Iran says no one can exclude it from the World Cup later this year, in response to President Donald Trump’s warning that their “life and safety” would be at risk in the US.
The Iranian team also said in the social media post on Thursday that the United States should not be allowed to co-host the tournament if it could not guarantee the safety of the teams taking part.
Trump’s comments came just two days after he told FIFA chief Gianni Infantino the Iranian players would be welcome despite the Middle East war.
“The Iran National Soccer Team is welcome to The World Cup, but I really don’t believe it is appropriate that they be there, for their own life and safety,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform on Thursday.
Iran’s team responded: “The World Cup is a historic and international event and its governing body is FIFA — not any individual, country.
READ ALSO: I Don’t Believe It’s Appropriate Iran Should Be At World Cup For Safety — Trump
“Iran’s national team, with strength and a series of decisive victories achieved by the brave sons of Iran, was among the first teams to qualify for this major tournament.
“Certainly no one can exclude Iran’s national team from the World Cup; the only country that can be excluded is one that merely carries the title of ‘host’ yet lacks the ability to provide security for the teams participating in this global event.”
The war, triggered by US-Israeli strikes on February 28, has thrown into doubt Iran’s participation at this summer’s tournament, jointly hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico.
Trump later posted another message on his social media platform to emphasise that the event would be safe for players and spectators from around the world.
“The United States of America looks very much forward to hosting the FIFA World Cup,” Trump wrote. “Ticket sales are ‘through the roof!’”
A US KC‑135 aerial refueling aircraft crashed in western Iraq, killing four crew members, the military said on Friday, adding that the incident was not caused by “hostile fire.”
A second plane involved in the incident, which the military said occurred at 2:00 pm Eastern Time (1900 GMT) on Thursday, landed safely.
“Four of six crew members on board the aircraft have been confirmed deceased as rescue efforts continue,” US Central Command (CENTCOM), which is responsible for American forces in the Middle East, said in a statement on X.
An investigation was underway into the crash, the command said, adding that “the loss of the aircraft was not due to hostile fire or friendly fire.”
The deaths bring the number of US service members killed in the ongoing conflict with Iran to at least 11.
READ ALSO: Middle-East War Escalates As Fresh Strikes Hit Iran, Gulf States
Iran’s military said in an earlier statement carried by state TV that an allied group in Iraq had downed the aircraft with a missile, killing all its crew.
The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which is a loose alliance of Iran-backed Iraqi factions, claimed to have downed a KC-135.
They also said they had targeted another plane that escaped.
Since the start of the Middle East war, the alliance has been claiming daily attacks on US interests in Iraq and across the region, but it rarely names its targets.
The KC-135 is at least the fourth US military aircraft lost during the war, after three F-15s were shot down by friendly fire over Kuwait.
KC-135s, which have been in operation for more than 60 years, generally have a crew of three — a pilot, a copilot, and a third who operates the boom used to refuel other aircraft, according to the US Air Force.
But some KC-135 missions require a navigator, and the aircraft can carry up to 37 passengers, an Air Force factsheet said.
Early in the war — which began on February 28 — Kuwaiti forces mistakenly downed three American F-15E fighters, but all six crew members were able to eject, according to CENTCOM.
A chieftain of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Kenneth Okonkwo, on Friday faulted the continued detention of a former governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai.
Okonkwo, who spoke on Channels Television’s Morning Brief, said El-Rufai’s detention violates constitutional provisions on fundamental human rights.
He noted that security agencies do not have the power to keep a suspect in detention under the guise of conducting investigations.
“That is illegal, and any such order is unconstitutional. So what I’m saying is that if El-Rufai committed any crime, please bring him to trial, grant him bail, so that if he is convicted, fine, nobody in ADC is quarrelling against the rule of law,” he said.
“The whole idea of arrest is that you have completed your investigation and found the person culpable for the crime you alleged he committed.
“It is the duty of the prosecution to prove the guilt of the suspect, not the suspect to defend his innocence,” he added.
READ ALSO: FG Sues El-Rufai Over NSA Phone-Tapping Claims
The lawyer argued that the former Federal Capital Territory minister’s rights must be respected.
“We are not saying he should not face trial. But his fundamental human rights should be guaranteed,” he stated.
Speaking further, Okonkwo alleged that El-Rufai’s ordeal might be politically motivated following his association with the ADC.
He also criticised the role of anti-corruption agencies, arguing that the ultimate responsibility for their actions rests with President Bola Tinubu.
Okonkwo said the “buck stops” with the nation’s commander-in-chief.
“He is being maltreated, he is being persecuted because he has joined ADC, and we are not exculpating anybody.
“And for now, he [Tinubu] is using his authority as the commander-in-chief to use the instrumentality of the anti-corruption agencies in courts because I wonder whether there is any commission fighting corruption in Tinubu’s regime,” the ADC chieftain added.
El-Rufai has been in the custody of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) since February 19, after his release by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
On Wednesday, a magistrate’s court sitting in Bwari, FCT, granted the ICPC a fresh order to detain him for another 14 days as investigations into allegations of money laundering and abuse of office deepen.
The Voice of Hind Rajab is a call to action, its makers and supporters have told Al Jazeera, and hopes are high for the Oscar-nominated film in the run-up to Sunday’s Academy Awards ceremony.
Nominated in the Best International Feature category, the Gaza-set docudrama reconstructs Israel’s killing of the five-year-old.
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On January 24, 2024, at about 7:30pm, Hind died of her injuries while she was trapped in a car, surrounded by the bodies of her relatives, after her family was forcibly displaced hours earlier from Gaza City. They had attempted to follow orders and leave. But on their way, Israel’s army fired more than 300 bullets at the black Kia driven by Hind’s uncle.
Hind has become a global symbol for the suffering of Palestinian children, more than 20,000 of whom have been killed in Israel’s genocidal war.
“The Oscars are important because it’s one of the biggest platforms in the world for a film,” one of the film’s producers, Odessa Rae, told Al Jazeera by phone from Los Angeles. “The goal of this film is obviously to be seen by the widest audience possible … the Oscars allows it to accomplish more in the world.”
Palestinians, too, have high hopes for the film.
In Gaza, filmmaker Mohammed al-Sawwaf told Al Jazeera, “The arrival of Hind Rajab’s voice to these platforms, and its ability to break through the indifference that exists there, is in itself something extremely valuable.”
He added, “A story of a human being from Gaza has been presented as the story of a person with a life and meaning, rather than the image of a Palestinian appearing as a number on news screens or as evidence of an event within the framework of war.”
Gaza-based filmmakers Mohammed al-Sawwaf, left, and Ibrahim al-Otla hope The Voice of Hind Rajab wins an Oscar as it humanises the impact of Israel’s war [Courtesy: Mohammed al-Sawwaf]
‘Devastating message will reach further’
The film uses Hind’s real voice, recorded on emergency calls with the Red Crescent, in the moments before she was killed by Israeli forces.
“I hope fervently that this remarkable film will win in its Oscar category, so that its devastating message will reach further, and have greater impact on those in government in a position to bring this bloodshed to an end,” Juliet Stevenson, a British actor and one of the UK’s most prominent pro-Palestine voices, told Al Jazeera.
The 89-minute feature tells Hind’s story from the perspective of the Palestinian Red Crescent workers who attempted to save her, but were blocked from reaching her by Israeli forces.
Directed by Kaouther Ben Hania, a Tunisian who cast an ensemble of Palestinian actors, the film has captivated critics, won awards and, in September, received a 23-minute standing ovation at the Venice Film Festival.
On Thursday, US lawmakers introduced the “Justice for Hind Rajab Act”, legislation aimed at accountability – a “step towards justice in Hind’s story”, said Rae.
Wissam Hamada, Hind’s mother, was separated from her daughter, having left by foot on the fateful day. Though she is unable to watch the film, as hearing Hind’s voice is still too much to bear, she has travelled with the filmmakers to several cities to speak about the unimaginable impact of Israel’s war on children.
An Oscar “would need to do more than recognise cinematic excellence – it must recognise that the story of a child and the suffering of an entire people cannot be erased or ignored”, Fatma Hassan Alremaihi, CEO of the Doha Film Institute, told Al Jazeera. “Awards alone do not change the reality on the ground. If the most visible platform in cinema recognises this film, it must also come with a commitment from the global community to protect and amplify the truth of the brutality we continue to witness every day.”
At first, Israel denied that its soldiers were even in the area where Hind was killed. After journalistic investigations, including by Al Jazeera, the army said it had raided “terror targets” in Gaza City that day. In January, Israeli officials told the BBC that they were reviewing the case.
“The hope is that such recognition is more than applause, but that it helps transform awareness into accountability and ensure that the humanity at the heart of Gaza’s suffering is neither denied nor forgotten,” Alremaihi said.
‘Don’t leave me alone’: Hind’s last words
Before her life was cruelly cut short, Hind had witnessed some of the worst of Israel’s atrocities.
In her last moments of life, she had begged her mother on the phone, “Don’t leave me alone, Mama. I am tired. I am thirsty. And I am wounded.”
“A story like Hind Rajab’s represents a symbol of thousands of other stories,” said al-Sawwaf, the filmmaker in Gaza. “There are thousands of women and men who had full lives, details, and dreams that are no less human than hers.”
“People in Gaza do not look at the Oscars or the arrival of these films as something capable of stopping the war, ending injustice, or changing reality,” he said.
The real impact, he believes, lies in changing how the world perceives what is happening in Palestine, and adds that “it may not change reality in a revolutionary way, but it changes how people view what is happening here.”
Two years after Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza began, a “ceasefire” was reached in October, 2025. But since then, hundreds of people have been killed in Israeli attacks.
“Despite mountains of news footage, and a large number of searing films and documentaries chronicling the catastrophe, the world is largely choosing to turn its back on the destruction of the Palestinian homeland, the pounding of their entire infrastructure, the murder of their people, the violation of their rights and freedoms. Future generations will be bewildered and horrified,” Stevenson said.
“But this film – The Voice of Hind Rajab – has managed to penetrate through to the mainstream cultural forums. In being nominated for an Oscar, it brings these acts of barbarism and cruelty to those in a position to act, and make change.”
Gaza filmmaker Ibrahim al-Otla, who works alongside al-Sawwaf, said the film “conveys the truth about deliberate killings, field executions, and the erasure of entire families from the civil registry”.
“It helps deliver the real picture and expose the crimes committed against the Palestinian people in Gaza, [but] what is happening in Gaza is far more difficult than what the world sees in these films.”
A child walks near the car where Hind was found along with the bodies of her family members. Two ambulance workers who had gone to save her were also killed in Gaza City, February 10, 2024 [Reuters]
Israel has killed almost 600 people in Lebanon and displaced more than 750,000 in less than two weeks. This is the opening act of Israel’s Gaza doctrine applied to a new front. The formula is consistent: Displace – either by ordering people to leave or by destroying their means of survival. Demolish civilian infrastructure to prevent return and expand territory through so-called “buffer zones”. Fragment any coherent governance by carving territory into disconnected enclaves where military action continues at a lower intensity.
I spent three years working in Palestine before being expelled by Israeli authorities. I watched this doctrine develop in real time. Now, from Beirut, I am witnessing its replication.
In the West Bank, Israel has spent decades fragmenting territory and denying Palestinians any contiguous geography. Water wells sealed with cement, homes demolished over impossible-to-obtain permits, herders pushed from their land by illegal settlement outposts. In Gaza, the same logic was applied with far greater speed and fury.
In October 2023, Israel announced that every Palestinian north of Wadi Gaza had to leave immediately. Days earlier, Israel’s defence minister had declared a complete siege: No electricity, no food, no water. By labelling an entire population as the enemy, Israel created a class of expendable people. The military released maps with Gaza divided into numbered blocks. When your number was called, you were forced to leave. Evacuation orders became the alibi for the crimes that followed. People were ordered into al-Mawasi, a stretch of coastline Israel designated a “safe zone”, a concentration area for hundreds of thousands living in tents, where air attacks continued. So-called evacuation zones were depopulated and destroyed.
Classic counterinsurgency logic would have entailed “clear, hold, and rebuild”. Israel’s approach was radically different: Destroy, displace, dismantle. The goal was not to pacify territory but to empty it. In both Gaza and southern Lebanon, Israel has treated civilian populations as indistinguishable from the resistance they support. Their displacement is the objective. The collapse of their political representation is a condition Israel seeks to make permanent. This is settler-colonial logic in contemporary military form.
The same playbook has now arrived in Lebanon, but with a revealing difference from previous Israeli operations here. In the first Lebanon war in the 1980s, Israel sought to install a sympathetic government. Gaza has shown that Israel has abandoned that aspiration. The goal is no longer to determine who governs a territory but to ensure that no coherent governance exists at all. Nor is Israel alone in this; the UAE’s approach in Yemen and the Horn of Africa – and its support to Israel in Gaza – reflects the same preference for isolated enclaves. What has emerged is a regional doctrine of fragmentation shared between aligned powers.
Israel has issued evacuation orders for the entirety of southern Lebanon and southern Beirut. The familiar map that appeared on my screen in Beirut last week had the same design and the same deadly ambiguity as the ones we dealt with in Gaza; announced evacuation zones failed to match those shown on the map. In Gaza, those who crossed the invisible lines were killed.
Hundreds of thousands of people are now on the move. Schools have become shelters, health workers have been killed, and people are sleeping on the seafront where just two nights ago a tent was bombed. Israel has threatened to attack Lebanese state infrastructure if the government fails to act against Hezbollah – extending its aims from displacement and infrastructure destruction towards the forced destabilisation of the state itself. The Lebanese government has responded by forbidding Hezbollah from firing. This is precisely the internal fracturing that Israel’s strategy appears designed to provoke.
But Lebanon is not Gaza. Hamas was fighting with an improvised arsenal inside a besieged strip of land, and this already proved challenging for Israeli forces. Hezbollah commands more sophisticated weaponry, hardened infrastructure, and decades of preparation for this kind of war. It has shown it can absorb heavy blows and strike back, surprising both Israel and outside observers with the depth of its capabilities. Israeli ground operations in southern Lebanon and the Bekaa have already met significant resistance. It is here that the doctrine may encounter its limits – not through diplomatic pressure, which has failed to materialise, but through asymmetric military reality. Iran has made Lebanon’s fate explicitly part of any ceasefire calculus, signalling a unification of fronts that Israel had thought were weakened.
A doctrine built on the assumption of impunity has encountered little resistance in the conference halls of a so-called rules-based order. The Gaza doctrine is the expanded version of what Israel previously called the “Dahiyeh doctrine” – the use of overwhelming force against civilian infrastructure – now weaponised towards a larger end: The permanent redrawing of the region’s geography, demography, and political order.
This doctrine has developed in a vacuum of accountability. The International Court of Justice has been ignored. The Security Council has been paralysed. Governments have continued trading with Israel as it steadily normalised the unacceptable. Daniel Reisner, who headed the international legal division of Israel’s military advocate general’s office, was candid in saying that “If you do something for long enough, the world will accept it […] International law progresses through violations.”
The United States is not a bystander to this failure; it is an active participant in deepening it. At the Munich Security Conference earlier this year, Secretary of State Marco Rubio framed the transatlantic alliance in ethnonationalist terms and cast colonialism as a Western achievement. At an event in Tel Aviv, US Ambassador Mike Huckabee expressed confidence that Washington would “neuter” both the ICC and the ICJ – the very institutions through which accountability might otherwise be pursued.
What is unfolding in Lebanon is the political continuation of an ongoing settler-colonial project. The evacuation orders are precursors to mass destruction, designed to prevent return and permanently alter the landscape. Stability in the Middle East demands more than ceasefire agreements that manage fragmented populations while permitting lower-grade warfare to continue. It requires unconditional enforcement of international law, full accountability for those prosecuting this doctrine, and the right of return and reconstruction – from Beit Hanoon to Beirut.
Eddie Howe and assistant Jason Tindall have spent more time with each other than with their own wives.
So it was rather fitting that the Newcastle United head coach likened the pair to a “married couple”.
“I won’t tell you who does what,” he smiled on Friday. “But that’s probably the best way of describing us.”
From tasting defeat at Darlington in their first game, in 2009, to taking on Barcelona in the last 16 of the Champions League, Howe and Tindall have been together on the touchline for the best part of two decades.
You could say that Tindall has ruffled one or two feathers in that time.
In fact, the so-called “mad dog” has got under the skin of some of the biggest names in the top flight over the years with his touchline antics and barracking of the fourth official.
And that has been just as the grinning Newcastle assistant intended.
This is a figure who “takes the heat away” from Howe – allowing the head coach to focus purely on the game – as friend, ex-coaching colleague and former team-mate Steve Fletcher explained.
“JT has played up to that character a little,” he said. “He’s not predominantly like that. He’s not massively controversial.
‘We certainly have a healthy conflict’
Last season’s 3-0 victory against Aston Villa was a case in point.
Villa analyst Victor Manas urged Tindall to “show some respect” and “lose the finger” after the Newcastle number two repeatedly shushed a visibly irate Unai Emery at St James’ Park.
Tindall, like Manas, was sent off following a flashpoint in the tunnel at the break.
But he later emerged at full-time in a hoodie with his and Howe’s faces splashed across it after vowing to wear the Wham!-themed jumper for a supporter if Newcastle won.
Such a move would have sent a now dormant social media account entitled ‘Jason Tindall desperate to be centre of attention’ into meltdown.
Yet there is more to the 48-year-old than the memes.
Few know that better than winger Matt Ritchie, who worked with Tindall at both Newcastle and Bournemouth.
“The perception may be wrong,” he said. “Because, honestly, this guy is a top coach and above all a top man with a really big heart.”
It is telling that Howe has brought this set-play and defence specialist with him wherever he has gone.
Howe would not even have taken his first steps in management with Bournemouth if his former team-mate had not already been in situ as an assistant he could trust, who also shared similar views on how the game should be played.
“The longevity probably comes from a healthy respect between us and the fact we started together on this journey,” he said.
“We have become accustomed to our strengths and weaknesses. We certainly have a healthy conflict, which is really important for me.
A valued coach with a different perspective
There have been plenty of heated discussions in the pair’s shared office over the years.
“JT is not the type of assistant manager who is just going to nod his head and agree with everything Ed says,” Fletcher said. “It’s not so much that he disagrees, but he gives him a different opinion.
“Ed has the final say, 100%, but JT is his right-hand man and is there with the other coaches to give a different perspective on things, whether it be formation or personnel.
“He’s always been at the forefront of giving his opinion and Ed really takes his perception on things very seriously.”
This dynamic – and the pair’s contrasting personalities – have contributed to their partnership standing the test of time.
Aside from a brief break, when Tindall stepped up to manage Bournemouth, following Howe’s departure in 2020, they have been side by side on the touchline for a staggering 766 competitive games.
Such is the trust Howe has in Tindall and his staff that when the Newcastle head coach was hospitalised with pneumonia less than a year ago he made the conscious decision to give them full responsibility.
“It’s over to you,” he told Tindall.
Tindall did not just have step up on the training ground alongside fellow assistant Graeme Jones – he suddenly found himself thrust in front of journalists at news conferences.
Some outsiders may have expected Tindall to make outlandish headline-grabbing statements but again, contrary to the persona, the softly-spoken Londoner was anything but box office.
Tindall, Jones and the rest of Howe’s staff were instead focused on maintaining standards behind the scenes, imploring the players to put in performances that would make the head coach proud.
Newcastle won their next two games impressively, hammering Manchester United and Crystal Palace by a combined scoreline of 9-1.
They were well-beaten in Tindall’s final match in interim charge, against Aston Villa, but Howe’s side were still on track to qualify for the Champions League by the time the head coach returned to the dugout for the run-in.
It showcased the value of Tindall, Jones, first-team coaches Stephen Purches and Simon Weatherstone, and Howe’s wider staff.
This has been a more challenging domestic season for Newcastle, who are languishing in 12th place in the table, after fighting on multiple fronts.
But Tindall was among those namechecked by Lewis Hall as the left-back discussed the defensive strides he had made on the eve of keeping Barcelona talisman Lamine Yamal quiet from open play earlier this week.
