Joe Biden was rushing back to the White House on Saturday afternoon from a weekend trip to Delaware as Israel fired dozens of drones against Israel, Ednews reports via The Guardian.
The drones were understood to be heading towards Israel, just a few hours after theWhite House had first announced the US president was returning to Washington “to consult with his national security team about events in the Middle East” amid the heightened tension between Israel and Iran.
The US president had been due to spend the weekend in Delaware at his residence in Rehoboth Beach but early on Saturday afternoon set off at short notice to return to the White House.
This followed Biden saying on Friday that he expects an Iranian attack on Israel “sooner rather than later” and issued a last-ditch message to Tehran, saying: “Don’t.”
Earlier on Saturday, Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard Corps in the strait of Hormuz, 50 nautical miles off the coast of the United Arab Emirates, seized an Israeli-affiliated container ship.
The ship’s operator, the Italian-Swiss group MSC, later confirmed that Iranian authorities had boarded it, rappelling from a helicopter. The White House condemned the seizure of the British-owned vessel.
National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said the US strongly condemned the seizure and urged Iran to release the ship and crew immediately.
“We will work with our partners to hold Iran to account for its actions,” she said, warning that “seizing a civilian vessel without provocation is a blatant violation of international law and an act of piracy.”.
Iran has threatened reprisals against Israel for a strike on the Iranian consulate in Syria on 1 April, in which seven members of the Revolutionary Guards including two generals were killed, sparking fears that an already volatile climate in the Middle East, with Israel and Hamas in Gaza at war, could quickly spiral further.
Lloyd Austin, the US defense secretary, spoke with Yoav Gallant, the Israeli defense minister, on Saturday to discuss urgent regional threats in the Middle East and “reiterated unwavering US support for Israel’s defense”, according to the Pentagon.