BBC correspondent Greg Mackenzie was at Stansted Airport speaking to passengers on the first UK government flight evacuating citizens from the Middle East. Some spoke about the anxiety and stress they experienced in Muscat, Oman as they waited for their flight to depart.

The UK government has said it is looking into organising more charter flights in the coming days out of Oman.

There have also been commercial flights flying out of the United Arab Emirates to the UK.

This page will no longer be updated but you can keep following our live coverage on this link.

If you're just joining us, here are the key developments from the last few hours:

• In a briefing at the US Central Command, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that firepower over Iran is about to expand dramatically and
• Trump said the US has been striking Iranian drone and missile systems "every single hour"
• Hegseth said that the US can sustain its campaign for as long as it wants to, and that a number of US allies have also stepped up to help
• He also said that US President Trump will have a "heck of a say" in who will run Iran, while Trump himself earlier told US outlets that he will "have to be involved" in the appointment of the next leader
• Meanwhile explosions have been reported in Beirut; Bahrain said Iran had attacked a hotel and residential buildings; and Qatar said it intercepted a drone attack on a US base
• The first UK government flight evacuating citizens out of the Middle East has landed in London's Stansted Airport after its departure from Oman

China is in negotiations with Iran to allow ships carrying crude oil and Qatari gas safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz, Reuters reported on Thursday, citing anonymous sources.

Now into its seventh day, the war between Israel, the US and Iran has left hundreds of ships at a standstill around the channel - a critical waterway for about a fifth of the world's oil and gas. Energy prices have surged.

Reuters and Bloomberg cited ship tracking data that showed a tanker claiming to be Chinese passed through the strait on Thursday, though the BBC has not been able to confirm its movements.

China is a big buyer of Iranian oil and has condemned the Israeli and US attack on the country.

Image source, Getty Images

Osmond Chia
Business reporter

The US Treasury Department has temporarily eased sanctions to allow India to buy Russian oil currently stranded at sea.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the 30-day waiver will allow oil to keep flowing in the global market and "alleviate pressure caused by Iran's attempt to take global energy hostage".

The move is a "deliberate short-term measure" that "will not provide significant financial benefit to the Russian government" as it only involves oil already stranded at sea, Bessent said on X.

US President Donald Trump sanctioned Russian oil following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, forcing buyers to seek alternatives.

Washington has put particular pressure on India - a major buyer of Russian energy - to stop buying its oil in an effort to reduce money flowing to fund the invasion.

Hezbollah has warned Israeli residents to evacuate towns within 5km (3 miles) of the border with Lebanon.

The warning was shared in a message on its Telegram channel in Hebrew early on Friday, according to Reuters.

"Your military's aggression against Lebanese sovereignty and safe citizens, the destruction of civilian infrastructure and the expulsion campaign it is carrying out will not go unchallenged," Hezbollah said.

The Israeli military began a wave of strikes on Lebanon late on Thursday evening, after telling people to leave the southern suburbs of Beirut, which is a stronghold of Hezbollah.

A short while ago, the IDF also said it had begun "a broad-scale wave of strikes against Iranian terror regime infrastructure in Tehran".

Qatar's Ministry of Defence says its air force has successfully intercepted a drone attack targeting the al-Udeid air base, the largest US military base in the Middle East.

The announcement comes after the Qatari government earlier sent out security alerts to cell phones in the country, warning residents to stay away from windows and open areas.

Explosions are being reported in Beirut, Lebanon following major evacuation orders by the Israeli military.

“The Defense Army has launched a wave of airstrikes targeting Hezbollah's terrorist infrastructure in Beirut's southern suburbs," a spokesperson for the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) said earlier on X.

The Israeli military says it began striking the southern suburbs of Beirut late on Thursday.

The IDF earlier ordered hundreds of thousands of people to leave the area, which is a stronghold of Hezbollah.

The first flight chartered by the UK government to take British citizens out of the Middle East has just landed at London Stansted Airport, the BBC has learned.

It had departed from Oman's capital city, Muscat.

Image source, Getty Images

A White House official has confirmed to the BBC that Trump administration officials plan to meet US defence executives on Friday to discuss weapons production.

The meeting will take place at the White House and will be attended by companies including Lockheed Martin and RTX, the parent company of Raytheon, Reuters earlier reported.

Discussions are expected to include accelerating weapons production, as the Pentagon works to replenish supplies after strikes on Iran and several other military efforts, according to Reuters.

In a press conference a short while ago, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said the US had plenty of munitions and can sustain its campaign against Iran for as long as it needs to.

Bahrain's interior ministry says a hotel and two residential buildings in the capital Manama have been targeted in an attack by Iran.

The latest attack has caused "material damage but no loss of life", the Ministry of Interior says in a post on X.

Earlier this week, the US Navy base in Bahrain was targeted by Iranian missiles.

Update: An earlier statement from Bahrain's Ministry of Interior incorrectly said that two hotels and a residential building had been targeted in an Iranian attack.

The US has ordered the evacuation of its embassy in Kuwait, the BBC's US news partner CBS reports.

The evacuation is to take place overnight Thursday into Friday, and embassy staff have been ordered to destroy information and wipe classified servers, two US officials told CBS.

The evacuation order comes as Kuwait's army says its air defences repelled a missile attack that penetrated the country's air space.

"The interception operation resulted in the fall of some debris, which led to limited material damage represented by damage to a vehicle, with no human injuries recorded," a Kuwaiti military spokesperson wrote in a statement on X.

Hard to see how Trump would be personally involved in selecting Iran's new leaderpublished at 23:45 GMT 5 March

23:45 GMT 5 March

Will Grant
North America correspondent

As we've been reporting, US-based media outlet Axios reports Donald Trump said in an interview that he needs to be "involved" in the appointment of Iran's next leader.

The question has been repeatedly raised in Washington on whether President Trump is seeking some kind of "Venezuelan solution" over the choice of the next Iranian leader.

The decision is normally taken by the Assembly of Experts – the body in Iran which appoints the Islamic Republic’s supreme leader. Now, though, Donald Trump has made it clear he intends to have a personal say.

Speaking to Axios, the US President ruled out the idea of working with the late Supreme Leader’s son, 56-year-old Mojtada Khamenei: “They are wasting their time. Khamenei's son is a lightweight”, he said during a phone call with the Axios reporter.

“I have to be involved in the appointment, like with Delcy [Rodriguez] in Venezuela," he added.

From the Trump administration's perspective, the key advantage of Delcy Rodriguez has been her willingness to turn a page on the US military action on Venezuelan soil which saw her predecessor, Nicolas Maduro, removed from power in early January.

In the process, she has also allowed the US apparent total control of Venezuela’s vast oil reserves.

Yet the South American nation is very different to the Middle Eastern one - as are their two governments.

If the Trump administration is seemingly happy to work with the remnants of the Maduro regime – at least for now – it is harder to see how the US president would be personally involved in appointing the new head of an Islamic theocracy.

Here are the key points from public remarks made in the past couple of hours by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Central Command Admiral Brad Cooper and President Donald Trump:

• The US has plenty of munitions and can sustain its campaign against Iran for as long as it needs to, Hegseth said
• The US bomber force has struck nearly 200 targets in Iran just in the last 72 hours, and sunk over 30 of Iran's ships, Cooper said
• Trump has a "heck of a say" in who will run Iran, Hegseth said
• Firepower over Iran is about to expand dramatically, according to Hegseth
• A number of US allies have stepped up to help, Hegseth said
• The war is not expanding, but "simplifying" as countries unify against Iran, he went on to say
• Trump said Iran has been calling and asking to make a deal, but "We want to fight now more than they do"
• The US has been striking Iranian drone and missile systems "every single hour", Trump said
• The US is demolishing Iran far ahead of schedule, Trump said

The press conference has now ended, but we're continuing to bring you lines from it. After Donald Trump's criticism of the UK over its initial refusal to permit the use of British bases in the Middle East, Hegseth said it was "unfortunate" access wasn't granted "from day one".

"But we got there. We got there, and that's now part of the way that we're operationalising bomber runs... It's more fighter squadrons, it's more capabilities, it's more defensive capabilities, and it's more bomber pulses more frequently," he says.

"The amount of firepower over Iran and over Tehran is about to surge dramatically," he said.

Hegseth and Cooper also said the US and Israel were targeting those who were targeting protesters in Iran.

"The more you do that, and you erode their will and capabilities, the more you create an opportunity for people to boldly stand up," Hegseth said.

Image source, Reuters

A reporter asks Hegseth about Trump's involvement in influencing who runs Iran after the death of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

"I think the president is having a heck of a say in who runs Iran given the ongoing operation we have," Hegseth responds.

"There's no expansion in our objectives. We know exactly what we're trying to achieve."

The question comes after Trump told Axios and other news outlets that he wanted to play a direct role in picking Iran's next leader.

We're now hearing from the head of US Central Command, Admiral Brad Cooper.

He says in the last 72 hours, the US bomber force has struck nearly 200 targets in Iran.

The US has, at this point, sunk over 30 Iranian ships, he says.

"And in just the last few hours, we hit an Iranian drone carrier ship roughly the size of a World War II aircraft carrier. And as we speak, it's on fire."

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has just began a briefing on the conflict at US Central Command. He says the US mission in Iran is "advancing decisively".

"Iran is hoping we cannot sustain this, which is a really bad calculation," he says.

Hegseth tells reporters that the US has "no shortage of munitions" and can sustain its campaign as long as it needs to.

"We have only just begun to fight, and fight decisively," he adds.

During Trump's preamble for his Inter Miami meeting, the president said Iran was "calling and saying how do we make a deal?"

"I say you're being a little bit late," he said. "We want to fight now more than they do."

In an interview with NBC News on Thursday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran "see's no reason why [they] should engage" with the US.

"The fact is that we don’t have any positive experience of negotiating with the United States. You know, especially with this administration. We negotiated twice last year and this year, and then in the middle of negotiations,, externalthey attacked us," Araghchi said.

Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from Washington DC

Image source, Reuters

I'm currently in the East Room of the White House, where US President Donald Trump is meeting with Inter Miami, the David Beckham co-owned Major League Soccer champions.

Trump is currently at the podium, standing a few feet from a pink "47" jersey and football featuring his signature and that of Inter Miami's members, including Lionel Messi. Marco Rubio and his wife entered just minutes before the event began.

As we've just reported, the US president lost no time before quickly jumping into an update on Iran.

He says the US is striking Iranian drone and missile capabilities "every single hour".

"So they have no air force, they have no air defence. All of their airplanes are gone, their communications are gone," he says. "Other than that, they're doing quite well."

The remark earns some scattered laughs and applause from the crowd.

Image source, Reuters

US President Donald Trump is speaking at an event at the White House, providing an update on Iran.

He says the US military, together with Israel, are "totally demolish[ing]" Iranian targets "far ahead of schedule".

Trump says there have been "47 years of horror" with the Iranian government, claiming the regime harmed innocent Iranian people.

"Our people are doing a great job," Trump says.

He adds that he has a plan for keeping down oil prices amid the conflict. He says prices were lower before, but "I had to take this little detour".