USIsrael

Islamabad, Pakistan — The war launched by the United States and Israel on Iran has already killed more than 1,400 people, set off retaliatory attacks by Tehran targeting Gulf nations and Israel, and pushed global oil prices above $100 a barrel.

Now, eighteen days into the conflict, aid agencies and countries neighbouring Iran are increasingly concerned about a potential refugee crisis.

The United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, estimates that 3.2 million people have already been displaced in Iran since US-Israeli strikes began on February 28. For now, the number of people physically crossing Iran’s borders remains comparatively modest. But this is what could happen next, and has put Iran’s neighbours on high alert.

Iran borders seven countries: Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iraq, Pakistan, Turkiye and Turkmenistan. Iraq shares the longest frontier, stretching for almost 1,600km (994 miles).

Each of these states faces its own political pressures, economic limitations and security concerns.

But pressure on the ground in Iran is mounting. The country’s Red Crescent Society reports that more than 10,000 civilian sites have been damaged since the war began, including 65 schools and 32 medical facilities, while more than 1,400 people have been killed in the US-Israel attacks. Strikes have hit residential areas in Tehran, Shiraz and Isfahan.

Meanwhile, commercial flights out of Iran have been suspended as airspace is closed.

Eldaniz Gusseinov, head of research at the geopolitical advisory firm Nightingale International, noted that because strikes have so far been concentrated largely on Tehran and western and southwestern Iran, other parts of the country — especially provinces bordering Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan are absorbing much of the internal displacement.

“If the strike pattern remains the same, internally displaced people inside Iran will increasingly concentrate in provinces located near those states, creating the preconditions for cross-border movement,” the Almaty-based analyst told Al Jazeera.

And things could get worse. If Tehran, a city of about 10 million people, were to lose its electricity grid or water supply in a US-Israel attack, for instance, residents could be forced to leave en masse.

“Infrastructure destruction does not produce the gradual, manageable flows that the Syrian war initially generated. It produces sudden, massive displacement, driven by the collapse of basic urban services,” Gusseinov said.

Turkiye fears repeat of Syrian migration crisis

Among Iran’s neighbours, only Turkiye, Iraq and Pakistan have extensive experience of hosting large refugee populations.

Imtiaz Baloch, an independent researcher focusing on conflicts in Pakistan and Central Asia, said that if the crisis in Iran deepens, many Iranians could seek refuge in neighbouring states, particularly Iraq and Turkiye.

Analysts say no country faces greater political exposure than Turkiye.

“Turkiye is currently hosting many refugees from Syria and other countries. A new influx of Iranian migrants would likely intensify the humanitarian burden and create new challenges for both host countries and international relief agencies in the coming days,” Baloch said.

Turkiye shares a 530km (329-mile) border with Iran and allows visa-free entry for Iranian citizens. It already hosts the world’s largest refugee population, including roughly 3.6 million Syrians, and anti-immigrant sentiment has hardened within domestic politics over the past decade.

Turkiye’s interior minister, Mustafa Çiftçi, said earlier in March that the government had prepared three contingency plans for the war in Iran.

The first involves intercepting migration flows within Iranian territory before they reach the border. The second proposes establishing buffer zones along the frontier. The third would allow refugees to enter Turkiye under controlled conditions as a last resort.

Turkish authorities say they have already strengthened the border with Iran, adding 380km (236 miles) of concrete wall, 203 optical towers and 43 observation posts – undertaken, according to a Turkish Ministry of National Defence statement issued in January, as the US was building up its armada in the Gulf late last year.

“Although there is currently no mass migration detection at our borders, additional measures have been taken on the border line, and these measures will be implemented if needed,” the Defence Ministry stated on January 15.

So far, this has not been necessary. According to Turkish government data on the movement of people from Iran, 5,010 entered Turkiye from between March 1 and 3, while 5,495 exited.

But Turkiye has felt the effects of the war’s spillover in other ways. On March 9, NATO confirmed it had intercepted an Iranian ballistic missile over Turkish airspace. The debris landed near Gaziantep, in the western-most part of the country, about 50km (31 miles) from the Syrian border. Iran denied that it was behind the attack on Turkiye.

Crisis on an unprecedented scale?

What makes the current situation in Iran particularly urgent is the scale of its population, say analysts.

Syria had approximately 21 million people at the start of its civil war. Iran has roughly 90 million. The Syrian conflict caused more than 13 million people to be displaced, including more than 6 million who fled the country.

A proportionate displacement from Iran would represent a humanitarian crisis with few modern parallels. To put it into perspective, if a country of 90 million experienced the exact same scale of crisis as Syria, nearly 56 million people would be forced to flee their homes, and nearly 26 million of them would become international refugees.

Gusseinov said such a scale of displacement and the capacity of international aid agencies is “fundamentally mismatched”.

Furthermore, Iran itself hosts one of the world’s largest refugee populations: about 3.7 million displaced people, most of them from Afghanistan.

“Any mass displacement from Iran, therefore, creates a dual crisis: Iranian civilians fleeing outward, and Afghan and Iraqi refugees who were already in Iran being displaced a second time, or pushed back to countries that cannot absorb them,” he said.

Iraq and the South Caucasus face difficult choices

Although most population movement is still taking place within Iran rather than across its borders, Iran’s neighbours do have cause for concern, analysts say.

“Iran’s neighbouring countries are already dealing with their own crises, which limits their ability to absorb a potential refugee influx. Countries such as Syria, Iraq, Azerbaijan, Pakistan, and Afghanistan are facing varying degrees of economic, political, or security challenges. These internal pressures make it difficult for them to accommodate a large influx of refugees,” Gusseinov told Al Jazeera.

Iraq, which shares Iran’s longest border, faces a particularly complex situation.

The country is not only a potential destination for Iranian refugees, but has also been caught in military exchanges between Washington and Tehran. US forces have targeted armed groups operating from Iraqi territory, while Iran and pro-Iran armed groups have struck – or attempted to strike – US military and diplomatic positions inside the country.

The UN’s International Organization for Migration says disruptions on the Iranian side of the border have led to the closure of several crossing points, although Iraqi crossings remain technically open. Meanwhile, the UNHCR says it is monitoring developments closely, and that the Iraqi government would lead any emergency refugee response.

The semi-autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, which, unlike the rest of the country, still allows visa-free entry for Iranian passport holders, adds another layer of complexity.

The region hosts several Kurdish armed groups, some of which have reportedly been in discussions with Washington about receiving military support in return for joining the war against Iran. The development has prompted Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) to strike Kurdish positions inside Iraqi territory.

Baghdad has publicly stated that it will not allow its territory to be used to infiltrate Iran, but experts on the region say its ability to enforce the position is limited.

Further north, the South Caucasus states of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia have each expressed concern while attempting to carefully balance relations with both Washington and Tehran.

Azerbaijan has closed its land borders to routine traffic, requiring government approval for any crossing, while Armenia’s border with Iran, which is just 44km (27 miles) long, remains open.

“Armenia is a small economy already absorbing Russian and Ukrainian migrants,” Gusseinov said.

Pakistan and Afghanistan confront overlapping crises

To Iran’s east lie Pakistan and Afghanistan, each grappling with existing refugee pressures.

According to the UNHCR, since October 2023, about 5.4 million Afghans have returned to Afghanistan from Iran and Pakistan, many not by choice.

Following the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan and the Taliban’s return to power in August 2021, a huge wave of Afghans sought refuge across the country’s borders, fearful of economic collapse and security threats.

The UN and international migration agencies estimate that between 1 and 1.5 million Afghans fled to Iran in the immediate aftermath of the US withdrawal, pushing the total Afghan population in Iran to upwards of 5 or 6 million.

Concurrently, hundreds of thousands of newly displaced Afghans crossed into Pakistan, joining a long-established refugee community there and swelling the total number of Afghans in the country to more than 3 million.

In response to this influx and citing domestic economic and security pressures, both Pakistan and Iran initiated aggressive mass deportation campaigns, forcing millions back into Afghanistan. Between late 2023 and the end of 2025, between 2.8 million and 3.5 million Afghans are thought to have been sent back.

Pakistan’s stringent repatriation plans pushed out more than 1.3 million people, while Iran drastically accelerated its expulsions, deporting nearly 2 million individuals in 2025 alone.

According to the UNHCR, in 2026 so far, more than 232,500 Afghans have returned to their country, including 146,206 from Pakistan and 86,253 from Iran.

The primary concern now is that the war in Iran could accelerate these returns, pushing people into communities already struggling to cope and potentially triggering further onward migration. The UNHCR has also warned that largescale and hurried returns of refugees could trigger further instability in the region.

Further complicating the situation, Pakistan and Afghanistan have been engaged in fighting, as Islamabad claims that Afghanistan is providing a safe haven to armed groups launching attacks at Pakistan. Kabul has consistently denied the presence of any such groups on its soil.

Another bout of hostilities in October 2025 led Pakistan to close its borders with Afghanistan. Since then, Afghanistan’s trade and economic ties with Iran have deepened.

“Destabilisation of the Iranian economy, therefore, hits Afghanistan through two channels simultaneously: reduced trade flows and refugee return surges,” Gusseinov said.

Meanwhile, Pakistan faces its own geographical and security challenges.

The country’s border with Iran runs through Balochistan, its largest but most volatile province, where separatist sentiment has simmered for decades. The province has seen an increasing number of attacks by armed groups seeking independence from Pakistan. In February this year, Pakistan’s military concluded a weeklong security operation in the province, and claimed it had killed 216 fighters in targeted offensives.

While Balochistan’s provincial officials say they have sufficient resources to accommodate refugees if large numbers begin arriving across the southern border, researcher Baloch said the reality was more complicated. Any refugee crisis, he said, could make the situation in Balochistan difficult for Islamabad to manage.

“Balochistan’s porous border is next to Iran’s Sistan and Baluchestan province, a region that has historically been home to various separatist groups. Any significant influx of refugees across this border could impose additional security and economic costs on Pakistan,” Baloch said.

“Right is right, wrong is wrong, and Trump’s wrong.” Former Marine Brian McGinnis, whose hand was broken by police and a congressman earlier this month in a protest at the US Capitol, says Donald Trump is “wrong” when it comes to the joint US-Israeli war on Iran.

‘For 40 years, we’re protecting you’: US President Donald Trump criticises allies’ reluctance to commit forces to open the key waterway for Gulf oil exports.

As the war US-Israeli war on Iran enters its third week, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has said that his country has shown it is ready to take the war “as far as necessary” and that the conflict must end in a way “that our enemies will never again consider repeating these attacks”.

Joint attacks by the United States and Israel have severely reduced Iran’s capacity to fire missiles and drones, experts say, but Iran retains enough capabilities to inflict significant damage.

“Iran’s ballistic missile capacity is functionally destroyed. Their navy assessed combat ineffective. Complete and total aerial dominance over Iran,” the White House said on Saturday. “Operation Epic Fury is yielding massive results,” it said in reference to the war launched by Israel and the US on February 28.

On Sunday, President Donald Trump said US forces had decimated Iran’s drone manufacturing capacity.

Still, on Monday afternoon, Qatar announced it had intercepted the latest in a series of missiles fired from Iran towards the country. Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain also issued alerts. A missile landed on a car in Abu Dhabi, killing a person.

So are Iran’s missile capabilities severely reduced? And how is it still firing projectiles at its neighbours and Israel?

Is Iran firing fewer missiles now?

Indeed, the number of retaliatory missiles and drones that Iran has fired towards Gulf countries, Israel and other nations in the region has seen a steep decline since the start of the war.

In the first 24 hours of the conflict, Iran had fired 167 missiles (ballistic and cruise) and 541 drones at the United Arab Emirates, for instance. By contrast, on day 15 of the conflict, it had shot four missiles and six drones, according to a tally compiled by Al Jazeera based on the emirate’s Defence Ministry statements.

The barrage against Israel has also decreased, from nearly 100 projectiles over the first two days to a single-digit number in the past few days, according to Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies.

Last week, the Pentagon said missile launches were down 90 percent from the first day of fighting and drone attacks were down by 86 percent.

How big is Iran’s missile arsenal – and how much has it been hit?

Iran has the largest inventory of ballistic missiles in the region, the US Office of the Director of National Intelligence assessed in 2022. While there are no official accounts on how many missiles it has, Israeli intelligence reports suggest it counted around 3,000 missiles, a figure that dropped to 2,500 following the 12-day war last June.

Key to the US-Israel strategy has been hunting down Iran’s launchers. Each missile launch generates a signature, such as a large explosion, that can be picked up by a satellite and radar systems.

According to a senior Israeli military official cited by the Institute for the Study of the War, Israel has put up to 290 launchers out of service, out of an estimated 410 to 440 launchers.

But Iran is a vast country, and without boots on the ground, it will be hard to completely eliminate Iran’s capacity to shoot despite the US and Israel having nearly full control of the country’s airspace, said David Des Roches, an associate professor at the National Defense University in Washington, DC.

“It is not obvious to identify launchers,” Des Roches told Al Jazeera. “What we see are missiles that were put in hidden places or places not associated with the military before the war, when there was less observation”.

According to Des Roches, the slowdown in launches is due to Iranian forces having lost the capacity to launch volleys. As a result, Iran has been firing one or two missiles at a time towards civilian and commercial infrastructure, especially in Gulf countries, instead of aiming volleys at military targets. Iran insists that it is targeting only US interests in the region.

“Militarily speaking [Iran’s action] is not significant – this is what is called harassment fire to exhaust alert systems in nearby countries and scare people off,” Des Roches said.

What’s Iran’s strategy?

According to Hamidreza Azizi, an expert on Iran and visiting fellow with the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWB), Tehran’s central calculation is that the Gulf and Israel may run out of their defensive capabilities before Iran runs out of missiles.

“There might be some interest in making this a war of attrition,” he said, pointing at the lower, yet constant, number of weapons launched from Iran each day.

“Although the US and Israel have been successful in taking out some of the launchers and major missile bases, the Iranians have decentralised the missile bases and missile command and they have been increasingly relying on mobile launchers which makes it more difficult for the other side to detect and target,” Azizi said. “This is a race about time.”

And in that race, Iran believes it has a chance, say experts.

“It does not matter how many you launch as long as you maintain a credible threat,” Muhanad Seloom, an assistant professor in critical security studies at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, told Al Jazeera. “It takes one successful drone to shatter a sense of security.”

Iran has long experience in producing cheap yet effective drones. The Shahed 136 can be made quickly and in large numbers in relatively simple factories, and several of them can be fired at once, overwhelming defences. It also doesn’t need complex launchers that can be targeted in air strikes. With a speed of just 185km/h (115mph), Shaheds can be shot down by helicopters. Still, many have managed to get through US and Gulf air defence systems.

Just on Monday, a fire broke out near the UAE’s Dubai International Airport in a drone-related incident that temporarily disrupted flights; another drone attack caused a fire at the Fujairah industrial area, also in the UAE; air sirens sounded in central Israel due to a missile fired from Iran; and in the Strait of Hormuz – a key waterway through which 20 percent of global energy supplies are shipped – hundreds of vessels remain paralysed over fear of being struck despite few attacks on ships. Since the start of the war, a maritime tracker has reported 20 incidents related to vessels.

This, say experts, is part of Iran’s defensive doctrine of asymmetric warfare against militarily superior powers, such as the US and Israel. The weaker party, Iran in this case, turns to unconventional methods of warfare, wearing down the enemy by targeting key infrastructure to inflict economic pain.

Tehran has already pushed oil prices to higher than $100 a barrel and sent global markets into panic mode. The second-biggest exporter of natural gas, Qatar, continues to keep shut its production; Bahrain’s state oil company has declared force majeure on its shipments, and oil production from Iraq’s main southern ⁠oilfields has plunged 70 percent.

If Iran can keep raising global oil prices, “it will inflict equal or more damage to the US than American bombs in Iran,” said Vali Nasr, a professor of international affairs and Middle East studies at Johns Hopkins University.

Sometimes, journalists indulge in myths and delusions they claim to decry.

This grating inclination has been on almost giddy display in the still evolving aftermath of United States President Donald Trump’s rash decision to join Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in launching a war with Iran.

Like falling dominoes, a “narrative” gathered momentum among the America’s “progressive” commentariat, insisting that Trump’s order to go to war offended large swaths of the MAGA movement and set off a seismic split in his ardent base.

It is a silly myth and a seductive delusion.

Sure, a handful of familiar MAGA personalities have grumbled that another Middle East conflict betrays the “America First” pledge that helped propel Trump back to the White House.

Conservative commentator Megyn Kelly has questioned whether the US is drifting, yet again, into an endless war without purpose or meaning. Podcaster Joe Rogan has talked about the conflict’s disastrous, unintended consequences. Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson has warned that the unprovoked attack could trigger chaos across an already volatile region.

Trump, of course, parried the backlash with trademark coarseness. He lashed out. He dismissed the naysayers. He mocked allies who briefly turned detractors.

Headlines blared that a domestic quarrel threatened to engulf his MAGA disciples in a “civil war.”

The idea that MAGA has fractured is fantasy. Disquiet is not rupture. Dissent is not rebellion.

The MAGA “movement” is not a conventional coalition held together by consensus around a coherent, considered set of principles or policies.

MAGA remains what it has always been: a political phenomenon built to burnish one man’s ego and narcissism. As long as that man is Trump, the “movement” bends to his designs and whims. It adjusts; and, inevitably, snaps back into loyal line.

That loyalty remains the movement’s signature force.

For nearly a decade, Trump has tested its limits. He has weathered scandals that would have devoured most politicians. Two impeachments. Criminal convictions. A litany of controversies, including his close and lengthy friendship with the architect of a worldwide sex trafficking ring, the notorious paedophile, Jeffrey Epstein.

Through it all, MAGA has, if anything, tightened its loving embrace of Trump.

The notion that a fraternal dispute over foreign policy would shatter the vice-like bond is absurd. That bond is emotion. It is visceral.

For his embittered supporters, Trump is the embodiment of grievance-fuelled defiance. He is a charismatic champion against enemies in Washington — the gilded establishment, the media, the global order who treats them with derision and contempt.

Within that parochial framework, Trump’s actions at home and abroad are filtered through the prism of fidelity. When Trump unleashes a war that he once opposed, his devout followers accept his shifting rationales — however obtuse or contradictory. They believe he sees threats others ignore. They believe he acts when others hesitate.

Indeed, polls confirm their steadfast confidence in Trump’s judgement and his enduring appeal.

The Republican Party has always harboured different instincts. Some supporters lean towards isolationism. Others favour aggressive displays of the America’s unparalleled power.

While there may be hints of unease among Republicans about the prospect of a long, costly war with Iran, that unease has not led, and likely will not lead, to a broad revolt anytime soon.

Trump’s standing within the Republican Party remains strong. His approval among Republican voters remains high. They trust him.

That trust trumps the simmering doubts raised by a small, albeit prominent, slice of MAGA fawning pundits and a few recalcitrant members of Congress.

Kelly knows it. Rogan knows it. Carlson knows it.

The trio understands that they operate inside a MAGA universe fashioned and controlled by Trump. Their popularity and influence depend on staying there. They know the defining rule of Trump’s gravitational pull: stray too far and you will be cast out.

Predictably, Carlson avoided escalation.

Instead, he declared his allegiance. He made plain that he still “loves” Trump. He reminded listeners that Trump had reshaped American politics.

Kelly and Rogan may question the risks and dangers of war, but neither would wage a sustained attack on the president. Neither would dare tell Trump’s loyalists to abandon him.

A fleeting disagreement over Trump’s reckless adventure in Iran will not translate into a lasting break.

Even the most high-profile MAGA hucksters recognise that confronting Trump invites retribution and disaster. Their audiences overlap. Their reach thrives in the same ideological ecosystem.

Picking an ultimately losing fight with the ecosystem’s vengeful anchor is rarely good business.

So, MAGA is, at the moment, experiencing a touch of turbulence. It will pass.

Which is why the constant search by establishment media for a dramatic MAGA schism keeps producing the standard result.

Nothing much changes.

Every time Trump sparks outrage, the same prediction appears. This time, the base will rebel. This time, the coalition will splinter.

This forecast is a tired ritual. It ignores the fundamental nature of the MAGA compact. That connection is not rooted in briefs or blueprints. It is a secular religion where the leader is never wrong.

Myopic scribes mistake a fracas for a collapse. They see tension and hope for a divorce. The believers are not preoccupied with the logistics of war or the mercurial logic of “America First”. They care about the man who gave them a voice.

Once the friction fades, the sceptics will retreat. They have nowhere else to go. The undeniable magnetism of Trump’s celebrity and command of MAGA reels most reluctant strays back.

To leave that agreeable orbit permanently is to vanish into irrelevance — a bleak fate for provocateurs who have forged lucrative careers amplifying Trump’s ignorance, intolerance, and fury.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

Footage shows a fire burning near Dubai International Airport after a drone ignited a fuel tank, according to authorities in the UAE. Flights have been suspended. Civil defence crews say the blaze is under control.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi says Tehran never sought a ceasefire with the US, and is ready for a long war.

Footage shows huge plumes of smoke from a heavy strike in the Iranian city of Hamadan, as the US-Israeli war against Iran enters its third week.

Alireza Enayati says relations with Saudi Arabia are ‘progressing naturally’ and he’s in direct contact with Saudi officials.

Iran’s ambassador to Saudi Arabia denied Tehran is responsible for attacks on Saudi Arabia’s oil infrastructure, saying if it was behind the strikes, it would have announced it.

Alireza Enayati did not suggest who carried out the attacks, but added Iran is only attacking United States and Israeli military targets and interests during the ongoing war, Reuters news agency quoted him as saying on Sunday.

After the US and Israel launched attacks on Iran at the end of February, Tehran retaliated against US and Israeli military assets, including in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan, Iraq, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Last week, the Ras Tanura oil refinery was forced to stop operations after debris from a drone caused a small fire. Attempted attacks were also reported on the Shaybah oilfield in the desert near the border with the UAE.

So far, Saudi Arabia’s Defence Ministry has not blamed anyone for the attacks.

Enayati said he’s in direct contact with Saudi officials, explaining that relations are “progressing naturally” in many areas.

Talks included Saudi Arabia’s publicly stated position that its land, sea, and air would not be used to target Iran. He didn’t elaborate.

Iran and Saudi Arabia re-established diplomatic relations in 2023, in a deal brokered by China, that saw the two sides, which backed rival groups across the region, agree on a new chapter in bilateral relations.

‘Reliance on external powers’

Enayati reiterated to the Gulf states that the war “has been imposed on us and the region” following coordinated US and Israeli attacks.

Asked about the attacks on Gulf nations, Enayati replied: “We are neighbours, and we cannot do without each other; we will need a serious review.”

“What the region has witnessed over the past five decades is the result of an exclusionary approach and an excessive reliance on external powers,” he said, calling for deeper ties between the Gulf Cooperation Council’s six members along with Iraq and Iran.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi also denied his country is targeting civilian or residential areas in the Middle East, and said Tehran is ready to form a committee with its neighbours to investigate the responsibility for such strikes.

So far, the UAE, which normalised relations with Israel in 2020, has faced the brunt of Iran’s attacks, with US bases and oil refineries heavily targeted.

While all countries targeted have strongly condemned Iran’s missile and drone strikes, regional sources say there remains growing frustration at the United States for dragging them into a war they did not sign up for but are now paying the heaviest price for, Reuters reported.

Enayati said to resolve the conflict, the US and Israel need to stop their attacks, and international security guarantees to prevent future “aggression” must be given.

Paul Musgrave, associate professor at Georgetown University in Qatar, said the administration of US President Donald Trump has lost much of its leverage in the region, and the US engaged in the wrong conflict at the wrong moment, without proper planning.

Iran’s strategy, meanwhile, now seems to be “not who has a bigger bomb or bigger munitions, but who has the highest threshold for pain”, Musgrave told Al Jazeera.

Several Gulf energy producers have declared force majeure on oil and gas shipments after disruptions to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz due to the US-Israeli war on Iran. Al Jazeera’s Alma Milisic explains what the legal term means and how it could affect global energy markets.

Ukraine’s leader previously said advisers were sent to Qatar, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia to help thwart Iranian drone attacks.

Ukraine wants money and technology as payback after sending specialists to the Middle East to help down Iranian drones during the ongoing Israel-United States war with Iran.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told reporters on Sunday that three teams were sent to the region to undertake expert assessments and demonstrate how drone defences work as countries in the Middle East continue to be targeted by Iran over hosting US military bases.

“This is not about being involved in operations. We are not at war with Iran,” Zelenskyy said.

Earlier this week, Ukraine’s leader announced military teams were sent to Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and a US military base in Jordan.

But he explained that more long-term drone deals could be negotiated with Gulf countries, and what Kyiv gets in return for its assistance still needs to be established.

“For us today, both the technology and the funding are important,” Zelenskyy said.

Throughout the four-year Russia-Ukraine war, Moscow has widely used Iranian Shahed-136 “suicide” drones, giving Kyiv expertise in knowing how to down the unmanned aerial vehicles through cheap drone interceptors, electronic jamming tools, and anti-aircraft weaponry.

However, US President Donald Trump has said he does not need Ukraine’s help in taking down Iranian drones attacking American targets.

‘Rules must be tightened’

Zelenskyy said he doesn’t know why Washington hasn’t signed a drone agreement with Kyiv, which it has pushed for months.

“I wanted to sign a deal worth about $35bn–50bn,” he said.

Still, as the Russia-Ukraine conflict continues with no end in sight, Zelenskyy raised concerns that the ongoing war in the Middle East will impact Kyiv’s supplies of air defence missiles.

“We would very much not like the United States to step away from the issue of Ukraine because of the Middle East,” he told reporters.

But as interest has grown for Ukrainian drone interceptors in light of the war, Zelenskyy said Kyiv’s rules to buy the drones must be tightened, with foreign countries and firms being unable to bypass the government and talk directly to manufacturers.

“Unfortunately, representatives of certain governments or companies want to bypass the Ukrainian state to purchase specific equipment,” Zelensky told reporters.

“Even in some free countries, we do not initially receive contracts from the private sector. A contract comes to me through the political channel. Only then does the private sector start negotiating with us.”

CCTV footage released by Israeli police shows the moment an Iranian missile struck a street in Tel Aviv. Emergency crews say at least three people were injured, and several vehicles were destroyed.

The decision by United States President Donald Trump to launch a war on Iran has left many international law experts questioning if the world order established after World War II is actually working.

In his second presidential term, Trump seems to be wielding total power without restraint, and the system of checks and balances enshrined in the US Constitution appears to be failing to limit his power.

Since Trump was sworn in in January 2025, he has ordered two unprovoked attacks on independent states, Venezuela and Iran; threatened to annex Greenland; strained traditional alliances with Europe; undermined the United Nations; and rattled international trade with his sweeping tariffs.

Previous constraints set by the UN system and international law appear supplanted by what Trump told reporters in January was a vision of power limited only by his “own morality”.

So what checks are there on Trump? Is he really free to attack states, set tariffs at will and, as leader of the world’s most powerful state, essentially dictate global policy? And if so, why are so many observers now saying his war on Iran is faltering?

Has international law put any checks on Trump?

Not so far.

According to analysts, both his attacks on Venezuela and Iran were in clear breach of international law and the UN Charter, principally the prohibition on the use of force under Article 2(4).

Debates about international law, how it has been geared over the decades to underpin the interests of the West and the US specifically, are hardly new. However, experts said, the Trump presidency has seen even the notional restraints of international law trampled underfoot.

Trump himself has brushed aside international law, saying in January that it would be up to him to decide when and how much international law applied to the US and his actions.

“In many respects, international law has historically served US interests, and self-interest should continue to generate US support for a rules-based order organised around the core principles enshrined in the UN Charter,” Michael Becker, a professor of international human rights law at Trinity College in Dublin who previously worked at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, told Al Jazeera, “But finding value in international law often requires adopting a long-term outlook that does not sit easily with short-term political agendas.”

“In the current geopolitical climate, the capacity of international law to provide a meaningful constraint on US action under Donald Trump has proven negligible,” Becker added. “That seems unlikely to change, especially given the failure by other states to strike a united front against Trump’s gangsterism.”

What about the UN?

Not so much.

From its founding, the role of the UN has been to promote dialogue instead of conflict and provide a global response to international challenges. However, Trump’s relationship with the body, like so many of the president’s associations, has rarely been so straightforward. On the one hand, while appearing to try to supplant the body with his members-only Board of Peace as well as sidelining UN aid efforts in Gaza, he has on occasion sought the legitimacy of the UN for a number of his projects, such as his calls in August for the UN to establish a Support Office in Haiti, to help limit migration to the US.

However, while the support of the UN may be helpful, it is clear that Trump has no intention of abiding by its charter, Richard Gowan, the Crisis Group’s UN director from 2019 to 2025, said.

“While other UN members see the US is breaking international law on a regular basis, they often hold back from criticising Washington too loudly in forums like the Security Council because they fear blowback from Trump,” Gowan said. “So Trump is learning he can sidestep the UN when he wants to and get away with it while occasionally using it for instrumental purposes.”

What about other powers?

Up to a point.

Many countries known as “middle powers”, such as Canada, the United Kingdom, France, and other Western and European states, have proven successful so far in pushing back against Trump’s efforts to unilaterally annex Greenland. But European powers have failed to condemn Trump’s unprovoked war on Venezuela and Iran, exposing their double standards in conflicts in the Middle East and the Global South.

Many analysts expect that a withdrawal of investments in the US by Gulf states, which are bearing the brunt of Iran’s retaliation to US and Israeli attacks, may also hasten the war’s end.

“Middle powers can generate friction but not a veto,” HA Hellyer of the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies in London said. “Collective action – European governments, Gulf states – can raise costs and extract tactical adjustments. The structural imbalance remains: The US retains decisive military, financial and institutional primacy.”

Smaller states often hedge their bets, follow Washington or look to regional alliances for protection, Hellyer added, continuing that while pressure was strongest in Europe, where the US is no longer seen as a reliable security guarantor, the idea of establishing an alternative continues to be a hurdle. “The logic of an alternative model is accepted; the capacity to execute it quickly is not. A prolonged interregnum follows. The Gulf Arab states are in an analogous position,” he said.

In the meantime, Trump and the US are free to act as they choose. “These are exposure-management strategies, pursued until structural dependence on the US security umbrella can be reduced,” he said.

China and Russia have so far criticised the breaches of international law while avoiding clear escalation, and India and other members of the BRICS bloc have largely stayed silent, suggesting a preference for strategic ambiguity over confronting Washington directly.

What about domestic restraints?

Not really.

The US Supreme Court was able to block Trump’s use of tariffs to manage large parts of his foreign policy by rewarding allies with lower tariffs and punishing critics with punitive import duties.

But none of the other traditional guardrails – such as Congress; the Department of Justice, which has provided unwavering support to the president; and even the news media – has contained the president’s ambitions. This isn’t entirely new. Previous presidents have ordered wars without congressional approval. However, with Trump, analysts suggested, it has been systematic.

Powerful US institutions have largely failed to hold the Trump administration accountable, analysts, such as Kim Lane Scheppele, a professor of international affairs at Princeton University, said.

“His base of strong supporters are saying that they are willing to experience short-term increases in gasoline prices if it leads to a friendly government in Iran in the long term. His opponents have been his opponents on everything, so he simply ignores and threatens them,” Scheppele told Al Jazeera.

“Trump pays more attention to market performance than to public opinion, so he started saying that he was minimising costs and saying that the Iran war is short term to boost markets again.”

“What the US is spectacularly missing is leadership to oppose Trump. Congress is not doing its constitutional job to constrain him. The Supreme Court is in his pocket because he packed the court in his first term. Lower court judges are heroic and have done amazing work under serious pressures, but they don’t get foreign policy questions, given the difficulty of anyone getting ‘standing’ … in the area of international matters,” she said, referring to the requirement that parties to a lawsuit must show actual or future direct harm to themselves to bring a case to court.

She noted that lower federal courts, although limited on foreign policy, have repeatedly checked executive overreach on immigration, sanctions designations and emergency powers, often under intense political pressure.

So why are so many people saying Trump’s war is faltering?

In the eyes of many observers, Trump, with no clear war aims or a defined resolution, is in danger of losing control of a conflict that appears to be both growing and reaching into economic areas apparently unforeseen by his administration, so while traditional restraints don’t apply, market forces, like gravity, always do.

Trump has repeatedly said the war would be over soon despite none of his claimed war aims being achieved.

Oil prices have surged due to his attacks on Iran, Tehran’s counterstrikes and threats to shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20 percent of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas passes.

The International Energy Agency’s decision on Wednesday to release 400 million barrels of oil from international petroleum reserves has failed to tame the prices. Iran has warned that oil could hit $200 a barrel as it continues its stranglehold of the waterway.

“Ultimately, the factors that might be most likely to constrain Donald Trump’s neoimperialist impulses – or his willingness to pursue the policy goals of those who have his ear – are the economic fallout from disrupting global energy markets and a broader disenchantment among US voters with his globe-trotting militarism, his rampant self-dealing and his callous disregard for the human costs of war,” Becker said.

Cars were seen burned and one overturned in a town in Tel Aviv district caused by shrapnel after a wave of Iranian missiles struck central Israel. According to local police, three people were wounded.

Iranian media report the deaths in central Iran as Tehran launches new missile salvoes at Israeli targets.

A missile strike on an industrial area of the central Iranian city of Isfahan has killed at least 15 people, with workers having been inside a factory at the time of the attack, Iranian media reports.

The strike hit a factory producing heating and cooling equipment on Saturday, a working day in Iran, according to the semi-official Fars news agency, which attributed the attack to US and Israeli forces.

It came on the 15th day of a conflict that Iran’s Ministry of Health says has now killed at least 1,444 people and wounded more than 18,500 since the US-Israeli attacks began on February 28.

Cities across Iran have been repeatedly targeted following the onset of hostilities.

On March 8, shelling damaged Russia’s consulate in Isfahan, injuring staff, with Moscow calling the strike a “blatant violation” of international conventions.

Iran’s Ministry of Culture said on Saturday that 56 museums and historic sites had been damaged, including Naqsh-e Jahan Square, a 17th-century centrepiece of Isfahan, and the UNESCO-listed Golestan Palace in Tehran.

UNESCO said it was “deeply concerned,” noting that four of Iran’s 29 World Heritage Sites had been affected.

Separately on Saturday, Iran’s army confirmed that Brigadier General Abdullah Jalali-Nasab had been killed in an Israeli attack, saying he was “martyred while defending the country”.

Earlier, US forces also struck Kharg Island, which handles roughly 90 percent of Iran’s crude exports, though a regional official said operations were continuing normally, and there were no casualties.

US President Donald Trump had previously threatened to target the island’s oil infrastructure if Tehran continued to disrupt the Strait of Hormuz.

Any prospect of negotiations appears remote. The Trump administration has rebuffed regional efforts to broker a ceasefire, with a senior White House official telling the Reuters news agency the president is focused on pressing ahead.

“He’s not interested in that right now, and we’re going to continue with the mission unabated,” the official said.

Iran has equally ruled out talks while the attacks continue, Reuters reported, citing an anonymous Iranian official.

Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs Abbas Araghchi struck a defiant tone on Saturday, saying the US security framework in the region had “proven to be full of holes” and calling on neighbours to “expel foreign aggressors”.

Israeli Minister of Defence Israel Katz said the war was entering a “decisive phase”, which would “continue as long as necessary”.

Iran launched new missile salvoes at Israel on Saturday, with explosions heard over Jerusalem, according to reporters from the AFP news agency.

Six waves of missiles, some carrying cluster bomb warheads, struck wide areas of the country, the Israeli army said. In Eilat, a cluster munition impact injured three people, including a 12-year-old boy, according to The Times of Israel.

The administration of President Donald Trump has warned that news outlets could have their broadcasting licences revoked over critical reporting on the war against Iran, accusing the media of “distortions”.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr said in a social media post on Saturday that broadcasters must “operate in the public interest”, or else lose their licences.

“Broadcasters that are running hoaxes and news distortions — also known as the fake news — have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up,” Carr wrote.

The warning was the latest apparent threat from Carr, who has repeatedly attracted scrutiny for statements that appear to pressure broadcasters to conform with Trump priorities.

Last year, for instance, Carr called on the channel ABC and its distributors to “find ways to change conduct, to take action” on comedian Jimmy Kimmel, whose late-night show had been critical of the president.

“We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Carr said of Kimmel on a podcast. ABC temporarily suspended Kimmel’s show in the aftermath of those comments.

Carr’s latest statement prompted swift condemnation from politicians and free-speech advocates, who likened his remarks to censorship.

“This is a clear directive to provide positive war coverage or else licenses may not be renewed,” Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii wrote.

“This is worse than the comedian stuff, and by a lot. The stakes here are much higher. He’s not talking about late night shows, he’s talking about how a war is covered.”

Aaron Terr, the director of public advocacy at the Foundation of Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), likewise denounced Carr for seeking to silence negative war coverage.

“The First Amendment doesn’t allow the government to censor information about the war it’s waging,” Terr said.

Trump denounces war coverage

Carr’s latest statement came in response to a social media post from Trump, accusing the “fake news media” of reporting that US refuelling planes had been struck in an Iranian attack in Saudi Arabia.

“The base was hit a few days ago, but the planes were not ‘struck’ or ‘destroyed’,” Trump said in a Truth Social post. “Four of the five had virtually no damage, and are already back in service.”

He added that reporting to the contrary was intentionally misleading. “Lowlife ‘Papers’ and Media actually want us to lose the War,” he wrote.

The president and his allies have faced accusations that they use the power of the state to penalise dissent and critical news coverage, raising concerns about press freedom.

Polling shows that the war, launched by the US and Israel on February 28, is largely unpopular in the US.

A recent Quinnipiac poll found that 53 percent of voters oppose the military action against Iran, including 89 percent of Democrats and 60 percent of independent voters.

The war has also been condemned by legal experts as a clear violation of international law, which prohibits unprovoked attacks.

Trump, however, has offered shifting rationales as to why he believes Iran posed an imminent threat to US security.

He has also asserted that the war is proceeding successfully, despite ongoing Iranian attacks on US forces across the region and the shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz, a key trade artery.

“We’ve won. Let me tell you, we’ve won,” he told a rally this week in Kentucky. “In the first hour, it was over.”

His administration, meanwhile, has blamed the news media for turning public opinion against the war.

“Yet some in this crew, in the press, just can’t stop,” Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said during a briefing on Friday.

A former Fox News host, Hegseth called for “patriotic” reporters to write more optimistic headlines instead. He denounced TV banners that read, for example, “Mideast war intensifies.”

“What should the banner read instead? How about ‘Iran increasingly desperate’? Because they are. They know it, and so do you, if it can be admitted,” Hegseth said.

He criticised the news outlet CNN, in particular, for a report asserting that the Trump administration had underestimated the chances of Iran closing the Strait of Hormuz.

Hegseth quipped that he hoped a prospective deal would soon place CNN under the control of David Ellison, son of close Trump ally and tech executive Larry Ellison.

“The sooner David Ellison takes over that network, the better,” he added.

A strike on the heavily fortified United States embassy compound in Baghdad caused a fire and damage to the complex. It is the second attack on the embassy since the United States and Israel launched strikes on Iran on February 28.

United States President Donald Trump has said the country’s military bombed military installations on Iran’s Kharg island, warning the area’s critical oil facilities could be next if Iran continues to block the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran, in turn, threatened on Saturday to reduce US-linked oil facilities to “a pile of ashes” if oil structures on the island were attacked, as the US-Israel war on Iran, now in its punishing third week, spilled over into a global oil price crisis already in the making.

Kharg island is where more than 90 percent of Iran’s oil is exported. Crude oil prices have surged more than 40 percent since the war began.

Trump said on Friday that US forces had “totally obliterated” all military targets on Iran’s Kharg island oil export hub, describing it in a social media post as “one of the most powerful bombing raids in the History of the Middle East”. He provided no evidence of that.

The US president said he had chosen not to “wipe out” oil infrastructure on the Iranian island, for now.

“However, should Iran, or anyone else, do anything to interfere with the Free and Safe Passage of Ships through the Strait of Hormuz, I will immediately reconsider this decision,” he added.

Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency reported, quoting sources, that more than 15 explosions were heard on Kharg island during the US attacks.

The sources said the attacks targeted air defences, a naval base, and airport facilities, but caused no damage to oil infrastructure. Iran’s Fars news agency reported thick smoke was seen rising from the island.

Al Jazeera’s Mohamed Vall, reporting from Tehran, said Iran’s potential retaliatory attacks on Gulf oil facilities would be a “catastrophic scenario” for the region, and for the “entire industry of oil and gas”.

“The Iranians are keeping this, apparently, as a card to use,” he said. “They’ve been talking about restraint and the possibility of that restraint ending if the Iranian oil facilities are attacked, as the Americans are hinting and threatening.”

US ground operation in the works?

Meanwhile, 2,500 more Marines and an amphibious assault ship are being sent to the Middle East, a US official told the AP news agency.

Elements from the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit and the amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli have been ordered to the region, according to the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military plans.

Marine Expeditionary Units are able to conduct amphibious landings, but they also specialise in bolstering security at embassies, evacuating civilians, and providing disaster relief.

“What we’re to make of this is that the US is very slowly increasing its military posture in terms of prosecuting the war, and that it is not intending to wrap things up any time soon,” Al Jazeera’s Rosiland Jordan reported from Washington.

The deployment does not necessarily indicate that a ground operation is imminent or will take place.

Trump dismisses prospect of deal

Following the attack on Kharg island, Iran would be “wise to lay down their arms, and save what’s left of their country”, Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

“The Fake News Media hates to report how well the United States Military has done against Iran, which is totally defeated and wants a deal – but not a deal that I would accept!” he posted separately, providing no evidence Tehran was seeking any sort of deal.

At least 1,444 people have been killed and 18,551 injured by US-Israeli attacks on Iran since February 28, Iran’s Ministry of Health says.

Al Jazeera’s Tohid Asadi, reporting from Tehran, said US-Israeli air attacks hit targets across the country, including in Tehran, Karaj, Isfahan and Tabriz. He said this was a sign that “we are not close to de-escalation.

“Iranian officials are talking about retaliatory strikes, with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps talking about using what they call their most advanced weaponry, including Heidar missiles, to target Israeli territories and US bases in the region,” he said.

Israel’s attack, echoing similar carnage it wrought in Gaza, kills doctors, paramedics and nurses who were on duty.

An Israeli strike on a health centre in southern Lebanon has killed 12 medical workers, the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health said, as its devastating assault continued amid a wider regional war launched by the United States and Israel on Iran 15 days ago.

The attack late on Friday occurred in the village of Burj Qalaouiyah in the Bint Jbeil District, and killed doctors, paramedics and nurses who were on duty, Lebanon’s health ministry said.

The carnage echoed Israel’s constant targeting of medics and hospitals that decimated Gaza’s healthcare system during its genocidal war on the Palestinian enclave and which contravenes international humanitarian law.

Israeli strikes have so far killed 18 paramedics among 773 people reported killed in Lebanon since fighting between Hezbollah and Israel reignited March 2, after a US-Israeli assault on Iran began on February 28, with the conflict now embroiling much of the region.

According to Al Jazeera’s Heidi Pett, reporting from Beirut, the toll of medics was preliminary as rescue teams continued searching for missing people.

“You can see how deadly some of these individual air strikes have been, not just across the south, but of course, we are seeing air strikes hitting across the capital, Beirut,” said Pett.

Lebanon’s Ministry of Health said it was the second attack on the health sector within hours, after another Israeli strike on the southern village of Souaneh killed two paramedics and wounded five others when it hit a paramedic centre.

The ministry condemned the attack and denounced what it called as continued violence against health workers.

At least four people were also killed in an Israeli air raid on Taamir Haret Saida in the country’s south, the Lebanese News Agency (NNA) said.

Meanwhile, Hezbollah overnight claimed it fired suicide drones against Israeli troops in the northern town of Ya’ara inside Israel.

It was the 24th military operation announced by the group on Friday.

The Lebanese armed group also said it launched rocket attacks targeting Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon, one in the town of Kfar Kila, and the other in the city of Khiam.

Late on Friday, Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem said his group is ready for a “long confrontation” with Israel as the war continues.

“This is an existential battle, not a limited or simple battle,” he said.

Damage in Israel from Iranian ‘cluster missiles’

Meanwhile, Iran’s retaliatory attacks against Israel continued.

Rocket and missile strikes early on Saturday targeted the Upper Galilee region of northern Israel, Channel 12 reported.

The news outlet said that a “limited number of launches” were either “intercepted” or exploded in open areas.

A post on X from Israel’s public broadcaster KAN featured several vehicles damaged in the strikes.

Alarms were raised for suspected rocket and missile fire in Manara, Margaliot, Kfar Giladi, Misgav Am, Tel Hai, Metula, Kfar Giladi and Kfar Yuval throughout the early morning on Saturday.

“A lot of the damage that we are being told about at the moment seems to be coming from these cluster missiles that Iran has been launching pretty much consistently for the last week at least and they scatter over a large area,” said Al Jazeera’s Rory Challands, reporting from Amman, Jordan.

“They disperse these submunitions bomblets. Each of those has about 2.5 kilogrammes (5.5 pounds) of explosives in them. You can see why that does quite some damage when it scatters and hasn’t been intercepted by the Israeli air defence.”

Mukalla, Yemen – A reported decision to impose thousands of dollars in fees on shipping headed for Yemen has experts worried that the price of imported goods and food will increase in the war-torn country, as it starts to feel the economic impact of the United States and Israel’s conflict with Iran.

Local traders and officials have said that international shipping companies informed importers earlier this month of the imposition of new fees of about $3,000 on each container bound for Yemen, described as “war risk” fees. The surprise move prompted government officials to scramble to assess and address its potential repercussions.

Because Yemen imports nearly 90 percent of its food and other essential commodities, economists and humanitarian organisations warn that the rise in shipping and insurance costs could quickly translate into higher prices for fuel, food and other goods, further worsening an already dire humanitarian situation.

Mohsen al-Amri, transport minister in Yemen’s internationally-recognised government based in the southern city of Aden, said he had instructed that the fees not be paid by ships already docked at Yemeni ports or those bound for the country, insisting that the ports remain safe.

“Our ports are far from the areas of geopolitical tension in the Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, making the imposition of ‘risk’ fees on shipments to these relatively safe areas unjustified from both operational and security perspectives,” he said in a social media post last week.

Al Jazeera has reached out to shipping companies to confirm details of the fee, but has yet to receive responses.

For more than a decade, Yemen has been gripped by a bloody war between the Saudi-backed government, based in Aden, and the Iran-aligned Houthi movement, which controls the capital, Sanaa. The conflict has killed and wounded thousands of people and displaced millions, creating what the United Nations once described as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. Hostilities have significantly declined since April 2022, when the warring parties agreed to a temporary United Nations-brokered truce.

‘High-risk’

Abdulrab al-Khulaqui, deputy chairman of the Yemen Gulf of Aden Ports Corporation, said Yemeni ports have long been classified as high-risk, prompting shipping companies to impose war-risk surcharges. These can reach about $500 per each 20-foot container and $1,000 per each 40-foot container, on top of regular shipping costs.

Al-Khulaqui said that the $3,000 fee now being demanded was “very high and unusual”, but was justified by shipping companies because they regard Yemeni ports as unsafe, despite their distance from Iran.

Although the Houthis are allied to Iran and previously attacked shipping in the Red Sea following Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, the Yemeni group has yet to intervene in the US-Israel-Iran conflict. Other Yemeni parties are also not involved, making Yemen one of the few regional countries yet to see any violence related to the fighting.

In addition to barring local traders from paying the new charges, the Yemeni government is considering other measures to pressure shipping companies to cancel the fees, including threatening to stop vessels belonging to those companies from docking at Yemeni ports. Authorities may also allow traders to contact exporters directly in countries of origin to negotiate any additional charges.

The new surcharges come as the United Nations has again sounded the alarm over Yemen’s worsening humanitarian situation, saying nearly 65.4 percent of the population – about 23.1 million people – will require urgent humanitarian assistance and protection services this year. This marks an increase of roughly 3.5 million people compared with 2025.

“Yemen continues to face an escalating food security crisis entering 2026,” the World Food Program said in its February Yemen Food Security Update, released on March 5. “January data revealed that 63 percent of households nationwide are struggling to meet their minimum food needs, including 36 percent facing severe food deprivation.”

Bypassing Yemen’s ports

In addition to rising insurance fees on shipments to Yemen, the war in Iran and potential disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz could cut vital supply routes from regional hub ports such as Jebel Ali in the United Arab Emirates.

Mustafa Nasr, head of the Studies and Economic Media Center, told Al Jazeera that shipping companies may begin seeking alternative hub ports to deliver goods to Yemen, which could increase costs and cause delays.

“The closure of Jebel Ali port would force shipping lines to seek alternative ports that may be farther away and involve significantly higher transportation costs,” he said.

Nabil Abdullah Bin Aifan, manager of the government-run Maritime Affairs Authority in Hadramout province and a maritime researcher, said most goods arriving at Mukalla port – the province’s main seaport – are transported on wooden dhows from Dubai.

He said that if disruptions occur in the Strait of Hormuz, traders may turn to alternative regional hub ports such as Salalah in Oman or Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.

“Large ships come to Dubai to unload their containers, and traders then unload the goods from the containers and load them onto those primitive ships, which have no insurance,” Bin Aifan told Al Jazeera.

For now, wheat shipments from Ukraine and goods transported from China to Yemen may see price increases due to rising insurance costs, while products imported from Gulf countries could disappear from the market.

Shipping lines may also consider routing cargo through the Cape of Good Hope rather than the Gulf, Bin Aifan said.

“Even before the recent developments involving Iran, ports in our region were considered high risk. However, after the relative calm that followed the halt to Houthi attacks in the Red Sea, confidence gradually returned and ships began sailing back to the region. Now, the war has brought the problem back again,” he said.

All of this means that Yemenis, already struggling with poverty and hunger after years of war, will likely have to pay more for imported food and goods.

Abdullah al-Hadad, an English teacher from the city of Taiz with 40 years of experience in the profession, said that his monthly salary – less than $80 – is already not enough to cover his basic needs. Meat and fish have become luxuries for his family, and he still owes nearly one million Yemeni riyals (about $670) to a local grocery shop.

To make ends meet, he works additional jobs as a taxi driver and in a grocery store, while his children also work after school to help support the family and pay for medication for his 10-year-old son, who has autism.

“What I suffer from as a government employee is the extremely low salary, which does not even cover basic necessities such as bread, tea, salt and sugar,” al-Hadad told Al Jazeera.

“Other foods that are essential for a healthy diet, like meat or fish, have become a distant dream.”

Videos posted by social media users showed smoke rising from the US embassy in Baghdad after a reported attack. Iraqi officials said a helipad at the embassy was hit by a missile.