Trump weighs US strikes on Houthis after deadliest attack on Saudi in 11 years

Former Qatari Prime Minister Hamad bin Jassim Al Thani on Saturday called Iran the “main enemy” of Persian Gulf states, a sharp shift in rhetoric from his earlier advocacy of dialogue with Tehran.

“It has now become clear that Iran is our main enemy,” he wrote on X, urging Persian Gulf states to unite behind Saudi Arabia against threats originating in Yemen but directed from abroad.

In 2023, he had opposed confrontation with Tehran and advocated negotiations.

The Saudi-led coalition said Saturday that a projectile had landed near King Fahd International Airport in Dammam, eastern Saudi Arabia, hours after the Riyadh airport was hit by the deadliest attack in 11 years.

Saudi Arabia’s civil aviation authority said 12 people were killed and 309 others injured in an attack on King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh.

The attack has been the deadliest in Saudi Arabia since a 2015 mosque bombing in the eastern city of Qatif.

President Donald Trump called the Islamic Republic a "lunatic country" and said Tehran could take further action before the November 3 midterm elections to hurt him politically, warning that the US could end the conflict quickly.

"They're a lunatic country. They know that. I tell them that all the time. I say, you guys are freaking crazy," Trump said during a speech in Tennessee on Saturday, mocking Iranian leaders for repeatedly threatening to kill their enemies.

"They'll probably do a little bit extra before the election thinking it's going to hurt us, but we could end it really quick. They don't know how nice I've been to them." he said.

Mahmoud Beheshti Langroudi, a teachers' union activist and former political prisoner, was charged with propaganda against the Islamic Republic on Saturday, a day after he was summoned to court.

Several ship captains near Ras Al Khaimah in the United Arab Emirates reported receiving radio broadcasts instructing them to leave their anchorages, UK Maritime Trade Operations said Saturday in an advisory circulated on X.

For the first time in Iran’s history, revenue from crude oil and condensate exports could dry up entirely by mid-December if the US blockade remains in place, according to the head of crude oil analysis at Kpler.

“Revenues from crude and condensate will drop to zero for the first time ever,” Homayoun Falakshahi told Iran International's Eye for Iran, warning that Tehran could lose between $3 billion and $6 billion in monthly oil income.

That makes December the critical month as the last Iranian oil shipments already outside the blockade zone make their way to Chinese buyers.

According to Kpler, just eight million barrels of Iranian crude remain on the water outside the blockade, down from nearly 90 million barrels in mid-July. Falakshahi expects those remaining shipments to be discharged by around October 18.

The Pentagon has increased its official count of American military deaths linked to operations against Iran to 21, adding two noncombat fatalities to its records.

The newly added deaths include Army National Guard Maj. Sorffly Davius, 46, who died in Kuwait on March 6, and an unidentified Navy service member who died by suicide in September, the Washington Post reported Saturday. The Pentagon's updated database also lists 865 US service members wounded during the conflict.

The revision follows an earlier Washington Post investigation that reported the number of American military personnel who had died in the Middle East since the war began was higher than the Pentagon's official figures.

A Caspian Airlines aircraft previously impounded in Turkey over unpaid debt has returned to Iran, state-run IRNA reported Friday.

The aircraft had been seized at Istanbul airport over debts owed by the Iranian airline, according to IRNA.

Iran's Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei praised police chief Ahmad Reza Radan as “brave and tireless,” honoring a commander with a long record of violent repression of protesters.

The message released by state media Saturday, but dated Thursday, October 8, and issued for National Police Week, praised Iran's police force as a pillar of national security and called for strengthening its capabilities, including the use of artificial intelligence.

Radan has been under US sanctions since 2010 for his role in the violent suppression of protests following Iran's disputed 2009 presidential election. The US Treasury held him responsible for police beatings, killings and arbitrary detentions, and cited allegations that he personally participated in abusing detainees at the notorious Kahrizak detention center, where protesters died in custody.

Since returning as national police chief in 2023, Radan has overseen the enforcement of compulsory hijab and successive crackdowns on Iranian protesters. During the 2026 nationwide protests, he warned that security forces had their “fingers on the trigger” against those taking to the streets.