Club, a US-based website which shares experiences of former US military veterans, during Washington’s very first escort mission in July 1987, a reflagged tanker hit an Iranian mine in the Gulf.

“The convoy continued, but the incident made clear that the United States had entered a shadow war with Iran at sea,” the article said.

“Over the next fourteen months, dozens of US warships rotated through the region escorting tankers and protecting shipping lanes. US forces also conducted special operations to hunt Iranian mine-layers at night and conducted strikes against Iranian military positions and ships. The mission wasn’t a small one, consuming 30 US Navy ships at one time,” the article added.

Then in April 1988, the US frigate USS Samuel B Roberts was damaged by an Iranian mine in the Strait of Hormuz. Historian Samuel Cox, writing for the US Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC), noted in 2018 that by the end of 1987 that vessel was so badly damaged, that “the only thing actually holding the ship together was the main deck”.

So, the US launched Operation Praying Mantis, seeking to destroy Iranian vessels.

The tanker war eventually ended in August 1988, following a United Nations-brokered ceasefire agreement between Iran and Iraq.

Cox noted that by the end of 1987, “Iraq had conducted 283 attacks on shipping, while Iran attacked 168 times. Combined, the attacks had killed 116 merchant sailors, with 37 missing and 167 wounded, from a wide variety of nationalities.”

“Initially, there was great concern that the attacks would cut off the vital flow of oil from the Arabian Gulf, but all they really did was drive up insurance rates. The world’s need for oil was so great, that over 100 dead merchant seamen was apparently an acceptable price,” he wrote.

What is happening in the Strait of Hormuz now?

The current hostilities between the US and Iran in the Strait of Hormuz began when Tehran, whose territorial waters extend into the strait, closed passage to all vessels after the US and Israel began bombing the country. On March 4, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) declared that it was in full control of the strait, and ships would need to get clearance from them to pass through it.

Shipping through the strait collapsed by 95 percent, sending the price of oil – 20 percent of global supplies of which are shipped this way – soaring above $100 a barrel.

Iran, through its imposition of control over who passes through Hormuz, has for almost eight weeks now, determined which vessels can exit the strait from the Gulf into the Gulf of Oman.

At first, Iran indicated that it would allow “friendly” ships to pass if they paid a toll. On March 26, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told Iran’s state TV: “The Strait of Hormuz, from our perspective, is not completely closed. It is closed only to enemies. There is no reason to allow the ships of our enemies and their allies to pass.”

Vessels from Malaysia, China, Egypt, South Korea, India and Pakistan passed through the strait through most of March and early April.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) provided these vessels with an alternative route through the Strait of Hormuz to avoid potential sea mines. US officials, including Donald Trump, have said mines have been placed there by Iran, although it has not officially confirmed or denied this.

But on April 13, alarmed that Iran was continuing to ship its own oil out of the strait, the US imposed a naval blockade of all Iranian ports. Since then, US Central Command has said US forces have directed 33 Iran-linked vessels to turn around or return to an Iranian port.

On Monday, the US military fired on and then captured the Iranian-flagged container ship Touska close to the Strait of Hormuz in the northern Arabian Sea, and, a day later, detained another oil tanker sanctioned for transporting Iranian crude oil as it sailed in the Bay of Bengal, which links India and Southeast Asia.

In a post on social media after detaining the Touska, the Pentagon wrote: “As we have made clear, we will pursue global maritime enforcement efforts to disrupt illicit networks and interdict sanctioned vessels providing material support to Iran – anywhere they operate.
International waters are not a refuge for sanctioned vessels.”

Since the US naval blockade of Iranian ports began, Tehran, which was earlier allowing vessels from “friendly” nations to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, has further tightened its grip on the strait.

Justifying the decision not to allow any foreign ships to pass until the US ends its naval blockade on April 19, Iran’s First Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref said the “security of the Strait of Hormuz is not free”.

“One cannot restrict Iran’s oil exports while expecting free security for others,” he wrote in a post on X.

Last Saturday, Iran reportedly fired at two Indian-flagged merchant vessels in the strait. The IRGC said the two ships were attacked because they were “operating without authorisation”, according to state media reports.

Then, on April 22, Iran captured two container ships seeking to exit the Gulf via the Strait of Hormuz after firing on them and another vessel.

What are the parallels between the two wars?

Just like during the Tanker War of the 1980s, shipping has been severely disrupted by the US-Israel war on Iran, upending global oil and gas prices.

According to an April 17 article by the World Economic Forum, from the mid-1980s when the Tanker War took place, to the start of the new millennium, a barrel of crude oil averaged $20.

On Friday, while a ceasefire between the US and Iran was in effect, a naval battle was still playing out in the Strait of Hormuz, and Brent crude, the international benchmark, topped $106 per barrel. During open warfare between the US, Israel and Iran in March and early April, oil rose as high as $119 per barrel.

Mines in the sea are another problem common to both time periods.

While vessels were damaged by mines during the 1980s Tanker War, there has so far been no report of vessels being damaged by mines in the current war. However, the risk is the same.

US President Donald Trump has said the US will ramp up efforts to remove mines from the Strait of Hormuz. This has not begun yet, however.

According to CNN, there are only a few US minesweeping ships in the Gulf. The US Navy also told the broadcaster that four dedicated minesweepers stationed in the Gulf region were decommissioned last year.

John Phillips, a British safety, security and risk adviser and former military instructor, told Al Jazeera: “There are some clear parallels between the current situation in Hormuz and the Tanker War of the 1980s. In both cases, the basic idea is the same: pressure at sea can have effects far beyond the water itself.

“A relatively small amount of naval disruption, whether that means mining, harassment of shipping, missile threats, or attacks on tankers, can create real strategic and economic consequences, especially in a chokepoint like the Strait of Hormuz. So in that sense, the original Tanker War is a useful reminder of how vulnerable global trade can be when the maritime domain becomes part of a wider political or military confrontation.”

What are the differences between the two wars?

During the Tanker War, the US escorted ships to protect them from Iranian attacks and also deployed vessels to remove mines. NATO countries like the United Kingdom, Belgium, the Netherlands, France and Italy also joined.

But in the current standoff in the Strait of Hormuz, US allies like the UK and other NATO nations have refused to join Washington in reopening the Strait of Hormuz, or begin minesweeping operations, fearing they will be dragged into the war.

In a post on Truth Social in early April, the US president took aim at allies, “like the United Kingdom”, which, he said, have “refused to get involved in the decapitation of Iran”, telling them to either buy US fuel or get involved in the rapidly escalating war.

“You’ll have to start learning how to fight for yourself, the U.S.A. won’t be there to help you anymore, just like you weren’t there for us. Iran has been, essentially, decimated. The hard part is done. Go get your own oil!” Trump wrote.

The framework of the US-Israel war on Iran is different from that of the war between Iraq and Iran in the 1980s, experts say.

“In the 1980s, the Tanker War was part of the broader Iran-Iraq War, so the shipping attacks were tied to a much larger land conflict between two regional armies. Today, the situation is more about Iran’s standoff with the United States and its allies, and the maritime activity is less about asymmetrical war at sea and more about deterrence, signalling and the threat of escalation,” said Phillips.

“The military lesson, really, is that Hormuz is still one of those places where limited actions can have outsized effects, but the modern setting is more fast-moving, more technologically advanced and potentially more volatile than the original Tanker War,” he added.

Analysts have also pointed out that, unlike in the 1980s, Iran is currently stronger when it comes to withstanding attacks and naval blockades by the US.

In the Tanker War, Iraq was militarily supported by Western allies, while Iran was under a US arms embargo imposed in 1979 after the Iranian revolution. While this gave Iraq a military advantage, Iran’s IRGC used asymmetric warfare tactics by striking Iraq’s allies’ ships and oil tankers.

Experts also say that since the 12-day war between Iran and Israel last year, Tehran has shifted its military doctrine from one that is primarily about defensive containment to an explicitly offensive asymmetric posture.

“Iran today appears more structurally aggressive in doctrine where it is formally embracing earlier and more extensive use of regional missiles, drones, cyberattacks and energy coercion [when energy resources and infrastructure are targeted or cut off], but is operationally constrained by battle damage, sanctions and internal instability,” Phillips, the risk adviser and a former military chief instructor, told Al Jazeera in an interview on March 2.

A former US ambassador to Bahrain, Adam Ereli, also told Al Jazeera that Iran and the IRGC have “revolutionary fervour”, which means they can “survive”.

“They can tolerate pain for a lot longer than I think most American decision-makers and planners calculate,” he said.

Writing obituaries is a sacred, tricky task. Major news organizations compose advance obits on major figures, a just-in-case endeavor that feels both hugely important and somewhat macabre.

Several years ago, it fell to me to compose an advance death notice for the legendary conductor Michael Tilson Thomas, who was confronting a terminal brain cancer diagnosis by doubling down on his performance schedule and delivering — by all accounts — spectacular performances.

The piece lay blessedly dormant for longer than anyone thought possible as Tilson Thomas persevered in the face of his illness — an inspiration to all who knew and loved him. And then, yesterday morning, it became necessary to publish. There was a rush to update the writing, to fact-check the timeline, to be sure that all salient points were included. Here was the final story of a remarkable human’s life. The sense of responsibility cannot be overstated.

I was surprised to learn that a former colleague at the paper had also written an advance obit on Tilson Thomas, so my editor worked to meld the two together. The other writer included information that I had missed and vice versa, so in many ways it turned out to be a good thing that we had mistakenly doubled up on the weighty task.

One detail that the other writer included that was formerly unknown to me: A Times story from 1985 reported Tilson Thomas walking off the stage at the Hollywood Bowl nearly 15 minutes into the hourlong second movement of Part II of Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 8. Tilson Thomas did this, according to the archived news clip, because a noisy police helicopter simply would not go away.

A reader wrote in after the obituary went live to say that he had been there when it happened, and offered up this fresh insight:

“I was at the concert. The helicopter was hovering long, low and loud(!) with a bright searchlight scanning the trees behind the shell. It was an impossible situation which [Tilson Thomas] handled with quiet dignity. And when he returned to the stage he opted to re-start the Second Movement of Mahler VIII from the top! It was a long and memorable night at the Bowl.”

Our obituary described Tilson Thomas as storming off the stage. Not so, said the reader.

“More determination than storm,” he wrote.

And suddenly I could picture it, that moment from more than 40 years ago, with Tilson Thomas displaying the singular determination and love for his craft that would sustain him much later in life when he faced down death with the same quiet grace, the same unwavering resolve. And the music … I can hear it over the chop-chop-chop of the helicopter, until Tilson Thomas is all that remains.

I’m Arts editor Jessica Gelt feeling grateful for stories past. This is your arts and culture news for the week.

The week ahead: A curated calendar

FRIDAY

Craft Contemporary hosts CLAY LA this weekend.

(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)

CLAY LA
Emerging and established ceramic artists gather their wares for Craft Contemporary’s ninth annual fundraiser, a vibrant marketplace with complimentary refreshments, music and hands-on air-dry clay activities. Fun fact: The museum was founded by Edith R. Wyle, grandmother of “The Pitt’s” Noah Wyle.
Market Preview Night, 6-9 p.m. Friday, $20 general admission, $15 members; weekend market, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday (free with $9 museum admission) and Sunday (pay-what-you-wish admission); regular museum hours, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesday-Sunday; noon-8 p.m., the first Thursday of the month. Craft Contemporary, 5814 Wilshire Blvd. craftcontemporary.org

Music director James Conlon of at L.A. Opera will conduct his farewell concert Friday at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.

(Ariana Drehsler/For The Times)

James Conlon Farewell Concert
The maestro, who is stepping down after 20 years as LA Opera’s music director, leads the organization’s full orchestra and chorus for an evening of Mozart, Verdi and Wagner as his grand finale. The event is followed by a celebratory gala on the stage of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.
7 p.m. Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N. Grand Ave., downtown L.A. laopera.org

SATURDAY
John Adams & Conrad Tao
The LA Phil’s John and Samantha Williams Creative Chair conducts the orchestra in a program that includes Piazzolla’s “Two Tangos,” Stravinsky’s “Song of the Nightingale” and Prokofiev’s “Lieutenant Kijé Suite,” plus pianist Conrad Tao performing Adams’ composition “Century Rolls,” inspired by 1920s self-playing pianos.
8 p.m. Saturday; 2 p.m. Sunday. Walt Disney Concert Hall, 111 S. Grand Ave., downtown L.A. laphil.com

Brewery Artwalk & Open Studios
This free semi-annual event at the former Pabst Blue Ribbon Brewery north of downtown features more than 100 artists sharing, discussing and (ideally) selling their work in the very spaces that much of it is created.
11 a.m.-6 p.m Saturday and Sunday. Brewery Arts Complex, 2100 N. Main St., L.A. breweryartwalk.com

Jerrika Hinton and Bradley Gibson in “Fremont Ave.” runs April 25-May 23 at South Coast Repertory.

(Marc J. Franklin)

Fremont Ave.
The world premiere of Reggie D. White’s multi-generational drama about three Black men in L.A. and the woman who is the glue in their lives. Directed by Lili-Anne Brown. Part of the Pacific Playwrights Festival.
Previews, 8 p.m. Saturday; 7 p.m. Sunday and Tuesday-Thursday; opening night, May 1; regular performances, May 2-23. South Coast Repertory, Segerstrom Stage, 655 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. scr.org

The Liminary
It’s 2042 in Last Call Theatre’s latest immersive experience and the U.S. is run by a nationalistic, isolationist government. Do you dare join the resistance? With interactive exhibits on immigration, community and hope, plus multiple endings and narratives inspired by the saga of immigrants.
8 p.m Saturday; 8 p.m. May 1-2, May 7-9 and May 14-16. 1919 3rd Ave. L.A. lastcalltheatre.com

Liz Larner, “smile (abiding),” 1996-2005; Rachel Harrison, “The Prepper,” 2024; and Rebecca Morris, “Untitled (#15-25), 2025” from the exhibition “planchette” at Regen Projects.

(Regen Projects)

planchette
A group exhibition featuring contemporary abstract sculptures and paintings by influential artists Rachel Harrison, Liz Larner and Rebecca Morris.
Opening reception, 6-8 p.m.; exhibit runs through May 23. Regen Projects, 6750 Santa Monica Blvd. L.A. regenprojects.com

SUNDAY
Gabriel Kahane & Roomful of Teeth
The eclectic singer-songwriter-composer teams up with the multi-Grammy-winning vocal group to perform music from their recently-released collaborative album, “Elevator Songs.”
7 p.m. Sid The Cat Auditorium, 1022 El Centro St., South Pasadena. sidthecat.com

WEDNESDAY

The Australian Chamber Orchestra comes to the Segerstrom Center for the Arts on Wednesday, April 29.

(Nic Walker)

Australian Chamber Orchestra
The ensemble from down under performs Purcell’s “Fantasia on One Note,” Handel’s “Concerto Grosso in A Major, Op. 6 No. 11,” a new work by John Luther Adams titled “Horizon,” Vaughan Williams’ “The Lark Ascending” (arranged by Adam Johnson), and Schubert’s ”Death and the Maiden” in the candlelit intimacy of the Samueli Theater.
7 p.m. Segerstrom Center for the Arts, 600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. scfta.org

Jason Delane, left. and Chuma Gault in “Hymn” at the Odyssey Theatre.

(Cooper Bates)

Hymn
In this drama by British playwright Lolita Chakrabarti, best known for her stage adaptations of the novels “Life of Pi” and “Hamnet,” two Black men meet at a funeral and discover a life-changing connection. Gregg T. Daniel directs this co-production between the Odyssey Theatre and the Lower Depth Theatre.
Previews 8, p.m. Wednesday, Thursday and May 1; 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays (an Wednesday, May 27); 3 p.m. Sundays (except May 31), through June 14. Odyssey Theatre, 2055 S. Sepulveda Blvd. odysseytheatre.com

THURSDAY

Los Angeles Ballet presents “Giselle” with Kate Inoue at the Ahmanson Theatre, April 30-May 3.

(Alex Lopez)

‘Giselle’
The Los Angeles Ballet’s staging of this classic supernatural romance features the original 1841 choreography by Jean Coralli and Jules Perrot (updated by Marius Petipa) and score by composer Adolphe Adam.
7:30 p.m. Thursday-May 2 and 2 p.m. May 3. Ahmanson Theatre, 135 N. Grand Ave., downtown L.A. losangelesballet.org

The 1967 romantic comedy “Barefoot in the Park,” starring Jane Fonda and Robert Redford, opens the TCM Classic Film Festival on Thursday.

(Paramount Pictures)

TCM Classic Film Festival
Hollywood Boulevard comes alive with four days of movie magic beginning with the opening night presentation of the 1967 romantic comedy “Barefoot in the Park,” starring Robert Redford and Jane Fonda. Other screenings include “Alice In Wonderland” (1951), “A Place In The Sun” (1951), “Gaslight” (1944), “Out Of The Past (1947) , “Modern Times” (1936), “The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951) and “The Magnificent Seven” (1960), with appearances by Fonda, Barbara Hershey, Carol Burnett, John Turturro and many more.
Thursday-May 3. TCL Chinese Theatre IMAX, 6925 Hollywood Blvd.; Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel; TCL Chinese 6 Theatres multiplex, 6801 Hollywood Blvd.; El Capitan Theatre, 6838 Hollywood Blvd.; Egyptian Theatre, 6712 Hollywood Blvd. filmfestival.tcm.com

Arts anywhere

New and recent releases of arts-related media.

French Violinist Renaud Capucon, seen performing during the 2024 Paris Olympics, has a new live album featuring the works of composer Ernest Chausson.

(Kristy Sparow / Getty Images)

Chausson
This concert album pairs two pieces by French Romantic composer Ernest Chausson: “Concerto for Violin, Piano and String Quartet, Op. 21.,” performed by violinist Renaud Capuçon, the late pianist Nicholas Angelich and the Ébène Quartet, and “Poème” for violin and orchestra, featuring Capuçon and the Brussels Philharmonic led by conductor Stéphane Denève. The show was recorded live in 2020. Warner Classics/Erato: Digital ($10) and CD ($17).

The City Unseen
Emmy-winning producer-director Daniel Sackheim, whose credits include “Law & Order,” “The X-Files” and “The Americans,” is also a serious photographer. His new book of black-and-white images casts Los Angeles as the protagonist in a noir landscape of nocturnal beauty where its darkest secrets lurk in the deepest shadows. Hat & Beard Press: 108 pages, $60.

International Jazz Day
The 15th annual event is Thursday in Chicago, but you can celebrate early with PBS’ broadcast of last year’s International Jazz Day All-Star Concert from Abu Dabai. Hosted by Jeremy Irons, the lineup includes Herbie Hancock, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Kurt Elling, Jose James, John McLaughlin, Helene Mercier, Danilo Perez, Arturo Sandoval and more.
10 p.m. Friday. PBS SoCal and streaming at pbssocal.org

— Kevin Crust

Culture news and the SoCal scene

Attendees walk around the Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s new David Geffen Galleries in Los Angeles on Sunday, April 19, 2025.

(Ariana Drehsler/For The Times)

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art news did not stop last week as it threw a glitzy opening gala for the new David Geffen Galleries, and — a few days later — welcomed members for previews prior to opening its doors to the general public on May 4. I attended the gala and checked in with a number of wonderful artists, including Mark Bradford, Ed Ruscha and Jeff Koons, about their thoughts on the new building. Then, on Sunday, we sent a team to get member reactions to the new space. Later in the week we published critic Leah Ollman’s review of the inaugural installation. Spoiler alert: Nope, not gonna give you one. You’ll have to read it.

We also ran a lovely profile by contributor Tara Anne Dalbow about Eileen Harris Norton whose jaw-dropping art collection is currently on display at Hauser & Wirth in downtown L.A. “Few people have done more to shape Los Angeles’ art scene than Eileen Harris Norton,” writes Dalbow. “The third-generation Californian, born and raised near Watts Towers in South Los Angeles, bought her first artwork at the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza, co-founded Art + Practice in Leimert Park, and has spent 50 years collecting artists who were, in many cases, her friends and neighbors.”

Joey Stromberg and Jenny Soo in “For Want of a Horse” at the Echo Theater Company.

(Cooper Bates)

Times theater critic Charles McNulty was — as always — incredibly busy, publishing two reviews and a feature in the past week. First up, his take on “For Want of a Horse” by Olivia Dufault, currently receiving its world premiere in an Echo Theater Company production at Atwater Village Theatre. “The subject is zoophilia, not to be confused with bestiality, though for many of us it will be a distinction without much of a difference,” McNulty writes. Curious? Read on.

McNulty also delivered a thoughtful profile Nicholas Christopher, who he dined with on a recent trip to New York. “A new Broadway star emerges each season, and this year the spotlight has alighted on Nicholas Christopher, who has been dazzling audiences and insiders alike as part of the awe-inspiring triumvirate powering the thrilling new revival of the musical ‘Chess,’” McNulty writes.

Finally, McNulty reviewed “Eat Me,” by Talene Monahon, having its world premiere at South Coast Repertory. A fan of Monahon‘s previous work, McNulty was not as impressed at he would have liked. The play, he writes, “is a relentlessly quirky work that gorges on its own dark whimsy.”

In other news, I got the scoop that new media artist Refik Anadol’s museum of AI arts, Dataland has set its opening date for June 20.

Elinor Gunn in “Joan” at South Coast Repertory. SCR has announced its 2026-27 season.

(Scott Smeltzer)

South Coast Repertory announced an expanded 2026-27 season, featuring nine productions, including “Hamlet,” starring Raymond Lee; Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s “Into the Woods;” Lauren Yee’s “Mother Russia;” and Oscar Wilde’s classic, “The Importance of Being Earnest.” “The 2026-27 season reflects programming changes established in SCR’s recently adopted strategic plan, which includes more classics, modern masterpieces and the continuation of an annual musical on the Segerstrom Stage,” a news release notes.

“GUAC,” the heartbreaking one-man show by a father who lost his son in the 2018 Parkland school shooting, returns Tuesday to Center Theatre Group’s Kirk Douglas Theatre after playing to a packed house last September. Manuel Oliver’s devastating plea for gun control runs for three weeks only, through May 17.

— Jessica Gelt

And last but not least

If you’re sad that you missed Coachella, this story about how much people paid to attend will make you feel all better.

April 24 (UPI) — Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Friday dismissed an alleged leak from the U.S. Department of Defense suggesting that Spain could face being suspended from NATO in retaliation for not supporting the United States in its war with Iran.

Arriving in Cyprus for a meeting of European Union leaders, Sanchez said he was not worried and that Spain was fully compliant with its treaty commitments to the collective defense pact.

“No worries. The Spanish government’s position is clear: absolute cooperation with our allies, but always within the framework of international law,” was his response to questions regarding a leaked Pentagon email setting out potential actions that could be taken against NATO allies who failed to adequately support the war or were otherwise seen as uncooperative.

However, Sanchez refused to be drawn directly on the alleged contents of the internal U.S. government communication leaked by a U.S. official to Reuters, which broke the story on Friday.

He said the Spanish government could talk about relevant official U.S. documents and policy positions but “does not comment on emails.”

An outspoken critic of the U.S. military offensive against Iran, Spain was highlighted as the prime candidate for being ejected from NATO, but the United Kingdom was also earmarked for retribution with a proposal pitching a rethink of Washington’s support for British sovereignty over the Falkland Islands.

In 1982, Britain fought and won a 74-day war with Argentina over the South Atlantic territory after its forces overran and seized islands.

President Donald Trump was incensed by Sanchez’s refusal to permit U.S. military aircraft to use U.S.-Spanish airbases or Spain’s airspace to launch strikes on Iran, culminating in him threatening to sever bilateral trade.

Britain initially denied permission for U.S. warplanes to use its airbases but relented two days or so after the start of the war on Feb. 28, allowing aircraft engaged in “defensive” missions to fly out of RAF bases in Britain and Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.

The Pentagon, which the Trump administration moved to rename to the Department of War, appeared to justify taking some type of punitive action.

Pentagon Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson said NATO allies “were not there for us” regardless of “everything” the United States had done for them.

“The War Department will ensure that the president has credible options to ensure that our allies are no longer a paper tiger and instead do their part. We have no further comment on any internal deliberations to that effect,” she added.

Calling NATO “a source of strength,” Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who was also attending the EU summit, called for unity.

“We must work to strengthen Nato’s European pillar… which must clearly complement the American one,” she said.

Berlin dismissed the idea Spain’s position within NATO was under any threat.

“Spain is a member of NATO. And I see no reason why that should change,” a German government spokesman said at a regular news briefing on Friday.

The 1949 treaty under which NATO was formed by the United States, Britain, France, Canada, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal, Luxembourg, Denmark, Norway and Iceland as a response to the Cold War contains no process or means for the expulsion or suspension of a member country.

Former NATO spokesperson and senior fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, Oana Lungescu, also dismissed the idea Spain could be suspended.

“It’s hard to know how seriously we should take such emails beyond ideological trolling,” she said.

Prestianni suspended ​for homophobic discriminatory conduct in Champions League match ‌against ​Real Madrid in February.

Benfica’s ‌Gianluca Prestianni has been handed a six-match suspension for discriminatory conduct ⁠that was deemed ⁠homophobic in a Champions League match against Real Madrid, UEFA announced.

Prestianni will be banned for two ⁠more matches after UEFA said on Friday that a further three-match suspension would be “subject to a probationary period of two years, starting from the date ⁠of the present decision”. He has already served a one-match provisional suspension.

The Argentinian winger was accused of directing a racist slur at Real Madrid forward Vinicius Jr during the Spanish side’s 1-0 Champions League playoff first-leg win ‌in February.

The first leg was suspended for 11 minutes shortly after Vinicius gave Real the lead early in the second half.

Television footage showed Prestianni covering his mouth with his shirt repeatedly before making comments that Vinicius and nearby teammates interpreted as a racial slur against the 25-year-old.

Prestianni had denied the accusation that he had made ⁠a racist comment, saying Vinicius had misheard him. Real’s ⁠Aurelien Tchouameni said the Argentinian told him he did not call Vinicius a “monkey” but directed a homophobic comment at him.

UEFA also said they would request FIFA to extend the ⁠suspension worldwide.

The suspension includes the one-match provisional suspension Prestianni served during the second leg of ⁠their knockout playoff on February 25, which ⁠Real Madrid won 2-1 to advance.

Benfica said they had been notified about the sanction imposed on Prestianni.

“Of the three-match effective ban, one has already been served and the remaining two ‌must be served in UEFA matches or Argentina national team matches in a FIFA context,” Benfica said.

Prestianni has played for Argentina only once, ‌making ‌his debut as a late substitute in a friendly game against Angola in November.

Choosin’ to stay home instead of trekking out to Indio for this weekend’s Stagecoach festival? Don’t worry, you’ll be able to listen to all the country music your heart desires. You can get your country heartbreak on with Ella Langley, Bailey Zimmerman and Cody Johnson, and then rock out with Counting Crows. If you prefer EDM, you can catch Diplo and Dillstradamus (Dillon Francis and Flosstradamus) as Friday’s closing acts.

The festival will be livestreamed on Amazon Music, Amazon Prime Video and Twitch beginning at 3 p.m. On Sirius XM’s The Highway (channel 56), you can listen to exclusive interviews and live performances along with a special edition of the Music Row Happy Hour. The station Y’Allternative will also be covering the festival on Friday evening.

Here are updated set times for the Stagecoach livestream Friday performances (times presented are PDT):

Channel 1

3:05 p.m. Noah Rinker; 3:25 p.m.; Adrien Nunez; 4 p.m. Ole 60; 4:25 p.m. Avery Anna; 5 p.m. Chase Rice; 5:55 p.m. Nate Smith; 6:50 p.m. Ella Langeley; 7:50 p.m. Bailey Zimmerman; 8:55 p.m. the Red Clay Strays; 10 p.m. Cody Johnson; 11:30 p.m. Diplo

Channel 2

3:05 p.m. Neon Union; 3:25 p.m. Larkin Poe; 4 p.m. Marcus King Band; 4:50 p.m. Lyle Lovett; 5:35 p.m. BigXthaPlug; 6:30 p.m. Noah Cyrus; 7 p.m. Wynonna Judd; 8 p.m. Counting Crows; 8:50 p.m. Sam Barber; 10 p.m. Dan + Shay; 10:45 p.m. Diplo featuring Juicy J; 11:05 p.m. Rebecca Black; 11:45 p.m. Dillstradamus

Sirius XM Music Row Happy Hour

1 p.m. Avery Anna; 2 p.m. Nate Smith; 2:30 p.m. Josh Ross; 3 p.m. Cody Johnson; 3:30 p.m. Gabriella Rose; 5:15 p.m. Nate Smith; 7:50 p.m. Bailey Zimmerman; 9:30 p.m. Cody Johnson; 11 p.m. Diplo

Sirius XM Y’Allternative

5 p.m. Ole 60; 6 p.m. Larkin Poe; 7 p.m. Marcus King Band; 8 p.m. Sam Barber

April 24 (UPI) — A bill to legalize assisted-dying in England and Wales was Friday set to run out of time to complete all the necessary stages for it to become law in the current session of parliament, 10 months after MPs passed the legislation.

The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill has been stalled in its committee stage in the House of Lords since June but with Friday set to be the final debate in the upper chamber before the 2024-2026 session ends in early May, it has run out of road.

“Detailed line-by-line scrutiny of the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill continues,” The Lords said Friday in its order of business for the day.

Members have used up all 14 committee-stage days allotted for the bill as they attempted to grapple with more than 1,000 amendments covering everything from blocking overseas patients from accessing the treatment and the inclusion of people injured serving in the military or in industrial accidents to making patients aware of non-lethal treatment options.

Only around halfway through the stages required before it can receive “Royal Assent” from King Charles and finally become law, the bill can no longer proceed and cannot be carried over to the 2026-2027 session.

Supporters vowed not to give up on the bill, which would give terminally ill adults with less than six months to live the legal right to end their lives with the help of medical professionals, saying they would try to reintroduce it when the new parliament convenes on May 13.

The bill’s sponsor, Labour MP Kim Leadbeater, said she had a group of backers who had agreed to try to bring back the bill immediately following the state opening of parliament.

To do so, they need to prevail in a ballot in which MPs compete for 25 slots to introduce legislation they have authored to the House of Commons, so-called private members’ bills.

The next private members’ bill ballot is scheduled for May 21.

Leadbeater said she was disappointed, upset and angry at the outcome.

She said that terminally ill patients and their families she had been speaking with felt “a real sense of feeling let down by our democratic system.”

“This is not over. The issue is not going to go away just because of an undemocratic filibuster in the Lords. We will keep pushing for a safer, more compassionate law until parliament reaches a final decision.”

Opponents were concerned over the watering down of key safeguards in the original bill introduced in the House of Commons in November 2024, including dropping the requirement for a High Court judge to review every case.

“If we’re going to do this, we have to have safeguards and I really don’t think there are anywhere near enough safeguards in it,” said Baroness Grey-Thompson, adding that it was the job of peers to go through every line in legislation.

She told the BBC that when bills failed it because it was usually because they were poorly drafted, rather than because of the number of amendments tabled.

“It was written in haste and there are so many gaps in it that a number of peers are really uncomfortable with this particular bill, even though they may be in favor of the principle,” she said.

Leadbeater said she hoped the Commons would pass the bill again and an accommodation could be agreed with members of the upper house over amendments.

She did not rule out invoking a very rarely used procedural maneuver, a theoretical nuclear option that dates back more than a century in which the Lords is rendered powerless to stop a bill that the House of Commons has passed more than once from becoming law — but said she hoped that would not be necessary.

A United States mediated ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon has come under strain after Hezbollah dismissed the agreement as ineffective. The truce, which took effect on April 16, was recently extended by three weeks following talks hosted by Donald Trump at the White House with Israeli and Lebanese representatives.

The ceasefire was intended to reduce hostilities that reignited on March 2, when Hezbollah launched attacks in support of Iran amid a broader regional conflict. While the agreement led to a noticeable drop in violence, clashes have not fully stopped. Israeli forces have continued operations in southern Lebanon, maintaining a self declared buffer zone, while Hezbollah has accused Israel of carrying out strikes, assassinations, and destruction of towns.

Hezbollah lawmaker Ali Fayyad stated that the continued attacks render the ceasefire meaningless and reaffirmed the group’s position that it reserves the right to respond to any Israeli action.

Why it matters
The fragile ceasefire highlights the difficulty of de escalating conflicts in the Middle East, especially when multiple fronts and actors are involved. Continued violations risk collapsing the agreement entirely, which could lead to a wider confrontation between Israel and Hezbollah.

The situation is further complicated by its connection to broader regional tensions involving Iran, making the ceasefire not just a bilateral issue but part of a larger geopolitical struggle. A breakdown could escalate into a more sustained and destructive conflict along the Lebanon Israel border.

Stakeholders
Hezbollah remains a central actor, positioning itself as a resistance force while balancing domestic and regional pressures. Israel is focused on security concerns and maintaining its buffer zone in southern Lebanon.

The United States is playing a mediating role, attempting to prevent escalation and maintain stability. Iran, as a key ally of Hezbollah, continues to influence the group’s strategic decisions and has pushed for Lebanon to be included in wider ceasefire discussions.

The Lebanese government is also a stakeholder, as continued conflict threatens its sovereignty, infrastructure, and already fragile economy.

What’s next
The extended ceasefire will be tested in the coming weeks as both sides continue limited engagements. If violations persist, the agreement could unravel, leading to intensified clashes.

Diplomatic efforts led by Washington may continue, but their success will depend on whether both Israel and Hezbollah show restraint on the ground. Without a broader regional understanding that includes Iran, the chances of a lasting ceasefire remain uncertain.

With information from Reuters.

AFTER 14 episodes, I’m A Celebrity All Stars is set to conclude at the grand finale with the winner set to be announced TONIGHT.

What was once 12 has now become four as the remaining celebs prepare to learn their fates.

What time is the I’m A Celeb All Stars final on tonight?

The final instalment of I’m A Celeb All Stars will be shown live tonight from an ITV studio in London.

It will be shown across two parts, with the first section running from 7.30pm to 9pm, and the second from 10pm to 10.30pm.

In the hour gap, Graham Norton’s new reality show The Neighbourhood will premiere on ITV.

Viewers will be able to vote for who they want to be King of the Jungle from the final four celebs remaining.

star out

I’m A Celeb star pulls out of final after Ant & Dec insist whole cast will attend

‘ARD TIMES

Why did Jimmy Bullard leave I’m A Celeb All Stars?

Votes will be counted by the 10pm programme, where the winner will be confirmed by hosts Ant and Dec.

Which stars are in the final?

As previously mentioned, just four celebs remain in the show after eight departures happened in South Africa.

The final four include Harry Redknapp, Mo Farah, Craig Charles, and Adam Thomas.

That means for the first time in over two decades the show has an all-male final – confirming that the winner will be King of the Jungle rather than Queen.

Football legend Harry Redknapp will be hoping he can repeat history as he won the show back in 2018, while Mo Farah has already beaten his last appearance back in 2021 where he placed fifth.

Fan favourite Craig Charles was amongst the top contenders to win the show when he first appeared in 2014, before having to leave the series early after his brother Dean suffered a fatal heart attack.

Whereas actor Adam Thomas will be hoping to win the show after experiencing drama with David Haye and Jimmy Bullard during his time in the jungle.

Who has been eliminated from the show?

Eight celebs have left the show in order to get to the final four.

The first to go was comedian Seann Walsh on day nine after being given the boot by Team Lion leader and finalist Harry Redknapp.

Next up to leave the jungle was controversial campmate David Haye on day 11 after a campmate vote-off.

Before Gemma Collins packed her bags in the same episode after David chose her when given the choice of another celeb to leave the camp with him.

Beverley Callard was next to leave on day 12 due to medical reasons and has since confirmed she won’t be present at the live finale after being diagnosed with breast cancer.

The most shocking elimination was Jimmy Bullard’s as he called out “I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here!” during a trial.

His decision to quit caused a row between him and Adam Thomas as the campmates were paired up and relying on each other – meaning Jimmy took Adam down with him by quitting.

Fortunately for Adam, who has since progressed to the final, the rules were bent and he was allowed to remain in the jungle.

Ashley Roberts and Sinitta were both recently eliminated off the back of being slowest to finish their trials.

Whilst Scarlett Moffatt was kicked out just 24 hours before the grand finale after losing a trial called Keep Your Eye on the Ball.

Ex-intelligence officer Amjad Youssef was seen shooting blindfolded civilians in a leaked video.

Syrian authorities have arrested the main suspect accused of the 2013 Tadamon massacre in Damascus, during which at least 41 people were killed.

Amjad Youssef was arrested following a “tightly executed security operation”, the interior ministry said, adding that surveillance and tracking operations were employed for days across the Al-Ghab Plain in Hama.

Footage circulating on social media showed the moment Youssef was arrested. He is seen handcuffed on the floor and then in a vehicle surrounded by security forces, with traces of blood on his face.

An intelligence officer during the leadership of former Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, Youssef was responsible for security operations in southern Damascus during the Syrian uprising. He has been accused of numerous crimes against civilians.

In 2022, a leaked video appeared to show evidence of crimes committed by Syrian forces. Youssef, whose face appeared clearly in the footage, was seen shooting civilians who had been detained and blindfolded, with their hands bound.

A military recruit filmed the incident and leaked the video, date-stamped on the day of the Tadamon massacre – April 16, 2013, after fleeing war-torn Syria.

The release of the video footage triggered an outcry, with some families recognising their relatives being killed in the video.

Youssef went into hiding after the fall of Assad in December 2024.

The Tadamon district was a battlefront between Syrian government forces and opposition forces at that time.

Youssef was trained in military intelligence and rose through the ranks to become an investigator.

Accountability following the massacre

In August 2023, German police arrested Ahmed al-Harmouni, a friend of Youssef, also accused of taking part in the Tadamon massacre, after a three-year investigation in cooperation with the Syrian Centre for Justice and Accountability.

Syria’s new government began a security campaign to pursue figures of the former leadership, while citizens launched a public fundraising campaign to offer a reward to anyone who could find those accused of atrocities, primarily Youssef.

Since then, several suspects of the Tadamon tragedy have been arrested and confessed to the killings.

Human Rights Watch visited the southern Damascus neighbourhood in December 2024, where it found human remains that showed signs consistent with execution and called on the transitional authorities to preserve evidence of war crimes.

United States President Donald Trump has claimed Iran is “collapsing financially” and said the country is losing millions of dollars a day due to Washington’s naval blockade of Iranian ports.

In a post on his Truth Social platform on Tuesday night, Trump wrote: “Iran is collapsing financially! They want the Strait of Hormuz opened immediately – Starving for cash! Losing 500 Million Dollars a day. Military and Police complaining that they are not getting paid. SOS!!!”

The US blockade of Iranian ports began at 14:00 GMT on April 13. Since then, the US has fired on and seized an Iranian-flagged tanker near the Strait of Hormuz, and redirected ships in the open seas carrying cargo to or from Iran. Iran’s armed forces have called this “an illegal act” that “amounts to piracy”.

In response to the US naval blockade, Iran has closed the Strait of Hormuz to all foreign shipping and has captured several foreign-flagged ships. Previously, it had allowed some ships deemed “friendly” to Iran to pass.

On April 19, Iran’s First Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref said the “security of the Strait of Hormuz is not free”.

“One cannot restrict Iran’s oil exports while expecting free security for others,” he wrote in a post on X.

“The choice is clear: either a free oil market for all, or the risk of significant costs for everyone,” he added. “Stability in global fuel prices depends on a guaranteed and lasting end to the economic and military pressure against Iran and its allies.”

In a statement on social media on Thursday, Iran’s parliamentary speaker and lead negotiator in the ceasefire talks, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said a full ceasefire could only work if the US naval blockade is lifted.

Analysts say the blockade is hurting Iran but believe the country has the economic and political will to sustain it.

How long can Iran survive the naval blockade?

Here’s what we know:

How is the naval blockade hurting Iran?

Iran exports oil, gas and other goods including petrochemicals, plastics and agricultural products by sea. Analysts say the US naval blockade of its ports, including in the Strait of Hormuz, could therefore affect this trade.

Soon after the start of the US-Israel war on Iran on February 28, authorities in Tehran implemented the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the only waterway out of the Gulf, through which 20 percent of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) supplies were shipped from Gulf producers in peacetime.

The near-shutdown of the vital chokepoint sent global oil and gas prices soaring, and since then, Iran has controlled the strait. However, it has continued to export its own energy products through the waterway.

Iran’s oil exports through the Strait of Hormuz account for about 80 percent of its total oil exports. According to Kpler, a trade intelligence firm, Iran exported 1.84 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil in March and has shipped 1.71 million bpd so far in April, compared with an average of 1.68 million bpd in 2025.

From March 15 to April 14, it exported 55.22 million barrels of oil. The price per barrel of Iranian oil – across its three major variants, known as Iranian light, Iranian heavy and Forozan blend – has not fallen below $90 per barrel over the past month. On many days, the price has surpassed $100 a barrel.

Even at the conservative estimate of $90 a barrel, Iran has earned at least $4.97bn over the past month from its ongoing oil exports.

By contrast, in early February before the war started, Iran was earning about $115m a day from its crude oil exports, or $3.45bn in a month.

Simply put, Iran has earned 40 percent more from oil exports in the past month than it did before the war.

Stopping this is a key motivation behind the US naval blockade of Iranian ports.

In an interview with Al Jazeera on April 14, Frederic Schneider, a nonresident senior fellow at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs, told Al Jazeera that the previous six weeks had been a boon for Iran in terms of oil revenues, but with the US blockade, that will change.

“Iran has some buffer in the form of crude oil reserves in floating tanks – basically parked tankers – which was estimated at about 127 million barrels in February. But that doesn’t mean that the blockade wouldn’t hurt Iran,” he said.

On Friday, Schneider told Al Jazeera that Iran, however, seems to be “playing the longer game” and has anticipated and prepared for this sort of conflict to some degree.

“The naval blockade has added economic strain, as several civilian ships have been captured in international waters. But it remains unclear how tight the blockade is, how many ships manage to pass given the considerable amount of floating Iranian oil, and how long Trump can maintain the blockade,” he said.

Can the US keep the blockade going for long?

Schneider noted that Trump will face a legislative challenge by May 1, when the 60 days he can maintain a foreign offensive without congressional approval come to an end.

Dire conditions have been reported on the ships that are upholding the blockade, he said, and it remains to be seen how China will react to the continuing seizure of ships that carry any of its cargo.

“China has already said it sees the blockade of Chinese trade with Iran as unacceptable. Further, the closure of Hormuz by Iran in retaliation is hurting, if not the US itself that much, American allies in the region and globally, raising the pressure on Trump,” he said.

“If we can glean anything from the behaviour of the two sides, it is Iran that is signalling patience and Trump showing impatience,” he added.

Adam Ereli, a former US ambassador to Bahrain, told Al Jazeera’s This is America programme that while the US blockade of Iranian ports and seizure of vessels transporting Iranian oil “makes sense” as a policy, it may not work as intended due to domestic political considerations in the US.

“The Iranians have prepared for this, for this eventuality. They have their own plans. They’ve got alternative means of storing their oil or selling their oil,” Ereli told Al Jazeera.

“Even if they ran out of oil, they have ways to survive a very tough blockade and sanctions regime that, frankly, I think will outlast Trump’s patience and the patience of the American people,” he said.

“Remember, this isn’t just about moving soldiers and ships and planes around on a map. There’s politics involved here in the United States,” he added.

“Trump is nothing if not attuned to the political winds. And for that reason, I think that you’ve got this Iran strategy on the one hand that runs up against an electoral strategy on another hand, and therefore, the question is, which one is going to give?”

Can Iran store the oil the US is blockading in the meantime?

Iran’s domestic refineries have a capacity of 2.6 million bpd, according to consultancy FGE Energy. Its oil and gas production facilities are concentrated in southwestern provinces: Khuzestan for oil and Bushehr for gas and condensate from the South Pars gasfield.

Iran is also the third-largest oil producer in the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and exports 90 percent of its crude oil via Kharg Island for shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.

The US naval blockade has begun affecting the country’s storage capacity, according to TankerTrackers, the maritime intelligence agency. The blockade means Iran has to store more oil, and space could become tight.

TankerTrackers said that on Kharg Island, to prepare for the possibility of running out of oil storage space, Iran has brought an old tanker named NASHA (9079107) out of retirement.

“She’s a 30yo [year old] VLCC [Very Large Crude Carrier] that’s been anchored empty for the past few years; currently spending 4 days on a trip that should take 1.5-2 days,” TankerTrackers said in a post on X, suggesting that the tanker is being used to store oil. It is unclear if the ship has a heading or course.

Can Iran continue to earn revenues from oil?

Yes, analysts say that for a few months, Iran can continue to earn revenue from oil which is already in transit at sea.

Kenneth Katzman, former Iran analyst at the Congressional Research Service in Washington, DC, said Iran is not exporting new oil amid the US blockade of Iranian ports, but Tehran has between 160 million and 170 million barrels of oil “afloat” on ships around the world currently.

Those supplies, which transited the Strait of Hormuz before the US blockade was imposed, are on board hundreds of tankers and “waiting to be delivered”, Katzman told Al Jazeera.

Katzman said he had been informed by an Iranian professor that, based on those supplies, Tehran could have revenue flows that can last until August despite the US naval blockade.

“Which is a long time. Does President Trump have until August? Probably not,” he said.

“He’s probably going to have to look at kinetic escalation if he wants to bring this to the conclusion that he wants, or he’s going to have to accept less than the deal he ideally wants,” he said.

Iranian ships will still have to avoid US naval ships on the open ocean, as the US Navy has also recently intercepted ships carrying Iranian cargoes.

On Wednesday this week, for example, the US military intercepted at least three Iranian-flagged tankers in ‌Asian waters, Reuters reported, and was said to be redirecting them away from their positions near India, Malaysia and Sri Lanka.

How else can Iran earn revenue?

Besides oil revenue, Iran is also currently receiving revenue from a “toll booth” system that the country imposed on the Strait of Hormuz in March.

On Thursday, Iran’s deputy parliament speaker Hamidreza Haji-Babaei said Tehran’s central bank had received the first revenues from tolls imposed since the start of the war, according to the semiofficial Tasnim news agency. It is unclear how much that toll revenue is.

Iranian politician Alaeddin Boroujerdi told the United Kingdom-based, Farsi-language satellite TV channel Iran International in March that the country has been charging some vessels as much as $2m each to pass through the strait.

According to Lloyd’s List, the shipping news outlet, at least two vessels that have transited the strait so far have paid fees in yuan, China’s currency. Lloyd’s List reported that one “transit was brokered by a Chinese maritime services company acting as an intermediary, which also handled the payment to Iranian authorities”. It is, however, not clear how much the vessels paid.

How resilient is Iran’s leadership?

In recent days, while pressuring Iran to negotiate a ceasefire deal, US President Donald Trump has claimed that Iranians are “having a very hard time figuring out who their leader is”, alleging that there is “crazy” infighting between “moderates” and “hardliners” in Tehran.

But the country’s officials have insisted that Iran’s government is united.

Mohammad Reza Aref, Iran’s first vice president, said on Thursday: “Our political diversity is our democracy, yet in times of peril, we are a ‘Single Hand’ under one flag. To protect our soil and dignity, we transcend all labels. We are one soul, one nation.”

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi also dismissed allegations that the Iranian military may be at odds with the political leadership.

“The failure of Israel’s terrorist killings is reflected in how Iran’s state institutions continue to act with unity, purpose, and discipline,” he wrote on X, referring to the assassinations of Iranian political and military figures Israel has carried out in recent weeks.

“The battlefield and diplomacy are fully coordinated fronts in the same war. Iranians are all united, more than ever before.”

One of the strongest messages of unity came from Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian.

“In Iran, there are no radicals or moderates,” he said on X.

“We are all Iranians and revolutionaries. With ironclad unity of nation and state and obedience to the Supreme Leader, we will make the aggressor regret.”

How strong is Iran militarily?

Iran has demonstrated considerable military resilience in the face of weeks of US-Israeli strikes through its use of asymmetric warfare.

This includes the use of guerrilla tactics, cyberattacks, arming and supporting proxy armed groups and other indirect tools.

During its war with the US and Israel, Iran has targeted energy infrastructure in Israel and across the Gulf, threatened to target banking institutions and targeted US data centres of technology companies such as Amazon in the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

Iran has also blocked the Strait of Hormuz and reportedly placed mines in the strait to disrupt shipping, sending global oil prices soaring.

Since the US began its naval blockade of Iranian ports in mid-April, Iranian officials have repeatedly promised that their country will defend itself and respond to any US attack.

Earlier this week, after the US military said it had seized an Iranian vessel and ordered dozens of others to turn around, Iran also retaliated by capturing foreign commercial vessels around the Hormuz Strait, which it said violated naval regulations.

Ereli, the former US ambassador, told Al Jazeera that Iran and the IRGC have “revolutionary fervour”, which means they can “survive”. “They can tolerate pain for a lot longer than I think most American decision makers and planners calculate,” Ereli said.

Ereli said it was unknown how long Tehran could last under “siege conditions” imposed by the US, but probably a lot longer than the US anticipates.

“I think they can go a lot longer, especially than most people imagine, and especially when it comes to kneeling to the Americans,” Ereli said.

“There’s a level of pride and survival. They’re at war with us, and for them it’s a war of necessity. They’ve got to survive,” he added.

Don’t you ever wish you could explore one of L.A.’s most vibrant boulevards without a car? When the first phase of Metro’s extension to its D Line opens May 8, L.A.’s transit system will add what has long been a missing puzzle piece. A busy, traffic-snarled section of Wilshire Boulevard, home to world-class museums, restaurants and galleries, will at long last be significantly more accessible.

Ride and walk, for instance, to the newly reimagined Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and then stroll to the Original Farmers Market or the acclaimed République. Or take transit to a concert at the El Rey Theatre, then grab a pint at Tom Bergin’s. And do it all without stressing about valet or parking in a part of town where the latter is at a premium.

Though this initial phase of the D Line extension is only three stops, for residents and business owners in the community, it feels monumental.

“I’m so excited for Metro to open and for lots of people to hopefully come and peruse these streets,” says Christina Mullin, owner of Miracle Mile Toys & Gifts. Mullin, who also lives in the neighborhood, has seen the area disrupted by construction for the better part of a decade, and is hopeful the subway stops will bring in an influx of shoppers.

“It’s such a nice, walkable area,” Mullin says. “You can walk all of La Brea and all the way to the Sycamore Kitchen. This will be very good for the city.”

And it seems to be generating much excitement, at least if Metro’s own marketing is any indication. A line of innuendo-filled “Ride the D” shirts went viral and then almost instantaneously sold out. (Those looking for the shirts are likely out of luck, as a Metro spokesperson says the item was intended only as a limited-edition run.)

Here are some highlights of destinations along the new stations, which are located at Wilshire/La Brea, Wilshire/Fairfax, Wilshire/La Cienega and will collectively serve Koreatown, Miracle Mile, Hancock Park, Carthay Circle, the Fairfax District and Beverly Hills. All should be within about a 20- or 25 minute walk.

The second section of the D Line will continue west through Beverly Hills and Century City, and the third will extend to Westwood and UCLA. The full rail line, according to Metro, is expected to be open by the end of 2027.