Trump strikes spark warning of retaliation against US Middle East bases
Phil Stewart, Parisa Hafezi And Andrew Mills
Updated ,first published
Washington, DC: The United States has withdrawn some personnel from bases in the Middle East, a senior Iranian official said, warning that Tehran would hit American bases if Washington attacked.
Tehran is trying to deter U.S. President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to intervene on behalf of anti-government protesters as Iran’s leadership tries to quell the worst civil unrest the Islamic Republic has ever faced.
Iran also temporarily closed the airspace around the capital Tehran to flights due to increasing tensions with the United States and nationwide protests. Fight tracker FlightRadar24 showed planes circling Iran on Thursday to avoid the country’s airspace.
The so-called Air Duties Notice was put in place for about two hours, or until 4am local time (11.30am AEDT), and allows exemptions for international flights arriving and departing from the country’s capital only with prior permission from Iran’s civil aviation authority.
The United States has withdrawn some personnel from key bases in the region as a precaution amid rising regional tensions, a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said Wednesday, Washington time.
Britain was also withdrawing some of its personnel from its air base in Qatar ahead of possible US attacks. “The UK always puts in place precautionary measures to ensure the safety and security of our personnel, including the withdrawal of personnel where necessary,” a Ministry of Defense spokesman said.
“All signals are that a US attack is imminent,” a Western military official said. “But this administration is also acting this way to keep everyone on their toes. Unpredictability is part of the strategy.”
The British government said the British embassy in Tehran was also temporarily closed and its staff withdrawn due to the security situation. Italy and Poland also called on their citizens to leave Iran. “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs calls for immediate departure from Iran and advises against all travel to this country,” the Polish foreign ministry said in a post on channel X. he said.
On Thursday morning (AEDT) Trump said he had been told “on good authority” that execution plans in Iran had been halted, even as Tehran signaled speedy trials and executions would continue in its crackdown on protesters.
“We’re told the killings in Iran have stopped, stopped, stopped,” Trump said. “And there are no executions, no executions, no plans for executions, so they told me that from a reliable source.”
Trump did not specify where he got this information, only describing it as “very important sources on the other side.”
He said he would “find out” later if this was true, but did not explain how. “I hope it’s true,” he said. “Who knows?”
Asked if this meant he did not plan to take any action against the Iranian government, Trump said: “We’ll monitor that and see what the process is. But we were given a very good explanation by people who know what’s going on.”
“There are no plans to hang anyone,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi told Fox News Thursday morning when asked about the protests.
“Hanging is out of the question,” he said.
Two European officials had previously said US military intervention could come within the next 24 hours. An Israeli official also said that Trump decided to intervene, but the scope and timing remained unclear.
According to Bloomberg, citing a White House official, Trump was briefed on military strike options in Iran, including non-military areas.
Qatar said the withdrawals from Al Udeid air base, the largest US base in the Middle East, were “carried out in response to current regional tensions”.
Three diplomats said some personnel were told to leave the base, but there was no sign that large numbers of soldiers were being taken by buses to a football stadium and shopping mall, as was the case hours before Iran’s missile attack last year.
Trump has repeatedly threatened to intervene in support of protesters in Iran, where thousands have reportedly been killed during the crackdown on unrest against religious rule.
Iran and its Western foes have described the unrest, which began two weeks ago with demonstrations against dire economic conditions and has escalated rapidly in recent days, as the most violent event since the 1979 Islamic Revolution that established Iran’s system of Shiite religious rule.
An Iranian official said more than 2,000 people died. A rights group put the death toll at more than 2,600.
Armed Forces Chief of Staff Abdolrahim Mousavi said on Wednesday that Iran “has never faced destruction of this magnitude,” blaming foreign enemies.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot described “the most severe repression in Iran’s contemporary history.”
Iranian officials have accused the United States and Israel of inciting unrest carried out by what they call armed terrorists.
Trump has openly threatened to intervene in Iran for days, without providing details. In an interview with CBS News this week, he promised “very strong action” if Iran executes protesters. He also called on Iranians to continue protests and seize institutions, saying “help is on the way.”
Activists have warned that executions of detainees could come soon.
In comments seen as a direct challenge to Trump, Iran’s judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei said the government should act quickly to punish more than 18,000 people detained through speedy trials and executions.
“If we want to do something, we must do it now. If we want to do something, we must do it quickly,” he said on Wednesday, Tehran time. “If it’s delayed, it won’t have the same impact two months, three months later. If we want to do something, we have to do it quickly.”
At least 2,586 people died in the repression of the demonstrations by security forces. Human Rights Activists News Agency reported. The death toll exceeds that of other protests and unrest in Iran in decades and is reminiscent of the chaos surrounding the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.
The senior Iranian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Tehran has asked US allies in the region to prevent Washington from attacking Iran.
“Tehran has told countries in the region, from Saudi Arabia and the UAE to Türkiye, that if the US targets Iran, US bases in these countries will be attacked,” the official said.
The official added that direct contacts between Iranian Foreign Minister Araqchi and US Special Representative Steve Witkoff were suspended.
The United States maintains forces throughout the region, including the forward headquarters of Central Command in Al Udeid and the headquarters of the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet in Bahrain.
The internet outage prevented the flow of information within Iran.
US-based HRANA rights group said it had confirmed the deaths of 2,403 protesters and 147 government loyalists so far, a figure that dwarfed revenues from previous waves of protests suppressed by authorities in 2022 and 2009.
The government’s prestige was shaken by a 12-day Israeli bombing campaign in which the United States participated last June, following setbacks by Iran’s regional allies in Lebanon and Syria. European powers reimposed UN sanctions on Iran’s nuclear program, further exacerbating the economic crisis there.
A Western official said unrest on this scale had caught authorities off guard, but the government did not appear to face imminent collapse and the security apparatus still appeared to be in control.
Authorities tried to project images showing that they continued to support the public. Iranian state television broadcast footage of large funerals for people who lost their lives in the riots in Tehran, Isfahan, Bushehr and other cities.
People waved flags and images of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and held up banners with anti-revolt slogans.
President Masoud Pezeshkian, an elected figure whose authority falls under Khamenei’s authority, told a cabinet meeting that as long as the government has popular support, “all the efforts of the enemies against the country will be in vain.”
State media reported that the head of Iran’s top security body, Ali Larijani, met with Qatar’s foreign minister, while Iran’s top diplomat Araqchi met with his Emirati and Turkish counterparts. Araqchi told UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed that “calm has prevailed”.
HRANA reported that 18,137 people have been arrested so far.
Reuters, AP, Bloomberg
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