Live updates: Kuwait says it’s intercepting missiles as ‘explosion

• New strikes: In one of the most serious exchanges since the ceasefire began, Iran fired missiles at Kuwait and Bahrain as the US conducted new strikes on Iran’s Qeshm Island. Earlier in the day, the US military said it “disabled” an oil tanker heading for an Iranian port by striking it with a Hellfire missile.

• Status of negotiations: Iranian media outlets have signaled talks between Tehran and Washington are ongoing, a day after reports that Iran suspended them. But the country’s top negotiator threatened escalation if Israel’s attacks on Lebanon continue.

• Israel-Lebanon talks: High-stakes talks between Israel and Lebanon have wrapped for the day and will continue tomorrow at the US State Department. The talks come after Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah and the Israeli military traded strikes overnight.

• US-Israel tension: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the Israeli military would keep striking southern Lebanon “as planned,” hours after US President Donald Trump declared that Israeli forces would not move on Beirut. Sources say a call between the two leaders became heated.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it targeted American bases in the region and a vessel near the Strait of Hormuz in response to what it said were US attacks on an Iran-linked oil tanker and strikes on Qeshm Island.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) has refuted Iran’s claim that it struck the US Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain and a US air base in the region.

CENTCOM earlier said it had also struck an Iranian military ground control station in “self-defense” on Qeshm Island, which is considered part of Iran’s “arch defense” near the Strait of Hormuz. The IRGC said the US targeted a military “communications tower in southern Qeshm Island with aerial munitions,” IRIB reported.

Iran said it launched retaliatory missile and drone attacks on “an American air and helicopter base” as well as the headquarters of the US Fifth Fleet,” which is in Bahrain. The US said Iran had fired at missiles at both Kuwait and Bahrain, with those fired at Kuwait falling short or breaking apart en route and those fired at Bahrain intercepted by US and Bahraini air defenses.

The IRGC has warned that “any further aggression would be met with a different and more severe response.”

The US military conducted “self-defense” strikes on Iran’s Qeshm Island, US Central Command said today.

CENTCOM said the strikes were in response to “attempted attacks by Iran across the Middle East.”

“Iran launched several ballistic missiles toward regional neighbors; however, all failed to hit their intended targets. Two Iranian missiles fired at Kuwait fell short or broke apart enroute, and three missiles launched at Bahrain were immediately intercepted by U.S. and Bahrain air defense forces,” CENTCOM said on X.

The US struck an Iranian military ground control station on Qeshm Island, according to CENTCOM, and no US personnel were harmed.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, meanwhile, said its attacks on Kuwait were in response to the “brazen and blatant aggression” by US forces on Qeshm Island. The IRGC claimed it fired at least 10 ballistic missiles at Kuwait.

It added that the attacks are an “initial response,” warning of a much stronger retaliatory strike to come.

Sirens sounded in Bahrain in the early hours of Wednesday, as the country’s Interior Ministry called on citizens to “remain calm” and seek shelter at the nearest safe place.

Shortly before the ministry’s announcement, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps claimed three missiles had hit “enemy bases” in Kuwait, while Kuwait’s army said it was intercepting “enemy” missile and drone attacks.

Iran’s state broadcaster later claimed that Iranian forces had targeted two air bases used by US forces in Kuwait. CNN has reached out to US Central Command for comment.

The State Department said Tuesday that “progress continues on the political and security tracks” in US-mediated talks between Israel and Iran in Washington, DC.

Talks will continue tomorrow, the agency said.

“Progress continues on the political and security tracks as we break from the failures of the past 20 years and advance toward a comprehensive agreement aimed at restoring Lebanon’s sovereignty and ensuring Israel’s security,” State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott said on social media.

The announcement came hours after Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Iran is trying to “stymie” diplomatic efforts between the two countries.

Kuwait’s air defenses are intercepting “hostile missile and enemy drone attacks,” the country’s army said in the early hours of Wednesday.

“The General Staff of the Army notes that any sounds of explosions, if heard, are the result of air defense systems intercepting the hostile attacks,” the army said.

“Everyone is asked to adhere to the security and safety instructions issued by the relevant authorities,” it added.

It did not say where the attacks originated but a Telegram account affiliated to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) claimed that “according to published footage and reports coming out of Kuwait” three missiles had “successfully struck enemy bases in Kuwait.”

It called Kuwaiti statements about interceptions “ridiculous and laughable” and “on par with the usual claims issued by these proxy and collaborator regimes.”

The attack comes soon after Kuwait reported on Monday that it had repelled done and missile attacks, with US Central Command then saying it had “successfully intercepted two Iranian ballistic missiles targeting American forces based in Kuwait.” CENTCOM added that no American personnel were harmed.

The latest attack, in the early hours of Wednesday, local time, comes shortly after Iran’s semi-official Mehr News Agency reported “explosion-like sounds” in the vicinity of the Iranian island of Qeshm.

“Explosion-like sounds” were heard near Iran’s Qeshm island in the early hours of Wednesday local time, the country’s semi-official Mehr News Agency reported, citing local sources and residents.

The exact nature and cause of the sounds is unclear, Mehr reported. It said neither military nor law enforcement authorities had commented.

Initial assessments indicate a projectile may have struck an uninhabited area on the island’s southern coast, an account affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said, citing the television broadcaster IRIB.

The news comes amid a visit to the island by the Iranian supreme leader’s special representative Hojjatoleslam Vakilpour to meet with cultural and political activists.

During the visit, Vakilpour quoted Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei as saying on Tuesday that “war and diplomacy must be pursued simultaneously and should not be placed in opposition to one another,” according to Iranian state broadcaster IRIB.

“The Strait of Hormuz does not belong solely to the Islamic Republic; it belongs to all the oppressed people of the world,” IRIB quoted Vakilpour as saying. “You, the people of Qeshm island, carry significant responsibilities in managing the Strait of Hormuz and safeguarding the Islamic Revolution.”

The US military “disabled” an oil tanker heading toward an Iranian port by striking it with a Hellfire missile on Tuesday, US Central Command said in a press release.

The Botswana-flagged M/T Lexie was transiting “international waters towards Kharg Island,” the CENTCOM release said. The ship’s crew “ignored repeated warnings” and did not comply with US orders enforcing a blockade on ships going to and from Iranian ports, it said. A seaport at Kharg Island in the Persian Gulf handles up to 90 percent of Iran’s oil exports.

“A US aircraft ultimately disabled the vessel by firing a Hellfire missile into the ship’s engine room, preventing the tanker from reaching Iran,” CENTCOM’s statement said. The US military similarly disabled a ship sailing toward Iran over the weekend.

The CENTCOM release said six vessels have been disabled since the blockade started in April and that 122 vessels have been redirected.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said today he has no problem with the Iranian soccer team but that he will watch Iran’s delegation “very closely” as the World Cup is set to kick off next week.

“The Iranian (soccer) team has chosen to stay in Mexico, as opposed to the United States,” Rubio told the House appropriations subcommittee during a hearing on Capitol Hil., “We have no problem with the athletes, as we stated earlier, or their support staff, but what we’re not going to allow is for them to embed in their delegation a bunch of people that we know have nothing to do with athletics and have ties to the (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) or things of that nature. So we were going to watch that very closely.”

The Iranian team’s training base has been moved to Tijuana, Mexico, from Tucson, Arizona, but the Iranians will play their group games in Los Angeles and Seattle.

As for fans planning on attending games in the United States, the top US diplomat expanded further on previous announcements regarding expedited visa screening.

“You have to prove that you have a ticket. You’ll still go through the vetting, you’ll still go through all that process, but you have to prove that you bought a ticket to a game, not just that you’re coming to attend,” Rubio said. “We’re interacting now on a daily basis with FIFA on the World Cup. We feel really good about the process.”

Talks between Israel and Lebanon have concluded for the day and will continue tomorrow, an Israeli official said.

The ongoing discussions come amid continued strikes between Israel and Hezbollah and the threat of escalation by the Netanyahu government. The attacks have threatened to derail US-Iran talks.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said yesterday that the Israeli military would keep striking southern Lebanon “as planned,” hours after President Donald Trump declared that Israeli forces would not move on Beirut. A call between the two leaders on Monday became heated, according to people familiar with the conversation, with the US president pressing his counterpart to scale back plans for operations in Lebanon.

Trump also claimed Monday that he held a call with “representatives of the Leaders of Hezbollah, and they agreed to stop shooting at Israel.”

The Trump administration imposed sanctions Tuesday on Iran’s largest cryptocurrency exchange as part of its pressure campaign against Tehran.

The sanctions were announced amid ongoing diplomatic efforts that have failed so far to reach an agreement on ending the US war with Iran. They target Nobitex, its CEO and three of its co-founders, as well as three other Iranian crypto exchanges.

The US Treasury Department accused Nobitex of “facilitating payments tied to Iran’s terrorist activities, sanctions evasion efforts, and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)-linked transactions, including activity associated with IRGC-affiliated ransomware actors.”

“Nobitex also helped the Central Bank of Iran access hundreds of millions of dollars in stablecoins used to prop up the plummeting value of the Iranian rial, while enabling regime insiders to access international digital asset exchanges and evade sanctions across multiple jurisdictions,” the Department said in a press release. “Following the commencement of U.S. combat operations in Iran, Nobitex played a role in protecting and moving assets and funds out of Iran to shield regime wealth despite internet blackouts.”

Last year, pro-Israel hackers stole the equivalent of roughly $90 million from Nobitex, according to multiple independent crypto-tracking firms.

High-stakes talks between Israel and Lebanon kicked off at the US State Department today as ongoing clashes between Israel and Hezbollah threaten to derail US-Iran negotiations.

New deputy national security adviser Mike Needham is leading the US side in the latest round of talks alongside Dan Holler, his successor as State Department counselor. Israel and Lebanon are represented by their respective ambassadors to the US.

The talks come as strikes between Israel and Hezbollah continue despite an ostensible ceasefire extension between Israel and Lebanon.

CNN’s Aida Karimi, Catherine Nicholls, Jennifer Hansler, Eyad Kourdi, Charlotte Reck and Charbel Mallo contributed to this report.

Hezbollah-owned Al Manar television reported Tuesday that the militant group has received two US ceasefire proposals to end its fighting with Israel and acknowledged it is discussing one put forward by US President Donald Trump, while insisting it must entail a “full inclusive ceasefire.”

The report marked Hezbollah’s first acknowledgment of a truce that Trump announced yesterday.

In its report, Al Manar said Hezbollah rejected the first proposal, which it said came from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. The Lebanese TV station said the Iranian-backed militant group is discussing a second proposal offered by Trump.

The first proposal outlined that Israel would not strike Beirut’s Dahieh district, a Hezbollah stronghold, in exchange for the group not attacking Israel, Al Manar reported.

After Hezbollah rejected that offer and threatened to keep attacking Israel, the United States proposed that, if the militant group did not attack the country, Israel would not attack Dahieh for multiple days, Al Manar said. The station suggested that the second proposal calls for a “full inclusive ceasefire” to take effect after 48 to 72 hours, which presumably would then also cover southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah is in communication with the Lebanese government and insists on “an inclusive ceasefire,” the outlet reported.

Israeli and Lebanese officials met for high-stakes talks at the US State Department in Washington earlier today.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Iran is trying to “stymie” diplomatic efforts between Israel and Lebanon and involve itself in the matter in order to claim credit if a peace deal is reached.

“We are trying to view the Lebanon-Israeli talks as separate and distinct from Iran, and what Iran wants to do is mix it all together,” Rubio told lawmakers on the Sente Foreign Relations Committee.

Another round of working-level talks between Israel and Lebanon, mediated by the US, kicked off at the State Department earlier.

Iran is “trying to stymie any effort in which Israel and Lebanon can work together and prolong it, so that if an arrangement is reached at some point in the future, they can claim credit for having forced it through leverage,” Rubio said.

The top US diplomat noted that “there’s a government in Lebanon” that the US will deal with. “Hezbollah is not their equal in terms of who we’re going to be dealing with, or who needs to be in charge,” he said.

He said a remaining challenge is “demilitarizing and defanging Hezbollah, while at the same time strengthening the legitimate government of Lebanon.”

“The capabilities of the (Lebanese Armed Forces) are not where they need to be, but there are also elements within the LAF that are not who they need to be, because they facilitate in some cases and cooperate with Hezbollah,” he added.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he believes Iran’s new supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, is alive and is “increasingly engaging.”

“I think there are indications out there that he is increasingly engaging at some level,” Rubio told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Khamenei has not been seen in public since he sustained serious injuries during an attack that killed his father and several of the country’s top military leaders at the beginning of the war, leading to speculation about his health and role in the Iranian leadership structure.

CNN has reported that US intelligence assesses Khamenei is playing a critical role in shaping war strategy alongside senior Iranian officials.

Negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program would be “highly technical” and could take months, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Tuesday.

The top US diplomat said such a phase would be predicated on Iran reopening the Strait of Hormuz.

“Phase 2 is they have to commit to very specific negotiations on … the disposition of the highly enriched uranium that still is buried deep in a mountain somewhere,” Rubio told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “They have to agree on negotiating severe and long-term limitations, and/or cancellation of enrichment activity in their country.”

Rubio indicated that Tehran had “agreed to negotiate aspects of their nuclear program,” but did not provide details on which aspects and noted any negotiations are “not a guarantee that ultimately it will lead to a deal that’s acceptable to the Senate or acceptable to the American people.”

He said first Iran must announce the strait is open, with no tolls, and that it will remove mines and not fire on ships. The US has not offered sanctions relief to Iran for opening the strait, Rubio said, noting that the lifting of sanctions would be conditions-based.

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam backed the resumption of Washington negotiations on Tuesday, touting the talks as a route to returning civilians to their homes after Israel-issued evacuation orders caused hundreds of thousands to flee south Lebanon ahead of Israeli strikes.

“What remains required is to consolidate the ceasefire across all of Lebanon,” Salam said in a post on X expressing support for today’s Israel-Lebanon talks in the US: “I reiterate that negotiations are the least costly option for Lebanon and the Lebanese.”

The leader urged optimism from the nation amid the uncertainty.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday acknowledged that the Iranians “still have a lot of drones,” while adding that the cheapness of the technology makes it a difficult threat to address.

America’s top diplomat used the public appearance to tout the US military’s degradation of Iran’s military defenses during the war that President Donald Trump launched against Iran in late February.

What Rubio called Iran’s “conventional shield” — the use of missiles and drones to protect its nuclear program — has been “substantially eroded,” he said.

What’s left of Iran’s navy is a “bunch of Boston Whalers with machine guns on them,” Rubio said.

The US blockade of Iranian ports, he added, was costing Iran “hundreds of millions” of dollars in lost revenue each day.

Talks between Israeli and Lebanese officials are currently taking place in Washington, as the Israeli military and the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah continued to trade attacks in southern Lebanon overnight.

Here are the latest developments on the ground in Lebanon:

CNN’s Sarah Tamimi, Dana Karni, Oren Liebermann and Charbel Mallo contributed to this reporting.

Four people were killed and 127 others were injured in an Israeli attack near Jabal Amel hospital in Tyre, southern Lebanon, on Monday.

Among those injured were 39 members of the hospital staff, with four in “critical condition.”

The World Health Organization’s representative in Lebanon, Dr. Abdinasir Abubakar, expressed serious concern about the ongoing damage inflicted by the latest wave of Israeli attacks in the country. “These attacks kill and maim, they also deprive people of the health services they need,” Abubakar said.

Video published by Lebanon’s Health Ministry shows damage across the hospital premises.

Abubakar called for an end to attacks on healthcare providers and stressed the urgent need for a ceasefire as hospitals continue to be overwhelmed by an influx of injured patients.

Since the start of the current escalation in fighting between Israel and Hezbollah fighters on March 2, thousands have been killed in Lebanon and more injured, most of them civilians.

“These have been among the deadliest months for Lebanon since the start of the conflict in October 2023,” Abubakar explained.

The Israeli military told CNN in a statement that the hospital was not targeted but rather affected as a result of strikes aimed at what they said is Hezbollah infrastructure in a nearby area.

“The IDF emphasizes that it operates solely against the Hezbollah terrorist organization and operates to the extent possible to mitigate harm to civilian infrastructure, medical facilities and medical personnel,” the military said in a statement.

Attacks on southern Lebanon continued even after Lebanon’s embassy in Washington said Hezbollah had confirmed it would refrain from attacking Israel in exchange for Israel ceasing strikes in Beirut.

This post has been updated with additional developments.

High-stakes talks between Israel and Lebanon kicked off at the US State Department on Tuesday as ongoing clashes between Israel and Hezbollah threaten to derail US-Iran negotiations.

The latest round of talks are being led on the US side by new deputy national security adviser Mike Needham as well as his successor to the State Department counselor role, Dan Holler. Israel and Lebanon are represented by their respective ambassadors to the US.

Officials did not answer shouted questions during a brief photo spray at the start of the meeting.

Strikes between Israel and Hezbollah have continued despite an ostensible ceasefire extension between Israel and Lebanon. On Friday, military delegations from Israel and Lebanon launched working-level security talks at the Pentagon.

Iranian state media said Monday that the country’s officials were suspending peace talks with the US due to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s actions in Lebanon. On Tuesday, Iranian media outlets signaled that talks between Tehran and Washington were ongoing, but the country’s top negotiator threatened escalation if Israel’s attacks on Lebanon continue.

Netanyahu said Monday that the Israeli military would keep striking southern Lebanon “as planned,” hours after President Donald Trump declared that Israeli forces would not move on Beirut. A call between the two leaders on Monday became heated, according to people familiar with the conversation, with the US president pressing his counterpart to scale back plans for operations in Lebanon.

Trump also claimed on Monday that he held a call “representatives of the Leaders of Hezbollah, and they agreed to stop shooting at Israel.”

According to a statement from the Lebanese Embassy in Washington, Lebanese authorities have received confirmation of Hezbollah’s agreement to a US proposal calling for a ceasefire with Israel.