American airstrikes on Iran are not imminent, U.S. officials say, because the Pentagon is moving in additional air defenses to better protect Israel, Arab allies and American forces in the event of a retaliation by Iran and a potential prolonged conflict, officials tell the Wall Street Journal.

The U.S. military could conduct limited airstrikes on Iran if the President were to order an attack today, officials say, but the kind of decisive attack that President Trump has asked the military to prepare would likely prompt a proportional response from Iran, requiring the U.S. to have robust air defenses in place to protect Israel as well as American troops across the Middle East.

The Trump Administration has told Iran through multiple channels that it's open to meeting to negotiate a deal, a senior U.S. official tells Axios.

Turkey, Egypt and Qatar are working to organize a meeting between White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and senior officials from Iran later this week in Ankara.

Reporter: “Sir, on Iran, the Supreme Leader said today that a U.S. attack could spark a regional war. Do you have any response to that?”

President Trump: “Why wouldn't he say that? Of course, he’s gonna say that. But we have the biggest, most powerful ships in the world over there. Very close. A couple of days and hopefully, we'll make a deal. If we don't make a deal, then we'll find out whether or not he was right.”

President Donald J. Trump appears to have softened his stance recently on Cuba, telling reporters earlier at his Mar-a-Lago Resort that talks are ongoing with high-level officials and he thinks a deal will be made with Cuba.

Reporter: “Mr. President, what do you want out of a Cuba deal?”

Trump: “Well, Cuba is a failing nation. It has been for a long time. But now it doesn't have Venezuela to prop it up. So we're talking to the people from Cuba - the highest people in Cuba - to see what happens. I want the people that came here that were horribly treated by Cuba to be taken care of, to be able to go back and do what they have to do. You know, they have their family there. They haven't been able to see them in years - many, many years. So, I think we're going to make a deal with Cuba… It's in bad shape. Cuba is in bad shape. Cuba has a humanitarian problem.”

The United States and Iran have informed each other that they are ready to conduct negotiations on an agreement to end ongoing tensions in the region, a senior American official aware of the details tells N12.

Traders on Polymarket remain unconfident that regime change will be coming soon to Iran as negotiations and a potential deal now appear possible, with chances that the Iranian Government will fall before 2027 currently sitting at 32%, down nearly 10% since Friday.

ISIS-Sahel has now officially claimed responsibility for last week’s mysterious attack against Diori Hamani International Airport in the Nigerien capital of Niamey.

Wow, ISIS-Sahel has published footage of last week’s attack against Diori Hamani International Airport in Niger, with dozens of terrorists - including several on motorcycles - successfully breaching both the civilian and military sides of airport, as well as several hangers and warehouses containing military equipment utilized by the Niger Armed Forces.

During the attack, ISIS appears to have destroyed or at least damaged a Diamond DA42 Surveillance Aircraft, a Mi-171Sh Helicopter, a Hürkuş-C Light Ground-Attack Aircraft, and a Cessna. Several other commercial aircraft at the civil terminal were also damaged by small-arms fire, in possibly one of the worst security failures for Niger since the military coup in 2023.

“Midnight Hammer was a very specific mission,” Lt. Gen. Jason Armagost, the Deputy Commander of Air Force Global Strike Command (AFGSC), told reporters at the Mitchell Institute Airpower Forum on Thursday. “It was like a play in a game. It wasn’t the game writ large.”

Iran responded to Midnight Hammer, U.S. strikes last June against its nuclear sites, by launching a small ballistic missile strike against a single base in the region, in an attempt to still look strong to domestic audiences but to also deescalate tensions with the United States.

If the United States were to undertake a major air campaign against Iran, Maloney and others say, Tehran would respond with as much firepower as it could muster, deploying its arsenal of short and medium-range ballistic missiles against U.S. and Israeli positions across the Middle East.

Iran would also likely mobilize its proxy forces, directing Shia militia groups to launch attacks in the region. Israel has battered Hezbollah in Lebanon and defeated Hamas in Gaza, but Tehran could encourage Yemen-based Houthis to target tankers and launch drone and missile strikes against civilian and military infrastructure in the region, and Iraqi militias and extremists groups in Syria could also mount attacks against U.S. Forces.

- The Wall Street Journal

President Donald J. Trump has announced that the Kennedy Center, which was unofficially renamed last year to the Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, will close for a two-year period beginning July 4, 2026, for major renovations to bring the center to its “highest level of Success, Beauty, and Grandeur,” in honor of the United States Semiquincentennial.

U.S. President Donald J. Trump’s senior envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to arrive in Israel tomorrow for meetings with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Chief of General Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, two senior Israeli officials tell The Times of Israel. These meetings are expected to precede potential talks in Turkey later this week between senior officials from Iran and the United States.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has ordered that Iran immediately enter into nuclear talks and further negotiations with the United States, in order to reduce tensions in the Middle East, according to reports from the Iranian state-run Fars News Agency.

President Donald J. Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner are expected to meet Friday in Istanbul with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, alongside representatives from several Arab and Muslim countries, to discuss a possible new nuclear deal between Iran and the United States, according to two sources with knowledge and a U.S. official who spoke to Axios.

The United States Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, has been accused of wrongdoing in a whistleblower complaint that was filed last May by an intelligence official that is so highly classified it has sparked months of wrangling over how to share it with Congress, according to U.S. officials and others familiar with the matter who spoke to the Wall Street Journal.

The filing of the complaint has prompted a continuing, behind-the-scenes struggle about how to assess and handle it, with the whistleblower’s lawyer accusing Gabbard of stonewalling the complaint and the disclosure of its contents potentially causing “grave damage to national security,” one official said. It also implicates another federal agency beyond Gabbard’s, and raises potential claims of executive privilege that may involve the White House.

In a statement, a spokeswoman for Gabbard’s office confirmed that the complaint concerned Gabbard but dismissed it as “baseless and politically motivated.”