The Times of Israel is liveblogging Tuesday’s events as they unfold.

Witkoff: Iran negotiators boasted of having enough enriched uranium to build 11 nuclear bombs

US special envoy Steve Witkoff says Iran’s top negotiators boasted in the first round of negotiations earlier this year of having enough highly enriched uranium to build 11 nuclear bombs.

“In that first meeting, both the Iranian negotiators said to us directly — with no shame — that they controlled 460 kilograms of 60% [enriched uranium] and that they’re aware that could make 11 nuclear bombs,” Witkoff recalls in an interview with Fox News.

However, the US also asserts that it obliterated Iran’s nuclear facilities, so it shouldn’t have the ability to turn that enriched uranium into a bomb.

Still, Witkoff says the Iranian negotiators “were proud that they had evaded all sorts of oversight protocols to get to a place where they could deliver 11 nuclear bombs.”

He says that during that first meeting, the Iranian negotiators also boasted having “an inalienable right” to enrich their nuclear fuel.

“We responded that the president feels we have the inalienable right to stop you dead in your tracks,” Witkoff recalls.

“Jared and I just sort of looked at ourselves flummoxed, and said, ‘We’re really in for it now,'” he adds.

He reiterates his claim that the highly enriched uranium that Iran has stockpiled could be turned into weapons-grade within a week or ten days, though this would again require the nuclear facilities that the US says it destroyed in strikes last year.

Witkoff says US President Donald Trump dispatched himself and Jared Kushner to hold talks with Iran to reach a deal in which Tehran would agree to eliminate its missile program, cease its support for proxies, eliminate its navy “so we can have freedom of the seas,” and cease its nuclear enrichment.

“We went in there and tried to make a fair deal with them, and it was very, very clear that it was going to be impossible — probably by the end of the second meeting, but we then went back for the third meeting just to give it the last college try,” he continues.

“They wanted us to report positivity. It was not positive that meeting,” Witkoff says.

IDF says it downed 2 drones launched from Lebanon

The IDF says it downed two drones launched from Lebanon that crossed into Israeli territory.

Earlier, suspected drone infiltration sirens sounded in several northern towns near the Lebanon border. The IDF Home Front Command later declared the incident “over.”

More additional suspected drone alerts blare in northern towns

More suspected drone infiltration sirrens sound in several northern towns near the Lebanon border.

Laughing off notion that he’s dragging Trump into war, Netanyahu insists that it’ll be quick

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denies that the US and Israel are engaging in an “endless war” against Iran, insisting that the operation will end quickly.

“I hear people are telling you that you’re going to have an endless war here — You’re not going to have an endless war because… this terror regime in Iran is at its weakest point” since its founding, Netanyahu tells Fox News in an interview.

“This is going to be a quick and decisive action,” he asserts.

Netanyahu says that the US and Israeli strikes will create the conditions for regime change in Iran.

US officials have given mixed messages regarding whether regime change is the goal, though. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said earlier that it isn’t and that neutralizing the Iranian missile, navy and nuclear threats is.

Netanyahu says 95% of the problems in the Middle East are generated by Iran and that the fall of the regime would lead to a flood of peace deals between Israel and its Arab and Muslim neighbors.

He maintains that the joint US-Israeli operations will “usher in an era of peace that we haven’t even dreamed of.”

Earlier, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared that the US launched Operation Epic Fury because Israel was going to carry out a preemptive strike against Iran and US intelligence indicated that Tehran would respond by targeting American assets in the region.

The remark further intensified criticism of the administration that Israel has dragged the US into a war with Iran.

Asked to respond to the claim, Netanyahu laughed it off.

“That’s ridiculous. Donald Trump is the strongest leader in the world. He does what he thinks is right for America. He does also what he thinks is right for future generations,” Netanyahu says, arguing that the US president understands on his own the threats posed by Iran.

Netanyahu spends much of his time in the interview praising Trump, who urged his followers to tune in to Fox News ahead of time and was ostensibly watching himself.

Iran’s FM: Rubio admitted US ‘entered a war of choice on behalf of Israel,’ blood is ‘on Israel Firsters’

Iran’s foreign minister reacts to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s remark that Washington attacked Iran over the weekend because it received intelligence that its assets in the region would be targeted in response to an Israeli attack.

“Mr. Rubio admitted what we all knew: US has entered a war of choice on behalf of Israel. There was never any so-called Iranian ‘threat,'” Abbas Araghchi posts on X.

“Shedding of both American and Iranian blood is thus on Israel Firsters,” he claims. “American people deserve better and should take back their country.”

New explosions heard in Riyadh, after attack on US embassy

New explosions are heard in Riyadh, an AFP journalist and residents say, as Iran presses on with its campaign of retaliatory strikes across the Gulf.

The explosions are heard in the center of the Saudi capital, with one resident saying they “heard a bang and the house shook.”

Earlier, Saudi’s defense ministry confirmed multiple drones had struck the US embassy in Riyadh, starting a small fire.

Saudis say attack using multiple drones on US embassy in Riyadh sparked ‘limited’ fire

An attack using at least two drones on the US embassy in Riyadh sparked a small fire, a Saudi defense ministry spokesman says in a statement, as Iran presses on with its campaign of retaliatory strikes across the Gulf.

“The US Embassy in Riyadh was attacked by two drones, according to initial assessments. The attack resulted in a limited fire and minor material damage to the building,” the statement says after witnesses told AFP they had seen smoke over the building housing the US diplomatic mission.

A source close to the Saudi army tells AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive issue, that Saudi air defense intercepted four drones targeting Riyadh’s diplomatic quarter in the attack.

In the aftermath, the US embassy issued shelter in place notification for citizens in Jeddah, Riyadh and Dhahran.

Netanyahu: Iran had been building bunkers that would’ve made nuclear, missile programs immune within months

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says an attack against Iran was urgently necessary because Iran was building new underground sites to shield its missile and nuclear programs from attacks.

“The reason that we had to act now is because after we hit their nuclear sites and their ballistic missile program… they started building new sites… underground bunkers that would make their ballistic missile program and their atomic bomb program immune within months,” Netanyahu claims in an interview with Fox News.

“If no action was taken now, no action could be taken in the future,” Netanyahu says in a snippet aired by the US outlet.

The full interview will be aired shortly.

Trump: You’ll soon find out response to Riyadh embassy attack; no boots on ground needed in Iran

US President Donald Trump tells NewsNation that people will find out soon what the retaliation will be to an attack on the US embassy in Riyadh and over the deaths of US military personnel during the Iran conflict, a reporter at the media outlet posts on X, citing an interview with him.

The US embassy in Saudi Arabia was hit by two drones, resulting in a limited fire and some material damage, the kingdom’s defense ministry has said in a post on X, citing an initial assessment.

Trump adds that he doesn’t think American boots on the ground will be necessary in Iran, the outlet says.

Suspected drone infiltration sirens sound in series of northern communities; IDF: incident over

A series of suspected drone infiltration alerts sound in a series of communities in northern Israel.

A short while later, the IDF Home Front Command declares the incident “over,” meaning people can leave bomb shelters.

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