Escalation: Middle East war widens
The Intelligence from The Economist
The Economist
4.5 • 3.7K Ratings
🗓️ 3 March 2026
⏱️ 25 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The war in Iran has entered its fourth day with further American and Israeli strikes, and Iranian retaliation across the region. Now Israel’s prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu has launched a ground offensive in Lebanon. Attacks on Tehran involved the use of Artificial Intelligence, so why is the Pentagon picking a fight with Anthropic, its supplier? And Pokémon turns 30.
Watch “The Insider” on Iran: Economist experts ask what will happen next
Guests and host:
- Anshel Pfeffer, Israel correspondent
- Henry Tricks, US technology editor
- Moeka Iida, Japan correspondent
- Rosie Blau, host of “The Intelligence”
Topics covered:
- War in Iran, America, Israel, Lebanon, Hizbullah, Middle East
- Anthropic, OpenAI, Claude, Artificial Intelligence
- Pokemon, media
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Economist |
| 0:02.0 | Hello and welcome to the intelligence from The Economist. |
| 0:12.0 | I'm your host Rosie Bloor. |
| 0:16.0 | Every weekday we provide a fresh perspective on the events shaping your world. |
| 0:24.9 | Among the many striking aspects of America's assault on Iran was that it involved the use of |
| 0:29.7 | AI. Tricky thing is, the Trump administration is having a big spat with exactly the company |
| 0:35.9 | whose software it relied on. |
| 0:39.3 | Our correspondent explains. |
| 0:46.2 | And as they used to say, now for something completely different. |
| 0:51.7 | Thirty years ago, a game released on Nintendo featured a strange set of pocket monsters. |
| 0:56.0 | That spawned what is now the world's highest-grossing media franchise. Happy birthday to Pokemon. |
| 1:02.0 | First up, though. This morning, Israel launched further strikes on Tehran and on Beirut, preparing for a ground offensive in Lebanon. |
| 1:23.6 | Israeli bombs had already killed dozens of people in Beirut yesterday, in response to attacks |
| 1:30.0 | by Hezbollah in Iranian proxy on targets in northern Israel. |
| 1:37.2 | The war started by America and Israel is now entering its fourth day. |
| 1:43.1 | Iran has directed missiles not just at U.S. bases, |
| 1:45.9 | but also at cities, airports and energy infrastructure across the Middle East, |
| 1:51.1 | and most recently, the American embassy in Saudi Arabia. |
| 1:55.4 | War is rapidly engulfing the region. |
| 1:58.5 | I hear the people are taking, we're going to have an endless war here. |
| 2:01.2 | You're not going to have an endless war. Israel's Prime Minister, Biniman Netanyahu, told Fox News |
| 2:06.6 | that there's still much he wants to achieve. I said it could be quick and decisive. It may take |
... |
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