NPR News: 03-02-2026 3PM EST

0:00Live from NPR News, I'm Lakshmi Singh. U.S. Central Command says forces have struck more than 1200 targets since the war began early Saturday. So, the U.S. is going after Iran's key military sites. The Trump administration says Iran has repeatedly ignored warnings to hold its nuclear program. The president defended the operation again today projecting it could run four to five weeks. At least four U.S. service members in Kuwait died as a result of the war. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Kain spoke earlier today. We expect to take additional losses. And as always, we will work to minimize U.S. losses. But as the secretary said, this is major combat operations. Iranian forces have launched retaliatory strikes on U.S. partners in the region. NPR Zeyabatrawi is in Dubai. It's not just here. It's also Abu Dhabi, which is a few hours drive away. They've also been targeted, but it's across the Gulf. Now we've seen oil installations now also hit in Saudi Arabia, and in Qatar, shutting

1:00down the Saudi Arabia's biggest oil refinery. There's been some suspensions there today. Also, Qatar's LNG gas production has been suspended. Qatar is one of the world's biggest exporters of natural gas. NPR Zeyabatrawi. NPR's Camilla Domenoski reports tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has halted due to the risk of attacks. About a fifth of global oil trade passes through the Strait of Hormuz. And even more than a fifth of the world's liquefied natural gas, or LNG, used for heating electricity. Despite threats, Iran has never closed the Strait before. Claudio Gallimberti is with rice dead energy. We have not seen anything like this in pretty much the history of the Strait of Hormuz. Higher oil and natural gas prices will drive up costs for gasoline, electricity, and inflation overall. The U.S. is the world's top oil producer, and the number one exporter of LNG. So higher prices are a boon to some U.S. companies. Camilla Domenoski and NPR News. More than a dozen U.S. military aircraft have left American bases in Spain after the

2:01Spanish government denied permission for the bases to be used in the offence of Iran. NPR's Miguel Macea reports from Seville. The two military bases in the south of Spain have been used by the U.S. since 1953. What on houses and airbase? While the coastal town of Rotta is home to the U.S. Navy. A Monday, Spain's Defense Minister, Margarita Robles, confirmed that they had not advised the use of the bases to support ongoing U.S. operations in the Middle East. In this moment, the operation that is ready for the problem. Robles said that the U.S. and Israel are acting without support of an international resolution, and therefore the bases are not available to them. On Saturday, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez came out against the U.S. and Israel's operation in Iran, demanding a quote, immediate escalation and respect of international law. Miguel Macea is NPR News, Seville, Spain. U.S. doctor trading higher, the sour with the Dow up 14 points. This is NPR News.

3:01The federal government's expanding work requirements for recipients of the federal food assistance program, known as SNAP, it took effect today. Ty Jones Cox is a vice president for food assistance at the center on budget and policy priorities. New law expanded that three-month time limit to apply to older adults up to age 65, who we know are more likely to face age-related discrimination in the job market, and they tend to have more work-limiting health conditions, even if they aren't receiving disability benefits. It also expanded it for the first time to parents, grandparents, and other caretakers of kids as young as 14. The family of Baltimore native Henrietta Lacks settled their second lawsuit with a major biotech company. Lacks sells have been used to develop major medical breakthroughs like the polio vaccine and the HVV vaccines. Here's W.Y.P.R. Scott Mossione. The Lacks family have settled their lawsuit with Novartis, marking another win for the descendants of a black woman whose cells were taken and used for scientific research without her consent.

4:01The Lacks family settled with thermo-fisher scientific in 2023. The amount of both settlements has not been released. Henrietta Lacks was receiving medical care for cervical cancer at a segregated ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1951, when doctors took samples from her tumor. The doctors found they could replicate her cells outside of her body, the first discovery of its kind. Since then, more than 100,000 scientific publications and numerous medical innovations have originated from the use of these cells. Lacks' family was never compensated for her contribution to medical science. For M.P.R. News, I'm Scott Mossione in Baltimore. It's N.P.R. Listen to this podcast sponsor-free on Amazon Music with a prime membership or any podcast app by subscribing to N.P.R. News Now Plus at plus.N.P.R.