WASHINGTON, March 10 (Reuters) - The U.S. military "eliminated" 16 Iranian mine-laying vessels ⁠near ⁠the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, the ⁠U.S. Central Command said in a statement, as President Donald Trump warned that any ​mines laid in the Strait by Iran must be removed immediately.

Iran is using smaller crafts to lay mines in the Strait of Hormuz, two U.S. officials said.

In today’s newsletter: The U.S. military says it “eliminated” 16 Iranian mine-laying ships near the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran has continued to ship crude oil via the Strait of Hormuz to China even as the war between U.S.-Israel and Iran has disrupted broader energy supplies via the waterway.

The U.S.-centric insurance idea runs counter to the realities of an international market, according to industry executives.

Three more cargo ships have been attacked, the threat of Iranian mines still looms, and countries have begun opening up their strategic oil reserves.

Whether any mines had been laid in the Strait of Hormuz since the war began on Feb. 28 is unclear. The Pentagon said 140 American service members had been wounded, eight severely, in the war. Arlington, Va. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Tuesday would be the most "intense" day of the air war in Iran. The body of Sgt. Benjamin N. Pennington, who died from injuries he suffered during an attack in Saudi Arabia, at Dover Air Base on Monday. John Ismay Liam Stack Helene Cooper Eric Schmitt and Euan Ward Amid concerns that Iran plans to choke off the world’s access to oil, the U.S. military said Tuesday that its forces had attacked 16 Iranian mine-laying vessels near a major oil route. The U.S. Central Command said on social media Tuesday evening that it had struck the vessels near the Strait of Hormuz. A video accompanying the post showed munitions hitting nine vessels, most of which were moored at the time of the attack. Whether any Iranian mines have been deployed in the water since the United States and Israel began attacking Iran on Feb. 28 was unclear. In the 1980s, Iranian forces laid mines in the Persian Gulf that required clearance by U.S. Navy minesweepers. In April 1988, an Iranian mine severely damaged — though did not sink — an American frigate, leading U.S. forces to launch retaliatory strikes. News of the minelayer strikes came on a day when the Trump administration officials sent mixed messages about the war, including about oil transport. They were the latest in a string of muddled statements about a conflict that has so far killed more than 1,800 people and disrupted global energy markets. The confusion was typified by Chris Wright, the U.S. energy secretary, saying on social media that a Navy warship had “successfully escorted” an oil tanker through the Strait of Hormuz, where the war has slowed ship traffic. Shortly afterward, a military official said that had not happened, and the social media post was deleted. The day before, President Trump threatened to strike Iran “TWENTY TIMES HARDER” if it moved to stop the flow of oil through the strait, even though Tehran had already begun doing so days earlier. And in a news briefing at the White House, the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said that President Trump, and not the leaders of Iran, would be the one to declare that Iran had unconditionally surrendered — one of the conditions he has laid out for ending the war. “When President Trump says that Iran is in a place of unconditional surrender, he’s not claiming the Iranian regime is going to come out and say that themselves,” she said. Early in the day, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters that Tuesday would be marked by a significant increase in American and Israeli strikes on Iran. As midnight passed in the Middle East that had not appeared to take shape, though Israel did begin a wave of attacks early Wednesday local time. As Washington again struggled to come up with a consistent narrative for the war, a humanitarian crisis loomed in Lebanon, where nearly 700,000 people have been driven from their homes, the United Nations said Tuesday. Israel’s mass evacuation orders and bombing campaign have transformed the country into a major new front in the expanding Middle East war. Airstrikes in Lebanon continued on Wednesday. In Beirut and its densely packed surrounding area, tens of thousands of people fleeing Israel’s attacks on the Iranian-backed armed group Hezbollah were living in schools and government buildings. Others slept in cars and on sidewalks along the city’s seaside promenade. More than 667,000 people have registered on the Lebanese government’s online displacement platform, the U.N. migration agency said on Tuesday, citing government figures. That included more than 100,000 in the past 24 hours, it said. Israel’s military also announced a new wave of strikes in Tehran, the Iranian capital, on Tuesday, after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that he hoped the Iranian people would oust the Islamic republic. “Ultimately, it is up to them” when the war ends, he said. Some Iranians said the strikes overnight Monday into Tuesday were among the worst so far. “It seems they are striking everywhere: homes, schools, mosques, hospitals,” said one resident, Javad, who asked to withhold his full name out of concern for retaliation. Here’s what else we’re covering: American injuries: The Pentagon said on Tuesday that Iranian strikes, which have killed seven U.S. service members since the war with the United States and Israel began, had also wounded 140 U.S. service members, eight severely. Russian oil: The Trump administration has started to loosen restrictions on Russian oil exports in a bid to temper rising gas prices, in the latest signal that the consequences of the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran were cascading into other crises. The easing of Russian oil sanctions, which were intended to help force an end to the war in Ukraine, includes a 30-day waiver for India to buy Russian oil already at sea without retaliation from Washington. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said the United States was considering lifting more sanctions on Russian oil. Death toll: U.S. and Israeli strikes have killed about 1,300 people in Iran, according to Iranian officials, while Iranian attacks across the Middle East have killed at least 30. Israeli strikes have killed more than 500 people in Lebanon, state media reported. U.S. casualties: Iranian strikes have killed seven American troops, and injured 140 U.S. service members overall, the Pentagon said on Tuesday. Of that number, military officials said 108 have returned to duty, but eight are severely injured. Read more › Health fears: Strikes on Iranian fuel depots led to dark plumes of smoke, black rain and sanitary concerns for local residents. “The war has entered our throats,” one said. Read more › Sirens sounded around the Middle East late on Tuesday night and into early Wednesday morning as Israel and the United States kept up their attacks on Iran, while Iranian forces retaliated, targeting Israel and American allies in the region. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps said late on Tuesday that it was beginning the 35th wave of its operation, attacking American military bases in the Middle East and locations in central Israel, according to Tasnim, a news agency affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards. The Israeli military also said late on Tuesday that it had begun “an additional wave” of strikes on Iranian government targets in Tehran. About 20 minutes later, the Israeli military announced that it had identified missiles coming from Iran and had sent directives for the public to shelter in protected spaces. And the practice repeated shortly thereafter, with the Israeli military telling residents they were free to leave protected spaces, only to send some people back to shelters an hour later. In Lebanon, residents of Beirut, the capital, reported explosions from Israeli airstrikes targeting Dahiya, a densely populated area on the southern outskirts of the city known as a stronghold of the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah. The explosions were seen and heard across the city and continued for hours, residents said. Residents said the explosions started in the afternoon, several hours after the Israeli military issued an evacuation warning. The Israeli military spokesman posted on social media earlier Tuesday that Hezbollah was hiding its weapons in the area. After midnight in the Middle East, the Israeli military said it was attacking Hezbollah infrastructure in the Dahiya area “in parallel” to the attacks on Iran. Hezbollah said in a statement that it had conducted 30 attacks on Tuesday. The Lebanese Ministry of Health said that at least 95 people had been killed in Israeli attacks on Lebanon on Tuesday. Elsewhere in the Middle East, the effects of the war also continued to be felt widely. Bahrain’s Ministry of Interior warned residents to seek shelter as sirens sounded early on Wednesday morning in the kingdom. Bahrain’s Defense Force reported late Tuesday that 106 missiles and 176 drones had been intercepted since the conflict began. The Kuwaiti Defense Ministry said that it had detected five drones entering the country’s airspace on Tuesday. Qatar’s Defense Ministry said across several announcements Tuesday that it had faced seven missile attacks. Early on Wednesday, Saudi Arabia’s Defense Ministry reported intercepting four drones and seven ballistic missiles in several attacks. As of Tuesday, it had reported more than 110 drone attacks, at least nine ballistic missile launches and six cruise missiles aimed at the kingdom since the fighting began late last month. The United Arab Emirates Defense Ministry also said early on Wednesday that it was contending with a barrage of ballistic missiles coming from Iran. Late Tuesday, the ministry said that it had detected nine ballistic missiles and 35 drones through the day. It noted that since the fighting began, 1,475 Iranian drones, more than 260 ballistic missiles and eight cruise missiles had targeted the Emirates. Dayana Iwaza and Hwaida Saad contributed reporting from Beirut, Lebanon. Bahrain says an Iranian attack hit a residential building in its capital. U.A.E. intercepts drones and missiles from Iran. Israel continues to strike Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon. A U.S. Patriot air defense ⁠system is deployed in Malatya province. From left, Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Vice President JD Vance at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware on Monday.Credit...Eric Lee for The New York Times The leaders of the United States war effort on Tuesday cast President Trump as the country’s sole arbiter on the future of its war in Iran, even as Mr. Trump has offered shifting rationales, aims and timelines. Asked what would constitute Iran’s “unconditional surrender,” one of the definitions of victory Mr. Trump has offered, the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said he would be the one to determine whether that objective had been reached. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth declined to answer questions about how much longer the war would last, saying only that the American military was giving Mr. Trump “maximum options” to conduct the war and that Mr. Trump “gets to control the throttle.” The Pentagon said that in addition to seven American service members who have been killed, 140 were injured, including eight severely. Here’s what else happened on Tuesday: Death toll: At least 1,940 people have been killed since the start of the war, largely in Iran. Information on the latest death toll from Iranian authorities was not immediately available, though Tasnim, a semiofficial Iranian news agency, reported that more than 15,000 people had been injured, citing the health ministry. Lebanon: Lebanese leaders and international aid groups were warning of a growing humanitarian crisis in Lebanon on Tuesday as tens of thousands of people in Beirut, the capital, and its densely populated metro area left their homes and moved into schools, government buildings, their cars and open sidewalks. The U.N. migration agency, citing government figures, said that nearly 700,000 people had been displaced by Israeli attacks. More than 100,000 people registered on the government’s online displacement platform in just the past 24 hours, the agency said. Persian Gulf: The United Arab Emirates and Qatar said their armed forces were intercepting missile attacks from Iran on Tuesday. Saudi Arabia’s civil defense agency said, without attributing responsibility, that a drone had caused some damage after it fell onto a residential site north of Riyadh. There were no injuries, the agency said. Israel: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel addressed the Iranian people in a message on social media in which he said his country was going to “create the conditions for you to grasp your destiny.” It echoed the rhetoric he has issued since Israel and the United States began the war on Iran: that the war was giving the Iranian people a chance to overthrow their government. A man injured in an Iranian missile attack on Monday died of his injuries, a medical center near Tel Aviv said. His death brought the number of Israelis killed since the start of the war to 14, including two members of the Israeli military. Members of the Iranian women’s soccer team arriving in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, after flying from Australia.Credit...Hasnoor Hussain/Reuters Two more people affiliated with the Iranian women’s national soccer team have opted to remain in Australia, a day after five players were granted asylum in the country in the wake of an act of silent protest during an international tournament, Australian officials said Wednesday. One player and one member of the team’s support staff requested asylum on Tuesday and were granted humanitarian visas overnight, said Tony Burke, Australia’s home affairs minister. The remaining team members and many of the support staff were each individually interviewed at the airport in Sydney, without any handlers or supervisors, and given the opportunity to stay, but decided not to, Mr. Burke said. “They were given a choice,” he said. “In that situation what we made sure of was there was no rushing, there was no pressure.” The rest of the team flew out of Australia late Tuesday. One individual was speaking with family members and apparently struggling to make a decision in the minutes before boarding the flight, but ultimately opted to board the plane, Mr. Burke said. Concern for the team’s safety arose last week after players refused to sing Iran’s national anthem during their opening game of the Asian Cup tournament hosted by Australia. The first five players to be granted asylum were given humanitarian visas early Tuesday to be able to remain in the country rather than return to Iran, amid widespread calls in the sporting world, the Iranian diaspora and even from President Trump urging the Australian government to ensure the women’s safety. A commentator on Iranian state television had called the women “traitors” last week for their silence during the anthem, saying they should be severely punished. Supporters who have been in contact with the players said some of their family members had been detained or threatened. “When those players were silent at the start of their first match in Australia, that silence was heard as a roar all around the world,” Mr. Burke said Wednesday. The authorities in Australia said the five athletes were moved to a secure location by the federal police earlier in the week. The two individuals granted asylum on Wednesday were reunited with their teammates who are staying in Australia, Mr. Burke said. Image Tony Burke, Australia’s minister of home affairs, with Iranian women’s soccer team members granted asylum.Credit...Australia Ministry Of Home Affairs/Australia Ministry of Home Affairs, via Associated Press The seven individuals were given humanitarian visas that would put them on a pathway for permanent status in the country, according to Mr. Burke. He emphasized that the choice was left up to each person with the team and that government officials did not exert any pressure, facilitating conversations with family members as they made the difficult decision. “Possibly for the first time, these individuals were meeting a government that said, ‘The choice is up to you, and here is the opportunity if you want to take it,’” he said. Boats docked in a fishing area in the Strait of Hormuz in Musandam, Oman, earlier this month.Credit...Amr Alfiky/Reuters In a social media post, the United States Central Command said Tuesday evening that it had attacked 16 Iranian mine-laying vessels near the Strait of Hormuz. A video accompanying the post showed munitions hitting nine vessels, most of which were moored at the time of the attack. Whether any Iranian mines have been deployed in the water since the current war began on Feb. 28 is unclear. The United States believed that Iran was preparing to mine the strait but had not begun the operation, according to an American official. Still, the preparatory efforts spooked the Trump administration, prompting the White House order to the military to strike Iran’s mine-laying equipment. The Strait of Hormuz is a strategically important waterway that connects the Persian Gulf to the northern Arabian Sea. Iran’s southern coastline runs along the strait, and military and civilian vessels transiting through are routinely questioned by Iranian authorities via maritime radio communications when entering and exiting the gulf. About a fifth of the world’s oil transits the strait via large civilian-run oil tankers. A pause in tankers passing through the Strait of Hormuz because of security concerns since the United States and Israel struck Iran on Feb. 28, leading to a broader war in the Mideast, has contributed to a global spike in oil prices and higher gas prices for consumers in the United States. In the 1980s, Iranian forces laid mines in the Persian Gulf that required clearance by U.S. Navy minesweepers. In April 1988, an Iranian mine severely damaged — but did not sink — an American frigate, leading to U.S. forces launching retaliatory strikes. Last week, President Trump said he might order Navy warships to escort merchant ships through the Strait of Hormuz, which U.S. forces did for a period of time in the late 1980s during similar tensions with Iran. Tuesday afternoon, Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on social media that a Navy warship had “successfully escorted” an oil tanker through the strait; he deleted the post soon afterward. A military official said that no Navy warships were escorting civilian ships in the Persian Gulf or through the Strait of Hormuz. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about current operations, pointed to comments made by Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who said at a briefing on Tuesday morning that the Pentagon had not been given the task of escorting merchant ships. Today the mission of clearing mines from the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz would be assigned to the Navy’s Task Force 56 in Bahrain, led by explosive ordnance disposal sailors who operate advanced autonomous underwater vehicles that use side-scan sonar, greatly reducing the amount of time required to locate mine-like objects on the seafloor. The sailors, who are all trained as divers, can use remote-operated vehicles to investigate any suspicious objects, and then dive as deep as 300 feet to neutralize or destroy mines. Peter Eavis contributed reporting. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the Capitol in January.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York Times Senate Democrats demanded on Tuesday that President Trump immediately dispatch Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio to testify under oath on the war in Iran, saying his administration had failed to explain the objectives, scope and endgame for the sweeping military operation in the Middle East. In a letter sent to Mr. Trump, the Senate’s top Democrat and the ranking members of the armed services and foreign affairs committees noted that it has been common practice for cabinet officials to come before Congress when the country is at war. And they pointed to the dizzying series of changing explanations from the president and senior officials about the justification and goals for the military campaign, along with its high cost. “Despite the public’s overwhelming concern about this war, your administration has provided shifting, and at times conflicting, objectives for this war, refused to define the scope of U.S. operations or the measurements for success, and failed to articulate an end game,” wrote Senators Chuck Schumer of New York, the minority leader; Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee; and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the ranking member of the Foreign Relations Committee. “The mounting cost of this war requires answers to Congress and the public,” they added. As the party in the minority, Democrats have no power to summon Mr. Hegseth and Mr. Rubio to testify. But several Democratic senators have threatened to try to stall Republican legislative priorities on the floor by forcing votes on a series of resolutions seeking to limit Mr. Trump’s authority to use military force in Iran, in a bid to get Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the majority leader, to agree to hold public hearings on the war. “Public hearings would be a small but important first step to uphold your oath, to inform Congress, and to explain your actions to the American people whose sons and daughters are on the front lines of this war,” Mr. Schumer, Mr. Reed and Ms. Shaheen wrote. Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming, the No. 2 Republican, criticized the threat by Democrats to use potential votes on the war as a point of leverage, calling their strategy a “charade.” Mr. Thune did not answer on Tuesday whether he planned to hold public hearings on the war, but said members of Congress would be hearing from administration officials “on a fairly routine basis anyway,” about the war. But Democrats argued that was insufficient, noting that Mr. Hegseth’s and Mr. Rubio’s predecessors routinely appeared before congressional committees to testify on military engagements, including on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. “We’re not going to let the Senate go on with business as usual,” said Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut. “We’re not going to let the Senate be silent until they make at the very least that commitment.” Senators from both parties emerged from a classified briefing saying the administration had not provided an estimate of the running costs of the war. But most Republicans appeared unconcerned about that issue. “Obviously there’s a cost to it, but the trade-off is exponentially more,” said Senator Jim Banks, Republican of Indiana. “This has been a very effective operation so far — maybe the most sophisticated military operation that we’ve ever seen.” Speaker Mike Johnson said Tuesday that “the timetable is yet to be determined” on a Pentagon request for supplemental funding to cover the cost of the war. But Democrats were already casting doubt on whether there would be sufficient backing for such a spending package. “At this point, I am a hard no on a supplemental,” Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts said as she left the briefing. “No more money. The one thing Congress has the power to do is to stop actions like this through the power of the purse.” The calls for public testimony by the administration came as the Pentagon has said it was investigating whether the U.S. was responsible for an attack on a naval base beside an elementary school in Iran on Feb. 28 that killed at least 175 people, most of them children. Mr. Trump has claimed without evidence that Iran was responsible. “Certainly I don’t believe there is any deliberate intent to target civilians in Iran,” Ms. Shaheen said exiting the classified briefing on Tuesday. But the episode, she added, “raises concerns among the public.” Several Democrats said they would demand answers from Mr. Hegseth on whether the Pentagon had changed its policies on mitigating civilian casualties. “It’s not a stretch to say that this secretary of defense wants us to have looser rules of engagement,” said Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii. Most Republicans said they were waiting on the findings of the Defense Department investigation to weigh in on the deadly school attack. Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana was the sole Republican to harshly criticize the strike. The U.S. made a “terrible, terrible mistake,” he said in an interview on Tuesday. “I don’t see any reason right now to hide behind the investigation,” he added. “I think we ought to just look the American people in the eye and say it looks like we made a mistake, and we’re sorry.” A food distribution center for internally displaced people in Dahiya, the densely populated southern suburb of Beirut that is a stronghold of Hezbollah, last week.Credit...Diego Ibarra Sanchez for The New York Times Since Zainab Ibrahim, 45, and her family arrived at a shelter in Beirut on March 2, she said, there has been no food for the traditional pre-dawn meal that precedes their daily fasts during Ramadan. They were forced to flee their home after Israel began carrying out strikes where they live in Dahiya, a dense cluster of neighborhoods south of Beirut that is a Hezbollah stronghold. “The situation is very difficult because there is a huge shortage of services, mattresses and, especially, food,” Ms. Ibrahim said. Charities have been providing meals for iftar, the meal to break the fast. But there are already shortages. “Yesterday they brought us chicken and rice without chicken,” she said. The U.N. World Food Program has warned that the fighting engulfing the Middle East is already affecting the most vulnerable: those, like many families in Dahiya, displaced by the fighting or already struggling with rising food prices in Lebanon, Iran and Gaza. Ms. Ibrahim and her family are among the nearly 700,000 people who have been displaced in Lebanon, the U.N. said, since hostilities with Israel resumed after the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah fired rockets into northern Israel in retaliation for the killing of Iran’s supreme leader. In Iran, the war is exacerbating a preexisting economic crisis, high food inflation and food insecurity. Short of hard currency, Iran could struggle to import the food it needs, according to the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization. A resident of Tehran, Amir Hossein Bagheri, said in a post on Facebook that bakeries were unusually empty and that food prices have skyrocketed. The cost of eggs has almost doubled in price in two weeks, he said. The effects of the war in Iran have spread to Gaza, where the humanitarian situation remains dire. The World Food Program said the price of food in Gaza had increased because aid shipments were not able to enter the territory after Israel issued border closures at the start of the war with Iran. Some crossings have reopened, according to the World Food Program, but food prices remain high. “Prices here surged immediately,” said Hussain Ghaben, 37, a father of three from Gaza City. The memory of famine and deprivation during the war in Gaza is still fresh, Mr. Ghaben said. “People rushed to the markets and bought everything they could with all the money they had — people with money, of course,” he said. “I could not buy anything as I had no cash at all.” He said he had five bags of flour and cans of beans stored in his tent — enough to last his family for about three months. “I hope that is enough until the war on Iran is over,” he said. The war in Iran has already slowed ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, disrupting supply chains in the region. The interruptions could affect fuel and fertilizer prices and drive up food prices far beyond the Middle East. About a quarter of the world’s fertilizer is transported through the Strait of Hormuz, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization. The full impact on agriculture may not be seen for months, the F.A.O. said. Addressing the Iranian people in a post on X in English, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said, “In the coming days we will create the conditions for you to grasp your destiny.” The post reiterated a message he has sent since the U.S. and Israel launched strikes on Iran in late February: that the offensive was “creating the conditions” for Iranians to overthrow their autocratic government. But as the war enters its 12th day, some Iranians have described feeling trapped between the punishing U.S.-Israeli strikes and their government’s repression, as intelligence and security services continue to monitor any signs of dissent. The remnants of a police station on Niloufar Street in Tehran after it was hit by airstrikes this month.Credit...Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times In the weeks after Iranians rose up in historic numbers earlier this winter to protest the government, prisons swelled with citizens caught in a deadly crackdown. Now they, along with other prisoners, face a new threat: airstrikes from the United States and Israel. At least two places holding prisoners in Tehran have suffered moderate damage from nearby blasts, according to Iranians who spoke to imprisoned relatives. And at least one detention center has been struck and heavily damaged, according to videos and satellite imagery analyzed by The New York Times. Iranian prisons hold a mix of people accused of criminal activity and those swept up in the crackdown on political dissent. At one point in January, Amnesty International reported that tens of thousands of Iranians had been “arbitrarily detained,” but it is unclear how many are still being held. Some family members said they had been unable to reach imprisoned relatives. “We’ve entered a dark tunnel,” said Taghi Rahmani, the husband of Narges Mohammadi, a human-rights activist and Nobel Peace Prize laureate. “There’s no telling when we’ll come out of it.” Mr. Rahmani said he had learned that his wife was moved from the notorious Evin prison in Tehran to a prison in the northern town of Zanjan two weeks before the attacks began. Other families said they no longer knew where their imprisoned relatives were being held. Image Evin prison in Tehran last year after the Iranian capital was hit by earlier Israeli strikes.Credit...Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times Shailin Asadollahi said her brother, Ali Asadollahi, an award-winning poet, had also been detained at Evin after a nighttime raid on his home roughly a month ago, with no formal charges filed. But a day after the attacks began on Feb. 28, said Ms. Asadollahi, who is now based in Germany, a family member went to Evin and was told by an officer that the detainees in Mr. Asadollahi’s ward had been relocated. Family members then traveled to the Revolutionary Court in Tehran to inquire about his whereabouts only to find that the court, too, had been damaged in airstrikes. Ms. Asadollahi said that the family had not received any information from the authorities about her brother, and that other prisoners were in the same situation. “Their lives are at risk,” she said. A spokesman at the Iranian Mission to the United Nations declined to comment after he was asked on Tuesday about conditions at the prisons and the relocation of detainees. A British couple detained in Iran last year while on a motorcycle tour around the world has also been caught up in the airstrikes. The couple, Craig and Lindsay Foreman, was also being held at Evin when it was damaged, family members said. “A bomb exploded so close to the facility that the blast blew out the windows of the ward where Craig Foreman is held and sent ceiling plaster raining down on the inmates,” the family said in a statement. It added that when Lindsay Foreman was speaking to her son on the phone during the explosion, “She described a scene of mass hysteria as women dived under metal bunk beds for cover, waiting for the next strike.” Last week, the Center for Human Rights in Iran, an organization based in New York, warned that Iran had “a history of using the shadow of war and crises to carry out abuses in prisons and retaliate against political prisoners.” Iran’s leaders have made clear that they will be even less tolerant of dissent during the war. The chief justice of the Islamic Republic, Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei, warned that “any act aligned with the enemy’s will” would be punished. Text messages sent to Iranians’ phones in recent days, and shared with The Times, urged people to report anyone sharing images with “the enemy.” The United States and Israel have been striking Iran’s police stations, detention centers and intelligence offices in an apparent effort to weaken the country’s security apparatus. In Sanandaj, the provincial capital of Iran’s Kurdish region, a military compound on Shebli Boulevard was heavily damaged in strikes on the city, according to satellite imagery analyzed by The Times. A former detainee confirmed that it was the Shahramfar base, which has been used by the Revolutionary Guards and the Ministry of Intelligence. The Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, based in Norway, reported that “several detainees and Kurdish political prisoners were injured.” Shiva Amelirad, a Kurdish activist in Toronto, said the detainees were caught in the middle of the war. “The prisoners are taking hits from the Islamic Republic on one side and from the U.S. and Israel on the other,” she said. A vehicle containing the remains of Sgt. Benjamin N. Pennington at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. He was the seventh American service member killed in the Iran war. Credit...Eric Lee for The New York Times Eight American service members have been severely injured in the 11 days since President Trump began the war on Iran, the Pentagon said in a statement on Tuesday. Iranian strikes have killed seven American troops, and injured 140 U.S. service members overall, the Pentagon said. Of that number, 108 have returned to duty. “The vast majority of these injuries have been minor,” Sean Parnell, the chief Pentagon spokesman, said in the statement. “Eight service members remain listed as severely injured and are receiving the highest level of medical care.” On Sunday, the Pentagon announced that a seventh American service member had died in the war with Iran. On Monday, the Pentagon identified the service member as Army Sgt. Benjamin Pennington, 26, of Glendale, Ky. Sergeant Pennington was seriously injured on March 1 when Iran struck a Saudi military base where American troops were stationed, U.S. Central Command said. He died from his injuries on Saturday night while military health officials were preparing to transfer him to a U.S. military hospital in Germany for more advanced care, officials said. Sergeant Pennington was assigned to the Space Battalion last June. He was assigned to the 1st Space Brigade at Fort Carson, Colo. On Saturday, President Trump witnessed the return of the bodies of the first six Americans killed in the war, at a solemn ceremony at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. The six Army Reservists were killed after an Iranian drone strike Sunday at the Shuaiba port in Kuwait. Eric Schmitt contributed reporting. President Trump has left wide-open the possibilities for how the war with Iran could wind down and how long it will take.Credit...Tierney L. Cross/The New York Times Since the United States and Israel launched their assault on Iran on Feb. 28, President Trump has given conflicting indications on how long it will continue. After he said near the outset of the war that it could last “four to five weeks,” the president and members of his administration have issued shifting statements on the timeline and the goals for the war. They have at times suggested that the United States was striving to topple Iran’s government and achieve an “unconditional surrender” and will continue an assault as long as it takes. At others, Mr. Trump and his officials have delivered the message that the war had already succeeded in its objective of decimating Iran’s military. That has left wide-open the possibilities for how the conflict with Iran could wind down and how long it will take, even as some in his administration try to assure the public that the United States will not be drawn into another long war in the Middle East. Here’s a look at officials’ often contradictory statements since the war began. In an interview with The New York Times the day after the initial strikes on Iran, Mr. Trump already had contradictory visions of how the war would pan out. He said that the United States and Israel intended to continue the assault for about a month, and predicted that it “won’t be difficult.” But he did not seem to have decided on what changes among Iran’s government he would consider a victory. During a news conference at the Pentagon last week with Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mr. Hegseth suggested the campaign was being kept to a smaller scope compared with the “nation-building quagmire” of past American interventions in the Middle East. He suggested this campaign could take anywhere from two to eight weeks, not settling on a number. At the same news conference, General Caine dismissed any suggestion that the U.S. campaign in Iran might mirror the one in Venezuela earlier this year and said that the Pentagon’s military objectives would “take some time to achieve.” He added, “We expect to take additional losses.” As his defense secretary assured the United States would not be dragged into a long conflict, Mr. Trump said the United States was “substantially ahead of our time projections,” which had put the campaign at four to five weeks. But he added that the United States had the capability “to go far longer than that.” Six days into the bombing campaign, Mr. Trump took to Truth Social to demand that Iran capitulate and said that the United States and its allies would “work tirelessly to bring Iran back from the brink of destruction, making it economically bigger, better, and stronger than ever before.” That appeared to shift the timeline further, into both regime change and rebuilding Iran, even as its current leaders have expressed defiance and expanded the battlefield by striking American bases across the Middle East. ‘The achievable objectives of Operation Epic Fury we expect to last about four to six weeks.’ Later that day, Ms. Leavitt, the White House press secretary, was asked what the president would consider a surrender. She declined to give a timeline beyond the plan she said the president had laid out. But she seemed to soften his demand for a surrender, saying it would “essentially” occur when Mr. Trump concluded his war objectives had been met. After attending the dignified transfer of six American service members who were killed when Iran struck a command center in Kuwait, Mr. Trump suggested to reporters that the United States was achieving its military objectives. “We’re winning the war by a lot,” he said. “We decimated their whole evil empire.” Asked if he was worried about high gas prices, which have risen nearly 17 percent since the war began, he said he was not and that the campaign would be “short.” ‘The war is very complete, pretty much.’ U.S. markets rebounded at the start of this week after Mr. Trump told CBS News that the war was “very complete, pretty much” and “very far ahead of schedule.” But after markets closed, in remarks to Republican lawmakers gathered for a retreat in Florida and in a news conference afterward, he left open the possibility of more comprehensive aims, even as he said the war would end “soon, very soon.” “We go forward more determined than ever to achieve ultimate victory that will end this long-running danger once and for all,” he said. At a news conference on Tuesday with General Caine, Mr. Hegseth joined others in the administration in asserting that Mr. Trump alone was in charge of the timeline. “He gets to control the throttle,” Mr. Hegseth said, though he added, “I want the American people to understand is this is not endless. It’s not protracted.” Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, the press secretary again appeared to qualify Mr. Trump’s demand of “unconditional surrender.” “When President Trump says that Iran is in a place of unconditional surrender, he’s not claiming the Iranian regime is going to come out and say that themselves,” Ms. Leavitt said. She added that Mr. Trump would decide when Iran no longer posed “a credible and direct threat.” Catherine Porter visited the French foreign ministry’s crisis center in Paris for French citizens stranded in the Middle East. France steps up efforts to repatriate citizens stranded in the Middle East. Image President Emmanuel Macron of France has refused to join the American and Israeli strikes on Iran.Credit...Abdul Saboor/Reuters On the fourth floor of the French foreign ministry in central Paris, some 20 Red Cross volunteers took calls on Monday afternoon from distressed French citizens who were stranded in the Middle East. It was one of three government-run crisis centers, staffed 24 hours a day, working to repatriate tens of thousands of French citizens stuck in the region after war broke out in Iran. “Our priority is the safety of our citizens,” said Éléonore Caroit, the French minister responsible for citizens abroad, as she visited the center that afternoon. The repatriation program is one part of a muscular response to the war from the French government, which has sought to project an image of assertiveness and strength after President Trump sidelined Europe in the buildup to war. President Emmanuel Macron has refused to have France join the American and Israeli strikes on Iran, calling them illegal. Instead, he has sent defensive weapons and deployed about a dozen warships to defend allies like Cyprus, protect shipping routes off the Iranian coast and — if necessary — help with repatriations. Experts say those battle ships make up more than half the French war fleet. So far, volunteers in the French call centers have fielded more than 11,000 calls and 7,500 requests for help returning to France, Ms. Caroit said. The French government has repatriated 1,500 French nationals, using both military and commercial planes, from Egypt, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. One French plane dispatched to the region turned back because of missile fire in the area, officials said. Separately, some 15,000 French citizens have returned to the country on commercial flights on their own, the French foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, told broadcasters this week. France was among the first countries to organize repatriation flights, amid criticism of the United States for failing to act fast enough to help stranded citizens. The first French repatriation flight reached France early last Wednesday, the day before the U.S. State Department said the first American equivalent reached the United States. Initially, the State Department caused an outcry after telling stranded Americans to leave the region “using available commercial transportation,” even as several countries closed their airspace. Assistant Secretary of State Dylan Johnson said on Monday that the government had since organized over two dozen charter flights carrying thousands of Americans from the Middle East.