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Israelis and Americans deserve to know why they are still at war  The Forward

The Iran War Is Pushing Some Countries to Cut Back On Energy Use  The New York Times

Opinion: Alaska gas line project could become a casualty of Trump’s war in Iran  Anchorage Daily News

Trump lashes out after he fails to convince European allies to help in war with Iran  CNN

Volodymyr Zelensky has shifted perceptions of Ukraine from victim to a country with the tools for victory, offering safety in the Middle East and beyond, writes world affairs editor Sam Kiley

Counterterrorism Director Resigns in Protest of Trump's War in Iran  People.com

A look at the top Iranian official and the head of internal security targeted by Israel  AP News

By Maggie Michael TEHRAN, March 17 (Reuters) - As U.S. and Israeli air strikes pound Tehran, Iranian rescue workers are braving the risk of secondary attacks and say they are suffering trauma from the horror of pulling dead children from the rubble. The rescue teams are responding to a daily barrage of strikes across the city, and one worker told Reuters that on each of the 10 days he had been working since the war began, he had been on between two and 10 call-outs.

How Will the Iran War End? Even Trump May Not Really Know  The Walrus

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Some of the most dramatic images have been of Bandar Abbas, home to a major Iranian military port next to the crucial Strait of Hormuz

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US President Trump reacted to the resignation of the US National Counterterrorism Centre’s director, Joe Kent.

Projectile hits area near Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant A projectile hit the area near Iran's Bushehr Nuclear power plant on Tuesday, Iran's Tansim news agency reported, citing the country's Atomic Energy Organisation.  No damage had been reported, according to the Atomic Energy Organisation.  The projectile hit the vicinity of the nuclear power ‌plant in the port city of Bushehr at around 7 pm local time, the news agency added. Reporting by Reuters.

Trump says US does not need Nato after being rebuffed over strait of Hormuz  The Guardian

Leqaa Kordia, longest-detained pro-Palestine protester, freed from ICE custody MEE staff on Tue, 03/17/2026 - 15:13 A US immigration judge set her bond at $100,000, despite her not being a flight risk Leqaa Kordia poses for a photo after her release from the Prairieland detention facility in Alvarado, Texas, on 16 March 2026 (Gazamom/X) Off After spending two consecutive Ramadans behind bars, Leqaa Kordia was freed from US immigration detention on Monday, in what her lawyers have described as a "staggering" $100,000 bond. Her legal team said the bond was "nonetheless...paid immediately".  The 33-year-old Palestinian immigrant, whose home is in New Jersey, was released from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas, after the Trump administration chose not to challenge what was a third release order by an immigration judge.  It had previously appealed the first and second orders for her release.  "I’m free! I’m free! Finally, after one year," Kordia said as she walked out to a group of waiting supporters, with a Palestinian keffiyeh draped around her shoulders.  (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); “There is a lot of injustice in this place,” she added. “There is a lot of people that shouldn’t be here in the first place.” Kordia's cousin, Hamzah Abushaban, told Middle East Eye on Tuesday that Kordia was in relatively good spirits and already at the mosque for Ramadan prayers by Monday evening.  "It was an extremely emotional day" for me, he said of receiving the call about Kordia's release. Abushaban is based in South Florida. "I had to pull over at a random gas station to process it all, and started crying," he said.  Last month, Kordia had to be hospitalised after fainting, hitting her head, and suffering a seizure. She had never experienced seizures before, her family said. Targeted for Gaza protests: The Palestinian still in US custody Read More » While in hospital for three days, Kordia was chained to the bed before being taken back to the detention centre. Her lawyers also expressed concerns about her weight loss. New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani said on social media that he raised Kordia's case with President Donald Trump during their meeting last month, adding that he is "grateful" for her release after she spoke up for "Palestinian rights".  Of all the arrests linked to pro-Palestine campus protests made by the Trump administration last year, Kordia was the last one still languishing in detention.  "This is a one hundred percent Islamophobic, anti-Palestinian liberation issue because she spoke out against Israel," Abushaban told MEE.  "It's heartbreaking...it's not the America I thought I was born in," he added. During a trial last year in a separate case, American Association of University Professors v Rubio, which sought to challenge Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s alleged “policy of ideological deportation”, US officials revealed that they had relied on the pro-Israel doxxing site Canary Mission to identify students for immigration detention. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); Legal status The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) maintains that Kordia did not have lawful status at the time she was arrested in New Jersey on 13 March 2025, and issued a statement the following day, insisting she was "overstaying her expired F-1 student visa", which had been terminated on 26 January 2022 for "lack of attendance". The DHS also cited Kordia's arrest by the New York Police Department in April 2024 during a protest against Israel's war on Gaza, organised by Columbia University students. The police, however, had arrested several students at the time, and Kordia was eventually let go after charges against her were dropped.  She was enrolled at Columbia and had joined the protest as a show of solidarity.  (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); "It is true that at that time she did not have lawful status," Amal Thabateh, a staff attorney at Clear, who is working on Kordia's case, previously told MEE.  US appeals court opens door to re-arrest Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil Read More » She thought she was close to becoming a lawful permanent resident because her US-citizen family had filed for that status on her behalf, Thabateh explained. But after receiving "faulty advice" from a mentor, Kordia voluntarily signed a termination notice, withdrawing from the F-1 visa programme and leaving her entirely out of status.  "We all know based on how other cases have gone, and just routinely [that] this happens all the time where people have losses in status," Thabateh told MEE. "They're in transition periods... and that's quickly solved and fixed." But that wasn't the case in what is now the era of enforcement under US President Donald Trump's aggressive immigration crackdown targeting pro-Palestine voices.  "The ways in which the government has criminalised the visa overstay is just another attempt to target Palestinian rights activists," Thabateh said. "The question is not whether overstaying a visa is criminal or a violation, but instead it's whether the ways in which Leqaa has been punished and targeted, whether that is a justification for very innocently following false advice about her immigration status."  Kordia arrived in the US from the occupied West Bank in 2016 on a Palestinian Authority passport, and was initially a visitor before adjusting her status to a student, as she began learning English. She has lost 200 extended family members to Israel's genocide in Gaza.  Thabateh told MEE that Kordia voluntarily went to meet with immigration agents after learning that people who knew her were being questioned about her life, and that agents had also approached her home.  It was during that meeting in Newark, New Jersey, on 13 March, that she was served with a notice to appear in court and then taken to the Texas facility overnight.  Kordia frequently described poor and discriminatory treatment at the Prairieland Detention Facility to her legal team, including inedible food, unsanitary conditions, and no religious accommodations.  US Muslims News Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:19 Update Date Override 0

Defence official tells Congress that 47 alleged drug-trafficking vessels have been struck since campaign began.

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Starmer, Zelenskyy urge ‘focus’ on Ukraine as Iran war diverts attention  Al Jazeera

Ali Larijani: What does the death of philosopher security chief mean for Iran? Rayhan Uddin on Tue, 03/17/2026 - 17:00 Tehran loses versatile operator across military, legislative and cultural spheres, but analysts say the Islamic Republic is 'designed to absorb' it Ali Larijani attends a ceremony held by Hezbollah to commemorate the first anniversary of their late leader Hassan Nasrallah's killing by Israel, on the outskirts of Beirut, Lebanon, on 27 September 2025 (Reuters/Mohamed Azakir) Off Ali Larijani, a politician, security chief and philosopher, was Iran’s renaissance man. The 67-year-old, whom Israel says it killed overnight, was one of the state’s most versatile figures, holding decades of experience in the military, legislative and cultural spheres. “He had his fingers in a lot of different pots,” Barbara Slavin, an American journalist and fellow at the Stimson Centre who interviewed Larijani four times, told Middle East Eye. “[He] had an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) background, but also headed national television for a while.” Larijani occupied many influential positions in Iran’s corridors of power, including as the head of state broadcaster Irib, the speaker of parliament and the head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); He served in the latter role between 2005 and 2007, and was re-appointed in August last year. The Iraqi-born Iranian was also an IRGC veteran of the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s, rising to the rank of brigadier general. Larijani’s interests were diverse: he wrote at least six philosophy books and was an expert on Immanuel Kant’s views on science and mathematics. Family ties Ali Larijani was perhaps always destined to rise to the top of Iran’s power structure. “Larijani came from a prominent clerical family. His brother was head of the judiciary for a while and was touted as a possible supreme leader after Ali Khamenei,” said Slavin. “His other brothers had important positions in the government.” “It's a funny kind of regime. It's ideological, but it's also very much based on family ties,” Slavin said. 'It removes a pragmatic insider who could help translate strategy into coordinated policy' - Sina Toossi, analyst As well as being multi-faceted, Larijani was also a pragmatist who reached out to different factions and actors both domestically and internationally. “He was a rare figure who combined immense political experience and security credentials, and who could build consensus across factions. That made him particularly valuable in crisis moments,” Sina Toossi, an expert on Iran and US foreign policy, told MEE. “His loss is meaningful in that sense. It removes a pragmatic insider who could help translate strategy into coordinated policy.” 'A moderate when he chose to be' Alan Eyre, an analyst and former US official, said Larijani could be both a moderate and a principlist. “He was a moderate when he chose to be, and a hardliner when it suited him better,” he told MEE. “In other words, he was a highly functioning mix of pragmatism and opportunism.” Eyre was the US State Department’s first Persian language spokesperson, and a core member of the US nuclear negotiating team in the 2010s. 'He was someone that the United States could have talked to' - Barbara Slavin, journalist At the same time, Larijani was the chief negotiator for Iran’s nuclear programme, supporting diplomacy and outreach in an effort to reduce sanctions on Iran. “He was someone that the United States could have talked to. Someone the United States has talked to in the past,” said Slavin, noting that she interviewed him in 2006 when Larijani was reaching out to Stephen Hadley, then the US national security adviser.   But as well as consensus politics, he was capable of strong, aggressive rhetoric and actions. After the US and Israel sparked the war, Larijani warned US President Donald Trump to beware “lest you be the ones to vanish”, and said that the Strait of Hormuz would become a strait of “defeat and suffering for warmongers”. When anti-government protests broke out in January, Larijani was viewed as an architect of a brutal crackdown on demonstrators. The Islamic Republic continues As versatile and experienced as Larijani was, his death is not likely to be fatal for the Islamic Republic. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); “It does not fundamentally threaten the regime’s survival. The Islamic Republic is a multi-layered and institutionalised system that is designed to absorb these kinds of losses,” said Toossi. Toossi rejected the idea that Larijani was effectively the de facto leader of Iran over recent weeks and months. He said the country didn’t operate in such a way, and that decision-making was spread across institutions, with the supreme leader at the apex and the president, IRGC and other bodies playing key roles. “Larijani was influential, but he was one actor within a broader system rather than its centre of gravity,” Toossi said. 'Israel can keep on killing supposedly 'key' leaders, but they will likely be replaced by younger, more hardline candidates' - Alan Eyre, former US official “Decapitation strikes rarely produce decisive political outcomes in systems like Iran’s. They tend to remove individuals, sometimes important ones, but leave the underlying structure and strategic logic intact.” Saeed Jalili, Larijani’s deputy security chief, is viewed as Larijani’s likely replacement. Eyre said that such a move would be “just another step in the 'hardlining' of the Iranian regime”. “Yes, there is some weakening in the sense that his replacement might be less competent, but the more important consequence is this 'hardlining',” he said. Larijani was reportedly working with Hassan Rouhani, the former reformist Iranian president, to postpone the election of Mojtaba Khamenei as supreme leader and to find an alternative candidate. The efforts ultimately failed, and Ali Khamenei’s son was selected by the Assembly of Experts. Eyre said that the question was not which figures would grow in importance following Larijani’s death, but which institutions. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); “His death increases the importance of the two main institutions running Iran: the IRGC and the Bayt-e Rahbari,” he said, the latter referring to the supreme leader’s office. “Israel can keep on killing supposedly ‘key’ leaders, but they will likely be replaced by younger, more hardline candidates.” Analysis News Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:19 Update Date Override 0