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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran's president said Saturday that a demand by the United States for an unconditional surrender is a "dream that they should to take to their grave."

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President Masoud Pezeshkian made the statement in a prerecorded address aired by state television.

He also apologized for Iran's attacks on regional countries, insisting that Tehran would halt them and suggesting they were caused by miscommunication in the ranks. His statement aired after repeated attacks Saturday morning on Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Also Saturday, long-haul carrier Emirates said that "'all flights to and from Dubai have been suspended until further notice" after an Iranian attack earlier in the morning.

Passengers at Dubai International Airport, the world's busiest for international travel, heard a boom while sheltering in train tunnels at the massive facility.

Emirates has been trying to get its sprawling travel network up and running after several days of halting flights over the war.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP's earlier story follows below.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Intense Iranian fire targeted the Gulf Arab states early Saturday as Israel and the United States kept up their airstrikes targeting the Islamic Republic.

There was no foreseeable end to the fighting. U.S. President Donald Trump's administration approved a new $151 million arms sale to Israel after Trump said he would not negotiate with Iran without its "unconditional surrender" and U.S. officials warned ofa forthcoming bombing campaignthey said would be the most intense yet in the weeklong conflict.

Iran's U.N. ambassador said the country would "take all necessary measures" to defend itself.

Associated Press video showed explosions flashing and smoke rising over western Tehran as Israel said it had begun a broad wave of strikes. Also early Saturday, loud booms sounded in Jerusalem and incoming missiles from Iran had people heading to bomb shelters across Israel.

There were no immediate reports of casualties by Israel's emergency services.

The U.S. and Israel have battered Iran with strikes, targeting its military capabilities, leadership and nuclear program. The stated goals and timelines for the warhave repeatedly shifted, as the U.S. has at times suggested it seeks to topple Iran's governmentor elevate new leadership from within.

Iran strikes Gulf States as fighting spreads

In a sign of the widening nature of the conflict, sirens sounded early Saturdayin Bahrainas Iranian attacks targeted the island kingdom. AndSaudi Arabiasaid it destroyed drones headed toward its vast Shaybah oil field and shot down a ballistic missile launched toward Prince Sultan Air Base, whichhosts U.S. forces.

In Dubai, several blasts were heard Saturday morning and the government said it had activated air defenses. Passengers waiting for flights out at Dubai International Airport, the world's busiest for international travel, found themselves ushered down into train tunnels at the sprawling airfield after the alert sounded.

Qatar's energy minister, Saad al-Kaabi, warned in an interview with the Financial Times that the war could "bring down the economies of the world," predicting a widespread shutdown of Gulf energy exports that could send oil to $150 a barrel.

The price for a barrel of benchmark U.S. crude rose above $90 on Friday for the first timein more than two years.

Writing for the Qatar-funded satellite news network Al Jazeera, a regional analyst warned Iran was making "a strategic miscalculation of historic proportions." Al Jazeera, a pan-Arab satellite news network owned and funded by Qatar's government, has been used in the past to signal Doha's opinions on regional matters.

Sultan al-Khulaifi, a senior researcher at the Center for Conflict and Humanitarian Studies, wrote: "By spreading the conflict to the Gulf, Tehran is doing precisely what Israel could not do alone: steering the war away from the Israeli-Iranian axis and transforming it into a confrontation between Iran and its Arab neighbors."

On Saturday, the defense minister of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan's army chief met to discuss ways to stop the attacks coming from Iran, the state-run Saudi Press Agency reported. Saudi Prince Khalid bin Salman, a son of King Salman, talked with Field Marshal Asim Munir in Riyadh about the Iranian attacks. Saudi Arabia and nuclear-armed Pakistan have signed a mutual defense pact that defines any attack on either nation as an attack on both.

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Russia is providing information to Iran, officials say

Russia has provided Iran with information that could help Tehran strike American warships, aircraft and other assets in the region, according to two officials familiar with U.S. intelligence on the matter.

The people, who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity, cautioned that the U.S. intelligence has not uncovered that Russia is directing Iran on what to do with the information.

Still, it's the first indication that Moscow has sought to get involved in the war.

Trump says US will help rebuild Iran once it has 'ACCEPTABLE' leaders

In a social media post Friday, Trump said "There will be no deal with Iran except UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!" After a surrender, "and the selection of a GREAT & ACCEPTABLE Leader(s)," he wrote, the U.S. and its allies will help rebuild Iran, making it "economically bigger, better, and stronger than ever before."

Those comments were likely to raise further questions about the endgame of the war. The fighting has killed at least 1,230 people in Iran, more than 200 in Lebanon and around a dozen in Israel, according to officials in those countries.Six U.S. troopshave been killed.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian wrote on social media that "some countries" had begun mediation efforts, without elaborating.

Iranian state television reported Friday that a leadership council had started discussing how to convene the country's Assembly of Experts, which willselect the new supreme leader.

US official warns that 'biggest bombing' is coming

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a television interview on Friday that the "biggest bombing campaign" of the war was still to come.

Israel has said that over the past week it has heavily bombed an extensive underground bunker that Iranian leaders had planned to use during the hostilities.

New information surfaced suggesting that a deadly Feb. 28 explosion at a school in the Iranian city of Minab, some 1,100 kilometers (680 miles) southeast of Tehran, was likely caused by U.S. airstrikes. The information included satellite images, expert analysis, a U.S. official and public information released by U.S. and Israeli military forces.

Iranian state media has said more than 165 people were killed in the blast, most of them of children.

Iran has blamed Israel andthe U.S.for the explosion. Neither country has accepted responsibility, though Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has said the U.S. is investigating.

Fighting with Israeli troops reported in eastern Lebanon

The Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah said its fighters clashed with an Israeli force that landed late Friday in the mountains of eastern Lebanon. The Lebanese Health Ministry said at least three people were killed.

Israel did not acknowledge the fighting, and its military did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Israel has carried out waves of airstrikes on the southern suburbs of Beirut, where Hezbollah has a large presence but which is also home to hundreds of thousands of civilians.

Lebanon's Health Ministry said at least 217 people have been killed by Israeli strikes since Monday and 798 wounded.

Roads in the Lebanese capital were choked with evacuating traffic as smoke rose over the city's southern districts. Two hospitals evacuated patients and staff.

"What can we do? We prayed here under the tree. During the night, we slept in the car because there is no place to stay," Jihan Shehadeh, one of the tens of thousands of displaced, said.

Metz reported from Ramallah, West Bank, Rising from Bangkok and Abou AlJoud from Beirut. Associated Press journalists around the world contributed.

HONG KONG (AP) — A subsidiary of a Hong Kong-based company that has lost control of two critical ports on the Panama Canal said it is seeking $2 billion of compensation in damages from Panama over its "illegal" takeover of the ports.

Panama Ports Company, a unit of Hong Kong's CK Hutchison Holdings, said in a Friday statement that it is demanding the sum underinternational arbitration proceedingsthat it had already started.

Panama's government last weekseizedcontrol of the Balboa and Cristobal ports on each end of the Panama Canal, a crucial waterway for maritime trade, after the country's Supreme Courtdeclaredearlier that a concession allowing the Panama Ports Company to run the pair of ports was unconstitutional.

Panama Ports Company operated the two ports since 1997 and had only renewed its concession in 2021 for another 25 years. Beijing and Hong Kong's governmentshad also hit backat Panama over the seizure of the two ports.

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The two ports came into the spotlight after U.S. PresidentDonald Trump,early last year, accused China of "running" the Panama Canal.

After CK Hutchison announceda dealin March last year that it would sell the bulk of their dozens of global ports, including the two Panama ports, to a consortium that involved U.S. investment firm BlackRock in a $23 billion deal, Beijing was quick to protest and the deal has been largely stalled over the past months.

CK Hutchison and the Panama Ports Company "will not relent and they are not coming for some token relief – they will assert all of their rights and damages they are due because of the radical breaches and anti-investor conduct of the Panamanian State," Friday's statement said.

In the statement, Panama Ports Company also said the Panamanian state had previously misstated the compensation figure sought in press comments. Panama Economy Minister Felipe Chapman had earlier said the company wasseeking $1.5 billionin compensation.

In a separate statement on Friday, CK Hutchison accused Panama of occupying the two ports andtaking the propertyand personnel of the Panama Ports Company "without transparency." The company also said it would continue to "pursue recourse to available national and international legal proceedings" on the matter.

Severe storms brought damaging tornadoes to parts of the central US Thursday and Friday, shredding buildings into piles of debris and killing at least eight people.

In southwestern Michigan Friday afternoon, four people were killed and others injured as severe thunderstorm activity kicked up a destructive tornado.

Three were killed and 12 others injured when the tornado ripped through the Union Lake area, the Branch County Sheriff's Office told The Associated Press. Several people were sent to the hospital, the AP said, although the extent of their injuries was not immediately clear.

Another person was killed and several others injured after the tornado touched down in nearby Cass County, officials said in anews release. Several large structures were damaged and a local state of emergency was enacted, they added.

The tornado was fueled by a lonesupercellthunderstorm and was tagged with a rare "particularly dangerous situation" designation by the National Weather Service as it tracked near Three Rivers, Michigan.

The State Emergency Operations Center was activated after damage was reported in Branch, Cass and St. Joseph counties,Michigan State Police said.

A tornado in the Three Rivers area launched fragments of buildings into the air and peeled large sections of the roof off a storage facility, video shows. It's unclear if anyone was injured. CNN has reached out for more information.

In Union City, east of Union Lake, video shows massive pieces of debris flying in the air as someone in the background says, "There goes a house."

The Michigan fatalities follow reports of a deadly tornado striking Oklahoma overnight Thursday, killing a mother and daughter.

On Friday, another round of dangerous storms killed two people in Beggs, Oklahoma, theOkmulgee County Sheriff's Officesaid.

As of late Friday, "all persons are accounted for and there are no more missing persons," Sheriff Eddy Rice said in a statement.

The most significant threat for dangerous storms peaked Friday afternoon and evening in parts of the Plains and Mississippi Valley.

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Storm threat stretches from Texas to Wisconsin

A broad area from Wisconsin to as far south as Texas was under the threat of severe storms through Friday evening.

The most significant storms were most likely in a Level 3 of 5 risk area for parts of seven states in the Central US, including Kansas City; Springfield, Missouri; Fayetteville, Arkansas; and Tulsa, Oklahoma.

The storms are being fueled by unusually warm air for early March along with a surge of energy from a shift in the jet stream. Record high temperatures were possible in dozens of cities on Friday from Chicago into the Southeast.

The ingredients fueling Friday's threat will lose a bit of their steam on Saturday. Still, there could be at least a smattering of severe storms, especially from Texas to the lower Mississippi Valley and in the eastern Great Lakes.

Wind capable of knocking down trees or power lines is the main concern for all threatened areas Saturday, including Houston and Buffalo, New York. The chance of a tornado is low, but we can't completely rule an isolated one out. Texas could also see isolated large hail.

Thursday's deadly tornado

A mother and daughter were killed Thursday night in western Oklahoma when their vehicle was struck by a tornado at the start of the two-day outbreak of severe storms underway in the Plains and Midwest.

The two were traveling near State Highway 60 and 243 Road west of Fairview, Oklahoma, when they were hit by the tornado, Major County Sheriff Tony Robinson told CNN.

Atornado warningwas in effect for part of Major County between 8 and 9 p.m. CT. The storms also blew over a semi-trailer in the county, which is about 80 miles northwest of Oklahoma City, according to a report from theNational Weather Service.

Thursday night's storms spawned a total of seven tornado reports from the Texas Panhandle to south-central Kansas. Hail the size of golf balls or larger also pelted the region.

In Grant County, Oklahoma, a reported tornado downed trees, power lines and damaged structures, according to reports from theWeather Service.

CNN's Ruben Correa, Taylor Romine, Hanna Park and Meteorologist Briana Waxman contributed to this report.

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By Jasper Ward and Alexandra Valencia

WASHINGTON/QUITO, March 6 (Reuters) - The U.S. and Ecuador carried out a joint operation targeting drug trafficking ‌operations in the South American country, authorities in both countries ‌said on Friday, with the U.S. calling the move "lethal kinetic operations."

Neither the U.S. Southern Command, ​a branch of its military that oversees forces in Latin America, nor Ecuador's defense ministry, said if anyone was killed or captured in the strike, which Ecuador dubbed operation "Total Extermination."

The operations used helicopters, aircraft, river boats and drones ‌to locate and bomb ⁠a drug traffickers' training camp in north-east Ecuador near the Colombian border, Ecuador's defense ministry said in a statement.

The ⁠camp belonged to the Comandos de la Frontera (CDF), a Colombian crime group made up of FARC dissidents, and had a capacity for 50 people, it ​added.

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Ecuadorean President ​Daniel Noboa has made a military ​crackdown on organised crime a ‌cornerstone of his administration, and his government imposed tariffs on its larger neighbor Colombia, accusing it of not doing enough to fight drug trafficking.

He is set to travel to Miami this weekend to take part in the Trump administration's "Shield of the Americas" summit, which brings together many right-wing ‌leaders across the region with a focus ​on regional security and organized crime.

"The United ​States is a key ally ​in this fight," the defense ministry said.

"At the request ‌of Ecuador, the Department of War ​executed targeted action to ​advance our shared objective of dismantling narco-terrorist networks," Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell wrote on X.

The operation followed a similar U.S-Ecuadorean operation ​announced by the U.S. ‌Southern Command earlier this week.

(Reporting by Jasper Ward in Washington, Alexandra ​Valencia in Quito and Sarah Morland in Mexico City; Editing ​by Christian Martinez and Diane Craft)

By Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON, March 6 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump's administration said on Friday a Colombian reporter for a Spanish-language news outlet in Tennessee, arrested by federal immigration ‌agents, will get due process.

The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested Estefany Maria Rodriguez ‌Florez, a journalist for Nashville Noticias, in the state capital on Thursday. She was taken to an ICE detention center ​and remains in custody.

ICE accuses her of violating her visa conditions. A lawyer for her was cited by local media as saying that "up until now, she hasn't had a case with ICE charging her with anything."

Rodriguez Florez has lived in the U.S. for five years and "frequently reports on stories critical ‌of ICE," her lawyers said ⁠in an emergency petition filed in federal court, saying she was arrested without a warrant.

ICE officers had an "administrative warrant" at the time of the arrest ⁠on Wednesday, an ICE spokesperson and a spokesperson of the Department of Homeland Security, of which ICE is a part, said on Friday.

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"She will receive full due process and remains in ICE custody pending the ​outcome ​of her immigration proceedings," the DHS spokesperson said.

ICE has ​been at the heart of Trump's ‌immigration crackdown, which rights advocates say violates free speech and due process, and has created an unsafe environment. Trump says his policies aim to curb illegal immigration and improve domestic security.

Rodriguez Florez had a meeting scheduled for March 17 with ICE's Enforcement and Removal Operations, her lawyers said. ICE previously twice rescheduled a meeting with her on her case, once due to a winter ‌storm and again when an agent could not find ​her appointment in the system.

Nashville Noticias said the reporter was ​with her husband outside a gym ​on Wednesday when the vehicle they were in, which was marked with the ‌media outlet's logo, was surrounded and she ​was detained.

Rodriguez Florez arrived ​in the U.S. on a tourist visa, filed for political asylum, later married a U.S. citizen and has a valid work permit, her lawyers say, adding that she and ​her husband have filed for permission ‌to adjust her status to lawful permanent resident.

The Trump administration alleges she was not ​authorized to stay in the U.S. beyond 2021 on her tourist visa.

(Reporting by ​Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by William Mallard)

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Daniel Hernandez's grocery store in south Minneapolis has served Latino families for over 5 years, but he says it's on the verge of closing due to lasting economic damage from the nation's largest immigration enforcement crackdown.

Noem Minnesota

Many of Hernandez's customers have continued to stay home or drastically reduce their spending, and 10 of the 12 Latino small businesses that rent space from him remain shuttered, he said in an interview Friday. Even though President Donald Trump's administration scaled back the crackdown earlier, and the presidentfired Kristi Noemas homeland security secretary on Thursday, many are still feeling the ripple effects.

Hernandez, an immigrant from Mexico, said only one business, an Ecuadorian ice cream shop, has been able to reopen since December,when the immigration crackdown began.

"I don't know if my business will survive, being honest," Hernandez said. "The amount of damage is so big that I am afraid."

The fall of Noem

Noem was pushed out amid mounting criticism over her leadership, including her handling of the crackdown and the aftermath of the shooting deaths of two Minneapolis residents by federal officers, Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

It's not clear how many Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal officers are left in Minnesotaafter peaking around 3,000at the height of the surge. Noem put the number at 650 in her congressional testimony this week.

But U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar told Minnesota Public Radio that White House border czar Tom Homan called her to say that total was incorrect, and they've cut backto their original numberof a little over 100 ICE officers, plus some additional agents working on fraud investigations.

ICE and Homeland Security officials did not immediately respond to emails seeking details Friday.

Many businesses are still struggling

Like Hernandez's Colonial Market, many businesses owned by immigrants or that cater to them are still struggling from sharp drops in sales.

"Instead of spending $150, now they spend $30, $40," Hernandez said.

Other customers stopped coming in altogether — either because they were afraid of being detained, regardless of their legal status, or because money is tight from being unable to work.

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said last month that small businesses have collectively lost tens of millions of dollars in revenue. He estimated the federal immigration operation cost thecity's economy $203 millionin January alone and led 76,000 people to experience food insecurity.

Activists credit community organizing

"We warn our community that the fight is not over," said Jaylani Hussein, a Somali American who is executive director of the Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, at a news conference Friday. "It is a good day to say good riddance to Kristi Noem. But it's not a good day to walk away from the fight."

The sense among many activists is that the intense community organizing against the surge played a decisive role in the administration backing down. And they say it sparked the formation of strong neighborhood networks that will live on and continue to push for social justice.

Minneapolis resident Patty O'Keefe, who wasdetainedin January for following a federal officer's vehicle, said she's happy to see Noem go but it will take more to bring about real change.

"It's a sign that we're winning, that the Trump administration feels like they have to make a change to save face because they're losing public support and losing the narrative," she said. "And I think it's a testament to the hard work of Minnesotans who fought back against this war of political retribution and xenophobia that has been and continues to be waged against us."

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Brandon Sigüenza, who was detained with O'Keefe, said the mood isn't celebratory because the crackdown is ongoing.

"I don't think Minneapolitans are necessarily dancing in the streets. Because there's still no justice for Renee Good, there's still no justice for Alex Pretti," Sigüenza said.

Minneapolis psychologist Lucy Olson helped organize a covert grassroots network that swelled to 2,000 volunteers assisting around 500 immigrant families with legal matters, shelter, food and rent assistance. She said that after the crackdown, the mutual aid systems that formed will continue to respond to community needs.

"For those of us who had the honor of participating as volunteers, I think we will never be the same," Olson said. "I think there's been cross-cultural friendships, the opportunity to build out neighborhood networks that have changed the face of our city."

Charges still against 39 indicted in church protest

Nekima Levy Armstrong,a local civil rights activist and lawyer, said at the news conference with Hussein that Noem should have been fired after the deaths of Good and Pretti.

Levy Armstrong, an ordained nondenominational Christian reverend, is also one of39 people indictedfor their alleged roles in aprotest in Januaryat a St. Paul church where a pastor, David Easterwood, is a top local ICE official. She said that she'd been praying for a day like Thursday when Noem was fired.

"So while we celebrate the fact that this woman has been removed from her high perch — where she thought she was untouchable, she thought she could literally allow these agents to get away with murder — we recognize that this system is very broken," Levy Armstrong said.

Safety for school children

Brenda Lewis, superintendent of Fridley Public Schools in suburban Minneapolis, said Noem's firing "doesn't really matter" because the safety of children in her school district is still impacted.

Fridley, which has students from many Somali and Ecuadorian families, has been the site of heightened ICE activity over the past two months. Federal vehicles were found in neighborhoods near the schools and at the homes of school board members.

Of the around 2,700 students in the district, more than 112 have unenrolled, Lewis said. Another 400 are in virtual learning. The district has also lost $130,000 in revenue because of lower participation in meal programs.

"It's not a Democrat or a Republican issue," Lewis said. "It's about children's safety, and we need to really come together and ensure that this absolute removal of safety for school children by a federal agency can never ever happen again in the state or the country."

GOP lawmakers in Minnesota have muted reaction

While the state's top Republican leaders had generally supported Noem's leadership of the surge, they've been mostly silent on her downfall. A message seeking comment from U.S. House Majority Whip Tom Emmer — the state's most powerful Republican — was not immediately returned Friday.

But GOP state Sen. Jim Abeler, a moderate from suburban Anoka, noted that he wrote Noem in January expressing "grave concerns" about actions by some of her officers in Minnesota.

"With her departure, I hope that what happened in Minnesota won't happen anywhere else," Abeler said in a statement.

Brook reported from New Orleans, while Raza reported from Sioux Falls, S.D.

By Jasper Ward and Alexandra Valencia

WASHINGTON/QUITO, March 6 (Reuters) - The U.S. and Ecuador carried out a joint operation targeting drug trafficking ‌operations in the South American country, authorities in both countries ‌said on Friday, with the U.S. calling the move "lethal kinetic operations."

Neither the U.S. Southern Command, ​a branch of its military that oversees forces in Latin America, nor Ecuador's defense ministry, said if anyone was killed or captured in the strike, which Ecuador dubbed operation "Total Extermination."

The operations used helicopters, aircraft, river boats and drones ‌to locate and bomb ⁠a drug traffickers' training camp in north-east Ecuador near the Colombian border, Ecuador's defense ministry said in a statement.

The ⁠camp belonged to the Comandos de la Frontera (CDF), a Colombian crime group made up of FARC dissidents, and had a capacity for 50 people, it ​added.

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Ecuadorean President ​Daniel Noboa has made a military ​crackdown on organised crime a ‌cornerstone of his administration, and his government imposed tariffs on its larger neighbor Colombia, accusing it of not doing enough to fight drug trafficking.

He is set to travel to Miami this weekend to take part in the Trump administration's "Shield of the Americas" summit, which brings together many right-wing ‌leaders across the region with a focus ​on regional security and organized crime.

"The United ​States is a key ally ​in this fight," the defense ministry said.

"At the request ‌of Ecuador, the Department of War ​executed targeted action to ​advance our shared objective of dismantling narco-terrorist networks," Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell wrote on X.

The operation followed a similar U.S-Ecuadorean operation ​announced by the U.S. ‌Southern Command earlier this week.

(Reporting by Jasper Ward in Washington, Alexandra ​Valencia in Quito and Sarah Morland in Mexico City; Editing ​by Christian Martinez and Diane Craft)