From New York, this is Democracy Now.

We have the strongest and most powerful by far, military in the world, and we will

easily prevail. We're already substantially ahead of our time projections, but whatever the

time is, it's okay, whatever it takes. The U.S. is sending more troops and fighter jets to the Middle East as the death toll

mounts in the region after the U.S. and Israel launched an unprovoked attack on Iran four days

ago. Iranian drones have hit U.S. embassies and Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, while Israeli troops

move deeper into Lebanon. This comes as Secretary of State Marco Rubio defends the preemptive

U.S. strikes on Iran.

The President made the very wise decision. We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action. We knew that

that would precipitate an attack against American forces. And we knew that if we didn't

preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.

We'll get the latest on the U.S. Israeli attacks on Iran and look at the escalating regional

war. Plus, we speak to economist Michael Hudson,

who says the U.S. Israeli attack was to prevent peace not to advance it. All that and more coming

out.

Welcome to Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, the War and Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman.

Iran's state broadcaster says U.S. and Israeli attacks have killed 787 people since President Trump

joined Prime Minister Netanyahu in a massive bombing campaign, striking 153 cities and more than 500 sites across Iran since Saturday.

Much of the violence is directed at Iran's capital, Tehran, where thunderous explosions rang out

for a third night in a row and into the daylight hours.

Residents woke to scenes of widespread destruction with city

streets littered with debris from collapsed buildings. One attack hit Nulipar Square in eastern

...