US media report Trump allegedly stopped attack on Iran shortly before execution
The airspace over Iran was closed for hours, US troops were redeployed from an important base in Qatar - and there was open talk of a military strike in Washington. Now the closure has been lifted.
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- Iran has reopened its airspace after a brief closure following U.S. moves that fueled a possible attack.
- NBC News reports evacuations from the US base Al Udeid in Qatar, the New York Times reports bombers on alert and possible secondary attacks.
- Trump said that Iran had halted executions, but at the same time the number of victims and the situation in the country remain difficult to verify due to information blackouts.
For hours, it looked as if the situation between the USA and Iran was about to change. On Wednesday, Tehran temporarily closed its airspace to air traffic - a measure that was seen as a warning signal in international security circles. However, operations over Iran resumed on Thursday morning, according to Iran's civil aviation authority, according to state-run media. ABC News reports that the closure was imposed by a NOTAM order and later expired.
At the same time, there were growing indications that Washington was seriously considering military options. NBC News writes that the US has begun moving hundreds of soldiers from the largest US base in the region, Al Udeid in Qatar, to other locations - out of concern of retaliatory strikes in the event of an attack on Iran. The relocation is part of precautionary measures in view of "heightened tensions", according to the statement.
There were also conspicuous movements in the air. Flight data showed that two American tanker planes took off from the US Air Force base in Qatar, according to your text with reference to flight data services. In addition, the New York Times reported that two US long-range bombers had been put on alert to fly secondary attacks if necessary. An unnamed US official later signaled that this had been suspended late Wednesday evening Swiss time.
Further action currently unclear
In this heated situation, President Donald Trump then set a new tone - at least rhetorically. He toldjournalists that the killing of demonstrators by the Iranian government had been stopped. "They have stopped and there are no plans for executions," said Trump. At the same time, he himself admitted that his information came from "very important sources on the other side" - and that it was unclear whether this was permanently true.
Trump left open the question of whether this means a military strike is off the table. "We will be watching to see how the process goes," he said.
Tehran is currently sending contradictory signals. According to the Associated Press, Iran's head of the judiciary Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei had called for accelerated proceedings and swift punishments - "If we want to do something, we have to do it quickly". Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi , however, said in an interview that there was no plan to execute people in connection with the protests.
