Gulf countries and Israel came under missile and drone fire. and Israeli forces struck Iran on Saturday, as the war raged into its second month with Washington expressing hopes for progress in talks with Tehran.
In a sign that the conflict may be expanding further, Israel's military said air defences responded to a missile launched from Yemen -- the first since the start of the war on February 28, and after threats from Iran's Houthi allies to launch attacks.
The war began when the United States and Israel launched airstrikes across Iran, killing supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and sending shockwaves across the globe.
A month later the conflict showed no sign of ending, with Israel announcing fresh strikes on Tehran and an AFP journalist in the city reporting around 10 intense blasts and a plume of black smoke.
Emirati authorities said debris from a successful missile interception started fires at an Abu Dhabi industrial zone, injuring five Indian nationals.
Saudi Arabia said it had intercepted a missile and several drones, and Bahrain said a blaze caused by the "Iranian aggression" had been brought under control.
In Israel, repeated air raid sirens sent people to shelters, including in Tel Aviv where one man was killed and two others wounded, and in the country's north, where media reported a simultaneous attack from Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah.
US President Donald Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff said Friday he believes Iran would hold talks with Washington "this week, we're certainly hopeful for it".
Washington expected Tehran to respond to a 15-point US peace plan, he told a business forum in Miami. "It could solve it all."
One major issue has been the near-closure of the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz, which has sent markets into turmoil and pushed oil prices to levels not seen since the start of the war in Ukraine.
US aircraft carrier in Croatia for maintenance
The USS Gerald R. Ford, the world's largest aircraft carrier that has been part of Middle East war operations, arrived at the Croatian city of Split on Saturday, the US embassy said in a statement.
AFP journalists saw the vessel arriving on Saturday morning as it headed toward the port, with the embassy saying it was part of a "scheduled port visit and maintenance".
The carrier left a naval base in Crete earlier this week after returning to the base following a laundry fire onboard, which injured two crew members.
"During its visit the USS Gerald R Ford will host local officials and key leaders to recognise the strong and enduring alliance between the United States and Croatia," the embassy statement said.
The United States and Israel launched a massive air campaign against Iran in late February following a major US military buildup in the Middle East that included the Ford and another aircraft carrier, the Abraham Lincoln.
Both ships -- which have air wings made up of dozens of aircraft -- have played key roles in Iran operations, and the withdrawal of the Ford leaves a gap for US forces in the region.
The Ford has been at sea for nearly nine months -- a deployment that has already seen it take part in US operations in the Caribbean, where Washington's forces have carried out strikes on alleged drug-smuggling boats, interdicted sanctioned tankers and seized Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro.
A fire broke out in a laundry room aboard the carrier on March 12, injuring two sailors and causing major damage to some 100 beds, according to the US military.
The carrier has also reportedly suffered significant problems with its toilet system while at sea, with US media reporting clogs and long lines for restrooms on the ship.
US-Israeli strikes hit civilian areas in Iran
Iranian media said on Saturday that US-Israeli strikes hit multiple residential areas, killing more than a dozen people overnight.
Strikes on residential areas in Borujerd, a city in the western province of Lorestan, killed "seven and wounded 36 others," Fars news agency quoted provincial official Ghodratollah Valadi as saying.
Similar attacks on the northwestern city of Zanjan on Saturday killed at least five people and wounded seven others, according to ISNA, quoting the city's political deputy governor Ali Sadeghi.
AFP was not able to independently verify any of these tolls.
Israel and the United States launched strikes on Iran on February 28, killing the Islamic republic's supreme leader and sparking a war that has since spread across the Middle East.
Iran has yet to provide an overall death toll, with the latest tally of over 1,200 released on March 8, according to the health ministry, which could not be independently verified.
Blasts rocked the Iranian capital overnight, hitting Iran's University of Science and Technology in the city's northeast causing damages to the buildings but no casualties, local media reported.
It was not immediately clear if other locations were hit in the overnight strikes.
On Saturday, rescuers from the Iranian Red Crescent were pulling bodies out from under the rubble of residential buildings in the western city of Kermanshah where at least 13 people were killed in separate attacks there the day before, according to local media.
AFP has not been able to access sites outside of the Iranian capital or independently verify figures, but journalists in Tehran have reported damage to multiple residential buildings and other civilian infrastructure.
Iran targets US vessel near Oman port
Iran's military said Saturday that it had targeted a US logistics vessel near the Omani port of Salalah.
"A logistics vessel supporting the aggressive US army was targeted by the armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran at a considerable distance from the port of Salalah in Oman," Ebrahim Zolfaghari, a spokesman for Iran's central military command said in a statement carried by state TV.
Meanwhile, a drone attack on one of Oman's main ports wounded a foreign worker, the Gulf country's authorities said on Saturday.
Two drones hit the port of Salalah in the far south of Oman, a statement carried by the country's official news agency said, injuring the worker and causing "limited" damage to a crane.
Severe damage to Kuwait airport radar
The radar system at Kuwait's international airport was heavily damaged in a drone attack on Saturday, Kuwaiti authorities said.
The attack on the tiny Gulf country caused no casualties, a civil aviation spokesperson told Kuwait's official news agency, but the radar system was badly damaged.
12 US soldiers injured in air strike on Saudi base
An Iranian attack on a base in Saudi Arabia has wounded at least 12 American soldiers, two of them seriously, while President Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff said he believes Iran will hold talks with Washington "this week" as the Middle East war entered its second month.
Iran has kept up retaliatory attacks on Gulf nations it accuses of serving as a launchpad for US strikes on the country, which began in a joint operation with Israel on February 28.
The attack on the Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia included at least one missile and several drones, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal reported, citing unidentified officials.
The soldiers were inside a building at the base when it was struck, the Journal reported.
Several aerial refuelling planes also suffered damage in the attack, the reports said.
Saudi Arabia has previously intercepted several missiles fired near the base.
The Pentagon and US Central Command did not immediately respond to AFP requests for comment.
Thirteen US military service members have been killed since the conflict with Iran broke out, with seven killed in the Gulf and six in Iraq. More than 300 more have been wounded.
Iran's government has not released an updated casualty toll, but a US-based activist group said on March 23 that around 1,167 Iranian troops had been killed and that the status of 658 troops was unknown.
- Blast near Erbil airport -
An explosion was heard near the international airport of Erbil, a city in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region, an AFP journalist reported and a witness said they saw smoke.
Erbil is home to a major US consulate complex, while its airport houses military advisors attached to a US-led international anti-jihadist coalition. Regular drone attacks by pro-Iran armed groups are usually intercepted by air defences.
Envoy sees talks ‘this week’
US President Donald Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff said Friday he believes Iran will hold talks with Washington "this week" as the US-Israeli war against Tehran entered its second month.
The war began on February 28 when the United States and Israel launched airstrikes across Iran, killing supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and sending shockwaves across the globe.
A month later the conflict showed no sign of ending, with US-Israeli strikes hitting two Iranian nuclear facilities on Friday and an AFP journalist in Tehran reporting around 10 intense blasts and a plume of black smoke early Saturday.
A brief military statement said Israeli forces were "currently striking Iranian terror regime targets across Tehran", without elaborating.
The near-closure of the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz has sent markets into turmoil and pushed oil prices to levels not seen since the start of the war in Ukraine.
"We think there will be meetings this week, we're certainly hopeful for it," Witkoff told a business forum in Miami. Washington expected Tehran to respond to a 15-point US peace plan, he said. "It could solve it all."
The diplomatic hopes came as Secretary of State Marco Rubio left G7 talks in Paris to declare Washington expects its military campaign to prove victorious within weeks.
"When we are done with them here in the next couple of weeks, they will be weaker than they've been in recent history," he told reporters.
Trump meanwhile reiterated his disappointment with NATO allies over their refusal to help secure the Strait of Hormuz, warning Washington may not help them if asked to do so. "Why would we be there for them if they're not there for us?" he said.
Rubio said he had won G7 support to oppose Iran's attempts to impose a toll on Strait of Hormuz shipping, a key sea lane for Gulf oil and gas exports.
"Not only is this illegal, it's unacceptable, it's dangerous to the world, and it's important that the world have a plan to confront it," he said.
G7 foreign ministers expressed the "absolute necessity to permanently restore safe and toll-free freedom of navigation" in the waterway and called for "an immediate cessation of attacks against civilians and civilian infrastructure."
Iran had sent "messages" to the American side but had not formally responded to the peace plan, Rubio said.
- 'Heavy price' -
US-Israeli strikes on Friday hit two Iranian nuclear facilities -- the Khondab heavy water complex and a uranium processing plant in Ardakan -- as well as two steel plants, with Israeli forces confirming the attacks and Iranian sources saying there was no radioactive release.
Iran "will exact (a) HEAVY price for Israeli crimes," Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote on X, adding the attack "contradicts (Donald Trump's) extended deadline for diplomacy."
Israeli killed as missiles hit Tel Aviv
Israel's military reported missiles fired from Iran as a man was killed in Tel Aviv and at least four others wounded across the country, with air raid sirens sounding in Jerusalem and explosions heard from Jericho in the occupied West Bank.
A witness shared video footage with AFP apparently showing an inbound missile barrage over Jerusalem as the military scrambled search and rescue teams to impact sites in central Israel.
Guards warning
Iran's Revolutionary Guards warned they would strike industrial sites across the region, urging civilians in such plants to "leave their workplaces immediately," having earlier issued similar warnings to those near American military bases and hotels hosting US troops.
Iranian strikes have shattered the Gulf's reputation for stability, hitting Dubai's airport, Bahrain's capital and energy facilities across the region during the course of the war.
Iran's Vice-President Esmael Saghab Esfahani threatened to attack Saudi Arabia's Yanbu port and the UAE's Fujairah oil complex should a ground invasion take place. The Guards said the Strait of Hormuz remained "closed" to vessels travelling to and from enemy ports, adding they had turned back three ships.
- 'Fingers on trigger'' -
Tehran also called for an end to US and Israeli attacks on aligned regional groups -- a reference to Hezbollah, among others, Tasnim reported.
Lebanon was drawn into the war after Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel.
Israel renewed strikes on Beirut's southern suburbs Friday, targeting Hezbollah infrastructure. The UN refugee agency warned Lebanon faced a deepening humanitarian crisis risking catastrophe, with over a million people displaced.
Lebanon's state-run National News Agency reported an Israeli strike on south Beirut's Tahouitet al-Ghadir area, where another raid without warning earlier Friday killed two people.
AFPTV footage showed smoke rising from the area, a Hezbollah stronghold largely emptied after previous Israeli evacuation warnings and heavy strikes.
Yemen's Houthi movement warned Friday it would join the war if US-Israeli attacks continue hitting Iran or if more countries enter the conflict.
"We affirm that our fingers are on the trigger for direct military intervention," the group said.
3rd strike hits Bushehr nuclear plant
A strike hit near Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant late Friday but caused no radiation leak or damage to the reactor, the UN atomic watchdog said, after Israeli strikes on the Islamic republic.
Iran told the International Atomic Energy Agency that the plant was operating normally and had suffered no technical or structural impact, the agency said on X.
The incident was the third in a series of reported strikes in Iran within the past 10 days, the IAEA said, as the war in the Middle East entered its second month.
Fire breaks out in UAE industrial zone
UAE authorities said fires broke out early Saturday at an industrial zone following an incoming missile and drone attack from Iran early Saturday, with no reports of casualties.
The United Arab Emirates' defence ministry said air defences were responding to incoming cruise missiles and drones fired by Iran, as Tehran pressed strikes in the Gulf a month into the regional war.
The Abu Dhabi government media office said in a statement posted online that authorities were dealing with two fires in the area of the emirate's Khalifa Economic Zones.
The statement said the fires had broken out due to falling debris from a "successful interception" of a ballistic missile.
First missile attack on Israel from Yemen
Israel's military reported a first missile launch from Yemen since the Middle East war began on February 28, after Iran's Houthi allies threatened to join the fighting.
A military statement said Israeli forces had "identified the launch of a missile from Yemen toward Israeli territory, aerial defence systems are operating to intercept the threat".
It was the first such statement mentioning a launch from Yemen during the war with Iran, which has entered its second month.
There were no reports of any casualties or damage in Israel, and media reports suggested the missile may have been intercepted.
Yemen's Houthi movement warned on Friday it would join the war if US-Israeli attacks continue to hit its ally Iran or if more countries join the conflict.
The Houthi have in the past attacked shipping in the Red Sea in response to regional conflicts, but had so far not intervened in the latest war.
"We affirm that our fingers are on the trigger for direct military intervention," the group said in a statement, warning that it would act if other nations joined the US-Israeli fight or if the Red Sea was used for "hostile operations".
- Israel hits Tehran -
Israel's military said it launched strikes on Iranian "regime targets" early Saturday, as an AFP journalist in the capital Tehran reported hearing around 10 intense blasts and seeing a plume of black smoke.
- NATO 'weren't there' for Trump -
US President Donald Trump reiterated his disappointment with NATO allies over their refusal to send military to help secure the Strait of Hormuz.
"They just weren't there," he said at an investment forum in Miami. "We spend hundreds of billions of dollars a year on NATO, hundreds, protecting them, and we would have always been there for them, but now, based on their actions, I guess we don't have to be, do we?"
"Why would we be there for them if they're not there for us? They weren't there for us."
Trump also said the Iranians "have to open up the Strait of Trump", immediately correcting himself to clarify he meant Hormuz but adding that "there's no accidents with me".
- Saudi Arabia intercepts missile -
Saudi Arabia said it "intercepted and destroyed" a missile targeting the area of the capital Riyadh.
- Lebanon clashes -
Israel's military struck Beirut's southern suburbs Friday, saying it was targeting Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.
In south Lebanon, Hezbollah said its fighters had clashed with "Israeli enemy army forces... with light and medium weapons".
- 'Regime change' unlikely: Merz -
The war is unlikely to lead to "regime change" in Iran, said German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.
"If that's the goal, I don't think you'll achieve it. It's mostly gone wrong" in past conflicts, he said at a forum in Frankfurt, pointing to the Afghanistan war.