Rayhan Demytrie
Reporting from the Iran-Armenia border

Iranians have continued to flee to neighbouring countries including Armenia.

At the Agarak border crossing one young woman who has travelled from Tehran has described continuous explosions and bombing sounds causing fear among residents.

She said that her family had to board up windows with sticks to prevent breakage. She said there were daily electricity blackouts, bread and water shortages and no internet access.

People are left in the dark with no information about where or when potential bombings might occur.

There are now rumours that the authorities might close the borders.

She also said she thinks some people don't want a regime change imposed by foreign countries.

"We were trying to make changes ourselves inside and I don't think a change coming from US or Israel would be a good change".

"It's a very big moment," BBC World Affairs Editor John Simpson says.

"For the US to get its hands dirty, to start dropping bombs on a country like Iran, is very important," he adds.

He adds that Americans believe that Iran doesn't have the kind of strength and abilities that people often assume it does.

He adds that it's "significant" that US bomber planes were able to carry out their mission "without any kind of resistance whatsoever" and that Israeli planes have been "flying at will" across Iran.

"Iran is not the kind of power that is able to do that".

Taraneh Fathalian
BBC Persian

The Iranian public are expressing their mixed feelings about the US strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities.

Although the internet is still patchy across the country following the nationwide blocks, some have managed to bypass the restrictions and voice their fear, anger and hope about the attack.

Some have told BBC Persian that they hope for de-escalation and a better future for Iran, while others vent their frustration about uncertainty and the fear of further escalation.

Shahla, not her real name, said: "My days and nights are the same. I feel paralysed, I just stare at the ceiling all day and all night. I keep wondering what is happening next, and we are constantly caught by surprise."

Saeed, not his real name, tells the BBC he is hoping that tensions will de-escalate after the US attack, he adds: "My child will be born in a few days and I hope she will be born in a new Iran with a new approach to national and international affairs."

"I am very angry and upset. I don't think if I have ever been this upset about my personal issues," another woman says.

She adds: "On one hand, I'm happy because this has reminded me that I am connected to something bigger than me. On the other hand, this is so upsetting because the Iran's war is among three people - three leaders and their egos."

Homayoun from the northern city of Maku said: "Although our lives have become more difficult and our problems have worsened, we stand by our country till the end."

President Trump made a choice after more than a week of Israel attacking Iran, BBC Chief North America correspondent Gary O'Donoghue says.

"He believed, by the look of it, that the Iranians were stonewalling on negotiations," he says.

Trump and his national security council "saw an opportunity when Iran was at its weakest moment," Gary O'Donoghue says.

Iran's militias in the region have been "absolutely decimated" and "degraded" and its missile stocks "have been depleted as well".

"So two of the big levers it can pull are much less effective right now."

"I think it is a different case," BBC World Affairs Editor John Simpson says, adding that the current situation "seems to have happened quite fast".

He says it's been about 10 days since the US State Department said Israel was doing what it wants to do in Iran and that it's got nothing to do with America.

"That has, of course, utterly changed," he says. "It's been turned right on its head, that policy."

He said "the speed" at which events have unfolded will cause "a good deal of nervousness" around Trump's allies and friends, including Britain, France and Germany.

"They'll be nervous that such a big change can happen so fast," John Simpson said.

For context: In 2003 Britain joined the US in a highly controversial military campaign against Iraq, justified partly by Iraq's supposed arsenal of "weapons of mass destruction".

The BBC's chief international correspondent Lyse Doucet says this is a "major turning point in the 45-year-old standoff" between America and Iran.

Iran's foreign minister has said America has "crossed a red line", she says, explaining that the strikes have "certainly put this tension into new terrain" which is "very unpredictable" and "perilous".

What will determine what happens next is how Iran chooses to respond, Lyse says, adding that it's a "war of words" as well as "an escalating war" on the ground.

She says Iran has "so few options".

Iran's supreme leader has acted with "great caution" since he came to power, Lyse Doucet says, and that he has used what Iranians call "strategic patience, playing the long game, but that game is up".

"If he does too little, he will lose face. If he does too much, he will lose everything."

At the Pentagon, the rhetoric was strong, but the evidence was thinpublished at 14:22 British Summer Time 22 June

14:22 BST 22 June

Gary O'Donoghue
Chief North America correspondent, reporting from Washington DC

That Pentagon briefing flooded the zone with facts.

There was plenty for military analysts to pore over, but one line stood out: we heard twice that the battle damage assessment is still ongoing.

That’s to be expected, but it also sits awkwardly alongside President Trump’s bold claim that Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities have been “completely and totally obliterated”.

How do you know if you're still assessing it?

The rhetoric was strong, but the evidence was thin or non-existent.

While we got maps of the bomber routes, there was no imagery of the nuclear sites themselves, no hard proof to back up the claims (the BBC has looked at satellite images showing the surface of the Fordo site here).

So, for now, I think that the jury is very much still out on what was actually achieved.

Meanwhile, Vice President JD Vance is also ramping up the messaging. He’s been on US networks warning Iran, suggesting its nuclear programme has been “pushed back by years”.

Expect that message to be hammered home throughout the day, as the president’s senior lieutenants line up to appear on America’s Sunday morning political talk shows.

Satellite images of Iran show fresh craters at nuclear site after US bombingpublished at 14:08 British Summer Time 22 June

14:08 BST 22 June

By Benedict Garman

New satellite imagery shows the aftermath of last night’s US strikes on Iran’s underground nuclear enrichment facility at Fordo.

High-resolution images from Maxar Technologies taken 22 June show six fresh craters - likely the entry points for US munitions - as well as grey dust and debris scattered down the mountainside caused by the strikes.

We previously wrote about the type of "bunker buster" munitions required for a strike on a deep underground facility like this: a bomb called a Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP). A short time ago, the Pentagon confirmed they were used as part of its operation.

Senior imagery analyst at McKenzie Intelligence Services, Stu Ray, told BBC Verify: "You will not see a huge blast effect at the entry point as it is not designed to detonate on entry but deeper down into the facility."

He added that it looks like three separate munitions were dropped on two separate impact points, and that the grey colouration on the ground appears to show concrete debris blown out by the explosions.

Ray also said the tunnel entrances appear to have been blocked off. As there are no visible craters or impact points near them, he suggests this may have been an Iranian attempt to "mitigate against deliberate targeting of the entrances by aerial bombardment".

It's uncertain how much damage the strikes have caused to the nuclear site itself. In the days leading up to the strike, Iran seem to have been taking actions to anticipate them, as we reported earlier.

Image source, Getty Images

Earlier we heard from US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, and Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen Dan Caine, at the Pentagon. Here's a recap of the key lines:

• Hegseth said the US "conducted a precision strike in the middle of the night against three nuclear facilities in Iran, Fordo, Natanz, and Isfahan"
• "We devastated the Iranian nuclear programme, but it's worth noting the operation did not target Iranian troops or the Iranian people," Hegseth added
• "This mission was not, and has not, been about regime change," Hegseth added
• On the details of the operation, Caine said the bombers set off from the US, with some heading west into the Pacific as a "decoy"

• Caine said around 75 "precision guided weapons" were used, including 14 "Massive Ordnance Penetrators" - also known as "bunker busters"
• Hegseth said no shots were fired at the US during the operation, adding that the bombers were on their way back to the US

Image source, US military

We'll shortly be hearing from our correspondents who will be answering some of your questions after the US bombed Iran's nuclear sites overnight.

You'll be able to watch and follow along by pressing watch live at the top of this page from 14:00 BST.

Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from the White House

Image source, Reuters

While the Pentagon briefing was taking place earlier, Vice-President JD Vance gave a brief interview to NBC News in which he said that "the United States is not at war with Iran".

"We are at war with its nuclear ambitions," he said, adding that the US believes it has "destroyed" Iran's nuclear programme.

Vance also pushed back at some of the criticism of Trump, saying that it's "not true" that the operation was outside his presidential authority - as House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries questioned earlier.

The vice-president added that the US and its allies will now work to "permanently" dismantle Iran's nuclear programme.

Vance is also scheduled to appear on an ABC News talk show later this morning.

Ghoncheh Habibiazad
BBC Persian, World Service reporter

Israel has targeted two locations near the city of Bushehr, IRGC-affiliated Fars News Agency reports.

Meanwhile, semi-official Mehr News Agency has reported that the air defence has been activated in “some locations” in the central town of Yazd, located in Yazd Province.

Al-Ghadir Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Unit of Yazd said in a statement that Israel has targeted two military zones in the province, Mehr reports on Telegram.

Bushehr province is where Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant is located.

The UN's nuclear watchdog warned yesterday that hitting Bushehr plant would lead to "a very high release of radioactivity".

The Israeli military has yet to comment on the fresh strikes reported by Iranian media.

Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from the White House

Republicans - even those from the isolationist wing of the party - have largely fallen in line behind President Trump's decision to launch strikes on Iran.

A few prominent voices that represent the broader "MAGA" movement, however, have been openly critical - a rare sign of dissent from some of Trump's closest backers.

"He's got to talk to MAGA," former Trump strategist Steve Bannon said on his podcast. "There's a lot of MAGA that's not happy about this."

"I believe he will get MAGA on board, all of it," Bannon added. "But he's got to explain exactly and go through this."

Another vocal Trump ally, Marjorie Taylor Greene, wrote on X last night that "every time America is on the verge of greatness, we get involved in another foreign war".

"This is not our fight," she added.

Democrats, for their party, have largely all come out against the operation, with many questioning whether it was legal without Congressional oversight.

"President Trump misled the country about his intentions, failed to seek congressional authorisation for the use of military force and risks American entanglement in a potentially disastrous war in the Middle East," House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said in a statement.

In one of the final questions that Pete Hegseth gets from reporters, he is asked if he's worried about how US allies might react.

He says the US understands the challenges facing allies in the region.

"We have been respectful and working in collaboration with them," he says.

He is then asked about communications between the US and Iran - and whether there's still a chance for a diplomatic solution. Hegseth says Washington has repeatedly invited Tehran to return to the negotiating table.

"They know precisely what the American position is, what steps they can take to allow for peace, and I hope they do so," he says.

Image source, Getty Images

Hegseth is asked to address US veterans' concerns about the US potentially becoming involved in "another open-ended war in the Middle East over weapons of mass destruction".

The defence secretary says: "This is most certainly not open ended." He adds that President Trump has provided him with a "powerful and clear" mission on the destruction of Iran's nuclear capabilities.

"That's what the Iranian regime needs to understand," he says. "As the president put out last night, he wants peace, there needs to be a negotiated settlement here."

Hegseth is asked to clarify about the damage assessment, and what his next step would be if Iran or militias under Iranian influence attack US interests in the region.

The damage assessment is ongoing, but the initial assessment is that "all of our precision munitions struck where we wanted them to strike and had the desired effect", Hegseth answers.

He again says the US believes it has destroyed capabilities in Fordo, which was their main target.

Hegseth is now asked if there was a particular moment when Donald Trump decided to "pull the trigger".

He responds, asserting that Trump was "fully committed to the peace process" and he wanted a negotiated outcome.

However, Hegseth says he "gave Iran every opportunity and was met by stonewalling".

He adds that there was "no particular moment for Trump, but there was a moment where he realised there was a time when action needed to be taken to minimise the threat".

As a reminder, the White House said on Thursday that President Trump would decide whether the US would get involved in the Iran-Israel conflict "within two weeks".

Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth is now taking questions from reporters gathered at the Pentagon and is asked about regime change in Iran.

"This mission was not and has not been about regime change," Hegseth stresses.

"The president has authorised a precision operation to neutralise the threats to our national interests posed by the Iranian nuclear programme and the collective self defence of our troops and our ally, Israel."

• Read more on Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

Continuing to bring reporters details about the military operation, Caine now says that the strike on Iran involved the "largest B-2 operational strike in US history".

He says that US forces remain on "high alert" and are "fully postured to respond to any Iranian retaliation".

He said that a retaliation would be an "incredibly poor choice" on their part.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Reuters/Department of Defense

We're continuing to bring you key lines from a Pentagon briefing following US strikes on Iran overnight.

Joint Chiefs of Staff Air Force Gen Dan Caine says it will take some time to fully assess the extent of the damage Iran sustained.

"Final battle damage will take some time but an initial battle damage assessment indicates that all three sites sustained extremely severe damage and destruction," he says.