This browser does not support the Video element.
Iranian missile strikes on Friday ignited a refinery and damaged a desalination plant in Kuwait, while U.S. and Israeli forces continued targeting sites inside Iran.
As the conflict entered its sixth week, Israel, Bahrain and Kuwait activated air-defense systems amid reports of explosions near Tehran and the city of Isfahan. Oil prices kept climbing as tensions further disrupted traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.
President Donald Trump said U.S. forces will continue hitting Iran "very hard" over the next several weeks. The Navy also confirmed the largest U.S. aircraft carrier had departed Split, Croatia, and is ready for full mission tasking. The USS Abraham Lincoln remains in the Arabian Sea, while the USS George H. W. Bush aircraft carrier departed Norfolk heading for the Middle East.
Smoke rises from an oil warehouse on the outskirts of Erbil, the capital of Iraq's Kurdistan Region, following a suspected drone strike on April 1, 2026. (Photo by Gailan Haji / Middle East Images / AFP via Getty Images)
Here’s the latest from Friday:
Officials confirm fighter jet was shot down
1:20 p.m. ET: An email sent by the Pentagon on Friday to The Associated Press stated the U.S. military received notification of "an aircraft being shot down" in the Middle East.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a previous statement that President Donald Trump had been briefed but did not offer any additional information.
1 fighter pilot rescued
12:40 p.m. ET: U.S. officials have rescued one pilot after their jet was downed over Iran on Friday. A search is underway for the second pilot.
Fighter pilot ejected from aircraft over Iran
9:05 a.m. ET: A U.S. fighter pilot ejected from their aircraft over southern Iran on Friday according to a channel affiliated with Iranian state television, according to The Associated Press.
Former Iranian diplomats suggest conditions for ceasefire
6:35 a.m. ET: Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran's former top diplomat, told Foreign Affairs magazine of a potential path for a ceasefire in the with the war with the United States and Israel.
Zarif insisted Iran is still "clearly winning" the war, but Tehran "should offer to place limits on its nuclear program and to reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for an end to all sanctions — a deal Washington wouldn’t take before but might accept now."
Zarif, who currently does not hold any official position in Iran's theocracy, previously helped reach the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.
He also would likely have had to run this position past senior members of the country's theocracy in order to publish such a piece.
War in Iran
The backstory:
The United States and Israel launched an attack on Iran on Feb. 28.
Iran’s supreme leader, as well as a dozen other leaders, were killed in a matter of days following the surprise attack.
By the numbers:
Thousands of U.S. service members have been sent to the Middle East and 13 have been killed.
More than 1,900 people have been killed in Iran, while 19 have been reported dead in Israel.
More than two dozen people have died in Gulf states and the occupied West Bank. More than 1,300 people have been killed in Lebanon, in addition to 10 Israeli soldiers.
The Source: Information for this article was taken from The Associated Press and previous reporting by LiveNOW from FOX. This story was reported from San Jose and Orlando.