Live: Israel says it will control bridges and area south of Lebanon’s Litani River

France's army chief said on Tuesday that the United States had become an unpredictable ally that was impacting France's interests and security.

"We were surprised by an American ally, who remains an ally, but who is becoming increasingly unpredictable and doesn't even bother to inform us when they decide to launch military operations," Fabien Mandon told a security and defence forum in Paris.

"It has an impact on our security and it has an impact on our interests."

A minority of members from the bureau of the Assembly of States Parties (ASP) at the International Criminal Court (ICC) are calling for the findings of a judges' report, which found no evidence of misconduct against ICC prosecutor Karim Khan, to be ignored, Middle East Eye can reveal.

MEE reported exclusively on Saturday that the court’s chief prosecutor had been cleared of any wrongdoing by a panel of three senior judges appointed by the bureau of the ASP, the ICC’s governing body, to review the findings of a United Nations investigation into complaints of alleged sexual misconduct.

MEE has since obtained a copy of the panel’s confidential report. The panel, composed of two male judges and one female judge, ruled unanimously that the UN’s Office for Internal Oversight Services' (OIOS) investigation had not established any "misconduct or breach of duty" by Khan.

Read more: Exclusive: 'Handful' of ICC states aim to sabotage report clearing Karim Khan

Israeli settlers injured five Palestinian workers in two separate hit-and-run incidents near Bethlehem on Tuesday, Wafa news agency reported, citing Palestinian security sources.

A settler drove into four workers from Nahalin near the village of Wadi Fukin as they tried to reach their workplaces in Jerusalem, the sources said. The men, Abdullah Abu Diya, Majdi al-Najjar, Muhammad Fanoun and Mohammad Shakarna, suffered bruises and cuts.

In a separate incident, a settler ran over a fifth worker, Ali Rizq Ali Yassin, after Israeli police shot and wounded him in the leg, the sources added.

Israeli forces also detained five other Palestinian workers from the nearby village of Husan, the sources said.

The Israeli military will control the remaining bridges over Lebanon's Litani River and the area south of the river, Israel's defence minister said on Tuesday.

US President Donald Trump appears to be determined to reach a deal with Iran aimed at ending hostilities in the Middle East, three senior Israeli officials said on Tuesday.

The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that they viewed it is unlikely that Iran would agree to US demands in any new round of negotiations, which broke down on 28 February with the launch of the US-Israeli war on Iran.

Those US demands were likely to include curbs on Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile programmes.

Israeli air strikes on the outskirts of the towns of Al-Haniyah and Al-Qulaylah in the Tyre district of southern Lebanon, Al Jazeera reported. 

Bahrain’s Interior Ministry says its civil defence crew “has succeeded in extinguishing a fire that broke out in a facility belonging to one of the companies due to the criminal Iranian aggression”.

Civil Defence extinguished a fire in a facility of a company as a result of the Iranian aggression. Relevant procedures were taken at the site. pic.twitter.com/J6heOaQoT5

— Ministry of Interior (@moi_bahrain) March 24, 2026

Ever since the state’s founding, Israeli leaders have trotted out phrases like “a villa in the jungle”, “tough neighbourhood” or, perhaps most tiresomely, “only democracy in the Middle East”.

The function of this propaganda has been to persuade their audience - both the domestic Israeli electorate, and the leaders and citizens of Israel’s allied states in the Global North - that the country is an island of civilisation in a sea of barbarism.

They suggest that despite its sweeping victories in most of the wars it has fought, its region-leading military backed by unlimited US aid, and its nuclear arsenal, Israel is in fact at continuous risk of being overrun by Arab, Iranian and Muslim hordes, and its people “driven into the sea” - just as, in fact, Jewish militias drove Palestinian refugees into the sea in 1948.

This myth has had a powerful, malign impact.

Read more: War on Iran: How Israel is demolishing the myth that once shielded it Opinion by Gabriel Polley

South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun on Tuesday asked his Omani counterpart for support on crude oil and LNG supplies, Cho's office said, due to shipment disruptions linked to the conflict in the Middle East.

Iranian authorities on Tuesday arrested three people for“spying on sensitive sites”  in the city of Shahroud in Semnan province, local media reported.

Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported that the individuals are accused of trying to “obtain information and documentation” on military and law enforcement sites and “send it to the enemy”. 

The report said that the provincial police commander confiscated “communication equipment and some prohibited items” from the suspects, who had contacts in the US and Israel. 

At least six Kurdish Peshmerga fighters were killed and 22 wounded in a rocket attack on their base north of Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan, security and Peshmerga sources said on Tuesday.

It was not immediately clear who carried out the attack, the sources added.

Division 7 of the Peshmerga was hit by drones and missiles around 03:00 on March 24 in Spilk Heights, Khalifan, Erbil. 6 were martyred and 20–25 injured, with at least five projectiles used, some intercepted, a senior official told Rudaw. https://t.co/TzP0gEFJqC pic.twitter.com/E1gkUH9dy2

— Ali Sarbaz (@alisarbazj) March 24, 2026

The death toll from air strikes targeting a site belonging to Iraq’s Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) in the western province of Anbar has reached at least 15 fighters, while 30 others were wounded, security and health sources told Reuters early on Tuesday.

The PMF confirmed in a statement the death of its Anbar commander, Saad al-Baiji, and 14 of his companions. It accused the United States of carrying out the attack, saying a US airstrike targeted a command headquarters while personnel were on duty.

Health sources said some of the wounded were in critical condition and the death toll could rise.

Iran’s Energy Minister Abbas Aliabadi on Tuesday said that the country has decentralised its power and can quickly rebuild electricity production facilities in case of being targeted by US-Israeli strikes. 

“People should not be concerned at all; if power plants are hit, they will be rebuilt and modernised quickly,” said Aliabadi in comments carried by Iran’s IRIB broadcaster.

US President Donald Trump on Monday announced a five-day postponement of all strikes on Iranian power plants and energy infrastructure, citing “very good and productive” talks with Tehran over the past two days.

However, on Tuesday morning, Fars News Agency reported that energy-related facilities in Iran’s Isfahan province and the southwestern city of Khorramshahr were struck by US-Israeli strikes.