Ana Faguy
Reporting from Capitol Hill

Image source, Reuters

For the first time since the strikes on Iran began, US President Donald Trump will be tested on whether he has the authorisation to launch the military action.

The vote on the War Powers Act has been scheduled in the senate for 16:00 local time (21:00 GMT) on Wednesday.

The measure is aimed at limiting Trump's ability to wage military operations - but given the growing number of unknowns surrounding the conflict and previous lack of authorisation during other administrations, it will face an uphill battle.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio argues "there's no law that requires the President to have done anything with regards to this".

"No presidential administration has ever accepted the War Powers Act as constitutional - not Republican presidents, not Democratic presidents," he added.

The senators who introduced the measure - Tim Kaine, a Democrat from Virginia, and Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky - have said they want it on the record how senators feel about the administration's action.

"[Senators will] Vote on whether we want to send our own kids – our own sons and daughters, the most precious resource we have in this country – into a war that could end up like the wars we have just recently exited in the same region,” Kaine said.

Danny Aeberhard
Europe analyst, BBC World Service

Europe – like elsewhere – is watching energy prices closely. During trading on Tuesday, the key European benchmark for natural gas, TTF, temporarily rose to levels more than double that seen before the initial strikes on Iran.

But the European Commission stresses that the direct impact on EU energy markets remains “limited”.

Spokeswoman Anna-Kaisa Itkonen told the BBC there was no immediate concerns around the security of supply.

The Commission puts this down to having diversified oil and gas supplies in recent years – in part due to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. EU member states can also use strategic reserves if necessary.

The EU imports neither oil nor gas from Iran.The bloc’s largest suppliers of oil are the US, Norway and Kazakhstan.

Saudi Arabia remains an important partner, though, providing 6.8% of the EU’s oil imports last year.

The EU’s largest suppliers of gas are Norway, and the US, when it comes to liquefied natural gas (LNG). Qatar, which has suspend LNG production, supplied 4% of the EU’s total gas imports last year.

Image source, EBU

Israel's ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, says the Lebanese government should "act now" against Hezbollah "to prevent further escalation".

He says the Lebanese PM, Nawaf Salam, is "absolutely right" to say Hezbollah must disarm. "But statements do not dismantle rockets... only action does," Danon says.

The Lebanese government has banned Hezbollah's military activities and demanded the group hand over its weapons to the state. Salam said Hezbollah's attacks on Israel showed disregard for the "will of the majority of Lebanese".

Israel announced earlier on Tuesday that ground troops will advance and seize "strategic areas" in neighbouring Lebanon to "prevent fire" on Israeli border communities.

But why is Israel targeting Lebanon as well as Iran? The BBC's Jon Donnison has more from Northern Israel in the video below.

Image source, Getty Images

In an earlier update, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it had struck "approximately 60 targets" belonging to the Iranian-backed group Hezbollah.

The targets included "weapons storage facilities, command centers, missile launchers and additional terrorist infrastructure," the IDF said.

The IDF had said before that it had completed additional strikes on Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon, in the areas of Tyre and Sidon.

Image source, EPA

Both Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon are continuing to exchange fire as the Tehran-backed militant group retaliates over the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Hezbollah says it targeted northern Israel's Haifa naval base at 20:00 local time (18:00 GMT). The Israeli military said shortly afterwards that several incoming projectiles were detected, and most were shot down.

Hours later, a loud explosion was heard in the Lebanese capital Beirut shortly after midnight (22:00 GMT), according to an AFP journalist.

Ana Faguy
Reporting from Capitol Hill

Image source, Reuters

On Capitol Hill, the hallways are crowded with more reporters than usual and security is heightened as lawmakers got their first glimpse at the Trump administration's war plan this evening.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other senior Trump administration officials were at the capitol to offer a full briefing to all members of congress.

Some lawmakers expressed frustration at the lack of authorisation from congress on the action, while others applauded the administration for its action against a brutal regime.

"It's not if they fall, it's when they fall," Senator Lindsey Graham, one of the administration's most fervent supporters on the war, said after the briefing.

Senator Chris Murphy, a Democrat, condemned the lack of approval from congress.

How long the administration plans to be engrossed with this war and what US troop involvement could look like remains murky, lawmakers said after the briefings.

Senator Richard Bluementhal, a Democrat, said he was still unsure about the "priorities of the administration".

"I just want to say I am more fearful than ever after this briefing that we may be putting boots on the ground," he said.

Emily Thornberry, Chair of the UK's House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, has told BBC's The World Tonight that Britain has to "stand up for what is right" and oppose US strikes on Iran.

Speaking to presenter James Coomarasamy, Thornberry said: "We have to stand up for what we believe in and we have to stand up for what is right. And our view is that this attack on Iran has no plan and it’s not in Britain’s interests to support it, and in any event it’s not in accordance with international law."

"We didn’t get involved in Vietnam, it was a no then and it’s a no now. We were right then and we’re right now," Thornberry, who has repeatedly criticised the US operation in Iran since it began on Saturday, said.

The MP's comments come hours after US President Donald Trump criticised UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, saying: "This is not Winston Churchill we're dealing with."

Image source, US Army Reserve

The US military has just identified four of the first American soldiers killed in the conflict with Iran.

The US Army Reserve soldiers, from the 103rd Sustainment Command out of Des Moines, Iowa, were:

• Capt Cody A. Khork, 35, of Winter Haven, Florida
• Sgt 1st Class Noah L. Tietjens, 42, of Bellevue, Nebraska
• Sgt 1st Class Nicole M. Amor, 39, of White Bear Lake, Minnesota
• Sgt Declan J. Coady, 20, of West Des Moines, Iowa

Two others were killed in the Iranian strike against a military facility in Kuwait on Sunday, but they have yet to be identified.

Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Monday that a US bunker in Kuwait was hit when a retaliatory strike launched by Iran evaded air defences.

The six deaths are the only fatalities confirmed by the US military since it launched strikes against Iran with Israel.

The Israeli military says it has begun a fresh wave of attacks on Iran.

"The IDF has begun a broad wave of strikes targeting the Iranian terror regime’s launch sites, aerial defense systems, and additional infrastructure," the Israel Defense Forces wrote on Telegram.

We'll bring you more details as they come in.

In remarks on Tuesday evening, Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney reiterates his country's support of the US operation in Iran.

He condemns Iran's strikes on civilians and civilian infrastructure throughout the Middle East.

Carney also urges "all parties, including the United States and Israel, to respect the rules of international engagement".

"Canada calls for a rapid de-escalation of hostilities, and is prepared to assist in achieving this goal," he says.

Carney adds that diplomatic engagement, combined with commitment to a broader political solution, is crucial to resolving the crisis and avoiding a larger conflict.

"Innocent civilians must be protected, and all parties must commit to finding enduring agreements to end both nuclear proliferation and terrorist extremism," he adds.

High-rise government building in Tehran demolished by strikepublished at 22:25 GMT 3 March

22:25 GMT 3 March

By Sarah Jalali

BBC Verify has been looking at images and footage showing the destruction of a high-rise government building in Tehran, which is thought to have been hit by an air strike on Monday night.

Ground-level pictures taken today and satellite imagery captured on Tuesday morning show the building has been almost completely demolished.

The tower held offices of a key secretariat in the Iranian government. The body rules on disputes between parliament (Majlis) and the Guardian Council, which scrutinises legislation and has the power to veto new laws.

Image source, Telegram/VahidOnline

Ben Wright
Political correspondent

It was eighty years ago this week that Winston Churchill cemented the phrase "special relationship" in the lexicon of international affairs.

Speaking in Missouri, the former wartime prime minister was describing the bond between the United States and Britain that he believed was essential in the new Cold War era. Eighty years on, the relationship seems far less special.

"This is not Winston Churchill we're dealing with," said Trump of his supposed ally Starmer.

It's not the first time the two leaders have had a public spat.The PM publicly rebuked Trump in January over remarks he made about British troops in Afghanistan.

The US president has previously attacked the UK's Chagos Island deal, criticism he repeated today. But he's clearly furious that Starmer did not allow Washington to use the joint UK-US base at Diego Garcia on those islands to launch attacks on Iran.

The PM believes the venture is unlawful and unmoored from any plan. It is the biggest rift between Washington and London for many years. But not the first.

Image source, PA Wire/PA Images

US-UK relations were severely strained during the Suez crisis in the Fifties and again during the Vietnam war, when Britain resisted US pressure to send in troops. British concerns were over-ridden when the US invaded Grenada in October 1983, to the fury of Margaret Thatcher.

But over many decades the so-called special relationship endured, underpinned by unique security and intelligence co-operation. That bedrock is still there.

But for a prime minister who has spent so much effort trying to keep Donald Trump on side, the diplomatic distance between London and Washington has widened dramatically.

In parliament certainly, many of Starmer's own MPs won't mind a bit.

On Saturday, Dubai issued an emergency alert to people's phones as Iranian strikes landed on the city.

Britons who experienced the strikes have been speaking to the BBC, describing hearing "bang, after bang, after bang" and the confusion that followed.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) says that it has killed the commander of Iran's Quds Force in Lebanon, Daoud Ali Zadeh, in a strike in Tehran.

"Fighter jets struck in the heart of Tehran, targeting Daoud Ali Zadeh, a senior official in the Quds Force and commander of the Lebanon Corps," IDF spokesperson Brig Gen Effie Defrin says.

The Quds force is one of the branches of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

"He attempted to attack Israel from Lebanese territory, and we struck and eliminated him on Iranian soil," Defrin adds.

Zadeh was "the highest-ranking Iranian commander responsible for Lebanon", the IDF says in a statement, accusing him of "guiding Hezbollah and other proxies' firepower capabilities".

"Israel will not allow Iranian elements that prevent Lebanon’s recovery and strengthen Hezbollah to establish themselves in Lebanon," the IDF says.

Smoke and fire seen in Lebanon after reported Israeli strikespublished at 21:25 GMT 3 March

21:25 GMT 3 March

By Richard Irvine-Brown

BBC Verify has been looking into the situation in Lebanon, where a new verified video shows a large plume of smoke engulfing a major road in the southern coastal city of Sidon, following a reported Israeli strike.

Israel has been attacking Lebanon in response to rockets and drones that were fired by the Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah.

Features in the video were checked against satellite and street-view mapping, which confirm it was filmed at a commercial area in the north of the city on the Beirut-Saida Highway.

Meanwhile, video from Beirut posted on SnapChat earlier today shows a shop on fire toward the south of the capital, around 1.5 miles (2.4km) from the airport.

We do not know the cause of the fire, but there is what appears to be a hole in the facade of one shop and scattered debris, which is consistent with the aftermath of an explosion.

Image source, X

Adam Goldsmith
Live reporter

Image source, EPA/Shutterstock

Croatia is sending four planes to evacuate citizens from Dubai. According to its foreign ministry, the flights will arrive in Dubai on Wednesday after around 300 Croatians who live in the United Arab Emirates, and several hundred more tourists have asked to return home.

In Slovakia, citizens are arriving home as repatriation flights touch down from Jordan; one passenger says he saw missiles flying around them while they were in the skies.

Passengers arrived in Prague on Tuesday morning, as two flights carrying Czech nationals touched down from the Middle East.

Image source, Reuters

As we heard from Emmanuel Macron earlier, France also already has repatriation flights under way, with two expected to arrive in Paris this evening.

UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper says over 100,000 Brits have registered their presence in the Gulf region, and she told MPs on Tuesday that some Britons will be repatriated on a Government charter flight from Muscat in Oman.

Meanwhile, Germany's Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said on Monday that the country would send planes to evacuate tourists stranded in the Middle East.

In a new update on the Telegram messaging app, the Israel Defence Forces says it has destroyed approximately 300 missile launchers in Iran and struck several targets in Lebanon.

"In the past 24 hours, hundreds of fighter jets and aircraft have been striking hundreds of targets simultaneously in Iran and Lebanon," the Israeli Defense Forces says in a statement, adding that 4,000 munitions have been deployed in Iran since the start of the operation over the weekend.

"As part of the defensive effort, the Israeli Air Force continues to conduct successive waves of strikes against the Iranian regime’s ballistic missile arrays and air defence systems," the IDF adds.

Image source, Reuters

More now on reports of a drone strike near the US consulate in Dubai.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio confirms a drone struck a parking lot adjacent to the consulate building.

"As I came in, I also saw the media reports about Dubai's consulate. The last update I had with seconds before getting these cameras was that a drone unfortunately struck a parking lot adjacent to the to the Chancery building, and then set off a fire in that place," he says.

"All personnel are accounted for. As you're aware, we began drawing down personnel from our diplomatic facilities in advance of this," Rubio adds.

He says: "But our embassies and our diplomatic facilities are under direct attack from a terroristic regime".

The consulate is located in a heavily populated part of the city - close to the British embassy and Saudi consulate.

The US State Department says it is "facilitating charter flights from the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan" for American citizens.

In a statement, it says that "in the past several days, over 9,000 American citizens have safely returned from the Middle East", including "over 300 from Israel".

Commercial aviation options remain available in Saudi Arabia, UAE, Oman, and Egypt, it adds, and the State Department "is actively helping American citizens book those tickets".

Earlier Dylan Johnson, US Assistant Secretary of State for Global Public Affairs, said that the State Department was "actively securing military aircraft and charter flights" for American citizens wanting to leave the Middle East.