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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hi, I'm Kim Vennell in Whanganui, New Zealand. It's Monday, March 2nd. Today, Israel hits Lebanon as the Iran conflict widens, risking a wider war between the U.S. and its allies and Iran's proxies. Polling shows just one in four Americans support U.S.
Chapter 2: What recent events have escalated the Iran conflict?
attacks on Iran. And midterm season kicks off with the Texas primary a litmus test for both parties. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes, seven days a week. But first, some breaking news.
For more, here's my colleague, Carmel Crimmins. Thanks, Kim. Three US jet fighters were mistakenly shot down by Kuwaiti air defences. That's according to the US military. In a post on X, US Central Command said the three F-15s were hit in an apparent friendly fire incident. The six crew safely ejected. Now back to Kim.
Scenes of devastation are unfolding across the Middle East.
Chapter 3: How are U.S. officials responding to the situation in Iran?
Part of a residential area in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv turned to rubble. In Dubai, a missile sparks a massive fire at the crucial Jebel Ali port. A US-run naval base in Bahrain is set on fire. An oil tanker is attacked off the coast of Oman. And in Tehran's Inghalab Square, thousands of people gather.
Wailing women beat their chests as supporters of the country's supreme leader mourn his death. In the days since Israel and the US began their assault on Tehran, the scale of the conflict has widened, both from Iran's continued retaliatory attacks and with Israel now expanding its gaze to Lebanon. More than a dozen explosions rocking the capital, Beirut, forcing residents to flee.
Israel says it's targeting the Iranian-backed armed group Hezbollah, which earlier launched missiles against Israel in retaliation for the killing of Iran's Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. A fragile peace between Israel and Lebanon, long-time enemies, is now in tatters. US President Donald Trump, meanwhile, is signalling that US and Israeli strikes on Iran could last weeks.
Combat operations continue at this time in full force and they will continue until all of our objectives are achieved.
He says almost 50 Iranian leaders have been killed and that the U.S. has started sinking Iran's navy, destroying Iranian warships and, quote, going after the rest. The US also announced its first casualties of the campaign. Three service personnel killed on a base in Kuwait, according to officials. Trump says there will likely be more US casualties.
But we'll do everything possible where that won't be the case. But America will avenge their deaths and deliver the most punishing blow to the terrorists who have waged war against basically civilization.
In Tehran, a new leadership council has temporarily assumed the duties of the supreme leader. But Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's death still leaves the Islamic Republic in its most perilous crisis since the 1979 revolution. Trump is hoping that will result in regime change that is more friendly to the U.S. and Israel's interests.
Several officials and analysts, however, think that looks unlikely, at least in the immediate term. The regime, they say, was meant to outlast one man. Foreign policy editor Don Durfee has the latest on where that leaves America in terms of next steps.
So on Sunday, Iran announced that they were setting up a new leadership council in the wake of the killing of Khamenei. It's led by President Massoud Pazeshkin. And Trump has said that he wants to have talks with this leadership council.
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Chapter 4: What are the implications of U.S. strikes on Iran for American voters?
It's not clear whether those are going to be successful or not. Iran is not Venezuela. In Venezuela, you still had a fairly large group of relatively apolitical government workers, you know, who are in theory willing to work with the United States. In Iran, you've had a clerical regime which exercised really tight control over all aspects of the government.
And you also have the powerful revolutionary guards who are deeply embedded in Iranian society. And, you know, just not clear that even if this leadership council were to make some sort of agreement with Trump, that the rest of the government would follow. Although you never know, there might be some sort of compromises that they might make that would be acceptable to the U.S.,
That could mean a drawn out war with a role of Iran's proxy fighters could be critical.
Well, Trump has said that the fighting could go on for another four weeks. Unclear if it would really last that long. But Israel and the United States have signaled that there's a lot of targets that they still want to hit. You know, today they were focusing on sinking the Iranian Navy.
And for Iran, they used a number of their ballistic missiles in retaliatory attacks over the last couple of days, but they are believed to still have many missiles in reserve. We don't know yet how many of those the U.S. might have destroyed, but for sure they're holding some missiles in reserve so that they continue to retaliate.
And beyond military retaliation, one of the worries with Iran is what they would call asymmetric retaliation, which could come in the form of terrorist attacks by Iran or by its proxies. Those could happen soon. They could happen over months, over years. You just don't know. So they have various ways of fighting back.
Markets are opening as news of the weekend reverberates. So to unpack what is happening on markets, I'm joined by Mike Dolan from our sister podcast, MorningBid. Hey, Mike.
Hi, Kim. Good morning.
Good morning. So how are markets reacting?
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