عربي English Türkçe اردو فارسى
Logo
Latest News
World

Trump Says Only Iran’s ‘Unconditional Surrender’ Can End War

Smoke rises after an airstrike in central Tehran, Iran, 06 March 2026. (EPA)
Smoke rises after an airstrike in central Tehran, Iran, 06 March 2026. (EPA)
TT
TT

Trump Says Only Iran’s ‘Unconditional Surrender’ Can End War

Smoke rises after an airstrike in central Tehran, Iran, 06 March 2026. (EPA)
Smoke rises after an airstrike in central Tehran, Iran, 06 March 2026. (EPA)

President Donald Trump said Friday that only Iran's "unconditional surrender" would bring an end to the Middle East war, as Tehran was rocked by some of the heaviest US-Israeli strikes of the spiraling, week-long conflict.

Now in its seventh day, the war has embroiled nations beyond the region, upended the world's energy and transport sectors, and brought chaos to even usually peaceful areas around the Gulf.

It has spread to Lebanon, whose prime minister warned of an impending humanitarian disaster as tens of thousands fled heavy Israeli strikes on Beirut's southern suburbs.

Trump, who has given varying reasons for starting the war that killed Iran's supreme leader Ali Khamenei last weekend, promised to help rebuild the country's economy if Tehran installed an "acceptable" new leader.

"There will be no deal with Iran except UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER," Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

"MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN (MIGA!)," he added.

In Tehran, crowds of men and women dressed in black, some carrying Iranian flags, gathered for the first Friday prayers since the start of the war, online footage showed.

Several loud explosions sent clouds of black smoke into Tehran's sky, according to AFP journalists who described the day's strikes as the heaviest yet on the capital.

"It's really very scary," a Tehran businessman who gave his first name as Robert told AFP.

"Checkpoints have been put up in place in the city to prevent looting and ensure control," the 60-year-old said at the Armenian border with Iran.

- 'Additional surprises' -

Both Israel and the US warned on Friday they were escalating their attacks on Iran.

"We have additional surprises ahead which I do not intend to disclose," Israel's military chief Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir said.

According to Iran's health ministry, the US and Israeli strikes on the country have killed 926 people.

Iranian government spokeswoman Fatemeh Mohajerani said on Friday that 30 percent of the dead were children. AFP could not independently verify either toll.

Iran has launched missile and drone attacks at Israel and Gulf states since the war began, with AFP journalists in Tel Aviv reporting hearing several blasts on Friday.

In Israel, at least 10 people have been killed, according to first responders there.

The US military has reported the deaths of six of its personnel.

- 'We'll sleep on the road' -

The conflict has sucked in Israel's neighbor Lebanon after Tehran's proxy group Hezbollah launched missiles at Israel.

Israeli air strikes hit sites in Lebanon's south and east on Friday.

There has been widespread destruction in the southern Beirut suburbs, considered a Hezbollah stronghold and home to an estimated 600,000 to 800,000 people.

AFP correspondents on the ground saw scenes of panic on Thursday as residents massively fled after an unprecedented Israeli order to evacuate immediately if they wanted to save their lives.

Hundreds of families milled around on a Beirut beach, left with nowhere to go.

"We'll sleep on the road tonight and God alone knows what will happen to us," one man told AFP, declining to give his name.

Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam warned that a "humanitarian disaster is looming" from the displacement.

On Friday, Hezbollah told Israeli residents to evacuate areas within five kilometers (three miles) of the Lebanese border.

The death toll in Lebanon rose to 217 on Friday, according to the country's health ministry.

Israel's army meanwhile said it had killed more than 70 Hezbollah militants.

AFP could not independently verify either toll.

Iraq, long a proxy battleground between the US and Iran, has also been dragged into the war. Drones struck an airport and two oil facilities in southern Iraq on Friday, a security official told AFP.

Earlier in the day, oil prices surged after Kurdish authorities in Iraq said crude production had been halted by a previous attack.

- 'Extraordinary mistake' -

The United Nations refugee agency said Friday it had declared the crisis a major humanitarian emergency, stressing the need for an immediate response.

The UN's rights chief also called for "impartial investigations" after Iran said a strike on a school that it blamed on the US and Israel killed more than 150 people.

Neither the US nor Israel has said it was behind the strike. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Monday that the Pentagon was investigating.

AFP has neither been able to access the site nor obtain independent confirmation of the toll.

The war has also come under increasing scrutiny in Europe, with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez calling the US-Israeli strikes an "extraordinary mistake" and "not in accordance with international law".

European Union chiefs are scheduled to hold talks about the war on Monday.

The war has not spared the rich countries of the Gulf, formerly seen as a tourist hot spot and a rare Middle East safe haven.

Qatar intercepted a drone attack on a US air base on its territory early Friday, while Saudi Arabia shot down three drones east of its capital Riyadh.

Thirteen people, seven of them civilians, have been killed in Gulf countries since the war began, including an 11-year-old girl in Kuwait.

New explosions were heard in the Kuwaiti capital on Friday, an AFP journalist said.

The conflict has also expanded as far afield as the Sri Lankan coast, off of which a US submarine torpedoed an Iranian frigate, and Azerbaijan, which threatened retaliation after a drone hit an airport.

Nations have scrambled to repatriate holidaymakers in the Gulf caught up in the fighting, with air traffic severely limited as missiles and drones dominate the skies above the region.

The war has also hammered global markets and sent crude oil prices soaring by about a fifth in the week since it erupted, all but blocking shipping in the critical Strait of Hormuz.

A fire broke out on the latest ship to suffer an attack in the Strait on Friday, Iranian television reported.

Most Viewed

 
 
World

Mounting Pressure on Iran Revives the Specter of the 2000 Aden Attack

US Navy aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush
US Navy aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush
TT
TT

Mounting Pressure on Iran Revives the Specter of the 2000 Aden Attack

US Navy aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush
US Navy aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush

US author Anne-Marie Slaughter argues in The Chessboard and the Web: Strategies of Connection in a Networked World that the world no longer operates or interacts according to the logic of a traditional chessboard.

The old model was linear and two-dimensional, centered on a single objective: toppling the king by controlling territory.

That logic no longer defines 21st-century conflict. Today’s world operates across overlapping, interlocking layers that interact and often collide simultaneously, within a continuously evolving network that includes military, economic, political, alliance, and informational dimensions.

As this network evolves, it generates both solutions and complications so rapidly that they outpace the ability of leadership to make timely decisions. Improvisation comes to dominate decision-making, errors multiply and accumulate, feeding back into the system and further deepening its complexity.

On the escalation ladder

Escalation depends on strategic flexibility and the tools available. In practical terms, the greater the flexibility, the greater the ability of actors to climb the escalation ladder, from low-intensity conflict to higher levels, until reaching a peak where one side yields, either on the battlefield or at the negotiating table.

But this climb is inherently a trap. Each step builds on the last. As these steps accumulate over time, the cost compounds, making it increasingly difficult to step back without incurring significant losses.

The US blockade

This is not the first time the US Navy has imposed a maritime blockade. The most notable case was Cuba in the 1960s during the Cuban Missile Crisis, labeled a “quarantine,” a term deliberately used to indicate a measure short of full wartime blockade. Cuba’s geography made it relatively easy to encircle.

A similar approach was later applied to Venezuela. Today, the focus has shifted to Iranian ports, both inside and outside the Gulf.

Direct comparisons are limited by differing contexts. Still, one constant remains: the US Navy possesses the capability to enforce such blockades, particularly given its dominance over global seas and oceans.

In Cuba, Soviet missiles targeted major US cities and the world was divided between two superpowers. In Venezuela, President Donald Trump invoked the Monroe Doctrine and implemented a national security strategy prioritizing the Western Hemisphere and America’s immediate sphere.

The Strait of Hormuz, however, is fundamentally different. Other waterways can be bypassed; Hormuz cannot. It is a closed corridor through which oil, gas, petrochemicals, helium, fertilizers, and other critical goods must pass. There is no alternative route; all shipments must transit Hormuz in both directions.

Iran’s strategy

Since the Shah’s era, aligned with the Nixon Doctrine, Tehran has pursued control over Gulf waters and influence over the Strait of Hormuz. The continued occupation of the UAE islands of Greater Tunb, Lesser Tunb, and Abu Musa since the 1970s underscores this long-standing strategic objective.

More than 30 islands are scattered across the Gulf’s deep waters, precisely along the routes used by oil tankers that require significant depth to pass safely. If linked together as part of a military-security network, they reveal long-term planning for scenarios such as the current one.

Iran’s naval doctrine relies on both the Revolutionary Guards and the regular navy, employing small submarines, torpedoes, fast attack boats, naval mines, drones, and ballistic missiles.

At its core lies an anti-access strategy designed to deny adversaries freedom of movement in Gulf waters.

Centers of gravity

Qeshm Island is critical for controlling access to the Strait of Hormuz. Kharg Island follows, serving as the hub for more than 80 percent of Iran’s oil exports, supplied by the oil fields of Khuzestan.

Beyond the islands, the South Pars gas field in Bushehr province is central to Iran’s energy system, providing more than 70 percent of the country’s domestic electricity needs.

These key sites have already been targeted during the conflict by US or Israeli airpower. To expand the scope of escalation and increase pressure, Trump deployed additional forces, including Marine units and elements of the 82nd Airborne Division, aimed at broadening military options and forcing Iran to soften its negotiating position. After talks in Pakistan failed, he moved to announce the blockade.

The current US approach

By declaring the blockade, Trump effectively altered the existing rules of engagement in the Gulf, imposing an asymmetric approach that avoids Iran’s strengths and prevents it from dictating the battlefield dynamics.

Instead, the US leverages distance, operating from the Arabian Sea, along with its technological superiority and strategic flexibility.

This effectively turns Iran’s own strategy against it. What once constrained US freedom of movement inside the Gulf is now being used to impose external pressure on Iran from the Arabian Sea.

If successful, the strategy could deprive Iran, according to The Wall Street Journal, of roughly $435 million per day, or $13 billion per month, while avoiding the costs of direct military action such as seizing islands like Kharg.

It would also confine Iran’s asymmetric capabilities within the Gulf and strip it of its most effective operational tools.

The central question now is how Iran will respond. How will it adapt its strategy in the face of this pressure? Will escalation continue? And could that escalation take the form of a maritime attack similar to the 2000 strike on the US destroyer USS Cole near Aden?

World

Iran Can Go up to Two Months without Oil Exports Before Cutting Output, Analysts Say

A man rides past a large billboard referring to the Strait of Hormuz in Tehran's Vanak Square on April 15, 2026. (AFP)
A man rides past a large billboard referring to the Strait of Hormuz in Tehran's Vanak Square on April 15, 2026. (AFP)
TT
TT

Iran Can Go up to Two Months without Oil Exports Before Cutting Output, Analysts Say

A man rides past a large billboard referring to the Strait of Hormuz in Tehran's Vanak Square on April 15, 2026. (AFP)
A man rides past a large billboard referring to the Strait of Hormuz in Tehran's Vanak Square on April 15, 2026. (AFP)

Iran can withstand a complete halt in oil exports of up to two months before being forced to curb production, analysts said, after the US began blocking shipping in and out of the country's ports on April 13.

The blockade could prevent roughly 2 million barrels per day (bpd) of Iranian crude from reaching its main buyer China.

Any Iranian production shutdowns would add to more than 12 million bpd of supply already disrupted by the regional war, tightening markets further and ‌lifting oil ‌prices.

With its exports blocked, Iran faces having to ‌divert ⁠crude into onshore storage ⁠tanks. Once those tanks are filled, the OPEC member would be required to curb upstream output.

Consultancy FGE NextantECA estimates Iran has about 90 million barrels of available onshore crude storage capacity, out of total capacity of roughly 122 million barrels.

"Iran can sustain current production of around 3.5 million bpd for roughly two months without exports, extendable to around three months with a modest ⁠500,000 bpd production cut," FGE NextantECA said in a ‌note.

Iranian domestic refineries process about 2 million ‌bpd of oil, they added.

The relevant Iranian authorities were not immediately available for comment.

Energy ‌Aspects assumes significantly lower available onshore storage of about 30 million barrels, ‌based on data from Kayrros.

Under that scenario, Iran could maintain current export levels for about 16 days before storage capacity runs out, based on export levels of 1.8 million bpd.

"The blockade may not have a significant impact on Iranian production in ‌April, but if it continues into May then output would need to be reduced substantially," said Richard ⁠Bronze, co-founder of Energy ⁠Aspects.

He said the consultancy assumes Iran cannot utilize its full nameplate storage capacity, adding that historic data show stocks peaked at 92 million barrels in May 2020, which likely marks a realistic ceiling.

Bronze also said Iran will likely deploy available oil tankers in ports as floating storage, delaying production cuts.

The US military said more vessels were being turned back under the blockade, including the Chinese-owned tanker Rich Starry, which is under US sanctions and which was seen heading back through the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday.

Eight Iran-linked oil tankers have been intercepted since the blockade began on Monday, the Wall Street Journal reported. A US destroyer stopped two tankers attempting to leave Iran's Chabahar port on the Gulf of Oman on Tuesday, a US official said.

World

World Bank Announces Water Security Plan for One Billion People

A girl carries jerrycans on a wheelbarrow after collecting water from a well at a mosque in Deh Mazang, Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, April 2, 2026. (AP)
A girl carries jerrycans on a wheelbarrow after collecting water from a well at a mosque in Deh Mazang, Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, April 2, 2026. (AP)
TT
TT

World Bank Announces Water Security Plan for One Billion People

A girl carries jerrycans on a wheelbarrow after collecting water from a well at a mosque in Deh Mazang, Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, April 2, 2026. (AP)
A girl carries jerrycans on a wheelbarrow after collecting water from a well at a mosque in Deh Mazang, Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, April 2, 2026. (AP)

The World Bank announced a plan Wednesday that aims to improve secure water access for a billion people within the next four years.

The new "Water Forward" program aims to "expand reliable water services and strengthen systems against droughts and floods."

The Bank said its own funds and technical advice would help improve water supplies to some 400 million people by 2030, with the balance coming from partners.

Regional development banks, OPEC's development fund, and the BRICS-aligned New Development Bank are among institutions that will participate, the World Bank said.

The global lender did not specify how much capital it would commit to the initiative.

Some four billion people -- half the world's population -- face water scarcity, due in part to "unclear policies, weak regulations, and financially unsustainable utilities that have slowed progress and deterred investment," the Bank said.

The global lender said that 14 countries had already voluntarily committed to reform and strengthen their water sectors under the new program.

The focus on governance issues -- not simply physical water infrastructure -- is promising, David Michel, senior associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said.

"In many countries, the water sector fails to fully deploy the funds already allocated to it."

However, the Bank's initiative "faces a long and difficult road ahead," he warned.

The issue of access to safe drinking water, in particular, has been highlighted during the war in the Middle East, with desalination plants in Iran and across the region damaged in bombardments.

Beyond conflicts and immediate drinking water needs, the World Bank said that better water security was needed to grow the global economy.

"Strong water systems are foundational to healthy economies that can attract private investment and create jobs," the Bank said.