Middle East crisis live: Iran says Trump’s threats to ‘blow up’ Oman ‘dangerous and bullying’

We have a statement from the Iranian foreign ministry in which the spokesperson, Esmail Baghaei, described Donald Trump’s threats against Oman as “dangerous” and “bullying”.

He was quoted as saying:

Threats to “destroy” a United Nations member state that has always played a constructive, effective, and responsible role in regional peace and security and has used its noble efforts in the service of regional peace and stability as a mediator in diplomatic processes for many years are not only a violation of the fundamental principle of prohibiting the threat of the use of force, but also another dangerous sign of the normalisation of lawlessness and bullying in international relations.

As a reminder, the US president said yesterday that he would “blow up” Oman if it entered an agreement with Iran to manage shipping in the strait of Hormuz.

Read more here:

At least a dozen people have been killed in Israeli attacks on southern Lebanon today, according to local media, as the Israeli military continues to push further into Lebanese territory.

Among those killed was a solider in the Lebanese armed forces. In a post on social media, the army said the soldier was “targeted by a hostile Israeli airstrike” while travelling between the villages of Zefta and Deir ez-Zahrani in the Nabatieh area.

Lebanon’s official National News Agency reported at least six people, including children, were killed in an Israeli drone attack on the Adloun Highway in the Nabi Sari area of southern Lebanon. The victims – reported to be members of the same family – were killed “as they were trying to flee from the threatened villages to a safe place at dawn”, according to the news agency. More deaths were reported in the southern Lebanese cities of Tyre and Sidon where the Israeli military said it is targeting Hezbollah infrastructure.

Three people stood inside a destroyed home.

Lebanese and Israeli military officials are set to hold their first security talks tomorrow in Washington, with talks at a political level scheduled on 2 and 3 June. The talks have extended a nominal ceasefire that went into effect on 17 April, although the attacks have since intensified.

Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson, Esmaeil Baghaei, has condemned the US after Donald Trump threatened to attack Oman if it sides with Tehran over reopening the strait of Hormuz.

In remarks during a cabinet meeting in the White House yesterday, the US president said he would “blow up” ally Oman if it did not “behave just like everybody else” in the ongoing dispute over the key waterway.

Donald Trump and other US officials sat at a table during a cabinet meeting at the White House.

In a statement this morning, Baghaei expressed solidarity with Oman, a key mediator in the Iran conflict, after “US officials’ threats”, without specifically naming Trump.

He also condemned US attacks on Bander Abbas, the Iranian port city near the strait of Hormuz.

The Israeli military said a soldier was killed in a Hezbollah drone attack in northern Israel near the border with Lebanon.

In a statement online, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said two other soldiers were injured in the same incident yesterday.

According to AFP news agency, 24 Israeli soldiers have been killed since renewed fighting with Hezbollah began on 2 March.

After 88 days of near-total internet blackout in Iran, long-delayed messages, images and poems flooded phones and social media feeds at about 5pm on Tuesday, when still-limited connectivity flickered back to life.

The first reactions, however, were not celebratory. Many new posts were threaded with scepticism, anxiety and anger.

Ellie*, 42, an artist from Tehran, was able to connect for the first time since 28 February. “I lit a cigarette, played SoundCloud and listened to our favourite music,” she said. “Ali [her husband] and I held back tears, then cried and convinced ourselves that this was a small taste of a much greater freedom after the fall of this regime … and we truly believe it.”

The part-restoration hit global headlines, with many regime supporters applauding the government.

Maryam*, a photographer in Tehran, said it was “nauseating to watch the celebrations and applause”.

“What an absolute joke,” she said. “It’s been truly absurd watching western media celebrate partial restoration as if it’s an achievement to applaud the regime for. The internet is our basic right.”

The US has targeted a military facility in Iran and downed four attack drones, US officials said, which prompted an apparent Iranian retaliatory attack on an American airbase in Kuwait, in fresh signs that any peace agreement remains elusive.

US Central Command forces shot down four Iranian one-way attack drones that posed a threat around the Hormuz strait, according to the officials, and struck a ground control station in the port city of Bandar Abbas that was about to launch a fifth drone. Iranian state broadcaster Irib reported later on Thursday the Revolutionary Guards had targeted an American base in Kuwait “that served as the source of the attack”.

Kuwait’s army confirmed its air defences were intercepting missile and drone threats just before 6am in Kuwait City.

Earlier, Donald Trump dismissed a report that Iran and Oman would manage shipping through the strait of Hormuz as part of a deal to end the war.

Oil prices jumped on Thursday – erasing much of Wednesday’s decline – amid the latest test of the ceasefire, with Trump warning he may have to “finish the job” and Tehran saying its forces are still “lying in wait with full magazines”. Brent North Sea crude – the main international benchmark – rose by 1.8% in Thursday morning trade to $95.95 a barrel.

But mixed signals underscored the fragile state of talks. Iran said a return to war was unlikely, while Trump told a televised White House cabinet meeting that Tehran “very much” wanted a deal but had not yet offered enough.

“So far they haven’t gotten there. We’re not satisfied with it, but we will be,” the US president said. “Either that or we’ll have to just finish the job.”

Here are the other main developments:

The Israeli military declared a new swathe of southern Lebanon a combat zone and said residents in the area should move north, warning it would act “with great force” against the Iran-backed Hezbollah in the zone. The statement on Wednesday appeared to signal a further escalation after more than 120 strikes hit Lebanon’s south and east on Tuesday, despite a ceasefire.
The major Lebanese city of Tyre has come under constant Israeli bombardment, according to local media. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it is hitting Hezbollah targets in the ancient coastal city in southern Lebanon, a day after issuing a warning forcing thousands of people to leave Tyre and surrounding areas. Lebanon’s official National News Agency reported two people were killed in Tyre in an Israeli drone strike on Thursday morning.

A fireball and smoke erupt from a building after an Israeli strike in Tyre, southern Lebanon, on Thursday

Trump appeared to direct a warning at Oman – a US ally and mediator in the Iran conflict – when asked about a possible short-term arrangement allowing Iran and Oman to control the strait of Hormuz. “No, the strait is going to be open to everybody,” he said. “It’s international waters and Oman will behave just like everybody else or we’ll have to blow them up. They understand that, they’ll be fine.”
Trump’s “rhetoric” would not force Iran to back away from its demands to enrich uranium, wield authority over the strait and see sanctions against it lifted, said Ebrahim Azizi, head of the Iranian parliament’s national security committee. “It is obvious Trump, seeking a way out of this strategic deadlock, alternates between issuing threats and appealing for an agreement,” Azizi said on X.
Hamas has confirmed that Israeli airstrikes in Gaza City killed the new leader of Hamas’ military wing. The group said on Wednesday that Mohammed Odeh was killed the previous day, along with his wife and two of his children.
More Israeli strikes in the city on Wednesday evening killed at least seven people, including two children and a woman. More than 20 people were wounded, including several children, according to Shifa hospital.