Hezbollah escalated its involvement in the widening conflict between Iran and the U.S. and Israel Tuesday, launching long-range missiles from Lebanon within 48 hours of coordinated strikes on Iran amid Operation Epic Fury.

The militant group also declared it was ready for an ‘open war,’ The Associated Press reported.

The Iranian-backed militant group fired rockets into northern Israel, prompting Israeli retaliation, according to The Times of Israel. Two were intercepted by air defenses, the military said.

‘Hezbollah is putting everything they have into the fight to add to the challenges Israel will face in this war,’ Ross Harrison, senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, told Fox News Digital.

‘But Hezbollah also knows that if the Iranian regime falls, they could be degraded,’ he said before highlighting that ‘Israel could not totally disarm Hezbollah.’

Hezbollah was formed in the early 1980s with Iranian backing during Lebanon’s civil war and has grown into Tehran’s most powerful proxy.

For decades, Iran has funded, armed and trained the group as part of its broader strategy to confront Israel and expand its regional influence.

‘Iran believes that it has to reestablish deterrence before the end of this war with the U.S. and Israel, so expanding it using Hezbollah and attacking Gulf Arab states and Cyprus is part of this,’ Harrison warned.

Israel responded to Hezbollah’s escalation with additional airstrikes on Beirut and expanded its ground operations, with the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) taking positions near the border.

The U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon reported seeing Israeli troops enter and exit Lebanese territory, though the IDF insisted its forces continue to operate there, according to The Associated Press.

The U.S. Embassy in Beirut also announced Tuesday that it would close until further notice in a post on X.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said, ‘To prevent the possibility of direct fire at Israeli communities, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and I have authorized the IDF to advance and hold additional dominant terrain in Lebanon and defend the border communities from there.

‘The IDF continues to operate forcefully against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon. The terrorist organization is paying and will pay a heavy price for the fire toward Israel.’

‘Hezbollah, this is an octopus. The head of the octopus is in Iran. The arms are all over the region,’ IDF spokesperson Effie Defrin told Fox News Digital.

‘Last night, they launched missiles into Haifa, into a city center in Israel. They started it, they knew the consequences of that.’

The IDF also announced that it had killed Daoud Ali Zadeh, commander of the Iranian Quds Force’s Lebanon Corps, in Tehran.

The Quds Force acts as a key liaison between Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, and Hezbollah leadership, facilitating the transfer of advanced weaponry and enhancing proxy firepower.

‘The Quds Force is the arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, responsible for Iran’s relations with its allied militias, such as Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Kata’ib Hezbollah in Iraq, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen,’ Harrison clarified.

‘The Quds Force is the IRGC’s expeditionary force, designed to give Iran strategic depth,’ he said.

 ‘They are (or were) significant in managing Iran’s relations with shadowy militia organizations, and it has been challenged over the last couple of years as Hamas and Hezbollah have been degraded.’

On Saturday, the U.S.-Israeli airstrike campaign had also targeted Iranian leadership in Tehran, killing Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, dramatically escalating tensions across the Middle East and triggering regional retaliation.

An interim Leadership Council made up of President Masoud Pezeshkian, Chief Justice Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Eje’i and Ayatollah Alireza Arafi is temporarily in charge of Iran, acting as the de facto head of state.

‘If Iran ends the war prematurely, then they believe the U.S. and Israel can come back later,’ Harrison said.

‘If they escalate, then they have a shot at recreating deterrence. It is a high risk, as it could bring them down. But the danger is they feel they have little choice, and Hezbollah is part of this for Iran.

‘If the Iranian regime can hang on, they win. That said, Iran cannot win militarily, but if they can deny the U.S. a victory, they win.

‘Fundamentally, the Iranian regime is trying to increase the pain of both Israel and the Gulf Arab states to be able to reestablish deterrence lost since the June 2025 war,’ Harrison added.

‘Attacking civilian areas and economic pain points alongside Hezbollah is also part of this strategy.’

Fox News’ Efrat Lachter contributed to this report.

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Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., will force a high-profile vote later this week to require the release of sexual harassment reports involving members of Congress.  

Mace said Tuesday that her resolution was drafted in response to recent reports alleging that Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-Texas, sent sexually explicit text messages to a former staffer. Regina Santos-Aviles, the one-time aide, later died by suicide in September 2025.

‘I mean, literally, this girl killed herself in the most heinous way,’ Mace told Fox News Digital when asked if the Gonzales allegations were her motivation for the resolution. ‘She literally lit herself on fire and died, and we’re just going to sit here and say, ‘Let the process play out?’ No.’

Gonzales has denied the affair and suggested he is being blackmailed by the attorney of Santos-Aviles’ husband. 

‘What you have seen is not all the facts, and there’ll be ample time for all of that,’ Gonzales told reporters last week.

Mace’s resolution would specifically require the House Ethics Committee to publicly release all records regarding acts of sexual harassment involving lawmakers or their staffers within 60 days of enactment.

The South Carolina lawmaker said on the House floor that she will deem the resolution ‘privileged,’ meaning House leadership will have two legislative days to vote on the measure. Lawmakers could also vote to table the resolution or refer it to committee, a way to kill legislation before having to weigh the measure itself.

Mace said she expected a vote on the House floor by Thursday but voiced pessimism when asked by Fox News Digital if she thought the resolution would succeed.

‘No, I’m not optimistic about anything, especially when they just hide everything under the rug,’ Mace said. ‘And if you’re an outspoken woman like I am, well, they’re going to come for you.’

Mace is among a group of conservative lawmakers who have called on Gonzales to resign amid allegations he had an affair with his staffer.

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., has called the allegations ‘really disgusting.’ Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., told reporters last week that Gonzales ‘needs to go.’

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has not made any push one way or the other, though he has called the allegations against the Texas lawmaker ‘very serious’ and ‘alarming and detestable.’ The speaker is wrestling with a razor-thin majority and can afford to lose just one defecting GOP lawmaker on party-line legislation.

The Office of Congressional Conduct is expected to send a report on Gonzales to the House ethics panel after the Texas primary elections Tuesday. Under House rules, reports on lawmakers cannot be released within 60 days of an election.

Gonzales is facing a primary challenge from his right flank, social media influencer Brandon Herrera, who is backed by the conservative House Freedom Caucus’ campaign arm. Herrera lost to Gonzales in 2024 by less than 400 votes.

Mace was one of four House Republicans to advocate for the release of files relating to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

A request for comment to Gonzales’ office was not immediately returned.

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President Donald Trump argued that whether he carried out strikes against Iran wouldn’t have mattered to congressional Democrats. 

They would have criticized him either way.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and his caucus immediately ramped up criticism of Trump’s Operation Epic Fury when the Senate returned Monday, and the administration has not yet signaled a clear exit strategy.

Speaking from the Oval Office Tuesday, Trump said Democrats would have criticized any decision he made.

‘If I didn’t do this, guys like Schumer who — losers, the Democrats, losers — guys like Schumer would say, ‘Well, you should have done this,’’ Trump said. ‘In other words, if I did it, it’s no good. If I didn’t do it, they would have said the opposite, that you should have done this.’

Democrats are furious that Trump did not seek approval from Congress to carry out the strikes and are pushing a war powers resolution vote this week to handcuff further use of the military in Iran.

‘Donald Trump has just launched America into a full-scale conflict against one of our most fervent adversaries,’ Schumer said on the Senate floor. ‘Without a plan, without an endgame and without authorization from Congress — or even a debate in full view of the American people.’

The administration argued after a closed-door classified briefing with congressional leaders and high-ranking lawmakers that the strikes were carried out as a preemptive measure.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters after the briefing, ‘We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action.

‘We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces,’ Rubio said. ‘And we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.’

But Democrats largely aren’t buying the administration’s argument. Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the top-ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, contended there wasn’t an imminent threat to the U.S. from Iran.

‘It was a threat to Israel,’ Warner said.

Senate Democrats plan to plow ahead with a war powers vote, likely Wednesday, led by Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., and backed by Schumer. Whether they can splinter off enough Republican support, as Kaine did earlier this year with his Venezuela war powers resolution, remains to be seen.

Trump argued that because Iran was ‘a purveyor of terror all over the world,’ Operation Epic Fury was inevitable.

‘It’s something that had to be done,’ Trump said.

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President Donald Trump is open to the idea of supporting militia groups in Iran willing to help take out the regime, according to reports. 

The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump has spoken with Kurdish leaders, who have a sizable force along the Iraq-Iran border.

‘President Trump has spoken with many regional partners,’ White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told the newspaper in a statement, without confirming Trump’s aims.

Trump spoke with two leaders of the main Kurdish factions in Iraq — Masoud Barzani and Bafel Talabani — a day after the Saturday bombing campaign began, Axios first reported. 

Officials told the Journal that Trump hasn’t made a decision on the matter, including what type of help the United States would provide, be it arms, intelligence or other resources. 

Fox News Digital has reached out to the White House. 

Among the approaches being looked at for Iran moving forward are backing militias while weighing different scenarios for who could realistically take power after the country’s leaders fall, the newspaper reported. 

Trump has urged the people of Iran to overthrow the country’s regime as Tehran appears to be weakened following U.S. and Israeli military strikes that have killed several key Iranian leaders and officials.  

‘Most of the people we had in mind are dead,’ he told reporters at the White House. ‘And now we have another group, they may be dead also. Pretty soon we’re not going to know anybody.’

The strikes have fueled speculation that the Kurds could advance into Iran amid Israeli strikes in the western part of the country. 

‘It is the general view, and certainly (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu’s view, that the Kurds are going to come out of the woodwork … that they’re going to rise up,’ one official told Axios. 

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President Donald Trump blasted British Prime Minister Keir Starmer Tuesday, saying, ‘This is not Winston Churchill we are dealing with,’ amid a lack of support for the United States and Israel’s joint military operation against Iran.

The president spoke in the Oval Office ahead of a meeting with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz Tuesday and took questions from reporters.

‘By the way, I’m not happy with the U.K. either,’ the president said, referring to Starmer blocking the United States’ use of U.K. bases to launch attacks on Iran.

Starmer initially blocked the U.S. from using British military bases, specifically Diego Garcia, for strikes against Iran during Operation Epic Fury. The U.K. later permitted the use of the bases for ‘defensive strikes’ after Trump’s complaints. 

The president referenced the Chagos Islands Tuesday, which are British territories in the Indian Ocean, saying it has taken ‘three, four days for us to work out where we can land there.’

‘It would have been much more convenient landing there as opposed to flying many extra hours, so we are very surprised,’ he said.

Trump added, though, ‘This is not Winston Churchill that we’re dealing with.’

Later, the president said the United Kingdom has been ‘very, very uncooperative with that stupid island.’ 

‘It’s a shame,’ Trump said. ‘That country, the U.K., and I love that country, I love it.’

‘My mother was born there,’ he said. ‘My father was born. Right? He knows all about my father. My father was born there. So, you know, very places that you sort of automatically very, very feel warmly about.’

The president said again, ‘This is not the age of Churchill.’

Starmer has defended his decision to stay out of the conflict, saying the U.K. was ‘not involved in the ​initial strikes against Iran, and we will not join offensive action now.’ 

‘But in the face of Iran’s barrage of missiles and ⁠drones, we will protect our people in the region,’ Starmer said in an address Monday to Parliament. ‘President Trump has expressed his disagreement with our decision not to get involved in the ​initial strikes, but it is my duty to judge what is in Britain’s national interest. That is what I’ve done, and I stand by it.’

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The State Department revealed communications with Congress on getting Americans out of the Middle East as Democrats on Capitol Hill say the department is ‘refusing to help people leave the region.’

Secretary of State Marco Rubio addressed concerns about Americans still remaining in the Middle East with reporters on Capitol Hill Tuesday, telling U.S. citizens abroad that ‘we need to know where you are’ in order to successfully help them evacuate. 

‘9,000 Americans have been able to leave the region since the start of this war,’ Rubio said. ‘We have about [1,500] Americans that are requesting assistance with departure. We have identified and continue to identify charter flights, military flight options and expanded commercial flight options, meaning working with the airlines to send bigger airplanes with more seats.’

‘Here’s the message I want to deliver Americans who are in the Middle East and in need of assistance… we need to know where you are,’ Rubio added. ‘We need to have contact information for Americans that need assistance. They have to register with us because, as these options begin to open up and as they open up we have to be able to call you, we have to be able to reach you, we have to be able to know where you’re staying so we can get this information to you and coordinate appropriately.’

Rubio strongly encouraged Americans still remaining in the Middle East to utilize the department website to initiate the proceedings to safely evacuate.

The Department of State told Fox News Digital that the department has been in ‘constant contact’ with Congress, specifically related to getting stranded Americans back home. 

‘The State Department is in constant contact with members of Congress in order to provide American citizens in the Middle East with assistance and accurate information on the security situation in the region, State Department deputy spokesperson Tommy Pigott told Fox News Digital in a statement. ‘There is no greater priority than the safety of American citizens both at home and abroad.’

‘The State Department has reached over a thousand Congressional staffers with briefings on the security situation on the Middle East and continues to be in constant contact with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee to ensure that their constituents have the facts on available support and assistance,’ Pigott added.

Democrats in Congress have accused the Trump administration of not assisting in getting trapped Americans out of the area. 

‘So the State Department is forcing everyone to immediately leave the region but is also refusing to help people leave the region,’ Sen. Chris Murphy, D-CT posted to X. ‘The strike itself is illegal and disastrous but their lack of readiness for what comes next is unforgivable as well.’

‘Incompetence everywhere,’ Murphy added.

Sources at the State Department told Fox News Digital that they contacted the Consular on the Hill with approximately 130 emails and calls from 88 congressional offices through Monday evening, seeking information to provide constituents or request information about citizens in the region. 

The department also told Fox that they communicated with more than 1,300 congressional staffers, held three webinars covering the security situation, and have been in constant communication with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and House Foreign Affairs Committee on Embassy operating status, regional requests for additional interceptors, and other military equipment. 

The department says they made 60 emails and a dozen calls on policy-related questions, briefing requests, and general inquiries from Congressional offices.

Rubio told reporters on Tuesday he is confident that the administration will be able to safely evacuate all U.S. citizens out of the region. 

‘Iran is run by lunatics, religious fanatic lunatics,’ Rubio said. ‘They have an ambition to have nuclear weapons. They intend to develop those nuclear weapons behind a program of missiles and drones and terrorism [so] the world will not be able to touch them for fear of those things… now is the time to go after them.’ 

During an interview with Fox News Digital, Kristy Ellmer, from New Hampshire, described the ‘shock waves’ and ‘red bursts in air’ she witnessed while with her husband in Dubai.

‘We were just sitting on the beach. We hadn’t been watching the news or anything, just enjoying the morning,’ Ellmer said. ‘All of a sudden, we felt explosions.’

She was scheduled to leave Dubai on Sunday, though she dealt with flight cancellations for Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday.

On Saturday, Iranian airstrikes hit Dubai International Airport as the country exchanged blows with the U.S. and its Israeli allies. 

She still remains in the region, hoping to get out of the country by the end of the week.

Fox News Digital’s Jessica Mekles contributed to this report.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s recent reactions to law enforcement, which some have interpreted as pushing back against the New York Police Department, likely won’t hurt him as much as previous mayors, a local crime expert told Fox News Digital, and could end up working to his overall political advantage. 

‘It may not hurt Mamdani in the way that it might hurt another mayor,’ said Manhattan Institute fellow Rafael Mangual. 

‘I do think that Zohran Mamdani is OK with being an opponent and a critic of the NYPD. I think he comes from a sort of ideological perspective that does not believe that the NYPD actually reduces crime. So, if the NYPD pulls back and crime goes up, I think he will see that as an opportunity to further criticize the NYPD and point to reasons why it should be defunded in favor of this Department of Community Safety and some of these other proposals that he would much rather invest in.’

Two significant events in the city indicate that the mayor will not defend the police department, according to Mangual, and could result in cops pulling back due to lack of support. They include an incident last month in Washington Square Park, dubbed ‘Snowballgate,’ where a mob of roughly 100 people pelted NYPD officers with snowballs, leaving two officers injured. 

Rather than condemning the assault, Mamdani appeared to downplay the violence, referring to the perpetrators as ‘kids’ taking part in a snowball fight. 

‘Mamdani did not come out in support of the NYPD in that incident. Instead, he seemed to kind of brush it off and even refused to call for the prosecution of the perpetrators,’ Mangual said, adding that the actions of the mob clearly qualified as an assault against police officers. 

‘Unfortunately, I think the mayor’s response was found wanting. He seemed unwilling to condemn it as an assault. He seemed unwilling to even say that it was something that shouldn’t be done in the future, and I think that is going to create a sense in the NYPD that this administration does not have their back.’

Perhaps more concerning, according to Mangual, was Mamdani’s reaction to a recent officer-involved shooting in Queens where, despite bodycam footage showing an officer being immediately attacked with a deadly weapon after entering a home at the owner’s invitation, Mamdani called on the district attorney to not prosecute the knife wielding suspect who was reportedly having a mental health episode. 

Additionally, Mamdani visited the attacker and his family after the incident.

‘For Mayor Mamdani to come out and not just meet with the family as if this individual is some sort of crime victim, but to also make an open call to the Queens DA not to prosecute the individual for the obvious and clear assault with a deadly weapon on a police officer, I think is just completely irresponsible,’ Mangual said. 

‘But it also will reinforce that sense in the NYPD that I think is already existing: that this administration is an opponent, not a partner. And if that dynamic continues, and it reaches further down into the rank and file, I do think that the city is going to see a more reluctant police force at a time in which it needs it to be proactive.’

As a candidate, Mamdani attempted to distance himself from previous support of police defunding but faced backlash last month when he announced that part of his plan to balance the budget involves cutting the NYPD’s budget and canceling 5,000 new officer hires.

‘I think what we’ve seen in the early days of this administration is that Mamdani is not yet willing to position himself as an open partner of the NYPD,’ Mangual said. ‘He is still trying to make a decision about whether he is going to lean into his more natural identity of an opponent of the NYPD.’

The NYPD is ‘between a rock and a hard place’ under Mamdani, Mangual said, adding that officers will be ‘less likely to put their lives on the line for a city that they do not feel has their back.’

‘He’d be perfectly happy with a world in which he can say, ‘Look, the NYPD is a failure, it’s not keeping crime down, it’s time to try other approaches,” Mangual said.

Fox News Digital reached out to Mamdani’s office for comment. 

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Former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave very different responses to House lawmakers last week when asked whether President Donald Trump should testify in their Jeffrey Epstein probe, newly released video shows.

Both testified to the House Oversight Committee behind closed doors for hours in their hometown of Chappaqua, New York.

Each was also asked by the Democratic side whether Trump should come before the committee himself, given his own known past ties to the late financier and sex trafficker.

‘Absolutely,’ Hillary Clinton answered when the question was posed by Democrats’ staff.

She cited the civil case involving writer E. Jean Carroll in which Trump was found civilly liable for defaming Carroll over her allegations that he sexually assaulted her, as well as the 34-count criminal verdict by a New York City court related to allegations he sought to cover up payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

Trump has denied any wrongdoing in both cases.

Neither case relates to Epstein, but Hillary Clinton claimed it proved a ‘pattern’ of behavior that would be relevant to the committee’s probe.

‘I think that it would be in keeping with the scope of the investigation of this committee to set up a deposition with President Trump. I know he’s been deposed many, many, many times. He’s taken the Fifth Amendment many, many hundreds of times,’ she argued.

‘So I’m not saying you’re going to get a lot of information, but given what’s in the files, and given past and prior conduct, he would be on my witness list.’

Bill Clinton’s response was far more muted, however.

When asked by Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., the committee’s top Democrat, whether Trump should be called in, the former president did not express support one way or another.

‘That’s for you to decide. But he did know him well, and I once had a brief discussion with him about it,’ Bill Clinton said.

Garcia attempted to move on to the next Democratic lawmaker before Bill Clinton cut in again, ‘I hate this, because I don’t believe I should inject anything, but I do not want to leave the impression, but since there was no follow-up question, he never — the president never, this is 20-something years ago, never said anything to me to make me think he was involved in anything improper with regard to Epstein, either.’

‘He just said, ‘We were friends. And then we had a falling out over a land deal, property deal.’ That’s all,’ Bill Clinton said.

He then said the conversation occurred on Trump’s golf course and that he ‘somehow’ knew that the former president had flown on Epstein’s plane.

‘And he said, you know, ‘We had some great times together over the years, but we fell out all because of a real estate deal.’ And he said, ‘I’m sorry it happened.’ That’s all,’ the former president said.

His deposition included far fewer dramatic moments on the whole than his wife’s, who was confronted by Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., and others during multiple explosive points in her own deposition.

At one point, Hillary Clinton even temporarily stormed out of her seat after it was discovered that Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., had run afoul of the deposition’s rules by posting a photo of the former secretary of state.

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As Israel wages what it describes as an existential campaign against Iran, IDF spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin said the war has reinforced a fundamental strategic shift in how Israel sees itself and its alliances, particularly with the United States and regional partners.

‘Israel was never part of this region. We thought we were part of Europe,’ he said. ‘Since the Abraham Accords started, we are having good relations with our neighbors. We are part of this region now.’

He described the 2020 agreements as transformative, building on the peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. ‘The military cooperation is great. Some of the things are overt and some covert,’ Defrin said in his first English-language media interview since the beginning of the conflict. ‘Iran is a regional threat, and that is clear to everyone now.’

But he stressed the campaign against Tehran is not only regional.

‘It’s a worldwide problem, it’s a global problem, it’s a regional problem and it’s also an Israeli problem,’ he said. ‘They are not hitting only Israel.’

Months of Deception

The spokesperson revealed that the operation was preceded by months of strategic deception.

‘It was a strategic and operational deception,’ he said.

On the eve of the strike, senior officials deliberately maintained routine appearances.

‘Friday night we went to dinner at home. The chief of staff and I returned late in cars that were not our official vehicles. The official cars stayed at home, and we made sure that from satellite imagery it would not look like the Kirya (ministry of defense) was full while all the planes were armed and ready.’

He said Iran was caught off guard. ‘For many long months there was deception, so they were surprised. They fired what they had pre-planned in their preset response.’

‘A Mutual Operation’

The spokesperson said the strike that killed Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, was carried out in coordination with the Trump administration. ‘It was a mutual operation,’ he said. ‘The cooperation between us and the American military is amazing. We have mutual planning and mutual executing for the plans in Iran and beyond.’

He framed the operation as part of unprecedented U.S.-Israeli military coordination. The entire operation in Iran is a mutual and coordinated campaign,’ he said.

He also described a broader international dimension. ‘It’s a problem with the United States of America as well,’ he said, citing attacks by Iranian-backed groups that have killed American service members and threatened shipping lanes.

‘They are posing a threat to the Red Sea… the movement of naval ships in the Suez Canal dropped by 90% since the Houthis started shooting at ships in the Bab al-Mandab Strait,’ he said. ‘It’s a global problem. It’s a terror regime. They are acting all over the world. And again, we had to act.’

He added that regional states increasingly understand the threat. ‘Israel is here to stay. You see the countries of the region placing their trust in Israel.’

Strike on Iranian Targets

Addressing reports that dozens of senior Iranian figures were eliminated in a strike on Tuesday, including claims that 88 members of Iran’s Assembly of Experts were killed, he dismissed the figures.

‘We struck a few targets involved in terrorism. We still don’t have any battle damage assessment. Once we have it, we will publish it. It’s too early.’

He emphasized that the targets were military. ‘We struck military targets,’ he said. ‘They are attacking population centers.’

According to the spokesperson, Israeli intelligence shows Iran is deliberately aiming at civilians ‘to exact a price,’ including launches toward civilian infrastructure.

War Aims

Explaining the decision to launch the campaign, the spokesperson described Iran as an imminent existential threat.

‘We didn’t have another choice, unfortunately. It’s an existential imminent threat. This is a terror regime,’ he said.

‘They declared it. Whatever they declared, they did.’

Asked whether regime change is an objective, he drew a distinction between military aims and political outcomes.

‘As a member of the military, I cannot say we have an aim to remove the regime,’ he said. ‘But definitely, we want to weaken it and create the conditions that one day this regime will be removed by its own people.’

As fighting expands to Lebanon following renewed Hezbollah fire, he reiterated Israel’s view of Iran as the head of a regional network.

‘Hezbollah is an octopus. The head of the octopus is in Iran.’

For Israel, he said, the campaign has clarified a strategic reality shaped by the Abraham Accords and deepened U.S. cooperation. ‘We are part of this region now.’

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Undersecretary of War for Policy Elbridge Colby told lawmakers that the administration’s latest defense strategy proposal does not sideline the U.S.’ European allies, but rather it aims to go back to a ‘Cold War mentality’ with an emphasis on ‘burden sharing.’

The Pentagon policy chief was grilled on Tuesday as members of the Senate Armed Services Committee questioned the 2026 National Defense Strategy (NDS).

The strategy outlines a shift in U.S. priorities to keep Washington engaged in Europe while also prioritizing defense of the ‘U.S. Homeland and deterring China.’ The NDS also calls for NATO allies, which it says are ‘substantially more powerful than Russia,’ to take responsibility for Europe’s conventional defense.

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker, R-Miss., expressed doubts in his opening statement about leaving Europe to handle threats from Russia. The senator said that ‘any clear-eyed assessment of the military situation in Europe makes it clear we cannot fully delegate the Russia problem to our European allies.’

Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., the committee’s ranking member, called the NDS a ‘flawed proposal,’ and also expressed concerns about the strategy’s approach to Russia, which he said focused U.S. efforts on Moscow’s growing nuclear arsenal, as well as its advances in space and cyber spaces.

‘While I understand the logic of pursuing the right balance of U.S. military capabilities with those of our European allies, I do not accept the abdication of our clear national security interests in Europe by suggesting Russia is their problem to manage,’ Reed said in his opening remarks.

Colby told the senators that the strategy did not leave America’s allies in danger, saying it was meant to focus U.S. resources ‘realistically and prudently’ while accounting for ‘our allies’ and partners’ ability and will to meet those challenges.’ He described the strategy as going back to a ‘Cold War mentality’ that focused on U.S. allies doing their part to combat threats within their regions. The Pentagon policy chief noted that the U.S. has a network of allies with ‘tremendous military power.’

Colby said the model that the administration is pursuing is ‘NATO 3.0,’ which aims to have ‘wealthy European allies take the lead for the conventional defense of European NATO.’

‘In Europe and other theaters, allies will take the lead against threats that are less severe for us but more so for them, with critical but more limited support from the United States,’ he said.

Colby cited this when responding to concerns Wicker expressed during his statement, saying that the strategy recognizes European interests in the context of certain threats without leaving U.S. allies in the lurch. He said the strategy is a return to shared defense burdens and responsibilities.

‘I think this is a return to the Cold War mentality, when these were expected to be real military alliances with burden-sharing, and members of this committee in the 1970s and ’80s on both sides of the dais, would make a real point of making sure that our allies did their part. And we’re going back to that noble heritage,’ he said.

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