'Middle East erupts' and 'OBE' for Queen's funeral horse
- Published
The lines of Iranian missiles streaking across the skies above Israel appear on all but one front page. The Sun, external's headline calls them "hell fire", the Daily Mirror, external describes the attacks as "revenge from above" and the Times, external says simply "Middle East erupts". The I paper, external warns the assault "sparks fears" of a "new war".
The Daily Mail, external's special correspondent, David Patrikarakos, says "the only surprise" was that the Iranian attack had not "come sooner". By splitting resources between two fronts in Gaza and Lebanon, Israel is, he says, embarking on a "hard and brutal road". And he warns a regional, and possibly global, war is now "all too real".
The Times suggests there will be much scrutiny of one disputed fact - whether or not the US was able to warn Israel about the missiles. Iran's representative office at the UN in New York is said to have originally denied alerting the US to the attack. But it later admitted there had been a notification. This, the Times suggests, would make it seem "Iran is still reluctant to take Israel head on".
There is a suggestion from an unnamed source in the Financial Times, external that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu does not want Tehran involved in his fight against Hezbollah. Separately, former deputy head of Israel's National Security Council Itamar Yaar tells the paper he thinks it is very unlikely Israel would attack Iran's nuclear facilities without US support, something he suspects would not be forthcoming in the next few months.
The Daily Mirror warns intense international diplomacy is failing but says abandoning hope is not an option. In its editorial, the Daily Express, external also urges that "military action must not be divorced from diplomacy".
A note of caution is sounded in the Guardian, external's editorial that Netanyahu has no clear exit strategy. It says without a diplomatic process, there are few limits to the crisis - only what the Guardian calls a "dangerous, fast‑growing, open-ended conflict".
Concerns about Israeli "mission creep" that could lead the entire Middle East into war are also raised in the Daily Telegraph, external's leader column. However it says Tehran is the main cause of the region's instability and US President Joe Biden and Sir Keir Starmer should decide what to do about Iran, not Israel.
Whitehall sources tell the Guardian that despite the promises of Chancellor Rachel Reeves to invest to grow the economy, ministers are being asked by Treasury officials to find ways to cut infrastructure project costs by up to 10%. The Treasury has declined to comment on the spending review process.
And finally dog owners are told in the Times their pets may have influenced the way they address them. A study suggests humans make between four and seven different sounds a second - while dogs, when they are barking, growling and whining, make only two different noises a second on average. Canines apparently also process sounds at a more leisurely rate. The study indicates the pets respond better if "sit" and "come" are said slowly, and this has encouraged owners to speak at a pace their dogs' brains can handle.
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