As the world writes to strengthen conflict in the Middle East, calls for urgent international restraint seem deaf.
When President Donald Trump launches a direct military strike in Iran, all eyes are in the White House. Such actions would represent a dramatic deepening of the US involvement in what has been limited to attacks between Iran and the US allies up until now.
After Israeli forces hit Iran's target on June 18, 2025, they cover the sky above Tehran, Iran, after an explosion in the capital.
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The White House said Thursday that the president will decide within two weeks whether to attack Iran.
The Kremlin warned Thursday that US intervention in Iran would cause a “severe spiral of escalation,” but Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Maria Zakharova told Reuters that the world is “millimetres” away from the nuclear disaster. Russia is now filled with its own war in Ukraine, accompanied by a fight over major nuclear power plants.
In the UK, Kiel Prime Minister Starmer chaired the Emergency Cobra Conference (the country's national crisis management system) as his government works to withdraw the families of staff at the British Embassy in Tel Aviv.
The high-level intelligence conference followed the presence of the stars at Canada's G7 Summit, during which he joined the other leaders of the group with repeated “commitment to peace and stability.”
But diplomatic possibilities are becoming increasingly bleak as Iran and Israel continue to trade more and more deadly blows and there are no signs of leaders involved returning from the brink.
Trump remained uncommitted in his comments on whether the US would attack Iran.
“I might do that, I might do that. I mean, no one knows what I'm going to do. I can tell you this, Iran has a lot of trouble and they want to negotiate,” he told reporters on the White House Lawn on Wednesday.
He added, “I'll be big next week.”
The president later said from his elliptical office, “I like to make final decisions a second before, because things change, especially in war.”
“dirty work”
German Prime Minister Friedrich Merz sparked some controversy in an interview Tuesday that Israel is doing “dirty work” to other countries by carrying out strikes at Iran's nuclear sites.
“I can only say that I have the greatest respect for the fact that the Israeli military and the Israeli government had the courage to do this,” Mertz told German broadcasters. Foreign ministers of Germany, France and the UK are scheduled to meet with their Iranian counterparts on Friday.
A huge wave of smoke at Soroka Hospital in Bercheva, southern Israel, following an Iranian missile attack on June 19, 2025.
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Meanwhile, China's Xinhua State Media Services cited Chinese Prime Minister Xi Jinping, who said that the ceasefire between Israel and Iran was a “urgent priority” and that using force was not the right way to resolve the conflict.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and XI called on Thursday, while both men lashed out at Israeli opposed, saying the country's actions in Iran “violated the UN Charter and other norms of international law.”
Leaders, both Iranian allies, said military action would not solve the problems Western and Israeli leaders have had over Iran's nuclear program, and said diplomacy was the only way.
After Trump posted a comment on his true social platform earlier this week, Iran demanded that he surrender unconditionally, warning that the US has the ability to assassinate Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Khamenei replied that American attacks on Iran would encounter “irreparable damage” and cause a wider war.
Israel and Iran exchanged missile barrages overnight, and Israel attacked Iran's Arak and Natanz nuclear facilities, but after heading for military facilities, Iran said it attacked a hospital in Israel's Negev region.
After the attack, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said Iranian leaders “cannot be allowed to exist anymore,” authorities said at least 30 people were injured in a hospital strike.