US strikes a city home to an Iranian nuclear site while Tehran hits oil tanker off Dubai coast

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — U.S. strikes hit a city Tuesday that is home to one of Iran’s main nuclear sites, sending a massive fireball into the sky, and Tehran attacked a fully loaded Kuwaiti oil tanker in the Persian Gulf.

The attacks were testament to the intensity of the war more than a month after the U.S. and Israel launched their first strikes. The conflict has left more than 3,000 dead and caused major disruptions to the world’s supply of oil and natural gas. On Tuesday, the average price of gasoline in the U.S. shot past $4 a gallon — just another sign of the war’s effects far beyond the Middle East.

U.S. President Donald Trump, who has vacillated between insisting there is progress in diplomatic talks with Iran and threatening to widen the war, shared footage of the attack on Isfahan. The central city is home to one of three nuclear enrichment sites attacked by the U.S. in a 12-day war in June, and analysts believe much of Iran’s highly enriched uranium is likely stored there.

Iran’s stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway leading our of Persian Gulf through which a fifth of the world’s oil is transported during peacetime, has driven up global oil prices, as have Tehran's attacks on regional energy infrastructure. That has shaken stock markets around the world and pushed up the cost of many basic goods.

Spot prices of Brent crude, the international standard, hovered around $106 a barrel Tuesday, up more than 45% since the war started Feb. 28.

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Seizing Kharg Island would risk US troops' lives and may not end Iran war, experts say

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is threatening to deploy ground troops to seize critical oil infrastructure on Iran's Kharg Island, a military gambit that experts say would risk American lives and could still fail to end the war.

If Trump wants to hobble Iran's oil industry for leverage in negotiations, a better option might be setting up a blockade at sea against ships that have filled up at Kharg Island's oil terminals, the experts said.

The island — located on the other side of the Persian Gulf from U.S. bases in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia — is the beating heart of Iran’s oil industry, through which 90% of its exports pass. It is important because Iran’s coastline is mostly too shallow for tanker ships to dock.

“Putting people on the ground might be the most psychologically compelling way of striking a blow at Iran,” said Michael Eisenstadt, a former U.S. military analyst who now directs the Military and Security Studies Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

“On the other hand, you’re putting your own troops at jeopardy," said Eisenstadt, a retired Army reserve officer who served in Iraq. "It’s not far from the mainland. So they can potentially rain a lot of destruction on the island, if they’re willing to inflict damage on their own infrastructure.”

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Gulf allies privately make the case to Trump to keep fighting until Iran is decisively defeated

WASHINGTON (AP) — Gulf allies of the United States, led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, are urging President Donald Trump to continue prosecuting the war against Iran, arguing that Tehran hasn't been weakened enough by the monthlong U.S.-led bombing campaign, according to U.S., Gulf and Israeli officials.

After private grumbling at the start of the war that they were not given adequate advance notice of the U.S.-Israeli attack and complaining the U.S. had ignored their warnings that the war would have devastating consequences for the entire region, some of the regional allies are making the case to the White House that the moment offers a historic opportunity to cripple Tehran’s clerical rule once and for all.

Officials from Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Bahrain have conveyed in private conversations that they do not want the military operation to end until there are significant changes in the Iranian leadership or there’s a dramatic shift in Iranian behavior, according to the officials, who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The push from the Gulf nations comes as Trump vacillates between claiming that Iran's decimated leadership is ready to settle the conflict and threatening to further escalate the war if a deal is not reached soon.

All the while, Trump is struggling to rally public support at home for a war that's left more than 3,000 dead across the Mideast and is shaking the global economy. Yet the U.S. leader is sounding increasingly confident that he has the full support of his most important Mideast allies — including some that were hesitant about a new military campaign in the lead-up to the war.

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Oil steadies and Asian stocks are mostly lower on mixed signs on Iran

HONG KONG (AP) — Oil steadied and Asian stocks were mostly lower Tuesday as signs of a de-escalation of the Iran war remained mixed.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 was down 1.6% to 51,063.72. Losses after the Iran war began on Feb. 28 have been wiping out the gains it made from the beginning of the year.

South Korea’s Kospi lost 4.3% to 5,052.46. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was down 0.3% to 24,678.17, while the Shanghai Composite index fell 0.8% to 3,891.86.

Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 was up 0.3%, while Taiwan’s Taiex was trading 2.5% lower.

U.S. futures were up more than 0.7% early Tuesday.

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Schumer had a plan to win back the Senate. But some Democrats aren't on board

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats’ hopes of reclaiming the U.S. Senate are colliding with a fight within their own party.

In Maine, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has thrown his weight behind Gov. Janet Mills in a crucial race, but some of his Senate colleagues are backing insurgent candidate Graham Platner in a rebuke of his strategic vision. A similar dynamic is playing out in other battlegrounds, including Michigan and Minnesota, where progressives senators are endorsing non-establishment candidates.

At stake is more than any single race. Democrats are fighting over whether the party's traditional playbook still works in a country that elected Donald Trump for a second time — and whether leaders like Schumer should remain in charge.

“Clearly there’s a disagreement of strategy here,” said New Mexico Sen. Martin Heinrich, who has endorsed Platner.

He added that “the business-as-usual calculation for what is going to be successful in a given election cycle does not necessarily, in my view, meet the moment.”

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European diplomats steer attention to Ukraine with visit on Russian atrocities anniversary

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — European foreign ministers visited Ukraine on Tuesday to mark the fourth anniversary of atrocities committed in a town near Kyiv by Russia’s invading forces.

With U.S.-led efforts to end the war on hold and Washington’s attention gripped by the conflict in the Middle East, European governments are keen to keep a spotlight on the continent’s biggest land war in decades, now in its fifth year.

A group of 12 European foreign ministers, as well as numerous lower-ranking officials, arrived by train in Kyiv where they were welcomed by Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha, who noted the “grim anniversary” of the shocking atrocities in Bucha.

Russian troops quickly occupied the town after invading Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022. They stayed for about a month. When Ukrainian troops retook Bucha they found more than 400 bodies left by Russia’s cleansing operation.

“Such a strong European presence (in Ukraine) on this day demonstrates that justice for this and other Russian atrocities is inevitable,” Sybiha said in a post on X. “Comprehensive accountability for Russian crimes is vital to restore justice in Europe.”

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Meta, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube aren't fully complying with child account ban, Australia says

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Australia’s online safety watchdog said Tuesday it was considering court against Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube alleging they are not doing enough to keep Australian children younger than 16 off their platforms.

Experts say the Australian courts could decide what steps the platforms can reasonably be expected to take under the laws that took effect on Dec. 10 banning young children from holding accounts.

eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant on Tuesday released her first compliance report since those laws took effect demanding 10 platforms remove all Australian account-holders younger than 16.

While 5 million Australian accounts had been deactivated, a substantial number of Australian children continued to retain accounts, create new accounts and pass platforms’ age assurance systems, the report said.

Inman Grant said in a statement her office had “significant concerns about the compliance” of half of those 10 platforms. Her office was gathering evidence against the five that they had not taken “reasonable steps” to prevent young children holding accounts.

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Georgia proposal could take DNA swabs from immigrants in custody for minor offenses

ATLANTA (AP) — Over the past three decades, the collection of DNA from convicted criminals has become standard in the U.S. justice system, and many states now also swab people arrested for serious crimes.

Legislation awaiting a final vote in Georgia would take that a step further by collecting DNA from people charged with less serious misdemeanors — but only if federal immigration authorities want them detained. That could include immigrants not ultimately deported.

If enacted, Georgia's measure would make it the third state to single out immigrants believed to be in the U.S. illegally for the collection of genetic material that wouldn't be taken from others. Florida passed a similar law in 2023. And Oklahoma in 2009 authorized DNA collection from immigrants in the U.S. illegally, though it remains subject to funding.

The new legislation comes as President Donald Trump's administration seeks to expand its use of DNA and biometrics in immigration enforcement as it carries out a plan to deport millions of people from the U.S.

"It is one example of something we are seeing across the landscape, which is government actors at all levels vacuuming up DNA in all available contexts,” said Stevie Glaberson, director of research and advocacy at the Center on Privacy and Technology at Georgetown University law school.

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Federal 'God squad' poised to exempt oil and gas drilling in the Gulf from endangered species rules

A U.S. government panel was due to convene Tuesday for the first time since 1992 to consider exempting oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico from the Endangered Species Act due to unspecified national security concerns, a move critics say could doom a rare whale species and harm other marine life.

Nicknamed the “God Squad” by groups who say it can decide a species’ fate, the Endangered Species Committee comprises several Trump administration officials and is chaired by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum.

Republican President Donald Trump has made increased fossil fuel production a central focus of his second term. He wants to open new areas of the Gulf off the Florida coast to drilling, and has proposed sweeping rollbacks of environmental regulations disliked by industry.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth notified Burgum on March 13 that an Endangered Species Act exemption for oil and gas drilling in the Gulf was “necessary for reasons of national security,” according to a court filing from the administration.

Government officials have not disclosed the rationale for the request, which came amid global oil shocks and soaring energy prices brought on by the Iran war. Experts say the administration must specify the military need that would endanger a species to make a case for the national security exemption.

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China factory activity rebounds in March as Iran war looms over growth

HONG KONG (AP) — China’s factory activity expanded in March, ending two months of contraction, the government said Tuesday, but analysts say prolonged impacts of the Iran war could weigh on growth.

The official manufacturing purchasing managers index rose to 50.4 from 49 in February, the National Bureau of Statistics reported, beating economists’ expectations and notching the strongest reading in a year. PMI is measured on a scale of 0 to 100 and a reading above 50 indicates expansion.

While the latest official data covered a period after the Iran war began on Feb. 28, analysts say the impacts of surging energy costs have not yet been fully seen. “So far supply disruptions have not occurred in a material way,” said Jacqueline Rong, Chief China Economist, BNP Paribas, a French bank.

A years-long property sector slump in China has also weighed on economic growth and weakened domestic consumption and investment demand in China, the world’s second-largest economy after the U.S. To help drive its economy, China has been reliant on growing exports, especially to regions such as Southeast Asia and Europe, which propelled its trade surplus last year to a record $1.2 trillion despite higher U.S. tariffs.

China’s export engine could hit headwinds as the Iran war drive up energy costs and disrupts supply chains, with most maritime traffic blocked from passing the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly a fifth of the world’s oil normally passes.

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