June 22, 2025 – Israel-Iran conflict

• US strikes Iran: The US attacked three key Iranian nuclear facilities early Sunday local time. President Donald Trump claimed the operation “obliterated” the sites,but officials are still assessing how significant of a blow it dealt to Tehran’s program.

• “Operation Midnight Hammer”: B-2 stealth bombers dropped more than a dozen massive “bunker-buster” bombs on Iran’s Fordow and Natanz facilities, while Tomahawk missiles struck Isfahan, according to a US timeline of the attack.

• Iran’s response: Tehran denounced the US and Israel at an emergency UN Security Council meeting and voiced skepticism about the potential for diplomacy. The world awaits an official response from Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

• Future US involvement: The strikes thrust the US into the Israel-Iran conflict, which has seen the two sides trade attacks for over a week. Top administration officials insist the US is not at war with Iran, but Trump has warned the US could launch more attacks if Tehran does not make peace and suggested Sunday evening that regime change was possible in the country.

Our live coverage of the conflict between Israel and Iran has moved here.

Israel launched fresh airstrikes targeting military infrastructure in western Iran’s Kermanshah city, said the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on Monday morning.

Earlier, Iran’s state-affiliated Nour News reported that Israel had struck Parchin, a large military complex southeast of Tehran, in a strike during the early hours of Monday.

Iran launched its own strike on Israel on Monday, firing a missile that was intercepted by Israel’s air defenses.

As calls grow within Iran for closing the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation for US attacks on its nuclear sites, a key diplomatic and economic backer of Tehran would stand to lose from that decision: China.

Connecting the oil-rich Persian Gulf to the open ocean, the Strait of Hormuz is one of the most critical oil checkpoints in the world. Some 20 million barrels per day of crude oil, or 20% of the global consumption, flowed through the narrow strait between Iran and Oman last year, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).

For China, the world’s largest importer of oil and the biggest buyer of crude from Iran, the Strait of Hormuz is even more important.

China imported 5.4 million barrels of crude every day through the strait in the first three months of 2025, according to the EIA’s estimates. That’s equivalent to about half of China’s daily average crude imports in the first quarter of the year, according to CNN’s calculation based on Chinese customs data.

On Sunday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio highlighted that vulnerability when he called on China to dissuade Iran from closing the Strait of Hormuz.

“I encourage the Chinese government in Beijing to call them about that, because they heavily depend on the Straits of Hormuz for their oil,” Rubio said in an interview with Fox News on Sunday, adding that closing the strait would hurt other countries’ economies more than the US economy.

China remains by far Iran’s largest energy buyer, though it has not reported purchases of Iranian oil in its official customs data since 2022, according to analysts. Some 90% of Iran’s oil exports now go to China, according to commodities data company Kpler, providing a key lifeline to Tehran’s heavily sanctioned economy.

China has condemned US attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities, saying the move “exacerbates tensions in the Middle East.” It has not commented on the potential closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

A number of close US allies have expressed support for its strikes against Iran, arguing that Iran had presented a nuclear threat, but urging diplomacy and de-escalation. Others, including key partners in the Gulf, have expressed concern and dismay over the strikes.

Western military sources tell CNN it’s still too early to fully assess the damage wrought by the US’ strikes on Iran’s main nuclear facilities.

But even the destruction of Iran’s nuclear facilities may not mean the end of the Iranian nuclear threat. Far from it.

For years, hard-line voices inside the Islamic Republic have been calling for a nuclear weapon as a deterrent against exactly this kind of overwhelming attack.

Even as Iran continues to insist its nuclear program is for strictly peaceful purposes, those calls will now inevitably have been bolstered and the nuclear hard-liners may finally get their way.

Ominously, Iranian officials are already publicly hinting at pulling out of a key treaty – the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, or NPT – designed to monitor and prevent the global spread of nuclear weapons.

Other Iranian lawmakers have called for the Islamic Republic to formally withdraw from the treaty, in what would likely be interpreted as a virtual confirmation of Iranian intent to build a nuclear weapon.

Read the full analysis here.

While there have been no major disruptions to the global oil supply so far, the attacks on Iran – by Israel and then the US – have rattled investors, sending oil futures soaring by around 10%, among fears Iran could retaliate by disrupting shipping in the Strait of Hormuz.

From the perspective of the global economy, there are few places as strategically important. The waterway, located between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, is only 21 miles wide at its narrowest point. It’s the only way to ship crude from the oil-rich Persian Gulf to the rest of the world. Iran controls its northern side.

About 20 million barrels of oil, about one-fifth of daily global production, flow through the strait every day, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), which called the channel a “critical oil chokepoint.”

On Sunday evening, following US airstrikes on three of Iran’s nuclear facilities, Brent crude, the global benchmark, briefly surged above $80 per barrel, according to Refinitiv data, the first time that’s happened since January. Before the conflict, prices had largely hovered between $60 and $75 a barrel since August 2024.

Whether oil prices will climb further now depends on Iran’s response. Rob Thummel, senior portfolio manager at energy investment firm Tortoise Capital, told CNN that a potential disruption to the Iran-controlled sea route would cause oil prices to surge toward $100 per barrel.

A closure of the Strait will be particularly detrimental to Asian economies which rely on the crude oil and natural gas shipped through the route.

Read more about this here.

Sen. Bernie Sanders on Sunday drew similarities between the US’s air strikes in Iran this weekend and the invasion of Iraq in 2003, telling a Texas crowd that “we cannot let history repeat itself.”

The progressive Vermont senator, speaking at a town hall in Fort Worth as part of his “Fighting Oligarchy” tour, highlighted how Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Donald Trump used similar language around the strikes in Iran to what Netanyahu and then-President George W. Bush said surrounding the US’s invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Sanders quoted a Netanyahu congressional testimony from 2002, in which the Israeli leader said, “There is no question that Saddam [Hussein] is seeking nuclear weapons.”

Sanders then emphasized how “George Bush said, ‘Saddam’s regime is seeking a nuclear bomb,’ and he argued for a preemptive attack,” referencing an analogy by the then-president that the United States could not afford to wait for “the smoking gun which could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.”

“No weapons of mass destruction were ever found,” Sanders continued. “That war was based on a lie. A lie that cost us 4,500 young Americans, 32,000 wounded and trillions of dollars.”

Bush in 2003 announced the invasion of Iraq under the pretext of disarming it from weapons of mass destruction, a claim that was later debunked.

Netanyahu and Trump have both cited the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear program, with the US president saying Saturday from the White House, “Our objective was the destruction of Iran’s nuclear enrichment capacity and a stop to the nuclear threat posed by the world’s No. 1 state sponsor of terror.”

Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei faces the greatest challenge yet to his leadership following US strikes on his country’s nuclear sites, an analyst said, as the world awaits an official response from the Supreme Leader.

Khamenei is arguably in the “most dire situation of his entire life as an autocrat,” Karim Sadjadpour, from the Carnegie Endowment of International Peace, told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins.

“He’s in a bunker. He’s 86 years old. He has limited physical, cognitive bandwidth. Most of his top military commanders were assassinated. He doesn’t control his own airspace. Israel controls it,” he said. “And, you know, there’s no way out of this war. He can’t win this war. He’s outmatched militarily, financially, technologically.”

Khamenei has not yet publicly commented since the US struck three key Iranian nuclear sites. He said last week in a national address that Iran will not surrender and warned that any US military intervention would result in “irreparable damage.”

After reportedly rejecting an Israeli plan to kill Khamenei, US President Trump stated last week that Iran’s Supreme Leader is an “easy target.”

Questions are mounting over whether such an intervention could trigger regime change in Tehran – an outcome that risks splintering the country and sending shockwaves across the region.

Khamenei has ruled Iran for more than 35 years as its highest authority, rising to power a decade after the 1979 Islamic Revolution overthrew a US-backed monarch.

The Supreme Leader “has survival instincts, but he also has defiant instincts,” Sadjadpour said. “And he’s having a real struggle in my view, reconciling those two.”

President Donald Trump praised the impact of the US’s strikes on nuclear sites in Iran as early assessments raise questions over whether the US destroyed the bulk of the country’s enriched nuclear material.

“Monumental Damage was done to all Nuclear sites in Iran, as shown by satellite images,” he wrote on Truth Social late Sunday night.

“Obliteration is an accurate term! The white structure shown is deeply imbedded into the rock, with even its roof well below ground level, and completely shielded from flame. The biggest damage took place far below ground level. Bullseye!!!” he wrote on Truth Social.

The US attacked three key Iranian nuclear facilities early Sunday local time. Trump claimed the operation “obliterated” the sites, but officials are still assessing how significant of a blow it dealt to Tehran’s program.

CNN reported Sunday that the US appears to have held back its most powerful bombs against one of the three facilities included in the operation, raising questions about whether it finished the job.

Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a staunch Trump ally, criticized the president’s decision to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities, writing in a statement on X Saturday night:

“There would not be bombs falling on the people of Israel if Netanyahu had not dropped bombs on the people of Iran first. Israel is a nuclear armed nation. This is not our fight. Peace is the answer.”

Greene’s comments highlight the divide within Trump’s MAGA movement between those who have rallied behind the president and those who have voiced skepticism toward greater US involvement in the conflict.

Israel is set to begin limited flights in and out of Ben Gurion International Airport on Monday, the airport authority announced.

Outgoing flights will operate with a maximum of 50 passengers because of new safety protocols, Israel Airports Authority (IAA) said in a statement. Israel’s Home Front Command has restricted large gatherings of people and closed non-essential workplaces because of the threat of Iranian ballistic missiles.

Meanwhile, the IAA will allow approximately 24 incoming flights per day as part of what it’s calling the “Safe Return” operation, as tens of thousands of Israelis remain stranded abroad. These inbound flights are allowed to operate with an increased capacity.

The IAA said the resumption of flights – even at limited capacities – would mark “a significant step toward the gradual restoration of routine international travel.”

President Donald Trump will meet with his national security team tomorrow afternoon in the Oval Office, according to a schedule released by the White House on Sunday night.

He has no public events on his schedule.

Trump was initially set to travel to the annual NATO summit, held in The Hague this year, on Monday. He is now slated to leave for the meeting on Tuesday.

President Donald Trump and his team were in contact with top congressional Republicans before his strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, but some key Democrats were not told of his plans until after the bombs had dropped, according to multiple people familiar with the plans.

The top two Republicans in Congress, House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, were notified of the US strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities ahead of time, according to multiple GOP sources.

People familiar with the matter initially told CNN that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries received notifications shortly before the public announcement — and after the attack itself.

But after White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt disputed that account, a source conceded Schumer had been called around 6 p.m. – a little less than an hour before the strikes began – with little detail. He was told of imminent military action without the name of the country in which the action was to take place, the source said.

Leavitt wrote on X the administration made “bipartisan courtesy calls to Congressional leadership” and spoke to Schumer in advance of the strikes. She said Jeffries “could not be reached until after, but he was briefed.”

Read more about this here.

President Donald Trump’s MAGA sphere of conservative media and influencers – many of whom had expressed skepticism before his decision to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities – is divided over the president’s dramatic move to strike.

Many of its most prominent figures rallied around Trump. But others sharply criticized the decision, said they want to see more explanation than his brief Saturday night speech, or warned of a drawn-out conflict.

Ahead of Saturday’s bombing, the prospect of United States involvement in another Middle Eastern conflict had opened rifts in the GOP. Trump himself had ripped the United States’ involvement in wars in the Middle East as a presidential candidate, and his “Make America Great Again” movement includes many more isolationist voices aligned with his “America First” vision. Those voices were at odds in recent days with GOP hawks who advocated a muscular US role in supporting Israel in its bid to stop Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.

But after Trump’s Saturday night announcement, some prominent MAGA voices rallied around the president. Others, however, expressed skepticism toward any broader mission in Iran.

Read more about the MAGA divide here.

President Donald Trump had been leaning heavily toward taking US military action in Iran for several days when he issued a directive to his senior aides: Tell the press he would make a decision on whether to act within two weeks, as a way to obscure his true thinking.

The president had been frustrated by coverage that suggested he had made a final decision on striking Iranian nuclear sites and he thought a two-week timeline could throw off the Iranians and conceal his plans, according to several sources familiar with what happened.

Trump made the call to issue the statement Thursday as he was set to have lunch with his former adviser Steve Bannon, who had been publicly skeptical of US involvement. Shortly after, his press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, walked into the White House briefing room and followed the president’s orders, signaling to the world that Trump’s mind wasn’t made up yet.

While the final call came Saturday as bombers were already in the air, those around Trump believed his mind had been largely made up for days regarding taking action in Iran. Trump had been briefed on attack plans already and was meeting with his senior national security aides in person on a daily basis, in addition to having multiple phone calls throughout the day.

Iran again activated air defenses over its capital, Tehran, in the early hours of Monday, according to semi-official Iranian media outlet Mehr News Agency.

It comes as Iran launched a missile at Israel early Monday, which was intercepted by the country’s air defenses, according to an Israeli official.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) says a new wave of Iranian missiles has been launched toward Israel.

“A short while ago, sirens sounded in several areas across Israel following the identification of missiles launched from Iran toward the State of Israel,” said a statement from the IDF.

The military instructed the public to enter shelters and said defense systems were operating.

A spokesperson for Magen David Adom, Israel’s national emergency medical service, said it hadn’t received any calls to their hotline about falls or injuries, “with the exception of cases of anxiety and people who were injured on the way to a protected area.”

Only one missile was launched by Iran and was intercepted by Israel’s air defenses, an Israeli official told CNN.

Video showed the missile moving through the sky above Jerusalem, and sirens were heard in several areas of the country warning people to enter shelters. People have since been told they can leave shelters.

Earlier, state-affiliated Iranian outlet Nour News reported Iran’s air defense system was intercepting “hostile targets” over the capital city of Tehran.

This post has been updated with additional information.

US President Donald Trump spoke with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Sunday evening, following US strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites that morning, according to Starmer’s office.

Trump and Starmer discussed “the need for Iran to return to the negotiating table as soon as possible and to make progress on a lasting settlement,” the statement continues, adding that the two leaders agreed to stay in “close contact” over the coming days.

The Israeli military struck Parchin, a large military complex southeast of Tehran, Iran state-affiliated Nour News reported early Monday local time.

A B-2 stealth bomber was seen returning to a US base in Missouri after completing Operation Midnight Hammer in Iran.

President Donald Trump had posted on social media Sunday evening the B-2 stealth bomber pilots who were on the mission to Iran have returned safely.

Remember: The unprecedented US operation involved seven stealth B-2 bombers. All told, more than 125 aircraft were involved, including the B-2s, refueling tankers, reconnaissance planes and fighter jets.

About B-2 bombers: Theyare the only planes capable of carrying the Massive Ordnance Penetrator, which experts have highlighted as the only type of bomb potentially capable of destroying Iran’s underground Fordow nuclear facility. Each B-2 bomber is able to carry two of these “bunker buster” bombs, which weigh an impressive 30,000 pounds each.