Live: Israel says it will control bridges and area south of Lebanon’s Litani River
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South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun asked his Iranian counterpart on Monday to ensure the safety of vessels that remain inside the Strait of Hormuz, his office said.
Hyun also expressed deep concern about the current war in the Middle East on the global economy, his office added.
The Kremlin on Monday cast as false a Politico report that Russia had offered to cut off intelligence sharing with Iran in exchange for the United States ending its support for Ukraine.
"This report - we have seen it," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. "It belongs to the category of untruthful, or rather, false."
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Monday there had been no assessment that mainland Britain was being targeted by Iran.
"We carry out assessments all the time in order to keep us safe, and there's no assessment that we're being targeted in that way," Starmer told reporters.
He was asked if Britain could be targeted by Iran after reports at the weekend that Iran had fired two ballistic missiles at the US-UK military base Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.
Starmer also said that any attempt to reopen the Strait of Hormuz needed careful consideration and a viable plan, and that his number one priority was to protect British interests and de-escalate.
Saudi Aramco, the world's top oil exporter, has cut crude supply to Asian buyers for a second month in April, two sources with knowledge of the matter said on Monday, after the US-Israeli war with Iran disrupted trade via the Strait of Hormuz.
The producer is supplying only Arab Light crude, exported from the Red Sea port of Yanbu, to term customers in April, the sources said, keeping supplies to Asian refineries tight and capping their refined products output.
Saudi Arabia has exported 4.355m barrels per day of crude so far in March, data from analytics firm Kpler showed, down from 7.108m bpd in February.
The producer is trying to boost crude exports via Yanbu to offset the Strait of Hormuz disruption, with loadings seen rising to record volumes in March.
One civilian was killed in an air strike in the al-Shahabiya district of Tyre in southern Lebanon, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency.
Four others have been moderately wounded, the report said, adding that the attack caused significant damage to a residential area.
Israeli strikes also targeted infastructure in the south, destroying the Qaqaiya bridge on the Litani river, located on a main highway linking villages in the Tyre district with others farther north.
The Israeli military has reportedly informed the family of an Israeli man who was killed yesterday in the northern community, Misgav Am, that he was hit by Israeli fire, and not by a Hezbollah attack.
Ofer Moskovitz, 60, was killed in Misgav Am yesterday. The army initially claimed he was killed by a rocket fired from Lebanon, and later launched an investigation into the incident.
An attack on Iran's southern coast and islands will lead to Gulf routes being cut with the laying of sea mines, the country's Defence Council said on Monday, according to state media.
The US is considering plans to occupy or blockade Iran's Kharg Island, the country's main oil export hub, to pressure Tehran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to all shipping, according to Axios.
"Any attempt to attack Iran's coasts or islands will cause all access routes in the Gulf... to be mined with various types of sea mines, including floating mines that can be released from the coast," the statement read.
"In this case, the entire Gulf will practically be in a situation similar to the Strait of Hormuz for a long time... One should not forget the failure of more than 100 minesweepers in the 1980s in removing a few sea mines."
The Defence Council recalled that non-belligerent states can transit the Strait of Hormuz only by coordinating passage with Iran.
China warned on Monday that further attacks on the Middle East risk creating an "uncontrollable situation" in the war-torn region, after US President Donald Trump threatened to "obliterate" Iran's power plants.
"If the war expands further and the situation deteriorates again, the entire region could be plunged into an uncontrollable situation," Chinese Foreign Minister Lin Jian told a news conference, when asked about Trump's threats.
My first visit to Iran took place in September 2015, when I attended a conference in Tehran on the subject of “Iranian terror victims” - ranging, in this case, from the thousands of Iranians killed by the pathological regime-change cult known as the Mojahedin-e Khalq, to the Iranian scientists assassinated with the apparently not-so-secret help of the Israeli Mossad.
I had ended up at the conference by accident, as the email invitation that had materialised in my inbox was addressed not to me, but to one General Mirza Aslam Beg, who, a Google search revealed, happened to be the former head of the armed forces of Pakistan.
Via prolonged pleading with the event organisers, I finagled an invitation for myself, as well - and after a frantic sorting of my Iranian visa, I found myself on a plane bound for Tehran in the company of a reformed right-wing politician from Spain, another conference invitee.
By way of small talk, he informed me that he had advised Iran’s ambassador to Madrid that it would behoove the Islamic Republic to acquire a nuclear weapon. His suggestion had been shot down on religious grounds.
Read more: How Iran is a victim of US-Israeli terrorism Opinion by Belen Fernandez
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Khatam al-Anbiya headquarters spokesperson on Monday said that its forces attacked Prince Sultan airbase in Saudi Arabia and the US Fifth Fleet in Bahrain.
The group said that it used ballistic missiles to target US reconnaissance aircraft stationed at Prince Sultan airbase, describing it as a key site for US military deployment and operations.
Israeli settlers attempted to set fire to a health clinic and vehicles overnight in the village of Burqa in the Ramallah, occupied West Bank, according to Wafa news agency.
Wafa also said a Palestinian teenager was injured on Sunday evening after being assaulted by Israeli forces in the town of Awarta, south of Nablus, according to an official.
Tokyo is "not thinking about" calling on Iran to let Japanese tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, the foreign minister has said, after Tehran said it was ready to help.
Japan depends on crude oil imports from the Middle East, most of which transits the strait, located in the Gulf.
Iran has effectively closed the strait in retaliation for US-Israeli strikes, sending countries reliant on the shipping lane scrambling for alternative routes and tapping reserves.
Asked about whether the government would urge Iran to let Japanese ships transit Hormuz, Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi said Sunday on a Fuji Television programme that "for the time being, we are not thinking about that".
Russia opposes any blockade of the Strait of Hormuz but says such issues must be viewed in the context of the broader global situation, Interfax reported on Monday, citing the Russian foreign ministry.
Iran’s Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Amir Saeid Iravani, has lodged a protest at the UN over what he termed as "Jordan’s facilitation of US attacks", Iranian media has reported.
Iravani made the comments in a letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the president of the UN Security Council, IRNA reported.
Rory Stewart told Sky News that American and Israeli attacks are pushing Gulf economies back by 10 to 15 years.
He pointed to Dubai, where decades of development turned desert land into financial and innovation hubs, now being devastated.
Stewart said Gulf states like the UAE and Qatar once relied on US bases for protection but are now paying the price, becoming targets themselves.
He warned that continued involvement risks a global economic meltdown and the start of a larger war, urging all foreign forces to withdraw immediately.
Rory Stewart told Sky News that American and Israeli attacks are pushing Gulf economies back by 10 to 15 years.
— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) March 23, 2026
He pointed to Dubai, where decades of development turned desert land into financial and innovation hubs, now being devastated.
Stewart said Gulf states like the UAE… pic.twitter.com/CXBfxlyZX9
