Reuters World News - US and Israel attack Iran; Tehran retaliates

Episode Date: February 28, 2026

The United States and Israel have launched attacks against Iran, pushing the Middle East into a renewed military confrontation. The Pentagon says strikes will last multiple days and U.S. President Donald Trump is warning that American lives may be lost. Iran has retaliated with strikes on Israel, and says U.S. bases are legitimate targets. Listen to the latest On Assignment podcast: Mexico vs. the cartels Listen to the Morning Bid podcast ⁠⁠here⁠⁠. Sign up for the Reuters Econ World newsletter ⁠⁠here⁠⁠.  Listen to the Reuters Econ World podcast ⁠⁠here⁠⁠. Visit the Thomson Reuters Privacy Statement for information on our privacy and data protection practices.  You may also visit megaphone.fm/adchoices to opt out of targeted advertising. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hi, I'm Tara Oaks in Liverpool. It's Saturday, February 28th. Today, the United States and Israel launched strikes on Iran. We look at the situation on the ground, and President Trump's aims, and the risks he faces from a drawn-out campaign. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines

in 10 minutes, 7 days a week. The United States and I have, Israel have launched what President Trump is describing as a major combat operation in Iran, plunging the Middle East into a new conflict that Trump says will end a security threat to the US and offer Iranians a chance to topple their rulers. Smoke plumes rise over Tehran's skyline, after explosions were heard in the capital as part of what the US has dubbed Operation Epic Fury. And in Tel Aviv, people will be able to be.

rush to shelters as Iran launches retaliatory attacks against Israel. In a video shared on Truth Social, President Trump cites decades of grievances with Iran from a 1979 embassy hostage crisis when 52 Americans were held for 444 days to attacks blamed on Tehran ever since. Trump says the strikes are aimed at destroying Iranian missiles and annihilating its navy, coming after a failure to get a breakthrough in talks this week. I'll say it again. They can never have a nuclear weapon.

And we sought repeatedly to make a deal. We tried. They wanted to do it. They didn't want to do it. Again, they wanted to do it. They didn't want to do it. They didn't know what was happening. They just wanted to practice evil.

Trump has warned that American lives may be lost in this military action and urged Iranians to stay sheltered. Stay sheltered. Don't leave your home. It's very dangerous outside. Bombs will be dropping everywhere. The Pentagon says the operation will last multiple days. Iran is vowing crushing retaliation,

with Iran's Revolutionary Guards saying all U.S. bases, resources, and interests in the region are considered legitimate targets for the Iranian army. It says it struck Israeli and U.S. bases with Iranian military, missiles and its operation would continue until its enemy was, quote, decisively defeated. The strikes came as Iranians were starting their working week. Our Middle East editor Edmund Blair describes the panic. Well, it was a weekday, so kids were at school, people at their offices, and it certainly created what sounds like havoc from the reporting we're getting from on the ground.

And we've already heard reports of queues at gas stations, people trying to fill up their cars. We've heard of people racing to try and get money out of banks, but finding that cash machines aren't working. We've heard some people racing to go and collect their children from school. And the sense we get from the people that we've spoken to is that there is a real sense of fear about what's coming next, what the future holds. with enormous uncertainty about both the strikes that we've seen and then what comes later. A source has told Reuters that Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali-Hamenei is not in Tehran and has been transferred to a secure location. An Iranian source close to the establishment says several senior commanders in Iran's

Revolutionary Guards and political officials have been killed. Reuters could not independently confirm the report. Here's Edmund on the response from Iran's government. In terms of their military response, we have already seen it, that they have said that they have fired missiles towards Israel, and they've also said that US bases around the regions are targets, and we have heard explosions around the Gulf, which is where the US has bases.

So what happens next? Here's Edmund with more. I think what is really interesting about what we've seen from President Trump is saying, citing a long history of disputes with Iran, and also saying that while he was urging Iranians to stay sheltered for now, he said that when the dust settles, now that would be the time to overthrow there and change their government. That's the same message from Israel's Prime Minister Netanyahu. So I think we can see the direction of travel from the US and Israeli perspective. They are looking to instigate some kind of change of government, but there's

no signal that that would involve US troops on the ground. To understand more about what President Trump's aims are with the operation, we called up our lead national security correspondent Phil Stewart in Washington. I think it's really important here just to focus on what President Trump himself said were the goals of this of this campaign, which are extremely maximalist. He, you know, he says that the U.S. is going to annihilate Iran's navy. It's going to wipe out its missile industry. It's going to prevent Iran from ever having a nuclear weapon. It asks the Iranian people to rise up and take over its government. I mean, these are words of a president who is looking to wage a major conflict against Iran. And I think that, you know, everyone needs to sort of digest

the idea that we're in uncharted waters right now. It's hard to read that any other way than a goal of regime change, but one that doesn't explicitly, at least at this point, include the concept of U.S. ground forces. If there are U.S. ground forces, we haven't seen them yet. We're learning about strikes by air and by sea. In the weeks running up to this, Reuters was first report that the U.S. military was preparing for a sustained campaign against Iran, if ordered to do so. And at this point, we have multiple U.S. officials telling Reuters that this campaign will last for multiple days. And so we're not talking about something that we've seen before. The operation follows days of talks between Iran and the U.S.

So the talks, you know, were inconclusive. But just hours before this operation began, And Oman's foreign minister had flown to Washington, D.C., and actually given an interview in which he had said that peace was within reach. And so, obviously, the White House did not feel that was the case or decided to go ahead, regardless of that opinion by Oman. So, you know, these talks obviously did not succeed. and now we're in a situation of real conflict. Phil says there are risks to President Trump from this operation. President Trump has an enormous amount of vulnerability right now. And he kind of recognized that when he spoke in his video address about the risks of U.S. casualties.

Any major Iranian counterattack against the United States or against Israel could drag the United States much, much deeper into a conflict against Iran. Right now, again, we're seeing air and naval strikes against targets in Iran. But should, you know, dozens, hundreds of American or even Israeli casualties take place as a result of retaliation by Iran, it's not unreasonable to think the U.S. could actually have to feel the need to escalate. And it's that escalation ladder that a lot of military analysts have always warned about when engaging with Iran because they have a far greater ability to counterattack. than adversaries the U.S. has attacked before, say, you know, the Taliban or al-Qaeda or Islamic State. You know, this is nothing like any of those. Reuters is covering the latest on this breaking news throughout the day.

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