Donald Trump has said he does not regret launching the war against Iran, despite concerns that the conflict and rising oil and gas prices could hurt Republicans in the November midterm elections.
“I don’t believe in the word ‘regret’,” he said in an interview with Fox News, adding that if he had to do it again “I would do exactly as I did”.
Oil prices have touched $108 a barrel for the first time since May after Iran-backed Houthi militants captured Yemen’s strategic port city of Mokha, raising fears it could bring them closer to targeting shipping through a critical waterway to the Red Sea.
It puts the Houthis closer to their goal of targeting shipping through the Bab el-Mandeb waterway and could give Iran another potential point of leverage in its war with the US.
Mokha is around 50 miles from Bab el-Mandeb, a geopolitical chokepoint connecting the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden and through which about 12 per cent of the world’s goods are typically shipped.
Meanwhile, Iranian officials mocked the US military after claiming they captured a cutting-edge sea drone and “picked it up like a plastic bottle”.
West Bank Palestinians are welcoming the UK government’s unprecedented ban on trade with the Israeli settlements - but say it is long overdue and doesn’t go far enough.
On Tuesday, UK foreign secretary Ed Miliband confirmed a “new approach” in the UK’s relations with Israel, imposing a ban on goods coming out of Israeli settlements in the West Bank which Britain regards as illegal.
Palestinians in the West Bank praised the “brave” government for a step in the right direction, as residents face growing violence and repression from Israeli settlers and authorities.
“It's too late, but to come late is better than never,” says Basel Adra, filmmaker and director of the Oscar-winning documentary No Other Land, which documents life facing settler attacks and home demolitions in the beleaguered area of Masafer Yatta in the southern West Bank.
Top White House advisers, including Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, have privately warned President Donald Trump that the conflict with Iran could extend through the remainder of his presidency, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, citing U.S. officials.
The private warnings were delivered during internal strategy discussions held in the Oval Office and the Situation Room. During these confidential meetings, senior officials informed the president that Tehran could continue to resist U.S. pressure, potentially prolonging the conflict beyond Inauguration Day in January 2029.
According to details reported by the Journal, the assessment from key aides highlights concerns within the administration that Iranian resistance may not be easily broken, suggesting military engagement could become a defining foreign policy issue for Trump's entire term in office.
These private warnings stand in sharp contrast to Trump's own public remarks regarding the war. Speaking on Wednesday, the president offered a much shorter timeline for the conflict, telling reporters and the public he expected the fighting to end far sooner than his top advisers projected in private.
In recent weeks, the United States has succeeded in loosening Iran's grip over the Strait of Hormuz while virtually shutting down Iran's own oil exports, accelerating its economic free fall.
But the war launched by the US and Israel in February — intended to last a few weeks — is still far from over, and the stalemate is costly for both sides.
An agreement reached in June quickly crumbled, with so sign of diplomatic progress since then. Low-level fighting persists, and the U.S. does not seem to have an exit strategy.
Yemen’s Houthi rebels attacked four cities in the south of Saudi Arabia on Tuesday in another expansion of the six-month-old war in the Middle East.
The Iran backed group said they were launching a broad operation deep into Saudi territory, claiming strikes on an airbase and energy infrastructure across the country, and sharing footage of explosions from attacks on trucks near the border.
Analysts say that Washington cannot afford to ignore the lingering Houthi question to the west, and that a wider coalition may be needed to finally close the second volatile front of the war with Iran.
Iran's foreign minister Abbas Araqchi and Pakistani army chief Asim Munir discussed finding ways to restore diplomatic efforts to de-escalate Tehran's conflict with the US on all fronts, a Pakistani security official told Reuters on Friday.
The two spoke by phone on Thursday and the conversation was focused on the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, the possibility of getting back to talks, and Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia, the official said.
Britain's economy grew by a much stronger than expected 0.4% in July, extending the strong performance seen in the first half of the year despite headwinds from the US-Iran war, figures from the Office for National Statistics showed on Friday.
Compared with a year earlier, output in July was 1.6% higher, the fastest annual rate since February 2025 and above economists' 1.2% forecast.
Growth in the three months to July held at the 0.4% recorded in the three months to June, compared with economists' median forecast for a slowdown to 0.3%.
Britain, like other European economies, has taken less of an immediate hit to growth from the US-Iran war than economists had feared at the outset.
But the conflict this week pushed oil prices above $105 a barrel with knock-on impacts on government borrowing costs, and the BoE expects inflation to rise to around 3.2% later this year.
Two people, aged 60 and 42, have been arrested in London on suspicion of assisting Iran’s intelligence service under the National Security Act.
Both were released on bail until late October, the Metropolitan Police has said.
Police said the arrests were not “connected to any of the incidents or attacks” involving Jewish and Iranian communities in London earlier this year.
Commander Helen Flanagan, head of Counter Terrorism Policing London, said she knows “news of these arrests will come as a concern to some members of the public” but added that she does “not believe there to be any imminent threat to the wider public”.
More than 100 US military advisers are in Saudi Arabia providing intelligence and targeting support as the kingdom fights Iran-backed Houthi forces in Yemen, according to CNN.
The US is helping Saudi forces use real-time battlefield intelligence and providing “geospatial” targeting support, but is not directly taking part in strikes, refuelling Saudi aircraft or providing other operational assistance, the outlet reported.
The deployment comes after recent Houthi advances, including the seizure of a strategic Red Sea port, raising fears that the group could threaten the Bab el-Mandeb, a key global shipping route.
US officials cited by CNN believe hundreds of Iranian Revolutionary Guard officers are in Yemen helping the Houthis, potentially with the aim of closing the waterway.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman reportedly called Donald Trump twice on Thursday to urge the US president to launch strikes against the Iran-backed Houthis, according to two US officials cited by Axios.
The request came as Houthi forces advanced along Yemen’s Red Sea coast and moved closer to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a crucial shipping chokepoint.
Trump reportedly declined to order US strikes, however.
The Axios report says that Washington is instead increasing support for Saudi Arabia while trying to avoid getting directly involved in the wider Saudi-Houthi conflict.
A senior Trump administration official said the US priority was keeping the Red Sea open while leaving the broader fight to regional allies.
The Saudi request marks a sharp reversal from July, when Riyadh had told Washington it could deal with the Houthi threat itself. The situation has deteriorated since then, with Saudi-backed Yemeni forces retreating as the Houthis advance towards the coast.
