DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran launched new strikes against Israel and U.S. military bases in the Middle East as aerial attacks resumed early Thursday after an American submarine sank an Iranian warship and Iran threatened the destruction of military and economic infrastructure across the region.
Israel announced multiple incoming missile attacks, and air sirens sounded in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Iranian state television said additional strikes
also targeted U.S. bases. The Israeli military said it had begun new strikes in Lebanon targeting the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group in Beirut’s southern suburbs.
The fighting continued after the U.S. and Israel intensified their bombardment of Iran on Wednesday.
The tempo of the strikes on Iran was so intense that state television announced the mourning ceremony for Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed at the start of the conflict, would be postponed. Millions attended the funeral of his predecessor, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, in 1989.
The U.S. and Israel launched the war Saturday, targeting Iran’s leadership, missile arsenal and nuclear program while suggesting that toppling the government is a goal. But the exact aims and timelines have repeatedly shifted, signaling an open-ended conflict.
President Donald Trump praised the U.S. military Wednesday for “doing very well on the war front, to put it mildly.” Fellow Republicans in the U.S. Senate stood with Trump on Iran as they voted down a resolution seeking to halt the war.
Iran fired on Bahrain, Kuwait and Israel as the conflict spiraled. Turkey said NATO defenses intercepted a ballistic missile launched from Iran before it entered Turkey’s airspace.
The war has killed more than 1,000 people in Iran, more than 70 in Lebanon and around a dozen in Israel, according to officials in those countries. It has disrupted the supply of the world’s oil and gas, snarled international shipping and stranded hundreds of thousands of travelers in the Middle East.
Neighboring countries braced for potential dangers Thursday, a day after Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened “the complete destruction of the region’s military and economic infrastructure.”
Qatar’s Interior Ministry said authorities were evacuating residents near the U.S. Embassy in Doha as a temporary precaution, without providing further details.
Fighter jets could be heard overhead in the United Arab Emirates city of Dubai.
And a new attack off the coast of Kuwait appeared to expand the area where commercial shipping was in danger.
An explosion rocked the area early Thursday, according to the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Center run by the British military. It said a tanker apparently came under attack, but the agency did not offer a cause. Iran in the past has attacked ships by attaching limpet mines to them.
Prior attacks since fighting began Saturday have happened in the Gulf of Oman and the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which about a fifth of the world’s oil is shipped.
Oil prices have soared as Iranian attacks have disrupted traffic through the strait, and global stock markets have been hammered over worries that the spike in oil prices may grind down the world economy.
U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said a torpedo from an American submarine sank an Iranian warship Tuesday night in the Indian Ocean.
Sri Lankan authorities said 32 crew members were rescued, while its navy recovered 87 bodies.
Israel said it hit buildings associated with Iran’s internal security command as well as the Basij, an all-volunteer force of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard whose bloody crackdown on protesters in January left thousands dead.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has said his country's forces have decentralized leadership, with units acting largely on their own, which could blunt the effect of attacks on top command and control hubs.
During his Pentagon briefing, Hegseth did not give a definitive timeline for U.S. operations.
“You can say four weeks, but it could be six. It could be eight. It could be three,” he said. “Ultimately, we set the pace and the tempo. The enemy is off balance, and we’re going to keep them off balance.”
U.S. and Israeli military officials say launches from Iran have declined as their attacks have taken out ballistic missiles, launchers and drones. Israel's Homefront Command announced it was easing restrictions that closed workplaces nationwide. It said workplaces could reopen Thursday if there’s a shelter nearby. Schools would remain closed.
Still, explosions sounded early Thursday in Israel, which said its defensive systems were moving to intercept Iranian missiles.
At least 1,045 people have been killed in Iran, the country's Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans Affairs said Wednesday. Eleven people have died in Israel. Six U.S. troops have been killed.
The death toll has exceeded 70 in Lebanon, where the health ministry and state news agency said at least eight people had been killed in strikes since Wednesday.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said the offensive against Iran was originally planned for mid-2026, but “the need arose to bring everything forward to February.”
He listed events inside Iran, Trump's positions and the possibility of “creating a combined operation” as reasons.
The protests in Iran put unprecedented pressure on its leadership. Trump threatened military action in response to the crackdown before shifting his attention to Iran's disputed nuclear program.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Wednesday that the U.S. launched its operation partly out of concern Iran might strike American personnel and assets in the region first. A phone call between Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before the airstrikes began was also “important with respect to the timeline,” she said.
Iran’s leaders are scrambling to replace Khamenei, who ruled the country for 37 years. It’s only the second time since the 1979 Islamic Revolution that a new supreme leader is being chosen.
Potential candidates range from hard-liners committed to confrontation with the West to reformists who seek diplomatic engagement. Mojtaba Khamenei, Khamenei’s son, has long been considered among them — though he has never held a government position.
In a sign that Iran’s leadership will only seek to consolidate its power, the head of the judiciary warned that “those who cooperate with the enemy in any way will be considered an enemy.”
Israel's defense minister, Katz, said on X that Iran's next supreme leader — if he continues to threaten Israel, the U.S. and others — "will be a target for elimination.”
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Becatoros contributed from Athens, Greece, and Magdy from Cairo. Associated Press writers David Rising in Bangkok; Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Israel; Julia Frankel in Jerusalem; Bassem Mroue in Beirut; Elaine Kurtenbach in Bangkok; Simina Mistreanu in Taipei, Taiwan; Bharatha Mallawarachi in Colombo, Sri Lanka; Giovanna Dell'Orto in Miami and Kevin Schembri Orland in Valletta, Malta, contributed to this report.
