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Iran launches retaliatory attacks after fresh US strikes – as it happened

We are closing our live coverage of developments in the Middle East – you can read our latest report here. Here is a quick recap of the latest. The United States and Iran each asserted Monday they controlled the strait of Hormuz after a weekend of attacks stretching across the wider Middle East, further threatening any diplomacy to end the war. The attacks were sparked by Iran striking a container ship in the strait off the coast of Oman. The US military’s Centcom described its forces as hitting dozens of sites in the strikes Monday, including air defense systems, radar sites, missile and drone equipment and small boats. “The Strait of Hormuz is a vital maritime corridor for global trade,” Central Command said. “Iran does not control it.” The US military early Sunday said it hit some 140 targets, including missile and drone launch sites, ammunition dumps, communication equipment and other sites — a far-heavier set of attacks than in two previous rounds of strikes in the last week. “We bombed the hell out of them last night,” U.S. President Donald Trump told NBC’s “Meet the Press.” Iran retaliated by attacking nations in the region hosting US military forces, while insisting it alone must control the strait and potentially charge vessels for traveling through it. Iranian attacks on Sunday stretched Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Jordan and even Oman — whose territorial waters with Iran make up the strait. Oman, which long has been an interlocutor between Tehran and the West, summoned an Iranian diplomat to criticise the attack. “The era of one-sided deals is OVER,” Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, the speaker of Iran’s parliament and a main negotiator, wrote. “We told you: keep your word or pay the price. Reality is knocking.” Iran and the US are nearly at the midway point of the 60-day period of an interim deal that was supposed to set-up talks for a permanent end to the war. Instead, it has devolved into a series of attacks over the strait and its future. President Donald Trump suggested last week that the interim deal in the war was “over.” But mediators, including Pakistan, Qatar and Egypt, have continued efforts to reach a final agreement to end the war. “A return to full-scale hostilities would have catastrophic consequences,” United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said in a statement.

Mastermind of €88m Louvre heist thought they ‘could have taken more’

Two men suspected of making off with €88m (£75m) worth of crown jewels from the Louvre museum in Paris last October have reportedly told investigators that the alleged mastermind behind the heist was disappointed by the haul and thought “they could have taken more”. The French newspaper Le Monde cited transcripts of the alleged thieves’ questioning last month by two investigating judges in charge of the inquiry, offering detailed insights into the burglary that made global headlines and led the museum’s director to resign. According to the account seen by the newspaper, the suspects, named locally as Abdoulaye N and Ghelamallah A, claimed they had broken into the Louvre’s Apollo gallery on the orders of a client they refused to name out of fear for their families. The duo seized eight pieces of jewellery including tiaras, a brooch, necklaces and earrings. But during their escape, the suspects dropped a gem-encrusted crown worn in the 19th century by Empress Eugénie, the wife of Napoleon III. “Yes, it was me, it fell out of my bag,” Abdoulaye N is said to have admitted, adding, as the judges showed him a photograph of the badly damaged crown: “What we did wasn’t right, it’s very serious.” He said the pair had handed over the remaining loot to the alleged mastermind, who “wasn’t happy” with the outcome. “He thought we could have taken more,” he told investigators. Both men said they had been hired only two or three days before the break-in and had been presented with a video filmed inside the gallery that showed the cases with the Napoleonic jewellery, to prepare them for the heist. Abdoulaye N was quoted as saying that they were given a clear mission: “Break windows and retrieve jewellery from inside the display cases.” A former minor social media star with a passion for motorbikes, Abdoulaye N said he had been “in dire straits” financially, and was promised €15,000-€20,000 for his role in the burglary. “Maybe more, depending on how much money it would bring in.” He said the alleged client’s motivation had been financial and that he had planned to resell the stolen jewels. “I knew I was going to rob the Louvre,” Abdoulaye N is quoted as telling investigators, while Ghelamallah A said he had not known about the target, which he said was initially presented to him as “a jewellery store where they make jewellery in Paris” and not the most visited museum in the world. “I would never have set foot there if I had known,” he said, saying he had agreed on a fee of between €20,000 and €25,000. After gaining access to a first-floor balcony via a furniture lift, the duo allegedly broke through the window of the Apollo Gallery, entered the museum and began cutting out the windows of two display cases. “When we got in, there was no one there, it was dark, only the lights in the display cases were on,” Abdoulaye N is quoted in the report as saying. “In the distance, I could see security moving around, behind a door, or something.” He said he had been aware they were racing against the clock. “We had to take as much jewellery as we could,” he said. “If we take more than three minutes, we know we have to leave, otherwise we’ll be reported. For me, what we did was taking too long.” Both Abdoulaye N and Ghelamallah A said they did not know what had become of the jewels since but refused to give investigators clues to the identity of the mastermind or any accomplices out of fear of reprisals. “They’re no choirboys,” Ghelamallah A said. Abdoulaye N was equally cautious: “I wasn’t threatened, but I received calls from outside [while in detention]. They told me to keep quiet.” Le Monde said investigators have not confirmed the burglars were acting on anyone’s behalf.

Swedish MEP files police complaint accusing Danish colleague of racist hate speech

A Swedish MEP has filed a police complaint accusing a fellow MEP of racist hate speech after she was targeted on social media over her condemnation of far-right, anti-immigration chants in the European parliament. The complaint, which was filed last week with police in Sweden, relates to the aftermath last month of the decision by some rightwing MEPs to erupt in chants of “send them back” following a vote aimed at increasing deportations across the EU. Soon afterwards, Abir Al-Sahlani, an Iraqi-born Swedish MEP with the Centre party, addressed the hemicycle, accusing the “fascists of the far right” of sinking to a “new low” with their chants. “I have never felt as unsafe in this parliament,” she told the chamber. “The shouting of the far right was not against a political opponent, it was ‘send them back’. It was about ordinary people who did no other ‘crime’ than looking for a better life in Europe.” As her comments made the rounds on social media, two MEPs from rightwing populist parties shot back at her online. “Cry more,” wrote the Finnish MEP Sebastian Tynkkynen, of the Finns party, in response to a clip of Al-Sahlani addressing parliament, while the Danish MP Kristoffer Storm, of the Denmark Democrats, said she “should go home”. On Wednesday, Al-Sahlani said she had filed a police complaint against Storm, accusing him of using racist speech as well as hate speech against her. Her complaint had only focused on the Danish MEP, she said, as Swedish police were unsure of how to handle Tynkkynen’s social media post. Both men have denied the accusations against them. The confrontation hints at the deep divisions that course through the European parliament, where far-right and rightwing populist MEPs now make up about a quarter of lawmakers – a record for the chamber – while people from minority ethnic backgrounds remain drastically underrepresented. Speaking to the Guardian days after she was targeted online, Al-Sahlani said she still was not quite sure what to make of it all. “I don’t know if I am disappointed or sad,” she said. “I feel sadness for European democracy, like, really, this is the level of our politicians? But also disappointed because, really, c’mon guys. I’m your colleague.” The comments by the rightwing lawmakers prompted a wellspring of support for Al-Sahlani online, punctuated with a smattering of rape and death threats. Her group in parliament, Renew Europe, lined up behind her. “Racism has no place in our institutions, and those who spread it must face the consequences of their actions,” Valérie Hayer, who heads the group, said on social media in response to Storm’s “go home” comment. In a letter sent soon after, Hayer called on the president of the European parliament, Roberta Metsola, to take disciplinary action against Storm and Tynkkynen. “I am particularly concerned that a member of my group, MEP Al-Sahlani, is being targeted and threatened on social media by fellow members,” Hayer wrote. “A clear and consistent response would send an important message that intimidation, harassment and behaviour that demeans our institution have no place in the European parliament.” In a statement, Metsola’s office described the incidents as “regrettable”, adding that there was zero tolerance for actions that undermined the respect of MEPs or the dignity of the institution. The parliament’s services were currently looking into what had happened, it added. On Monday, Metsola addressed parliament, telling lawmakers the “aggressive chanting, jeering, finger-pointing and filming of members that took place” was not acceptable. “There is a line, and that was crossed last plenary,” she said, adding that her office would “take appropriate action to ensure that the scenes we witnessed last month” would never happen again. Al-Sahlani said she had initially wavered on whether to speak up after the chants. “People with my colour skin – there are not so many of us in that room,” she said. “I hesitated for a very long time. Should I take the fall? What will they then scream at me?” She pushed aside her concerns as she considered the broader context. “They attacked people who have no power. And that should scare anyone in Europe, because if you start to attack the weakest people, then it’s a slippery slope towards something much, much worse,” Al-Sahlani said. The situation was being aggravated by those on the centre right who were “enabling the fascists”, she added, citing as an example the deportations legislation that had set off the chants. The legislation, which Amnesty International has described as “absurd, cruel and discriminatory” and has been criticised by more than a dozen UN experts, was passed after much of the centre right opted to join forces with the far right rather than work with pro-European, pro-democratic parties in the parliament. “We could have had better legislation,” Al-Sahlani said. “But they chose the most inhumane, undignified content for that kind of legislation and went with it.” Tynkkynen pushed back in an email at Hayer’s allegations that he had threatened or made comments of a racist nature towards Al-Sahlani, describing them as “false accusations”. He said he planned to file a complaint regarding these accusations, but did not provide more details, saying only that the “form of the complaint is still under consideration”. Storm said in an email that his remarks “were neither intended to be racist nor can they be reasonably characterised as racist”. Soon after the incident, he explained his view to Politico: “The phrase ‘go home’ was intended to mean that if she found the democratic decision and the reactions to it so distressing, she would have been better off leaving the chamber and taking time to reflect rather than accusing a big majority of political opponents of making her feel unsafe.” Al-Sahlani brushed off the explanation. “People are smarter than this,” she said.

Fire bomber planes battle Fontainebleau forest blaze near Paris

French officials rushed two firefighting planes to the Paris region on Sunday after a “very virulent” fire of “exceptional scale” erupted in the sprawling Fontainebleau forest about 60km (40 miles) south-east of the capital. The fire began late afternoon in the one-time royal hunting preserve that today is dotted with quiet villages. It raced across 800 hectares (2,000 acres) and was still spreading early on Monday, officials said, causing the partial closure of the A6 highway, the country’s main north-south artery, and disrupting traffic during a busy, heatwave-stricken summer travel weekend. High-speed rail was also disrupted. French rail company SNCF said on Sunday evening there were delays of up to six hours for trains arriving at or leaving from Paris’s Gare de Lyon. Firefighting aircraft had to suspend operations at nightfall on Sunday. About 15 homes were evacuated in the village of Vaudoue and firefighters were defending several other towns in the area, said the local Seine-et-Marne fire service. Without the firefighting planes, other villages would already have been evacuated, said Olivier Compta, who was overseeing the firefighting operation. About 400 firefighters worked to contain the fire, which erupted two days before the 14 July Bastille day national holiday. Eric Brocardi, of France’s national federation of firefighters, said it was the first time firebomber planes had been sent up from the normally drier and hotter south of the country to extinguish fires in the Paris region. Two firefighting helicopters and an observation aircraft were also helping to fight the blaze, he added. “The aim is to save lives and property,” he said as the fire advanced. Earlier, firefighters dealt with a fire that had blocked a highway running east from Paris and disrupted a high-speed train line to the south of France. The Paris region – and large parts of the rest of France – have been sharing in a succession of heatwaves since May that have seen temperature records broken in several countries across Europe and have caused thousands of excess deaths, according to estimates in Belgium, Britain, France and Spain. Several other European countries have faced record-breaking average temperatures. The June heatwaves would have been “virtually impossible” without climate change, the World Weather Attribution group of scientists said. The interior minister Laurent Nunez, whose office announced he would visit Fontainebleau on Monday, said that forest fires had already consumed 17,000 hectares this year. Once the figures had all been tallied, that would come to 25,000 hectares – “twice as much as the same period” in 2025, he added. With Agence France-Presse

Ukraine war briefing: Zelenskyy replaces PM and flags law enforcement overhaul

Yulia Svyrydenko stepped down on Sunday as Ukraine’s prime minister amid predictions she would become Kyiv’s ambassador to the US. Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president, said there would also be changes in the top ranks of law enforcement agencies. Reuters reported that well-informed opposition lawmaker Yaroslav Zhelezniak tipped Svyrydenko to take up the post of ambassador to the US; while the new PM was most likely to be Serhiy Koretskyi, head of state energy company Naftogaz. Lawmakers said other possible successors included Svyrydenko’s predecessor, Denys Shmyhal, currently energy minister; or Mykhailo Fedorov, the defence minister. Zelenskyy said Ukraine was “changing its political strategy” and he had offered Svyrydenko the opportunity to lead “a new, important area” in Ukraine’s relations with a key international partner. It comes after the Nato summit in Ankara where a thaw in relations with Donald Trump’s administration was evident, and the US president promised to give Ukraine a licence to build Patriot air defence missiles. Over the past year, Ukraine has been shaken by its largest corruption scandal, which ‌led ⁠to the resignation of the influential head of the presidential administration. Zelenskyy also triggered protests in 2025 when he moved to strip anti-corruption bodies of their independence. The president was forced to back down. Drone attacks killed three people and wounded five in the Moscow region, the governor said on Monday, as Ukraine continues to target Russian oil and gas facilities and military-related factories. “In the settlement of Pionersky in Istra, three people were killed and three more wounded as a result of a drone falling,” Andrey Vorobyov said. Two more people were wounded in another part of the region, the governor said, adding that air defences shot down 81 drones over the region. Ukrainian drones on Monday morning blew up an oil depot in Mikhailovsk city in Russia’s Stavropol region, social media channels from both Russia and Ukraine said. “An enemy drone attack is being repelled in the vicinity of Stavropol,” the regional governor, Vladimir Vladimirov, posted online – a Russian version of events that often follows a strategic target being hit. Earlier, a Ukrainian attack hit the Syzran oil refinery in the Samara region of Russia’s south-west, Russian media said. Pictures showed plumes of black smoke rising over the site. Officials said one person was killed and the regional governor, Vyacheslav Fedorishchev, said a child was one of three injured. Ukraine denies targeting civilians. Russia was forced to suspend shipping in the Sea of Azov after 90 vessels were targeted by Ukrainian drones in less than a week, Luke Harding writes from Kyiv. Ukraine’s drone forces chief, Robert Brovdi, said on Sunday that his units had hit 10 tankers and four ferries overnight, as well as a major oil refinery in the city of Syzran. There had been several strikes on electricity substations in occupied Crimea, he added. Ukraine’s allies known as the “coalition of the willing” will be meeting in Paris on Monday for talks on pressuring Russia to end its more than four-year war. France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, said in Ankara that he would use the summit to unveil new defence initiatives and joint military exercises. The meeting ⁠will also focus on tackling Russia’s shadow fleet, new military capabilities for Ukraine, greater mobilisation of defence industries and deeper operational cooperation among Kyiv’s backers, Macron said. Keir Starmer, Britain’s outgoing prime minister, is among those expected to be in Paris, as well as EU leaders Ursula von der ⁠Leyen and António Costa. Two ⁠more countries, Moldova and North Macedonia, have joined the coalition, the Elysee said. A French presidency official said the focus would be anti-ballistic-missile cooperation ranging from sourcing more US Patriot interceptors and advancing the deployment of the Franco-Italian SAMP-T air defence system to looking at how the European and Ukrainian defence industries could develop alternatives. One option under consideration was for different European nations to cooperate on a system ‌that would complement SAMP-T and/or Patriot and give Ukraine a significant role in production. Volodymyr Zelenskyy described the late US senator Lindsey Graham as “a true defender of freedom and the values that make our world safer”. Graham, 71, died on Saturday, reportedly from a massive heart attack. He had just returned from a trip to Ukraine and was a staunch supporter of its battle against Vladimir Putin’s invasion. David Smith writes that on Friday, Graham had announced an agreement with the Trump administration to move forward on a package of sanctions against Russia. Russian drones attacked Odesa on Sunday evening, Ukrainian regional officials said. Earlier, a wave of Russian drones and missiles killed four people, Ukrainian officials said on Sunday. Three died in attacks on Ukraine’s central Dnipropetrovsk region, including two in a strike on an “industrial enterprise” in the city of Kryvyi Rih, regional officials said. A separate drone attack on the southern city of Kherson killed a 48-year-old, said the mayor, Yaroslav Shanko. Ukrainian strikes on the Russian-occupied part of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region meanwhile left four dead, Russian officials said.

UK couple found burned and semi-conscious in Almería amid Spanish wildfires

A British couple have been found badly burned and semi-conscious in a Spanish ravine amid deadly wildfires that have swept through the country’s Almería province, according to local media reports. The couple were on holiday in the region and were thought to be out hiking when they were caught up in the wildfire, which has so far killed 13 people and burned more than 6,000 hectares (14,800 acres). At least 23 people are missing. They were found on Thursday by Guardia Civil officers who were searching the charred landscape near the worst-hit community of Bédar for survivors. They found the couple in a critical condition, semi-conscious and with severe burns covering 40% of their bodies, before they were airlifted to hospital in a two-hour rescue operation. They remain in hospital in intensive care. Sgt Pedro Barre, one of three officers involved in the search operation, told Spain’s TVE state broadcaster officers heard a sound in the distance but at first thought it was an echo. He said: “As you gain more experience, something inside you tells you: ‘Look again, try one more time.’ We’ll never forget that look of surprise and emotion on their faces.” Rafael Zea, another of the officers involved in the operation, said: “Being able to call out in the condition they were in was a titanic effort.” On Saturday afternoon, after high winds eased, firefighters were able to start gaining control of the flames. On Sunday, Andalusia’s regional government head, Juan Manuel Moreno Bonilla, said the fire had been contained and its perimeter secured. At least 1,400 people have been evacuated from their homes due to the blaze, which has involved more than 500 firefighters and emergency workers. Most of those ⁠killed are thought to be British and Belgian nationals, along with one Spaniard. Forensic scientists in Madrid are using samples from the bodies of the victims and DNA samples from the families of those reported missing to try to identify the dead. It is one of the deadliest wildfires in Spanish history, with officials saying the damage to the landscape made it look “like a bomb has gone off”. Bonilla said the dry weather, caused by high winds and several heatwaves fuelled by the climate crisis, had made the area a “ticking timebomb” for a wildfire.

Trump rejects Iran’s strait of Hormuz closure claim as fight for control goes on

Donald Trump has rejected Iranian claims to have closed off the strait of Hormuz as both sides battled for control over the waterway, leaving a ceasefire agreed last month at the point of collapse. US forces said they had attacked 140 targets in Iran on Saturday night and Sunday morning after Tehran struck and disabled a container ship in the strait, whose transit it said had not been approved. In a statement, US Central Command (Centcom) said its targets had included missile and drone sites, naval facilities, ammunition depots, communication networks and surveillance locations. Iran on Sunday struck back with drone and missile strikes it said were aimed at US interests across the Gulf, with reports of aerial attacks in the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Jordan, Bahrain and Oman. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) issued a statement declaring the strait of Hormuz closed, although US Centcom said some ships were continuing to cross the waterway. “Iran does not control the strait. Traffic is flowing,” the Centcom headquarters, which oversees US forces in the Middle East, said on X. Later in the day, Trump said US forces were keeping the strait open by force. “It’s open. We bombed the hell out of them last night,” he said on NBC’s Meet the Press programme on Sunday. “They’re very, very evil and sick people. We had meetings with them. They agreed to a deal yesterday, a perfect deal for us. No nuclear, no this, no that, no nothing. They gave up everything. And then after that, they left the room. And then within an hour, they launched a drone at a ship.” The US-run Joint Maritime Information Center said traffic was transiting the strait at “reduced levels”. The White House did not provide any more details of Trump’s claimed deal on Saturday, and Iran did not refer to any talks. A US-Iranian memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed on 17 June extended a ceasefire in the war by 60 days to allow the restoration of trade through the strait and create breathing space for talks on Tehran’s nuclear programme and sanctions relief, the main points of contention between Iran and the west. Apart from some indirect technical talks, those negotiations have failed to materialise, and fighting has continued between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, which was supposed to be covered by the agreement. The MoU started to unravel when Iran attacked three commercial vessels on Monday night as they were crossing the strait along a southern route next to the Omani coast that the Iranians said they had not approved. This drew US missile attacks in response, beginning almost a week of tit-for-tat exchanges. Tehran is determined that any long-term settlement in the region recognises its control over the strait, which it seized soon after the US-Israel attack on Iran in February. On Sunday, Mohsen Rezaee, a senior adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, was quoted in state media as saying: “This strategic passage is more important than dozens of atomic bombs, and the Islamic Republic of Iran will protect it.” In the latest round of strikes, Iran hit a container ship, the Cypriot-flagged GFS Galaxy, which was travelling through the strait on a southerly route along the Omani shoreline, according to the UK Maritime Trade Operations centre, a British military body. The vessel was struck, disabled and its crew forced to take to lifeboats. The Indian government said 10 of its nationals from the ship had been rescued but that one remained missing. In response, Centcom said on Saturday night its forces had struck 140 Iranian military targets “to degrade Iran’s ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial vessels freely transiting the strait”. Iran’s retaliatory drone and missile attacks across the region were apparently aimed at US bases in neighbouring Arab countries. The IRGC claimed to have destroyed “the logistical support centres for naval vessels and the refuelling facilities for US aircraft carriers at the port of Duqm in Oman”. Without confirming details on the damage, Oman condemned the attack, which came just hours after the sultanate hosted an Iranian delegation for talks on security in the strait. Referring to the strait of Hormuz, the IRGC said several vessels had “disregarded our warnings and instructions to correct their course and proceed along the approved route”. One of them “was struck by a warning shot and brought to a stop”, it added. The strait would remain closed until the “end of US interference”, the IRGC said, adding that it would consider targeting “additional enemy bases in the region” if it faced more American attacks. The return of hostilities has rattled global markets, though the price for Brent crude oil was $75 a barrel going into the weekend, well down from wartime highs of more than $120 and close to its prewar average . The latest price appears to reflect traders’ belief that the US and Iran want to avoid a return to full-scale war, and that the global economy is adapting to the prolonged uncertainty over the strait.