Mideast Conflict

Six ballistic missiles targeting Saudi Arabia‘s port of Yanbu on the Red Sea and the southwestern city of Taif have been intercepted, a Saudi military spokesperson said Thursday, blaming Iran-backed Houthi rebels in neighbouring Yemen as fighting escalates.

Iran reiterated its conditions for ending more than seven months of war with the United States, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pushed back against French President Emmanuel Macron’s remarks about the occupied West Bank during the United Nations General Assembly.

Palestinian villagers wailed over the mangled remains of their olive trees on Wednesday after Israel’s military uprooted them with bulldozers, days ahead of the annual olive harvest, normally a source of joy for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.

Iran’s president said Wednesday that his people have been “victims of terrorism” by the United States, delivering a rare wartime speech at UN General Assembly a day after U.S. President Donald Trump said he could “annihilate” the Islamic republic.

Middle Eastern leaders have gathered this week for the United Nations General Assembly in New York as three years of wars across the region show no signs of letting up.

The British military said an “unknown projectile” struck a tanker as it entered the Strait of Hormuz on Monday, injuring two crew members. The vessel continued toward port under its own power.

An Israeli was fatally shot in an attack in the West Bank, and the Israeli military said Sunday it killed an alleged attacker who attempted to ram his vehicle into troops also in the occupied territory.

Saudi Arabia warned of a “hostile aerial threat” and issued a string of emergency alerts across the kingdom, including in its capital, late Friday and early Saturday.

Iran says it struck an oil tanker trying to transit the Strait of Hormuz, while hundreds of thousands of people rallied in Tehran in the largest show of support for the government since the United States and Israel launched attacks in February.

Hundreds of thousands of Iranians rallied Friday in a government-organized show of defiance after months of war, pledging their readiness to take up arms in the biggest such demonstration since the United States and Israel attacked in February.

Saudi Arabia said debris from an intercepted Houthi drone killed one person, while United Nations-backed human rights experts said there are “reasonable grounds” to believe the United States committed war crimes in two strikes in Iran when the war began.

Human rights experts commissioned by the UN’s top human rights body say they have found “reasonable grounds” to believe the United States committed war crimes in two strikes in Iran, including on a school in the southern city of Minab.

The Trump administration has approved visas for top Iranian officials, including the president and foreign minister, to attend next week’s UN General Assembly high-level meeting in New York even as the two countries are locked in a stalemated war.

The State Department said that Palestinian officials had failed to live up to their commitments under previous agreements to seek peace with Israel.