Global News Podcast - US insists attack on Iran was a success as Iran's leader dismisses it as 'showmanship'

Episode Date: June 27, 2025

The US defence secretary insists their strikes undermined Iran's nuclear plans. Also: Journalist Anna Wintour is to step down as US Vogue editor, and a man whose crimes helped create the term Stockholm Syndrome has died.

This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Valerie Sanderson and in the early hours of Friday 27th June these are our main stories. Washington has doubled down on its assessment that its strikes on Iran have severely undermined Tehran's nuclear ambitions after Iran's Supreme Leader dismissed the attacks as showmanship. Gaza has received its first delivery in more than three months of medical aid from the World Health Organization. The legendary fashion journalist Anna Wintour has announced that she's standing down as the editor of US Vogue magazine after 37 years in the role.

Also in this podcast, we hear from a woman who was held hostage in the siege that gave rise to the term Stockholm syndrome. I think it was the feeling that someone cared about me. I don't feel ashamed at all for this I did what I could to survive The ceasefire between Israel and Iran may be holding, but the United States and the Islamic Republic are refusing to let the dust settle. In our earlier podcast, we brought you some of the first televised address since the ceasefire by Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. He declared victory over Israel and said that President Trump was wrong to claim that US

strikes had obliterated Iran's underground nuclear site at Fordow. A short time later, US defence secretary Pete Hegseth gave a combative press conference in the Pentagon, castigating journalists for reporting a US intelligence leak which said that Saturday's bombing raid failed to destroy that site. Rather, he called it an historically successful attack. There has been speculation that highly enriched uranium was moved from Fordow days before the attack. But President Trump said that nothing had left the site.

Iran has always insisted that its nuclear programme is for civilian purposes only. I asked our security correspondent Frank Gardner if the world will ever find out the full damage to Iran's nuclear capabilities. I think the only way we're going to know is if the UN nuclear watchdog inspectors are allowed back in, if the Iranian regime collapses or if there's some really convincing hard intelligence that comes out of that. I'm not talking about conjecture because I mean there's no question that the bombs they dropped were dropped with pinpoint accuracy down

to ventilation shafts and it's hard to believe that they went all the way down and didn't damage or destroy the centrifuges. But we don't know for certain and there's also a big question about where is the unaccounted for 408 kilograms of highly enriched uranium that's enriched to 60%, which is very close to weapons grade. Then of course you've got the knowledge, which has not been destroyed. That will be in data banks, in hard drives, in the brains of surviving nuclear scientists who haven't been killed by Israel. So, you know, it looks good to say it's been a total success. And it looks good for Iran's supreme leader,

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to say it's been an abject failure. The truth is probably somewhere in between the two. And from what Khamenei was saying, is it your sense this isn't over? It's over for now because both sides have got the message. Donald Trump does not want to see this flare up again. They've done this round. This round is over. But the problem isn't over because Israel is going to be watching Iran like a hawk for any signs that it's reconstituting its program. And there will be hardliners in Iran's in the leadership who will be pushing as soon as they

think attention is off them to build a nuclear bomb as the best deterrence, the best defense they've got to not be attacked again. They look at North Korea, which has defied Western sanctions, built around 50 nuclear warheads and the missiles to deliver them, and no one's attacking North Korea in a hurry. And they would like to be in the same position. So I think there will be some who are pushing for that. So is it your sense this has made the region more unstable rather than less so by this action? It's such a cliche, I know, but only time will will tell but I'm afraid that is the truth. It's much too soon to

judge whether this has been a successful failure. I mean one thing's clear Ayatollah al-Hamenei was talking a load of nonsense today in his address when he said you know this has been a slap in the face and that the US has failed and this and that. I mean sorry it's been an unmitigated disaster for Iran. Its air defences are totally penetrated. It lost over 600 people. Some of its top commanders were taken down. It has been shown to be in a demonstrably weak position. And it's true that quite a lot of its missiles did get through and hit Israel. And I think it's been a shock to Israel that that is true. But Iran didn't win this. I mean, there's no winners really in this. I think this is just the end of this chapter. But the problem

persists. And both Iran and Israel have got a degree of jeopardy here. Israel's problem is that it still faces an implacable foe in Tehran that has vowed the destruction of the state of Israel, that hasn't changed. And there is the potential for them to pursue a new underground nuclear enrichment program. And for Iran, the jeopardy is that if Israel suspects that strongly enough, Benjamin Netanyahu is in as much of a warlike mood, there is the risk for Iran that there could be another preemptive attack by Israel. So we're not out of the woods yet. Well, as you heard Frank say there, the threat of further airstrikes on Iran is still a very

real one. But on the ground in Tehran, people are still trying to piece their lives back together after 12 days of bombings. Our international correspondent, Lisa Set, has been allowed into the Iranian capital on condition that her reports are not broadcast on the BBC's Persian service which transmits news in Farsi. That's part of an Iranian law that applies to all international media agencies who are operating in Iran. In this Tehran hospital they're still treating some of the civilians and soldiers injured in Israeli attacks. All the beds in this emergency department had been filled with patients.

Asher Bargay, the head nurse, worries they could be overwhelmed by casualties again. I'm scared they might attack again, she tells me, reflecting what we hear from so many people in this capital. We don't trust this war has ended, she says. Tehran slowly returns to life, at least on the surface. It's the third day of this fragile ceasefire. For now, it's holding. More shops open today at this popular Tajrish bazaar.

More residents who fled this city have returned. I wanted to come back to the comfort of my own home, remarks Roya, as she shops for food at the start of the Iranian weekend. It was tough to be away, but the nights we spent here were really hard too. During Friday prayers, there's certain to be defiant slogans from the government's most loyal supporters, condemning the United States and Israel. On Saturday, state funerals will be held for many of the senior military commanders and nuclear scientists assassinated in Israeli operations. Another official event where grief will mix with anger and hostility, and another moment when Iran will again be in the eyes of a world

where many now worry about what comes next. Lise Doucet in Tehran. It's been a month since the controversial US and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation set up aid distribution points in the territory, bypassing larger international groups such as the United Nations. In that short time, more than 400 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military while trying to collect supplies at these hubs, that's according to the UN. But now the World Health Organisation says it's delivered medical aid into Gaza for the first time since early March, before the collapse of the Gaza ceasefire and Israel's crackdown on aid. For more, I spoke to the BBC's Will Vernon.

Will Well, this was a post on social media by the WHO boss, Tedros Adhanim Ghebreyesus. He said that this delivery crossed into Gaza containing medical supplies, blood, plasma, all of which are desperately needed. And he said this will be distributed to hospitals in the coming days. He did describe it as a drop in the ocean and said that aid at scale is essential to save lives. As we know, access is severely limited. Trickle was what one UN official described it to me. And he also said there was no looting incident with this shipment, which could be a little pushback against that Israeli narrative that Hamas has been looting aid, which of course many

agencies say isn't a major problem. And what is the Israeli attitude to this? Because presumably it couldn't go in without their say so. Well, we've had some pretty confusing messages throughout the day. I mean, we've been talking for many weeks, haven't we, about the difficulties of getting aid into Gaza. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said yesterday that the army had two days to present a plan for how to prevent Hamas from looting aid. Today there have been reports that it's been restricted even further. Two officials spoke to the Reuters news agency and said that aid had stopped altogether from the north of the

Strip and then the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said that it was the only humanitarian organisation distributing aid in Gaza and they said that there was a two-day suspension of aid deliveries which they were exempt from. Now the UN haven't commented officially, neither have the Israeli government about whether aid has been suspended or just throttled further. So it's not entirely clear what is happening. What we do know and what we've heard many, many times before is that major aid agencies say there is an acute shortage of food and other supplies in Gaza. It is desperate there, isn't it?

It is, as well as the shortage of supplies. There's also daily deaths, shootings, at least 40 killed during today, according to local authorities. Israel says they are controlled by Hamas, which is disputed. And my colleagues in the region earlier were talking to doctors and locals, eyewitnesses who said they witnessed an Israeli airstrike by a drone on a busy market. A Hamas controlled police force had turned up there to investigate reports of humanitarian aid being looted and these locals and doctors said that at least 18 were killed on this airstrike on that busy market.

Will Vernon, in the other Palestinian territory, the occupied West Bank, three Palestinians have been shot dead in the latest clash with Jewish settlers. Our correspondent, Wera Davis, reports. There's been sporadic violence across the West Bank in recent weeks, even months. Not as highlighted or as obviously damaging as perhaps what is going on in Gaza, but nonetheless, ever since that war in Gaza there's been increasing violence here in the occupied West Bank. I'm now outside the village of Turmus Aya and there have been clashes between settlers from the settlement and from various Jewish outposts coming down and setting fire to cars and buildings in these villages. In the village just up the road where

we've just come from called Kfar Malik, three young men were shot and killed last night after clashes between settlers who'd come down with Molotov cocktails and tried to set fire to cars and houses. At some point those settlers were backed up by the IDF, the Israeli army, they fired live rounds towards the village and three young men were killed. Now the Israeli army says they did that after receiving stones and gunfire from within the village. Villagers deny categorically that they fired. They said they did defend their houses with stones and whatever they could have to hand

after being set alight by settlers. But it's an example of the increasing tension and violence in the occupied West Bank. More than 900 people have been killed here in Israeli military activity. since the start of the Gaza War. 35 Israelis have also been killed. Settlers are feeling increasingly emboldened. Only last month the Israeli government approved the building of 22 new settlements. Those settlements are of course regarded as illegal under international law because they're being

built on occupied Palestinian land. But Israeli government ministers, particularly those on the far right, often support the actions of settlers and support the ultimate goal of settlers, which is to annex the Palestinian West Bank. Wirri Davies reporting from the occupied West Bank. One of the men involved in the hostage situation that gave rise to the term Stockholm syndrome has died. Clark Olufsen was 78. Olufsen was already serving a prison sentence back in 1973 when his friend Jan Erik Olsen took four people hostage to Stockholm Bank and demanded that Olufsen be brought in to join him. Over the course of a six-day siege, hostages appeared to have developed emotional

attachments to their captors, demanding that they be allowed to go free. The siege ended peacefully and the two men were arrested, but the hostages refused to testify against them. A Swedish psychiatrist later coined the term Stockholm Syndrome in an effort to explain the seemingly irrational affection that some captives felt for their hostage takers. It's never been an official psychiatric diagnosis. In 2016 the BBC's Dina Newman spoke to Kristin Enmark, one of the hostages. There was some agreement between the police and Clark that he was going to be the negotiator. So you suddenly you were in a position where you had to trust him.

I don't know, in that position, I think you take every straw you can get. Maybe not trust, but maybe I have to respect this man in a way and see if he can do anything for us. While Kristian was terrified of the first robber, Jane, she began to see Clark Olson as a friend. He took me under his wing and he said that I'm going to see that nothing is going to happen to you.

It's hard to explain to anyone else how much that meant to me. I think it was the feeling that someone cared about me. Maybe it was more some dependence in some way. But I think about it now that it was more some dependence in some way. But I think about it now that it was a brilliant strategy from me. He protected me from Janne. And if he was going to hurt someone, he wouldn't pick me because he know that Clark liked me. And even now thinking about it, you don't feel ashamed, you feel this was the best strategy for you.

I don't feel ashamed at all for this. I did what I could to survive. Do you think Clark was attracted to you sexually? He never showed any sexual things. He never touched me in the wrong place, if you understand. It was just two people comforting each other. Already by the second day, Kristian had so much respect for Clark that she did not hesitate to plead with the Swedish Prime Minister, Ullof Palme, to allow the criminals release. Kristian's survival strategy of identifying with one of the kidnappers brought about peculiar changes in her behavior, which she did not notice at the time.

Looking back at day two, she remembers when Janne the robber threatened to shoot the male hostage Sven. He wanted to make a demonstration to show the police that he was serious, that he was dangerous. And he said to Sven that he was going to shoot him in the leg. Sven was of course scared and Janne said to him, I'm not going to hurt any bones. And Sven was scared. And then I said to Sven, and this took me 10 years to tell anybody this. I said to Sven, but Sven, it's only in the leg. And I feel so ashamed about this. I thought that he was being a coward, not letting him being shot in the leg.

Kristin Enmark speaking to the BBC's Dina Newman and you can hear the whole interview on the BBC Witness website. Still to come… I feel like there's a consensus building around the world that this regime got to go. California's Iranian community take to the streets to protest about the conflict in Iran. Earlier this month, the US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sacked all 17 members of a group that devised the government on a vaccine policy. His hand-picked replacements for the advisory committee on immunisation practices

have been meeting for the first time. Some of them have openly spoken out against certain vaccines. The BBC spoke to Noel Brewer, one of the advisors who lost his place on the committee. I was fired from the position via an editorial in the Wall Street Journal. Before that, I'd served on the Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices. The committee helps the US to know who should get vaccines at what age and how many doses. Sorry, did you say you were fired via the Wall Street Journal? You found out by reading it in the paper.

Better than that. A journalist emailed me an article from the Wall Street Journal. It was an op-ed and that was by the Secretary of Health and Human Services. And that article fired me and the other 16 members. Why do you think you were fired from your post? The current secretary appears to prefer people who have vaccine skeptical views. So he assumed that you wouldn't agree with him, I guess. They've been making some important decisions

on the committee today. They voted 5 to 1 to recommend against flu vaccines containing the preservative thimerosal, I think is how you say it. What's your view on that? And tell us first what that vaccine is. Thimerosal is a preservative that's used to help ensure the safety of vaccines. It's used only in vaccines for seasonal influenza that are in multi-dose vials or for pregnant women. The vaccines are also sometimes given to young children.

And this decision now to recommend against that particular vaccine, what's your reaction to that? Thimerosal is subtle science. We've known for decades that it is safe. Spending precious time and resources, re-litigating this is not helpful to anyone. There was also no evaluation of the quality of the evidence except by one of the members Normally for this level of discussion they would have engaged in something called an evidence to recommendation framework. That was not present Okay, so, I mean, I think it was Lynn Redwood who put this forward at the committee. She said that the thimerosal uses said that the thimerosal uses mercury and it contributes to the overall amount of mercury in a person's system. It's incredibly limited. There are enough stocks and other sources of flu vaccine that don't contain the compound, so it's unnecessary to use this.

We have precious public health resources and picking this particular fight is not really helpful. We have other things we need to do that are urgent. This is not it. What's your reaction though to the fact that the committee did continue to recommend that all Americans aged six months and older receive an annual influenza vaccine? I'm encouraged that they're able to recommend what is already known to be best evidence and best practice. But? The entire tenor of the discussion was one to question vaccines and to sow doubt.

We need to have a system that has leadership from the top all the way down, encouraging people to understand that vaccines are safe and they're effective. In cases where they're not, they will not be recommended. The presentations will also make it harder for health care providers to explain clearly to patients that vaccines are safe and effective. No, Brewer, talking to Rebecca Kesby. It's been four years since the last James Bond film was released. No Time to Die was the final outing for Daniel Craig as 007 and the last entry in the franchise

before it was sold to Amazon MGM Studios. Fans have been wondering what the future of James Bond could look like in the hands of the tech and streaming giant and now we have a clue. The Oscar nominated director Denis Villeneuve, known for bringing an artistic touch to action blockbusters like Dune and Blade Runner 2049 has been hired to helm the next Bond film. We asked the film critic Larishka Evans-Zadda what the choice of Villeneuve means for the series. Well my first thought was like finally because we've been waiting for some Bond news for a very long time now but yes I was surprised I think because

he carries a particular stamp he's's a visionary director. He comes with a particular vision, a particular style, and also he's a very high prestige director. We're talking an Oscar nominated director here with a string of Oscar winning hits to his name. So it showed that they're definitely positioning this film as a prestige potential Oscar winner for the future, rather than a kind of, I don't know, mainstream studio product crowd pleaser. Is it a big moment for the whole movie industry? KATE The New Bond is always a huge moment. I think

with the sale of the Bond franchise to Amazon, people really did think, where is the franchise going to go? Is it going to go more to streaming? Are we going to see it sort of fragmented into lots of mini-series and prequels and sequels and Bond spin-off TV rather than having it as a big tentpole event movie every year. Of course we don't know the full details here but you have to think if you've got a director like Denis Villeneuve you're going to have a grand big screen event with this new Bond film. It's going to become one of the biggest films of the year again and it's re-establishing that.

The film critic Larushka Ivanzadeh speaking to Sarah Montague. For decades the journalist Anna Winter has been dubbed the queen of fashion, famous for her signature oversized black sunglasses, her perfectly coiffed bob haircut and her authoritative leadership style. When you're not clear and you're not decisive you have a lot of people swimming around you waiting for you to make up your mind and that's just a waste of everybody's time and most importantly it's a waste of their time and to me that's disrespectful.

Can I ask what's up with the sunglasses? No it's just everyone asks it and it's just a habit and help me see and they help me especially helpful when you're jet-lagged. But after 37 years as editor-in-chief of American Vogue, Anna Wintour has announced she's stepping back from the role. Fashion journalist Charlotte Ambrose told me that although her departure marks the end of an era, it's not the end of Ms Wintour's influence. I mean it's a huge deal.

Anna Wintour has been a massive name and influence in the fashion industry and she's shaped it really to what it is today. There has not been any sign or reason as to why she's done it. She also didn't necessarily signal to that earlier in the year when she said she's not retiring anytime soon. She's not leaving Vogue. She's going to continue to take on her role as global editorial director at Condé Nast, which is certainly more strategy focused and she'll be overseeing a lot more brands, not just focusing on Vogue. Do we know why she's done this? Two things it could be because she's had such a long tenure and she's 75 so she could be scaling back from the

kind of hands-on everyday responsibilities of being head of editorial or perhaps stepping back from focusing on the US fashion industry to focus on broader markets perhaps the Asia-Pacific region or the Middle East which are really having a come-up in the luxury fashion industry to focus on broader markets, perhaps the Asia-Pacific region or the Middle East, which are really having a come up in the luxury fashion industry and are growing markets as well. How influential has she been in her 37 years at the helm of Vogue? I mean, she's just made Vogue the fashion bible it is and made it stand out from other major fashion brands. She's a disruptor and pioneer for change. I mean, when she started

at the magazine in 1988, her first cover was the first time a model had on the cover of Vogue wearing jeans. The printers actually called up the magazine and said, is this a mistake because it was just so groundbreaking. Similarly, in 1992, she broke a century of Vogue tradition by featuring a man on the cover. And she's also been an early instigator of putting actors, pop stars, and politicians on the cover. And she's also been an early instigator of putting actors, pop stars and politicians on the covers. Notable people include former US Vice President Kamala Harris, Beyoncé, Gigi Hadid and

Kim Kardashian. You mentioned a couple of the covers. What else will she be remembered for? Her own personal branding and styling. She's got her big glasses. She's got her bob. Her outfits from the 90s to now, any of them could have been taken at any moment because she really understands what the art of personal branding and styling is. I mean, she said famously, let it be unique to yourself and yet identifiable to others. She really made herself into this kind of timeless caricature. And who could replace her, do you think, at the helm of Vogue? I mean, I would personally love for it to be Edward Anningfield. And he's British Vogue isn't he? Yes, in terms of representation he's a queer man of colour who immigrated to the UK so apart from just his talent and

artistic brilliance he'd just be amazing from a representation perspective. Similarly Chioma Nardi who's actually head of editorial content at British Vogue, she stepped up a couple years ago, she was also the first woman of colour to serve in a senior leadership role. But this all comes at a time when there's been so much change in the fashion industry just within the fashion houses themselves as well. It really could be anyone. And also what we should point out is it's one of the world's biggest industries, isn't it? Worth billions of dollars. Yeah, of course. I think it's really easy to forget how huge fashion is because it just spans so many different industries.

It's global and it's huge. And particularly American Vogue itself just has such a massive readership, both online and in print. It will just be amazing to see how the direction will change and who will be fulfilling such huge boots and a huge legacy that Wintel will leave behind. The fashion journalist Charlotte Ambrose. Let's return to our main story once again, the conflict between Israel and Iran. Southern California is home to the largest community of Iranians outside their home country. Many Iranian Americans in West Los Angeles support President Trump's decision to intervene in the conflict by launching airstrikes against Iranian nuclear sites. The BBC's Regan Morris went to a demonstration in LA against the Islamic Republic of Iran and compiled this report. A woman in a Make America Great Again hat leads a chant for regime change in Iran. The crowds dance and

wave Iranian, Israeli and American flags. Bita Ashrafi left Iran 50 years ago as a child. Her red hat reads, Trump was right about everything. I fully support his decisions because this has been going on for 46 plus years. The tyranny, the dictatorship, rape, torture of prisoners. We're just against the Islamic Republic of Iran. The Iranian people inside Iran are against Islamic Republic. Demonstrations outside the West LA Federal Building are a common sight, but even by LA standards, this one is unusual. It's happening under the watchful eyes of armed US Marines, controversially ordered here by President Trump during protests against immigration raids. But these immigrants are proudly demonstrating in support of President Trump,

even if they don't fully trust him. Who can tell what President Trump is doing or not to? He says different things. You never know which way he's going. Everything is OK. We'll see how it goes from here. I feel like there's a consensus building around the world that this regime got to go. Farzane Sayeed is here wearing a Make Iran Great Again hat. We're not necessarily asking him to interfere in any way with any of the regime change movement.

We're just asking him kindly, please do not settle with this communist regime. Do not meet them halfway. Do not negotiate with them. They will go back to terrorizing the world. And we're in this section of Los Angeles, in West LA, that people call tarangulists or a little Persia. Do you live here?

Yes, I do. It feels like there's millions of Persians in LA. Southern California is a melting pot, but there are proud Persians here who lost their home after the revolution. Jewish community, Bahá'í, Muslim community, Christian community, Armenian community. We all lost our homes. The good thing, especially in West LA, we all get together and we all have one voice. We all have this absolute disgust for Islamic Republic. But not all Persians in Southern California

support U.S. military intervention in Iran. Rana Purobab, who owns three restaurants in Tarangeles with her husband, says she thinks it was a mistake and that it could help the regime stay in power. We don't want war. We don't want United States to do anything because I vote for President Trump, but since I'm seeing some of the things happening, I'm regret because I feel like he said he don't

want to go war. He want a peace. Now, to me, he's like my way or highway. He's like a little boy that he want say, that's mine. Then I want to do it. I do it. So he don't want to listen to nobody. Now that there's a ceasefire between Iran and Israel, many here hope that Iranians will find a way to overthrow their government

and create a democracy. And many of the Persian exiles here in California say they're available to help. That report by Regan Morris. And that's it from us for now, but there'll be a new edition of the Global News podcast later. If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, send us an email. The address is globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at BBC World Service. Use the hashtag global news pod. This edition was mixed by Lee Wilson. The producers were Alison Davis and Peter Goffin.

The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Valerie Sanderson. Until next time, bye bye.