$37.5bn cost of Iran war revealed as senator warns of ‘another forever war’ | First Thing

Pete Hegseth reveals costs so far as Trump administration seeks more funding. Plus, rediscovered plane wreck that changed flying for ever

Good morning.

The US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has told the Senate that the US-Israel war on Iran has cost $37.5bn so far, as he faced lawmakers furious over the conflict’s soaring price tag and the deaths last week of three American service members. He defended the Trump administration’s roughly $88bn supplemental funding request, calling it “urgent, necessary”.

What is happening in Iran? The Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, has described how he was pulled from the rubble of a leadership compound after the US-Israeli airstrike that killed the country’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, on the first day of the war, and has survived since by constantly moving around Tehran by car. Deepa Parent, meanwhile, has reports from the ground with ordinary Iranians, who say “it’s truly hell here” as airstrikes, repression and water shortages become the “new normal”.

What other developments have affected the region? Zohran Mamdani, New York’s mayor, has acknowledged he does not have the authority to arrest Benjamin Netanyahu, but urged US federal authorities to do so if the Israeli prime minister visits the US later this year. The White House has announced that American airline carriers will be able to resume direct flights to Lebanon more than 40 years after the US suspended the route.

What is uranium enrichment? It is the process of increasing the presence of isotope uranium-235 so the substance can sustain a nuclear chain reaction. Enrichment is not an automatic path to a nuclear weapon, but could open the door to a Saudi Arabia weapons programme, something its de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has not ruled out if Iran obtains an atomic bomb.

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