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A former high-ranking Iranian government official, Brig. Gen. Alireza Asghari, 63, has defected to the United States, Iranian exiles and other sources told Newsmax today. Asghari had access to highly-classified intelligence information and "defected to the Americans with lots of secrets," respected Iranian journalist Alireza Nourizadeh told Newsmax from London. The disappearance of the former Revolutionary Guards General has created a panic in Tehran. Gen. Asghari left Iran on an officially-sanctioned trip to Damascus, Syria, then went missing during a stop-over in Istanbul, Turkey on February 7, according to statements by Iranian government officials in Tehran. Nourizadeh believes he had...

KAN Israel News, citing an Iranian-linked news network, reports that $3 billion was transferred from Abu Dhabi to Tehran aboard a private Boeing 737. According to the report, Iran agreed to halt direct attacks on Israel after receiving a U.S. message, delivered through Qatar, in from further strikes in Lebanon. The funds were reportedly flown to Tehran’s Mehrabad Airport aboard UAE Royal Jet aircraft A6-RJF, which was tracked traveling from Abu Dhabi to Iran. At this stage, the flight itself was genuine (it happened during Irans airspace closure) and the presence of a UAE delegation in Tehran has been reported...

Israel conducted strikes on military targets in western and central Iran early Monday local time, the Israeli military announced, escalating a conflict that had already broken through the ceasefire just hours earlier when Iran fired multiple waves of missiles at Israel on Sunday. The strikes came despite a direct phone call from President Trump to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, urging him not to retaliate immediately for the Iranian missile attack. A senior U.S. official told the Associated Press, on condition of anonymity to describe a private call, that Trump believed he had convinced Netanyahu to wait. Israel struck anyway....

Iran lashed out at its neighbors Saturday after U.S. forces downed missiles Iran launched at targets in the Strait of Hormuz. “U.S. forces intercepted multiple Iranian ballistic missiles and drones launched by Iran toward the Strait of Hormuz and Gulf neighbors,” U.S. Central Command posted on X. “Iran fired seven ballistic missiles toward Kuwait and Bahrain hours after U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) shot down four Iranian one-way attack drones that were launched toward the Strait of Hormuz,” CENTCOM said. “The attack drones posed an immediate threat to regional maritime traffic. U.S. forces subsequently struck Iranian coastal surveillance radar sites in...

WATCH LIVE UPDATES: Netanyahu and Trump Hold Phone Call After Iran Ballistic Missile Barrage Iran launched a ballistic missile attack targeting northern Israel following Israeli airstrikes in Beirut. The attack prompted widespread security measures across Israel, including the cancellation of classes nationwide, as officials prepared for the possibility of additional strikes. So far, missile alerts have sounded hundreds of times across Israel as Iran has launched at least five separate rounds of missile fire. Approximately six waves of ballistic missiles from Iran have been detected. The latest escalation began after Israel carried out airstrikes against targets in southern Beirut, a...

Iran has launched a salvo of ballistic missiles toward Israel, triggering sirens across the northern region with no immediate reports of impacts or casualties

Summary Missiles were launched from Iran toward Israel a short time ago and defense systems are operating to intercept the threat, the Israeli military said in a statement. US bases and and Israeli assets in the region have become "legitimate targets," Iran's Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said in a post on X on Sunday. US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that he did not plan to withdraw US troops from the region, telling NBC News that “I think we’ll keep them there until such time as we have a completion.” A US-drafted resolution sent to countries on the...

The U.S. government for decades has expressed concerns about China’s proliferation of nuclear- and missile-related technologies to other countries, with recent focus on the threat of Chinese acquisition of U.S.-origin nuclear technology. (See CRS In Focus IF11050, New U.S. Policy Regarding Nuclear Exports to China.) Official U.S. government sources indicate that the Chinese government has ended its direct involvement in the transfer of nuclear- and missile-related items, but China-based companies and individuals continue to export goods relevant to those items, particularly to Iran and North Korea. U.S. officials also have raised concerns about entities operating in China that provide other...

American military forces executed a series of preemptive, defensive airstrikes in southern Iran on Monday, US Central Command (CENTCOM) confirmed. "US forces conducted self-defense strikes in southern Iran today to protect our troops from threats posed by Iranian forces," CENTCOM spokesperson Capt. Tim Hawkins told Fox News. He added, “Targets included missile launch sites and Iranian boats attempting to emplace mines. US Central Command continues to defend our forces while using restraint during the ongoing ceasefire." The American confirmation followed a wave of reports across state-controlled Iranian media networks. Tehran's press outlets initially reported that a pair of naval vessels...

A veteran has sparked fierce controversy after publicly blaming Donald Trump for the deaths of school children in Minab, alleging that Tomahawk missile strikes caused catastrophic destruction. The explosive accusation has reignited debate over military accountability, civilian casualties and the human cost of conflict. The remarks are drawing intense scrutiny as questions grow over command responsibility, rules of engagement and the wider fallout from US military actions in the region. The claims have fuelled sharp political reactions, renewed outrage over civilian harm and fresh demands for transparency surrounding the deadly Minab incident.

As food prices spiral and farms shut down across Iran, even establishment figures are openly questioning how a country capable of producing precision missiles cannot manufacture affordable cars or keep chicken within reach of ordinary families. Former Industry Minister Mostafa Hashemitaba says the crisis is rooted not only in consumer markets but across the country’s collapsing production chain, from fertilizers to poultry farming. Writing in Sharq on May 20, Hashemitaba said the price of a 50-kg bag of triple-phosphate fertilizer had jumped within months from three million rials to 70 million rials, a nearly 24-fold increase. Other fertilizers, he added,...

A surge in missile and rocket production tied to rising global conflicts is transforming smaller U.S. manufacturing hubs into critical parts of the American defense supply chain, as weapons makers race to expand capacity and hire thousands of workers, The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday. Defense contractors including Lockheed Martin (LMT), L3Harris (LHX) and RTX (RTX) have significantly expanded operations in Camden, Arkansas, following increased Pentagon demand for missile systems, rocket launchers and artillery ammunition after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The investment wave has fueled rapid hiring and factory expansion across the region. Aerospace and defense employment in...

A new estimate from the Congressional Budget Office suggests that the cost of building and maintaining the proposed “Golden Dome” missile defense system could reach roughly $1.2 trillion over two decades, far exceeding the $185 billion figure previously cited by Pentagon leadership. The ambitious program aims to significantly expand existing U.S. missile defense infrastructure. Plans include bolstering ground-based interceptors, upgrading sensor networks and enhancing command systems, while also introducing a major space-based component designed to identify, monitor and potentially intercept threats from orbit. This orbital layer would rely on a large network of satellites, including systems capable of engaging incoming...

A spokesman for Iran’s terrorist Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) condemned the United States on Friday for conducting what U.S. Central Command referred to as “self-defense strikes” to protect American assets in the region, claiming that it had responded and caused “significant damage.” Central Command (CENTCOM), the wing of the American armed forces responsible for operations in the Middle East, revealed on Thursday that it had “intercepted unprovoked Iranian attacks and responded with self-defense strikes,” destroying the Iranian assets used in the attack. CENTCOM described a flurry of “missiles, drones, and small boats approaching American naval assets and attacking, but...

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth labels the new "Project Freedom" as a strictly defensive mission to bypass legal war power limits, while mocking Iran’s failed attempt to maintain the Hormuz blockade. In a special briefing today, top U.S. defense officials addressed the significant escalation of Iranian aggression that occurred overnight. General Caine provided a detailed account of the ceasefire violations, confirming that Iran launched attacks against Oman, the United Arab Emirates, and critical fuel facilities at the Port of Fujairah. According to General Caine, Iran directly targeted American naval assets during the surge. "Iran launched at least nine missiles toward American...

You know how gas prices are already skyrocketing? Well... Fire reported at the Fujairah Oil Industry Zone in the UAE following an Iranian drone strike. pic.twitter.com/Kps0lfvJRF— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) May 4, 2026Fujairah is the only UAE refinery that bypasses the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway between the Arabian Gulf and Iran that is currently locked down by Iranian mines/rockets and the U.S. Navy. The region produces a third of the world's oil, and a crucial percentage (hundreds of millions of barrels daily) are bypassing the strait by using the Fujairah refinery. Or ... they were (no word yet on how this...

ARLINGTON— The Navy took a major step forward in delivering game-changing hypersonic strike power to carrier pilots when it awarded California startup Castelion a contract nearing $105 million to fully integrate the Blackbeard hypersonic weapon onto the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet. The deal puts U.S. forces on a fast track to field its first operational air-launched hypersonic strike weapon from carrier decks by 2027. Unlike land-based ballistic missiles, Blackbeard is made for Navy aircraft carriers and can be launched from an F/A-18 fighter jet operating hundreds of miles from shore, giving the U.S. enhanced capabilities to strike an adversary’s missile batteries...

Concern about the status of U.S. munitions inventories has intensified as reports emerge about high expenditures of Tomahawks, Patriots, and other missiles in the Iran war. As Operation Epic Fury remains paused in a shaky ceasefire, there is an opportunity to assess whether the U.S. military nears the point of going “Winchester”—or running out of ammunition. Analysis of seven key munitions shows that the United States has enough missiles to continue fighting this war under any plausible scenario. The risk—which will persist for many years—lies in future wars. In the 39 days of the air and missile campaign before the...

A Russian spy ship parked in international waters off Kauai for several days has delayed a Missile Defense Agency missile test, officials said. U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor said in a statement that it “is aware of the Russian vessel operating in international waters in the vicinity of Hawaii, and will continue to track it through the duration of its time here. Through maritime patrol aircraft, surface ships and joint capabilities, we can closely monitor all vessels in the Indo-Pacific area of operations.” It was not immediately clear if the Russian vessel is broadcasting an automatic identification system, or...

“Jesse, as soon as we got the ceasefire, we got a bunch of missile fire. [It] wasn’t five minutes from the Truth Social post to the point where the phones started alerting that missiles had launched from Iran. The first of the missiles was intercepted, and the shrapnel landed outside of Jerusalem, not causing any problems,” Tobin told Jesse Watters. “What we saw here in Tel Aviv were these cluster bombs, like you see on your screen right now. They break up and look a bit like a 4th of July firework and usually has one bright point that comes...