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Iran and NATO summit live: CIA chief says Iran nuclear site 'severely damaged' by strikes, Trump responds to 'daddy' comments

CIA boss John Ratcliffe says Iran's nuclear programme has been "severely damaged" by recent strikes. Elsewhere, Donald Trump has responded to being described as NATO's "daddy" by Mark Rutte. Watch and follow live below.

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We're pausing our Israel-Iran coverage - here's a recap of their 12-day war

We're pausing our live coverage of the Israel-Iran conflict.

Before we sign off, here's a recap of what happened during the 12-day conflict from start to finish:

Israel launches Operation Rising Lion

  • The conflict started on 13 June with Israel launching airstrikes on Iranian nuclear sites, including Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan;
  • They also hit military and government sites, oil and gas infrastructure and targeted Iran's high-ranking military leaders and nuclear scientists;
  • This, Israel said, was due to intelligence that suggested Tehran was close to producing a nuclear bomb. Iran has always denied this and maintained its nuclear development is for civilian use;
  • Iran responded to the strikes with missile and drone attacks of its own, targeting Israeli cities like Tel Aviv and Beer Sheba and, in some cases, beating Israel's sophisticated anti-air defence systems.

Nightly strikes take their toll

  • Over the next two weeks, thousands are injured and several are killed as missile and drone attacks happen nightly in both countries;
  • Israel claims to have killed several high-profile Iranian military personnel, including Mohammad Hossein Bagheri, the chief of staff of Iran's armed forces;
  • It also claims to have aerial superiority over most of Iran, helped in part thanks to "ground commandos" who Israel claimed operated deep inside Iran to "create operational freedom";
  • During the entire conflict, Israel says 28 people were killed, while Tehran says 627 have died in Iran.

US mulls intervention

  • The US, Israel's largest ally, reportedly vetoes an Israeli plan to assassinate Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during the first week of the conflict;
  • On 20 June, Donald Trump says he will need two weeks before deciding whether the US joins Israel to strike Iran's nuclear facilities;
  • American intervention is considered vital if the Iranian site at Fordow is to be destroyed - the facilities lie beneath a mountain that only US "bunker buster bombs" can reach.

Trump launches strikes

  • In a surprise operation, the US launches strikes on Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz using stealth bombers and missiles fired from submarines in the region;
  • Trump immediately labels the operation a success, claiming Iran's nuclear facilities have been "completely obliterated" by the attack;
  • More than 75 weapons were used in total, including 14 30,000lb GBU-57 bunker buster bombs, and 125 aircraft took part;
  • Almost immediately there are reports that the damage done isn't as extensive as Washington claims, while it also appears that Iran moved some of its enriched uranium at Fordow in anticipation of the US attacks;
  • Tehran responds by launching missiles at US military bases in Qatar and Iraq. No casualties are reported, with air defences intercepting the missiles.

Shaky ceasefire holds

  • Trump announces a ceasefire has been suddenly accepted by both sides on 23 June;
  • Despite this, both Israel and Iran claim each other has violated it within moments of it starting;
  • A furious Trump claims neither country knows "what the f*** is going on" and demands Israel turn around its jets, which it subsequently does after a phone call between Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu;
  • Israel frames the ceasefire as their victory for neutralising Iran's nuclear threat, while Iran says the ceasefire has been "forced" onto Israel and Tehran's defensive response has been a success.
Watch: How to 'Trump-proof' a NATO summit

Donald Trump's appearance at the NATO summit this week no doubt had world leaders and officials on their toes.

He arrived in The Hague against a precarious global backdrop, making this one of the more significant summits in recent memory.

So, how did NATO prepare for the arrival of the US president to ensure the two-day summit was 'Trump-proof'?

Below, Sky's political editor Beth Rigby and security and defence editor Deborah Haynes answer that very question.

Trump: Hegseth news conference will prove 'interesting and irrefutable'

Donald Trump says his defence secretary will hold a news conference at the Pentagon tomorrow.

He says Pete Hegseth and military representatives will speak to the media at 8am local time (1pm UK time) to "fight for the Dignity of our Great American Pilots".

"The News Conference will prove both interesting and irrefutable. Enjoy!" he added.

Analysis: The truth about the success of US airstrikes on Iran lies buried deep underground

By David Blevins, US correspondent

The B2 bombers have returned to their US base, but questions about the success of their airstrikes last weekend hang in the air.

President Donald Trump is pushing back hard against a leaked preliminary intelligence report, suggesting the audacious bombing raid only set Iran's nuclear ambition back "by months."

"It's destroyed... Iran will not have nuclear. We blew it up. It's blown to kingdom come," Trump told a press conference.

A statement from CIA director John Ratcliffe backed that up.

But Democrats say Trump was claiming Iran's underground facilities had been "obliterated" long before any intelligence had been received.

Arizona senator Mark Kelly, who flew 39 combat missions in the first Gulf War, said: "He's just saying that because he wants that to be the narrative.

"He said it the night of the strike, without any information, not even satellite imagery, and certainly without any information about what happened underneath 200 feet of rock and granite and dirt.

"The likelihood of something underground like that being obliterated is incredibly low," he added.

Senator Kelly blamed Trump for Iran's enrichment growing from "less than 4% to, public reporting, 60%", accusing him of "chucking the Obama deal out the window."

The leaking of the classified report from the Pentagon and subsequent debate has enraged US defence secretary Pete Hegseth.

"If you want to make an assessment of what happened at Fordow, you better get a big shovel and go really deep because Iran's nuclear programme is obliterated," he said.

"Those that dropped the bombs precisely in the right place know exactly what happened when they exploded, and you know who else knows? Iran."

The White House is railing against what it calls the "fake news media" for reporting the content of the leaked report.

But the success of a military operation has become a battle of political narratives in Congress.

That will last longer than a 12-day war because the truth lies buried, quite literally, deep underground.

In pictures: Scenes in Gaza

While much of the world's attention has been on Israel's conflict with Iran in the last two weeks, the war in Gaza has been ongoing.

Nearly 900 Palestinians were killed in the enclave during the 12 days that the Israel and Iran fought, according to a tally of figures from the Hamas-run health ministry.

Here are the latest images from Gaza showing buildings in ruin, smoke rising after an explosion and Israeli military vehicles manoeuvring.

CIA chief: Iran's nuclear facilities 'severely damaged' by strikes

The head of the CIA says that a "body of credible intelligence" indicates that Iran's nuclear programme has been "severely damaged" by recent strikes.

"This includes new intelligence from a historically reliable and accurate source/method that several key Iranian nuclear facilities were destroyed and would have to be rebuilt over the course of years," John Ratcliffe adds in a statement on X.

For context: An early US intelligence report was leaked yesterday that suggested US strikes did not destroy the core components of Iran's nuclear programme and only set it back by a matter of months.

Donald Trump disputed the report today, doubling down that the US has "obliterated" the sites and set the programme back "decades". His defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, claimed there was a "political motive" behind the leak.

Podcast: Why is the UK buying nuclear-carrying fighter jets?

Downing Street is already calling the government's decision to purchase at least 12 new F-35 stealth jets the most significant strengthening of the country's nuclear capability in a generation.

In purchasing the aircraft, Sir Keir Starmer is handing the Royal Air Force the ability to carry airborne nuclear warheads for the first time since the 1990s.

So, what are these jets? And why is the UK expanding its nuclear capability?

Lead UK news presenter Sarah-Jane Mee speaks to Dr Thomas Withington, an expert in air defence, to understand what this move means for the UK and what it tells us about the shift to make the country war ready. 

Trump says Gaza ceasefire 'very close' - but deaths continue on both sides

By Tom Cheshire, data and forensics correspondent, in Jerusalem

President Donald Trump has suggested a ceasefire in Gaza may be imminent, saying that "great progress" is being made, as a result of the end of the recent 12-day Israel-Iran war. 

"Because of this attack that we made, I think we're going to have some good news鈥� Gaza's very close," Trump told the NATO summit this afternoon.

Even as the conflict between Israel and Iran has dominated headlines, the war in Gaza has been grinding on. 

Israel said that seven soldiers had been killed by an explosive device in Khan Younis, in the south of the enclave - the highest death toll in a single incident since the breakdown of a truce in March. 

And the Gaza Health Ministry, run by Hamas, said that another 33 people had been killed, and 267 people injured, seeking aid at food distribution points. 

Sky News's Gaza team observed bodies being laid out at Nasser Hospital, and people being treated, after reports of gunfire at one aid point near the Netzarim corridor, in the middle of Gaza.

Aid points criticised as 'death traps'

Rabih Abed-Rabo, a Palestinian man, told Sky News that tens of thousands of people had gone to the site to seek food. 

"I'm really thanking God I managed to get this bag. I have to feed 15 people. We've been trying for three months," he said. 

"I went back and forth to that area 10 times. Near the tanks, near the Israelis, through intense gunfire. Thank God."

The Gaza Health Ministry says that in total, 549 people have been killed at the food distribution centres since March.  

The aid stations are operated by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a private organisation backed by Israel and now funded directly by the US too. 

A UN official has described them as "death traps".

The IDF did not comment on the latest incident but told Sky News: "The Ministry of Health in Gaza is controlled and directed by Hamas, and is therefore subject to its agenda. In consequence, as has been proved and demonstrated repeatedly, the data of the Ministry is replete with inconsistencies and false determinations."

Mossad praises 'historic' Iran operation

In a rare public statement, Mossad, Israel's top-secret intelligence agency, praised the "historic" operation against Iran, declaring that the threat from Iran has now been "significantly neutralised".

It says its agents have been working "shoulder to shoulder" with the Israeli military "in order to realise the goals of the campaign and to bring it to its conclusion".

Mossad chief David Barnea said yesterday that the agency will continue to keep a "watchful eye on all known Iranian projects".

"We are intimately familiar with them - and we will be there, just as we have been until now," he said.

Barnea also expressed "gratitude and esteem for our central partner, the CIA", whose cooperation helped "make the operation possible".

Iran 'partially reopens airspace'

The eastern half of Iran has reopened its airspace, aircraft tracker Flightradar24 says.

It says the western half of the country remains closed except for international flights in and out of Tehran and "special domestic flights" - both with prior permission required.