By Maya Gebeily, Nandita Bose, Parisa Hafezi and Maha El Dahan
BEIRUT/MIAMI/TEL AVIV/DUBAI, March 8 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said he is not interested in negotiating with Iran and raised the possibility that the Iran war would only end once Tehran no longer has a functioning military or any remaining leadership in power.
Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on Saturday, Trump said the air campaign could make negotiations a moot point if all potential leaders of Iran are killed and the Iranian military is destroyed.
"At some point, I don't think there will be anybody left maybe to say 'We surrender,'" Trump said.
IRAN PRESIDENT'S APOLOGY CAUSES STIR
Israel said it had initiated fresh strikes across Iran on Sunday, and a huge fire engulfed a government office block in Kuwait hit by drones, as a war that has brought chaos to the Middle East and roiled global oil markets entered its second week.
Trump has justified the attack by saying Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States, without providing evidence, and was getting too close to being able to build a nuclear weapon.
The U.S. and Israel have discussed sending special forces into Iran to secure its stockpile of highly enriched uranium at a later stage of the war, Axios reported, citing four people with knowledge of the discussions. The White House did not immediately comment on the report.
Iran's president apologized to neighboring states for its attacks on U.S. facilities in those countries, in an attempt to cool anger across the Gulf, but stirred criticism from hardliners at home.
"I personally apologize to neighboring countries that were affected by Iran's actions," Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said, urging them not to join U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran.
He dismissed Trump's demand for the Islamic Republic's unconditional surrender as "a dream," but said its temporary leadership council had agreed to suspend attacks on nearby states unless strikes on Iran originated from their territory.
Pezeshkian's comments caused a political stir in Iran, prompting his office to reiterate Iran's military would respond firmly to attacks from U.S. bases.
Ali Larijani, Iran's secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, said on state television there was no rift among Iranian officials over its handling of the war.
Saudi Arabia has told Tehran that continued Iranian attacks on the kingdom and its energy sector could push Riyadh to respond in kind, four people familiar with the matter told Reuters.
The governments of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates reported Iranian drone attacks in their countries on Saturday and early Sunday with varying degrees of damage. Iran's Revolutionary Guards also targeted U.S. forces at a base in Bahrain, Iranian state media said.
In Norway's capital Oslo, the U.S. embassy was hit by an explosion early on Sunday, causing minor damage but no injuries, Norwegian police said. It was not immediately clear what caused the blast or who was involved.
Washington has halted for now a federal security bulletin that would have warned of a heightened threat to the U.S. in light of the Iran conflict, a Trump administration official told Reuters. But a recent U.S. intelligence assessment had warned that Iran and its proxies "probably" pose a threat of targeted attacks on the United States.
ISRAEL WARNS LEBANON TO REIN IN HEZBOLLAH
Huge explosions were heard in parts of Tehran, state media reported, while Israel said it had struck Iranian missile sites and command centers.
The U.S.-Israeli attacks have killed at least 1,332 Iranian civilians and wounded thousands, according to Iran's U.N. ambassador, Amir Saeid Iravani.
U.S. forces were likely responsible for an apparent strike on an Iranian girls school that killed scores of children, U.S. officials have told Reuters. But Trump, without citing evidence, told reporters on Saturday that Iran was responsible.
"We think it was done by Iran because they are very inaccurate as you know with their munitions. They have no accuracy whatsoever. It was done by Iran," said Trump. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, standing behind Trump aboard Air Force One, said the matter was still under investigation.
Iranian attacks have killed 10 people in Israel. At least six U.S. service members have been killed. Their remains arrived on Saturday at an Air Force base in Delaware.
In Iran, local news agencies, citing an Iranian Oil Ministry source, said its fuel depots were hit by strikes in three areas, including Karaj, west of Tehran.
Tehran has responded to the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran by hitting Israel and Gulf Arab states hosting U.S. military installations. Israel has launched fresh attacks in Lebanon after the Iran-aligned militia Hezbollah fired across the border.
With the conflict spreading, Israel warned Lebanon of a "very heavy price" if it did not rein in Iran-allied Hezbollah militants, as it pounded the group's strongholds with airstrikes and mounted a deadly airborne raid in the east.
On Saturday morning, more buildings in Beirut's Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs had been reduced to rubble, dust and tangled wires, Reuters video showed. The death toll from Israel's attacks on Lebanon since Monday rose to around 300.
Iran's apparent strategy of maximum chaos has driven up the costs of the conflict by raising energy prices and hurting global business and logistics links.
Kuwait's national oil company began cutting output on Saturday, adding to earlier oil and gas cuts from Iraq and Qatar. Oil prices have hit multi-year highs with the conflict effectively shutting the Strait of Hormuz.
(Reporting by Nandita Bose in Miami, Parisa Hafezi and Maha El Dahan in Dubai, Maya Gebeily in Beirut, Idrees Ali, Mike Stone and Humeyra Pamuk in Washington, Pesha Magid in Jerusalem, Aaron McNicholas and Reuters bureaux; Writing by William Maclean, Matthias Williams, Richard Cowan and Alistair Bell; Editing by Rod Nickel and William Mallard)
