The Latest: Trump says Iran war may last 4 to 5 weeks, but prepared ‘to go far longer’

The intensity of the attacks and the lack of any apparent exit plan set the stage for a prolonged conflict with far-reaching consequences. Israel and the U.S. have given conflicting answers about what exactly the war’s objectives are or what the endgame might be.

At least 555 people have been killed in Iran so far by the U.S.-Israeli campaign, the Iranian Red Crescent Society said, and more than 130 cities across the country have come under attack. In Israel, 11 people have been killed, with 31 in Lebanon, according to authorities.

The U.S. military announced Monday that two previously unaccounted for service members were confirmed dead, bringing the total American casualties during the operations against Iran up to six.

Here is the latest:

Voters in Texas wonder why US attacked Iran

Several voters from Houston casting ballots in a Texas primary election said they’re worried about what will come next in Iran.

“I think that this could go on for years to come if they don’t have a clear exit strategy,” said Charles Padmore, a 45-year-old independent contractor. “I don’t even think they have a strategy. I think they just went in blind.”

He posits that Trump acted “by the whims of Israel.”

Nineteen-year-old college student Sophia Morales and her mother, Dina Morales, don’t feel like they’re getting a clear explanation from Trump about why he attacked Iran.

“I feel like Iran was in a war with Israel, but then all of a sudden, we’re in war too,” said Sophia Morales. She especially wants an explanation following reports that a girls school was bombed. Added her mother: “I don’t think I’ve heard of any clearer plans of what’s next after the bombing, just like what’s next in Venezuela.”

If Iran was a legitimate threat to the United States, Trump should have “gone the right way” and convinced Congress to authorize military action, said Alex Diaz, 31, a high school teacher.

“I’m just like, ‘Are you trying to kill us? Are you trying to cause a World War III?’” Diaz said.

Two Trump voters trust the president on Iran

Two Trump supporters in Texas say they’re confident the president is doing the right thing in Iran and don’t see a conflict with his campaign promises to pursue peace.

“I just expected him to do what needs to be done to protect America,” said Connie Stamps of Waco. “He wants to protect America first, and that’s what he’s doing. And he cares about the whole world. So he’s the peace president.”

Stamps said she’s thankful to have a president “who is brave enough to do what he says he’s going to do.”

Mollie Leutwyler Smith, who also lives near Waco in McLennan County, said she didn’t have war with Iran in mind when she cast her ballot for Trump, but she appreciates that he’s taking decisive action. She prefers his approach to the deal former President Barack Obama brokered with the Iranians.

“Did I vote for that in particular? I won’t say I voted for that, but, yes, I think as the president, he can make decisions,” she said.

Israel says it will reopen a Gaza border crossing closed since Iran war began

COGAT, the Israeli military body overseeing civilian affairs in Gaza, announced one crossing into the territory would reopen on Tuesday “for the gradual entry of humanitarian aid.”

At the start of the war with Iran, Israel had said it couldn’t safely operate the Gaza crossings under fire. However, the U.N.’s humanitarian office monitoring Gaza warned Monday that a total closure would stretch stocks of food, water and fuel, as well as further inflate the price of basic goods in the devastated Palestinian territory.

In its announcement late Monday, COGAT said it would work in coordination with the American Civil Military Coordination Center and under some security restrictions to reopen the Kerem Shalom Crossing.

US Embassy in Jordan temporarily evacuates staff

Diplomatic staff at the U.S. Embassy in Jordan have left the embassy compound in Amman “due to a threat.”

The U.S. diplomatic mission did not disclose additional details, but the announcement comes not long after Iran-backed Iraqi militia Kataib Hezbollah threatened to attack American military bases in Jordan.

The announcement that embassy personnel had left the compound in Amman appeared to be a prelude to a potentially larger departure of diplomatic staff from Jordan.

Jordanian police meanwhile urged residents living near the embassy to stay indoors, close windows and take other “precautionary measures.”

Rubio warns ‘hardest hits’ are still to come on Iran

Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks to reporters before his scheduled House and Senate Intelligence Committees briefing about Iran on Capitol Hill in Washington, Monday, March 2, 2026. (AP Photo)

Pressed on how long the U.S. military would remain focused on Iran, Rubio said as long as it takes.

“The hardest hits are yet to come from the U.S. military. The next phase will be even more punishing on Iran than it is right now,” he told reporters at the U.S. Capitol.

“How long will it take? I don’t know how long it will take,” he said. “We have objectives. We will do this as long as it takes to achieve those objectives.”

Rubio says regime change is not the objective in Iran

“We would love for there to be an Iran that’s not governed by radical Shia clerics,” he said heading into a classified briefing on Capitol Hill. “That’s not the objective.”

The initial joint U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran killed the country’s Supreme Leader Ali Ayatollah Khamenei, along with many other top leaders.

“The objectives of this operation are to destroy their ballistic missile capability and make sure they can’t rebuild it, and make sure that they can’t hide behind that to have a nuclear program,” he said. “That’s the objective of the mission.”

Rubio, Hegseth and others are briefing the congressional leaders and the top lawmakers on the national security committees in Congress about the Iran operation.

US death toll rises to 6 troops

The U.S. military on Monday announced the deaths of two more American service members during the operations against Iran, bringing the total death toll to six people.

U.S. Central Command stated in a post on X that U.S. forces “recently recovered the remains of two previously unaccounted for service members from a facility that was struck during Iran’s initial attacks in the region.”

The post did not state where two service members were killed. Their identities are being withheld until 24 hours after their families are notified, the military said.

Iran’s top diplomat shares a photo of graves dug for girls killed in apparent airstrike

Iran’s foreign minister posted an aerial photo showing rows of freshly dug graves for more than 160 girls who he said were killed by an airstrike on an elementary school in the country’s south.

“Their bodies were torn to shreds,” Abbas Araghchi said in a post Monday on social media, adding, “This is how ‘rescue’ promised by Mr. Trump looks in reality.”

The photo shows mourners gathered among long, orderly rows of graves stretching across an open dirt lot. White chalk rectangles mark measured burial plots as yellow excavators dig into the earth.

Iranian state media has reported that the girls’ school was hit in an airstrike on Saturday, killing at least 165 people and wounding dozens more. The Israeli military said it was not aware of strikes in the area. The U.S. military said it was looking into the reports.

Senior UN official highlights impact of recent Middle East escalations on children

U.N. political chief Rosemary DiCarlo briefed the U.N. Security Council on Monday during a session chaired by First Lady Melania Trump on protecting children, education and technology in conflict.

Before making general statements about the impact of conflict on children worldwide, DiCarlo highlighted the immediate impact of the U.S.-Israel strikes and Iranian retaliation on the youngest citizens of regional countries.

“We have been reminded of this truth over the last two days. Schools in Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman have closed and moved to remote learning owing to the ongoing military operations in the region,” she said.

DiCarlo added that the world body was aware of the reports about the deaths at a girl’s school in southern Iran, which Iran said killed dozens of children. Both U.S. and Israel have said they are looking into it.

Mourners grieve Israeli teens killed in Iranian missile attack

Three young siblings killed in an Iranian missile strike in central Israel were buried Monday night at the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem.

Yaakov, 16, Avigail, 15, and Sarah Biton, 13, were among nine people killed Sunday when a missile hit a shelter in a synagogue in Beit Shemesh, the deadliest attack on Israelis since the war began. Rescuers searched the rubble late into the night.

Israel’s rescue services said 65 people were hospitalized, including two seriously wounded.

President Isaac Herzog visited one of the injured, Penina Cohen, at Hadassah Hospital on Monday. She told him she lost her husband, Yosef, and her mother-in-law, Bruria, in the strike. She and her young son were sitting beside them in the shelter when the missile hit.

“I was right beneath the hole that was torn open, and I have no explanation for how we were not more seriously hurt. We experienced a great miracle,” she said. “Today my son turns 13, and he was meant to celebrate his bar mitzvah. Instead, we are burying my husband and mother-in-law.”

Iran accuses US of hypocrisy before Melania Trump’s UN meeting on protecting kids during conflict

Moments before U.S. First Lady Melania Trump led a U.N. Security Council session Monday on protecting children in armed conflict, Amir Saeid Iravani, Iranian ambassador to the U.N., blasted the subject of the meeting, saying that it was in contrast to the reported deadly strikes on a girl’s school in Iran on Saturday.

“It is deeply shameful and hypocritical,” Iravani told reporters, “that on the very first day of its presidency of the Security Council, the United States convenes a high-level meeting on protecting children, technology, and education in armed conflict under the agenda item ‘Maintenance of international peace and security,’ while at the same time launching missile strikes against Iranian cities and bombing schools and killing children.”

He added, “For the United States, ‘protecting children’ and ‘maintaining international peace and security’ clearly mean something very different from what the UN Charter provides.”

US military says it’s taken out 11 Iranian warships in the Gulf of Oman

“Two days ago, the Iranian regime had 11 ships in the Gulf of Oman, today they have ZERO,” U.S. Central Command said in a post on X.

The statement follows President Donald Trump’s Truth Social post on Sunday that U.S. forces had “destroyed and sunk 9 Iranian Naval Ships.” The president said they would be “going after the rest” and had “largely destroyed their Naval Headquarters.”

UN says Israel’s Gaza closure causes fuel rationing and water shortages

The U.N.’s humanitarian office tracking Gaza said Monday that the Israeli closure of all crossings into Gaza was stretching stocks of food, inflating the prices of basic goods and halting municipal services like solid waste collection as humanitarian workers tried to ration fuel supply. It said that reduced water production in some parts of Gaza City had left people drinking as little as two liters of water a day.

COGAT, the Israeli military body overseeing civilian affairs in Gaza, closed crossings into the territory at the start of the unfolding war and froze the entrance and exit of humanitarian workers. It said the crossings cannot not be safely operated under fire and that they would reopen as soon as the security situation allows.

Tense calm in Jerusalem during a lull in Iranian missile fire

A tense calm has settled over the central Jerusalem after an afternoon and evening with no sirens announcing incoming missiles from Iran. The streets are still quite empty in West Jerusalem, where most Israelis live.

NATO chief calls on European allies to support war against Iran

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said in an interview that the United States’ and Israel’s war against Iran is crucial for security in Europe. He said the allies could support the effort even without direct involvement in military operations, through logistics and access.

Rutte, a former prime minister of the Netherlands, said he unreservedly approves of Trump’s decision to attack Iran and kill its supreme leader. Rutte cited the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran.

“It would be a stranglehold on Israel. It could potentially mean Israel’s defeat,” Rutte told German public broadcaster ARD in its Brussels studio on Monday.

When asked about the possibility of NATO entering the war, Rutte said absolutely no one believed that NATO would be involved. “This is Iran, this is the Gulf, this is outside NATO territory,” he said.

NATO troops deployed for 20 years to Afghanistan, and its 2011 air campaign helped topple Libya’s late leader Moammar Gadhafi.

Iran says it shot down 20 drones since the war began

Iranian state-run IRNA news agency said the country’s military has shot down 20 “enemy drones” since the beginning of the U.S. and Israeli attacks on Saturday.

Iraqi militias threaten US military presence in Jordan

A prominent Iran-backed Iraqi militia has threatened to attack American military bases in neighboring Jordan.

Kataib Hezbollah has claimed attack on U.S. bases in northern Iraq in solidarity with Tehran.

Iran has been targeting American military assets in the Mideast in its ongoing war with Washington and Israel.

The Iraqi government for years has tried to keep a delicate balance maintaining strong ties with both Washington and Tehran.

Israel strikes a Hezbollah-linked financial institution in Lebanon

The military said it has completed a wave of strikes targeting branches of al-Qard al-Hasan, saying the quasi-banking system is being used to fund the militant group’s military wing.

The strikes come amid a day of successive Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon and in its capital, following Hezbollah rocket fire on Israel.

Al-Qard al-Hasan is officially a non-profit charity institution operating outside the Lebanese financial system, and one of the tools by which Hezbollah entrenches its support among the country’s Shiite population.

Israel targeted the institution also in 2024 during its months-long conflict with Hezbollah.

More US adults oppose initial airstrikes on Iran, early polling suggests

Americans’ initial reactions to Trump ordering airstrikes against Iran over the weekend appear more negative than positive, according to a new snap poll from The Washington Post that was conducted via text message on Sunday.

About half of those polled opposed the strikes, while 39% were in support. Roughly 1 in 10 were unsure. Democrats and independents drove much of the disapproval, with nearly 9 in 10 Democrats and about 6 in 10 independents opposed to the military strikes.

Republicans were much more supportive, with 81% backing the military action. About 1 in 10 Republicans were opposed, and a similar share were unsure.

Respondents were about twice as likely to say the U.S. should stop the military strikes as that time, rather than continue them.

Spain says joint US bases were not used in attack on Iran

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez called the U.S. attack an “unjustifiable” and “dangerous” military intervention.

Defense Minister Margarita Robles said “no assistance of any kind, absolutely none,” had been provided from the Rota and Morón bases in southern Spain, which are shared with the U.S. but remain under Spanish command.

“There is a deal with the U.S. over these bases, but our understanding of the deal is that operations have to comply with international legal frameworks and that there has to be international support for them,” Robles said.

The U.S. and Israel were acting “unilaterally without the support of an international resolution,” Robles said.

Flight map data from FlightRadar24 showed that several U.S. military aircraft had left the bases in southern Spain since the weekend attack, including nine tankers that departed Sunday from Morón for Germany.

Israel says it intercepted a drone from Lebanon

Israel’s military said the hostile aircraft was intercepted and it is reviewing the incident. The army’s social media post did not blame the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah or any other party.

Iran-backed Hezbollah did not immediately issue a statement. The group had fired rockets late Sunday into northern Israel, sparking Israeli strikes throughout Lebanon that killed at least 31 people and displaced thousands.

Drone hits at a fuel terminal in the UAE but fire is contained

Authorities in Abu Dhabi quickly responded to the drone attack on the Musaffah fuel terminal and got the fire under control. No injuries were reported and operations at the terminal were not affected, according to a statement by the Abu Dhabi Media Office posted on X.