All language subtitles for Global.Eye.S2026E08.1080p.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.H.264-7VFr33104D_track3_[eng]

Hello and welcome to Global Eye,

a programme that brings you the
very best of our reporting

and investigations from across
the BBC World Service.

With reporters who are embedded in
their communities around the globe,

our mission is to help you make
sense of the world we live in.

I'm Carine Torbey, the BBC's
correspondent here in Beirut,

where I was born and grew up.

I've reported on the extraordinary
power shifts here

in the Middle East
for over a decade,

but the events of the last week
have been seismic.

Over the next half hour,

I'll be your guide to
what brought us to this point

and what the coming weeks
could bring.

Coming up on the programme,
Nawal Al-Maghafi reports on

the events of the last week
and looks at how BBC Persian,

banned from operating
in the country,

gets information from inside Iran.

And the ultimate act of defiance -

star of an Oscar-winning film,
Taraneh Alidoosti,

whose photo without a headscarf on

social media became one of the

defining images of the 2022
anti-government uprising in Iran,

speaks about the impact of
the protests and her time in prison.

Lebanon is the second front
in the war,

with Israel pounding large parts of

the country and displacing hundreds
of thousands of people.

This came after Lebanon's
Shia group, Hezbollah,

acting in alliance with Iran,
launched rockets on Israel to avenge

the killing of the
Iranian supreme leader,

Ali Khamenei, and retaliating

to near daily attacks by Israel,

despite a ceasefire that put an
end to another full-blown war

just over a year ago.
So how did it come to this,

an entire region now consumed
by an escalating conflict?

Nawal Al-Maghafi reports on
the events of the last week.

Operation Epic Fury,
one of the largest,

most complex military offensives
in modern history,

is a culmination
of longstanding tensions that,

on February 28th,
finally erupted into open conflict.

A short time ago,
the United States military began

major combat operations in Iran.

Our objective is to
defend the American people

by eliminating imminent threats
from the Iranian regime -

a vicious group of very hard,
terrible people.

Its menacing activities directly
endanger the United States,

our troops, our bases overseas,
and our allies throughout the world.

Israel and the US went to war with
Iran just after breakfast time,

hitting the capital
and sites across the country.

Donald Trump wants to bring down
what he described as a very wicked,

radical dictatorship. Meanwhile,
millions of ordinary Iranians

are caught in the middle.

This is a country scarred by months
of protests and deadly crackdowns.

In January, 92 million people
were cut off from the internet

following the deaths of thousands
of anti-government protesters.

Now, within hours of their attacks,

Iran once again fell under an
almost total internet blackout.

Getting accurate information
out of the country is a challenge.

This is the heart of our coverage.
BBC Persian,

which broadcasts across
multiple platforms

and is consumed by 24 million people
a week around the world -

the majority in Iran, despite being
blocked and routinely jammed

by Iranian authorities.

Within hours of the offensive,
reports came in of a strike

at a school in Minab, southern Iran,

near an Islamic Revolutionary
Guards Corps base

which has previously been a target.

Iranian authorities say 168 people,

including children, were killed.

BBC Persian teams cannot visit Iran.

They have a forensic
journalism team dedicated

to sifting through video material
that's coming out of the country.

They were one of the
first media teams

in the world to report details
of the school attack.

When I first heard about
the school being hit,

first thing come to my mind was that
where it was exactly, to geolocate

the school on the map and see,
maybe there was any other,

like, military targets around it
and it was a mistake.

So that was initial thoughts
coming to my mind.

And you could see on some satellite
images that there are marks

on the playground, that you
could see this is a school.

Initially we thought that

this is just a girls' school,
primary school.

But then we're trying to verify
the killed children.

And there was this massive
funeral for them.

And we looked at the pictures
and we realised

more than half of them were boys.

I wanted to ask you about who
was responsible for this attack.

We are digging on videos
and everything online to see

if we could see any remnants
of the missile,

so would have give us some clues
about the make of the missile.

Where does it come?

Which army uses
this kind of missile?

But so far we haven't
found anything.

And we carry on investigating,
and we are pressing both Pentagon...

Our reporter in Washington asked

the US Defence Secretary about,
did you hit the school?

And the Secretary said that we
never deliberately hit any school,

but he didn't deny it, that it
was them, and he didn't confirm it.

Thirty bombs are thought to have
hit the Supreme Leader's compound,

killing Ayatollah Khamenei
and a significant

number of other senior intelligence,
military and security personnel.

The Iranian regime hit back

in a series of attacks

aimed at the extensive network
of US bases in the Gulf,

sending shock waves
across the region.

Thousands of supporters of
the Iranian regime gathered

for the first of 40 days of mourning
for the Supreme Leader.

This was a city under attack,

but the regime maintains
a solid base of support,

and its power is centred
on a complex network

of political and
religious institutions.

Iran is not a monolith.

There are different groups of people
in Iran. There is a minority

who fully support the
Islamic Republic of Iran,

and its, you know, aggressive agenda

and anti-American, anti-Israeli
agenda,

think that Iran is right
to follow a path of resistance.

There is also another group
of people who are so fed up

with the Islamic Republic
that they are cheering the bombings,

and they think it's
a price worth paying

in order to see regime change
in Iran.

But there is also a third group,

that you may not hear from them
all the time,

who want a major change

in terms of how the country
is run and, you know,

want a different Iran and
would welcome a regime change.

But they think regime change
couldn't and shouldn't come through

bombings from 20,000-30,000ft.

Throughout the day,
Israeli forces carried out

air strikes against targets in Iran.

Again, the retaliation was swift.

Nine people were reported dead
in the Israeli city of Beit Shemesh.

America suffered its
first casualties.

Donald Trump promised
to avenge their deaths.

Yet even as Washington
hardened its rhetoric,

the conflict was
spilling deeper into the Gulf,

Iran striking targets across
at least nine countries - Israel,

Bahrain, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Qatar,

the UAE, Oman, Jordan and Kuwait.

This is a war that
most Arab governments

didn't want and tried to prevent.

And now they've found themselves
on the front line.

March 2nd saw
significant escalation,

with a new front
opening up in Lebanon.

The Lebanese Health Ministry
reported at least 50 people dead

from Israeli strikes.

And as missiles continued
to strike Iran,

the Iranian Red Crescent
reported more than 550 fatalities.

For BBC Persian,
reaching audiences cut off inside

the country
became even more critical.

We are on satellite.
We have a satellite TV.

They even try to jam that.

And we have tried
to diversify our ways of,

you know, getting
the information to people.

We have started a lifeline radio
that you can listen to on,

you know, short wave
or medium wave.

Here's the thing - there is a
need for BBC Persian in Iran

because there are no independent,
impartial media outlets in Iran,

and people rely on the BBC and
BBC Persian to have accurate,

up-to-date information.

Iran is the seventh nation
in which Trump has authorised

strikes in his second term.

The US Defence Secretary,
Pete Hegseth, said the operation

wouldn't lead to endless war.

The mission of Operation Epic Fury
is laser focused -

destroy Iranian offensive missiles,
destroy Iranian missile production,

destroy their navy and
other security infrastructure,

and they will never
have nuclear weapons.

But critics argue the White House
had failed

to make a consistent case
for why the war started,

or what America hopes to achieve.

By the fifth day,
the war had escalated

far beyond the Middle East.

A US Navy submarine torpedoed
an Iranian warship

off the coast of Sri Lanka,
raising further questions about

the legality of America's claim
that this is a war of self-defence.

For some Iranians living
under daily bombardment,

the only option was to flee.

BBC Persian spoke to some of those
crossing the border into Turkey.

Honestly,
people are completely stressed.

The situation is critical.
No-one is really themselves.

Because of the rising prices
and everything that was already

going on, people were already
under a lot of pressure,

and now that the war
has started again,

the situation has become even worse.

I don't really know
what will happen.

The only thing I do know
is that I absolutely don't

want anything to do
with the clerics.

I think most people
feel the same way.

The US and Israel argue
that their actions will pave

the way for peace and stability,

but in a country almost three times
the size of Iraq,

further violence
and instability could lead

to a new refugee crisis across
the Middle East and beyond.

As this conflict goes
into its second week,

with the news Iran has
named Mojtaba Khamenei,

a son of the deceased Supreme
Leader, as his father's successor,

BBC Persian staff focus on
what they are there to do,

despite the many challenges.

We try our best to be
there as storytellers.

Our job is to find out information
and share that with our audience

anywhere we can, and that
is what we try to focus on.

It's not easy.

You see people in tears,

you see people very upset,

and we try to support each
other as much as we can,

but it has never been easy.

If it was easy, there wouldn't
be a need for BBC Persian.

The reason there is a BBC Persian
is that there are people

who need us to do this job.

Iran's geographical location
is key to understanding

the regional and global impact
of this conflict,

in particular its ability

to curtail the flow of oil and gas

through one of the world's
most important shipping lanes,

the Strait of Hormuz.

It gives Iran huge leverage
over the world's economy.

The BBC's global journalism team has
taken a look at how the geography

of the region could affect
the future direction of the war.

This is the Strait of Hormuz.

It's what is called a choke point.

It's a narrow strategic route for
global trade that is used 24/7.

This bit here is just 39km wide.

This shipping route is how we get
20% of the world's oil and gas,

as well as 30% of urea that helps
us make fertiliser to grow food.

Iran is using its military to
disrupt traffic through the strait,

which is something
they've done before.

It's a very important trump card.

Shipping companies
are no longer going to

the Strait of Hormuz
because they're worried

their tankers or their
ships might get stuck.

Gulf countries use this strait
to import some food and products

from other parts of Asia,

so closing it comes at
a price for Iran too.

This is something the
Iranian regime has decided,

"We're just going to have to
bear the economic cost of this,

"bear the burden of this, but we're
just going to make everybody hurt

"as a consequence of this."

And we can see the
impact of that already -

the price of oil has gone up,

and you can see from this time lapse
how the strait was incredibly busy

before, and now it's not.

And there's another choke point
that could disrupt global trade.

It's not in Iran's control,

but it's close to one of its
remaining allies - the Houthis,

the militia group based in Yemen.

Ships cross the narrow Bab el-Mandeb
Strait to go through the Suez Canal

and up into the Mediterranean Sea.

The Houthis have attacked
ships in this region before.

And the alternative route -
going around the Cape of Good Hope -

is longer and a lot more expensive.

The Middle East and this region,
really, it's a key point

in the global supply chain.

It just depends how long this
conflict is going to go on for.

Could well see an impact
in terms of food security,

in terms of inflation.

So what began with strikes in Iran

has had a ripple effect
through the region and beyond.

Please raise your right hand
and repeat after me...

Donald Trump campaigned for
the presidency on a commitment

to restore America's greatness

and a pledge to stay
out of foreign wars.

They said, "He will start a war."
I'm not going to start a war.

I'm going to stop wars.

But since he returned
to office last year,

he has expanded US military reach,

removing former Venezuelan leader
Nicolas Maduro from power,

and now going to war with Iran

in what has the potential to become
the biggest US military campaign

since Afghanistan and Iraq.

But Washington and Tehran
were once close allies,

so how did their relationship
become so fractured?

Oil was discovered in
southwestern Iran

at the start of the 20th century.

This redefined the role

of the country on the global stage

and began a complex
journey with the West,

and especially the United States.

A British company that
would later become BP

set up Iran's oil industry
and business was good.

But over time, there were
growing calls from Iranians

for more control.

The problem was there was so much

wealth to be gained from the oil

that was being extracted,

that then they could see all of
that money just leaving the country,

and so it's that history
of feeling that this is oil

on Iranian territory,
under their ground,

and they're not getting any
of the benefit from it.

One of the strongest voices was
Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh.

He came to power promising
to nationalise Iran's oil,

which he did in 1951.

As a result, Britain,
supported by America,

boycotted Iranian oil, causing
exports to all but collapse

over the next two years.

Then, in 1953, American and
British intelligence agencies

orchestrated a coup to push him out.

So America saw Mosaddegh as being
someone who would develop ties

between Iran and Russia,
so, basically, it was an opportunity

that then allowed
American oil companies

to get a foothold in
the Iranian market.

The coup cemented control
of the Western-backed Shah,

or king of Iran,
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

For the next 26 years,
with support from the US,

the Shah built infrastructure,
started land reforms,

improved education and
gave women the vote.

These very fast-paced social changes
that are happening

alongside this influx of
enormous amounts of oil wealth

into the country, and we see very
fast transformations within society.

The reforms boosted the economy,

but not everyone benefited equally,

and some religious leaders felt they
were a threat to Islamic values.

Then the Shah increased
political control over society.

In Iran, under Mohammad Reza,
Shah Pahlavi becomes much stronger

and he has American support
to train up his secret police,

to interrogate people
and to try and stamp out

any possible areas of opposition.

In time, the Shah's feared secret
police, his opulent lifestyle

and pro-Western policies sparked
riots, strikes and mass protests

from across Iranian society.

And all this led to the
Iranian Revolution in 1979,

which changed the
country completely.

The religious leader
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini

returned from exile and
established an Islamic republic.

This transformed not only Iran,
but how it saw the world.

The shift from friends to
enemies starts in 1979,

partly just because of where
the revolution ended up going

under the leadership of Khomeini,
whose rhetoric was anti-American.

In November 1979,
a group of students who said

they were angry about
America's treatment of Iran

stormed the US embassy in Tehran
and held dozens

of Americans hostage inside
for more than a year.

When the hostage crisis happened,

the relationship
fundamentally changes.

Iran was no longer a friend
and overnight becomes an enemy.

In response, the US applied economic
sanctions for the first time,

banning all trade with Iran,
including oil.

Since then, US concerns
that Iran could develop

a nuclear weapons programme

have strained relations further
and meant more sanctions.

Iran has repeatedly

said its nuclear programme
was only for peaceful purposes.

There were attempts
at reconciliation,

but a breakthrough didn't come
until 2015,

when, after more than a decade
of negotiations,

Iran signed an agreement
to limit its nuclear programme.

In exchange, the US

and others stopped crippling
economic sanctions,

allowing Iran to once again
sell its oil internationally.

This fell apart during
Donald Trump's first presidency.

He took the US out of that agreement
and reimposed sanctions.

At the heart of the Iran deal
was a giant fiction

that a murderous regime desired only

a peaceful nuclear energy programme.

In June 2025,
the UN's nuclear watchdog said Iran

had breached its nuclear obligations
under the nonproliferation treaty.

Iran condemned the resolution
as political

and has always said it

has never looked
to develop a nuclear weapon.

Israel launched a series
of strikes on Iran,

resulting in a 12-day war between
the two countries.

This culminated in direct
US involvement,

including air strikes
on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Our objective was the destruction
of Iran's

nuclear enrichment capacity
and a stop to the nuclear threat.

Since the Iranian revolution,
the US and Iran

were fighting each other
in different arenas.

Diplomatic, economic, political,

espionage, cyber. The only thing
that had not happened

was the use of military force.
But he broke that taboo.

With that final taboo broken,
the course towards a much bigger

conflict was set, and the two
countries' journey

from close friendship
to deadly hostility was complete.

While access to information
from Iran remains limited,

social media has long been
a vital communications lifeline

for the Iranian opposition.

In 2022, acclaimed Iranian actress
Taraneh Alidoosti

expressed solidarity with
the Woman, Life, Freedom protests

when she posted her
picture online without a headscarf.

The image went viral
and she was taken into detention.

Speaking before the
current conflict,

she sat down with BBC Persian.

This is her extraordinary story.

CHEERING

CHANTING

A leading Iranian actress,
Taraneh Alidoosti...

She expressed solidarity with
the anti-government protests.

She's one of the most
prominent actresses in Iran.

One of Iran's most famous
female actors has been arrested.

UPROAR

SCREAMING

HORNS BLARE

CHEERING

Thanks for joining me in Lebanon.

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We'll be back next week. Goodbye.