The Global Story

For Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, the war on Iran is the culmination of a long-standing political ambition. On Sunday, Netanyahu said he was finally doing what he had “hoped to achieve for 40 years – to crush the regime of terror completely.” Polling suggests the war is popular in Israel too.
But it’s a lot more complicated for Donald Trump. He was elected on a promise to end foreign wars, and current polling suggests the war is not supported by most Americans.
We talk to the BBC’s international editor Jeremy Bowen about whether this war, which Netanyahu says is an opportunity, complements or collides with Donald Trump’s own interests. And ask if Benjamin Netanyahu has everything to gain from this war, and Donald Trump a lot more to lose?
Producers: Lucy Pawle and Sam Chantarasak
Sound engineer: Travis Evans
Senior news editor: China Collins
Photo: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters. U.S. President Donald Trump points his finger towards Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as they shake hands during a press conference after meeting at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, U.S., December 29, 2025.

Following President Donald Trump’s announcement over the weekend that the United States was launching an offensive in Iran alongside the Israeli military, comparisons to past US interventions in the region began to proliferate. Many Americans asked whether this latest military operation would become another ‘forever war’, as the US invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan came to be called.
We talk to Gordon Correra, security analyst for the BBC, about America’s complicated history of intervention in the Middle East and surrounding region, and ask what these past conflicts might tell us about possible outcomes for the war in Iran.
Producer: Viv Jones, Aron Keller and Xandra Ellin
Sound engineer: Travis Evans
Senior news editor: China Collins
Photo: A US soldier watches as a statue of Iraq's President Saddam Hussein falls in central Baghdad in 2003. Credit: Reuters/Goran Tomasevic

Five days since the first US–Israeli strikes on Iran, and the death of supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei, the country is once again in a communications blackout. With limited access to reliable information, it is difficult to know how ordinary Iranians are coping.
Parham Ghobadi, senior reporter and presenter at BBC Persian, has been speaking to people inside Iran to guage their fears, their expectations, and how they are navigating a moment that could reshape their country’s future.
Producer: Viv Jones, Valerio Esposito and Chris Benderev
Executive producer: Bridget Harney
Sound engineer: Travis Evans
Senior news editor: China Collins
(Photo: A woman reacts on the street following an Israeli and US strike on a police station, amid the US-Israeli conflict with Iran, in Tehran. Credit: Majid Asgaripour/West Asia News Agency/Reuters)

The Gulf states are some of the wealthiest places on earth, and have until recently been mostly insulated from Middle East conflicts. But the US-Israel war with Iran is now engulfing the Gulf.
The BBC’s security correspondent Frank Gardner joins us to discuss whether this is a moment that could change the entire region and affect all of us.
Producers: Cat Farnsworth and Xandra Ellin
Mix: Travis Evans
Senior news editor: China Collins
Photo: Smoke billows from Jebel Ali port in Dubai after an Iranian attack. Credit: Raghed Waked/Reuters.

This weekend, Iranian state media confirmed that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who ruled Iran with an iron fist for more than 30 years, had been killed in joint US-Israeli strikes. In Iran, his death was met with an outpouring of grief by his supporters, while many across the country and in the diaspora met the news with jubilation and a tentative sense of hope. But what happens now?
President Trump has urged Iranians to “seize control of your destiny, and to unleash the prosperous and glorious future that is close within your reach,” but how realistic are the prospects of them forming a new – and significantly different - government? And how will the weakened regime retaliate against the US and Israel’s strikes?
Caroline Hawley, Diplomatic Correspondent for the BBC, joins us to discuss.
Producers: Hannah Moore, Aron Keller and Chris Benderev
Executive producer: Bridget Harney
Mix: Travis Evans
Senior news editor: China Collins
Photo: A woman holds an image of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Tehran, Iran. Credit: Majid Asgaripour/WANA via Reuters.