a number of us military personnel are injured in a missile attack by iranian—backed militants on an airbase in western iraq. iran's president vows to punish israel for an air strike in damascus that killed five iranian revolutionary guards. tens of thousands of people protest in germany against the far—right following revelations that a major party had discussed plans to deport immigrants. iam i am helena iam helena humphrey. it is good to have you with us. a number of us military personnel have been injured in a missile attack on an airbase in western iraq. us central command says an iran—backed militia targeted the al—assad airbase, which hosts american troops, with ballistic missiles and rockets on saturday evening. it says, the personnel are "undergoing evaluation

for traumatic brain injuries" — and at least one iraqi service member was wounded. this comes as tensions continue to grow across the middle east with missile attacks also reported in syria, lebanon and yemen on saturday. iran's president has vowed revenge on israel for an air strike on the syrian capital that killed five members of tehran�*s elite revolutionary guard. israel has not confirmed or denied involvement in the attack. syrian activists say at least ten people were killed altogether in the raid, which destroyed a building used as a base by iranian military advisers in damascus. here's what those who witnessed the strike say happened. translation: l was - using my asthma inhaler. my little granddaughter, who is three years old, was sitting beside me. i swear, ijumped and the inhaler hopped too. i tried to protect the little one like this. during the earthquake, it didn't happen like that. three huge sounds shook the whole area. translation: within seconds, israeli missiles descended - in a terrifying manner with a sound beyond description. a building collapsed instantly, cars were shattered, buildings demolished. it is a crime of the

most heinous kind. well, iranian proxy groups have been involved in attacks across the middle east in recent weeks. i spoke about tehran�*s aims with negar mortazavi, who is a senior fellow at the center for international policy here in washington. negar, thank you very much forjoining us here on bbc news. we know typically israel doesn't speak about its campaign against the iranian military presence in syria. but explain to us the background to this latest attack. this is a continuation of a shadow war that has been ongoing between iran and israel in syria, way before october 7. it is tangentially related to the bigger conflict we are seeing but it has escalated since the october

7 attack and israel's subsequent attacks on gaza. i see it from the big picture view as part of that a proxy war, essentially the nonconventional war, there war of attrition israel is conducting in gaza. this is in support of the palestinian cause and to raise the cost for israel. in response to this, iran has now vowed revenge. when you hear that, how do you interpret it, how much credence do you give it? what's sort of form do you think you could take? we saw a series of assassinations before this round, we saw the assassination of a hezbollah commander in lebanon, the assassination a hamas commander in beirut, the assassination of a couple of iranian — top irgc officials in syria.

and we also saw a terrorist attack inside iran and we saw iran respond to some of those by launching missiles — in an unprecedented move — launching directly from iranian soil into iraq and syria, and pakistan, in response to another separatist group that has been launching attacks on iran. what they are talking about, as far as retaliation, could look more like a direct attack and also raising, essentially, or escalating some of the attacks that the so—called axis of resistance, iran's allies houthis, hezbollah, against israel and the united states.

i want to touch on the distinction between iran acting through its proxies than carrying out attacks and claiming them, essentially. we have seen more of that in this past week. what do you think that tells us, the fact that iran is clear about being behind these latest attacks. i think iranian officials, in policy and public statements, have made it clear that their absolute redline are attacks on iranian soil. this is something that a senior adviser to the supreme leader reiterated. assassination of commanders outside is one level of escalation, but attacks on iranian, that was one of the major redlines and isis claimed the last attack. the attack on iraq, the iranians said this was a safe house or a centre connected to mossad. some of the case may be accurate, some may not, but the political messaging

was that these were some of the major redlines that had been crossed and therefore they retaliation for them is much more severe, as you also mentioned, missiles being shot from iranian soil. the last operation we saw was in 2020. this is in reaction to an assassination by the united states and in response iran shot missiles into the us base in iraqi. but it's a rare move — this is not something that iran engages in — and it sends a signal that they are escalating this further.

negar mortazavi, senior fellow at the center for international policy, thank you for speaking with us. thank you. meanwhile, in tel aviv, thousands of israelis are rallying in the streets, demanding the government does more to secure the release of hostages in gaza. protesters called for elections for a new government. the protests come as prime minister benjamin netanyahu has again insisted israel should retain security control over all palestinian territories. in a statement on saturday, he said this condition was "contrary" to a future palestinian state being established, defying pressure from the us and others to commit to future palestinian statehood. our middle east correspondent mark lowen reports from jerusalem. in gaza's skies, where bombs have rained down, not an israeli attack, but an israeli appeal — for information on the hostages seized by hamas. around 130 are still not home. how many are dead is unknown. the subtext from israel — "this is why we're still on the offensive." but in israel, at the prime minister's residence, angerfrom families of the missing who want him to do more to get them back. polls show most think benjamin netanyahu should be prioritising their release. many here still feel failed by a state created to protect them.

translation: | want to | have a country that cares for us, because our prime minister and the war cabinet doesn't. splits have spread to the top. gadi eisenkot of the war cabinet accused mr netanyahu of dishonesty by vowing total victory over hamas, adding that he was responsible for leaving israel open to its attack. a war cabinet at war with itself spells trouble for israel's leader. benjamin netanyahu's growing unpopularity at home is increasingly echoed abroad — publicly rebutting the us by rejecting a two—state solution with a future palestinian state, and refusing allies' calls to ease the offensive in gaza. israel's great political survivor is looking isolated and vulnerable. after speaking to israel's prime minister, president biden

tried to sound positive. could a possible future demilitarised palestinian state be discussed 7 there are a number of types of two—state solutions. there's a number of countries that are members of the un that still don't have their own military. a number of states that have limitations. so, i think there's ways in which this could work. fears continue over the spillover of this war. and today, it hit damascus, where syria and iran say an israeli airstrike killed members of the iranian revolutionary guard. israel doesn't comment on its attacks abroad. and so, as israeli troops pushed deeper into southern gaza, fires are being lit in different parts of this tinderbox region. and as the conflict escalates, the question is how far the flames will spread. mark lowen, bbc news, jerusalem. a neighbourhood in chicago,

in the us, has long been known as little palestine. bridgeview has shown various forms of support for palestinians in gaza. billboards and signs all around the area call for a ceasefire. but many members of the palestinian community there say they're also suffering because of the current conflict. the bbc�*s sally nabil reports. this is little palestine, or bridgeview, a suburb of chicago, illinois. a large palestinian community lives here, and their presence is visible. they are thousands of miles away from home, but closely tied to the ongoing fighting in gaza. this is the sign, this is the famous sign. since the fighting broke out in gaza, laila has had this sign in her garden. shortly after putting it up, laila, a us—born mother of three, received death threats in two consecutive letters.

the biggest change is not being able to go outside whenever i want to go outside. sometimes... sometimes i get scared that maybe a person will come and try to take one of my kids just to get back at me. i've explained to my kids, if you see somebody trying to hurt me, you run back into the house and don't try to save me. just run back. because it happened to wadea, so it could happen to me. wadea was a six—year—old palestinian—american who lost his life last october after being stabbed 26 times. the suspect, his landlord, is now to be tried for murder and hate crimes. wadea was 0dai's only child. it's here where he used to sleep when he visited his father's place on weekends. 0dai cannot get over the shock. translation: | still

hear his voice. - he used to come on saturdays, and up till now, i still stand next to the window waiting for him. i know he won't show up, but it just relieves me to wait. but it's not all tragedy for palestinians here. over the past couple of months, a few support rallies took place in chicago, where various communities came together to call for an end to the war. for palestine support rallies, these are absolutely the biggest that chicago has ever seen, especially other oppressed communities — the black community in the united states, latino community, other immigrant communities, the native communities here, asian, have always been on the side of the palestinian people. back at laila's place, the family tells me they hate to live in fear. even if the war is over, they will always feel bitter when they remember how it

meant to be uncomfortable at their own home. sally nabil, bbc news, bridgeview, illinois. let's turn now to germany, where more demonstrations against right—wing extremism have been taking place across the country. the protests have been gathering momentum over the last week. they're a response to reports that senior figures within the far—right party alternative for germany, or afd, had met in november to discuss the deportation of millions of people with immigrant backgrounds. germany is wrestling with a potentially explosive debate over whether to ban the party, which is polling second nationally. the afd says it's being smeared by opponents. earlier i spoke with hans schindler, who is senior director of the counter extremism project, a transatlantic think tank. you know, you have something of a split screen here, essentially. you've got those tens of thousands of people who came out to protest. at the same time, you've got the fact that the afd has

increased — has been doing well in the polls, particularly over the summer. how does germany feel about this party, do you think? well, thanks so much for having me. it is really a difficult, difficult political subject because part of the party are already officially declared right—wing extremists and anti—constitutional. so, the entire young wing, the young alternatives, is, for the country, declared right—wing extremists and anti—constitutional and four of its federal state organisations are declared right—wing extremists. this meeting in november that came to light a couple of days ago reallyjust confirmed the fact that we have a deeply, deeply anti—democratic strand in this party which, unfortunately, is polling between 20—30% nationally. if you take a look at what we've seen in statewide elections in recent months — you know, places like hesse, bavaria, for example — we've started to see afd come out from that popularity seat of the east, spreading more in the country. what do you think is behind

that growing popularity? well, i mean, it's the same populist agenda that many parties in europe, and some party here in the united states, is following, where you blame all essential difficult problems that everyone finds themselves in, caused by climate change, caused by the energy crisis, caused by the wars in ukraine and of hamas against israel and the situation in the middle east really on foreigners — that, basically, is the central argument that the afd has put forward since its inception and it's essentially, really, a protest party. but in difficult situations where crises and cost of living crisis are rampant, of course, protest parties always gather more votes. one thing i am curious about, though — and a distinction, i guess, between that very interesting comparison with the united states — is, you know, germany's history. i lived in germany for a very

long time and there's such a sense of awareness there with regards to the rise of the nazi party 1933. people will always say, "never again". and yet, growing support among young people. you know, are there new kind of tactics, particularly when it comes to kind of more underground, far—right — the movement there in terms of getting young people on board and supporting? well, i mean, the right—wing extremist scene has been very active in the last years in germany. since 2019, consistently, every single federal minister of the interior has said the greatest threat to democracy comes from right—wing extremism. islamistic extremism terrorism is a close second but the bigger threat is right—wing extremism. we've seen a slew of movements and groups being banned in the last couple of years from this particular spectrum. we've seen several attempts to actually conduct fairly serious right—wing extremist—informed terror plots and, in december2022, we actually did have a coup

d'etat attempt, incidentally, involving one former afd federal member of parliament. and so, how do you tackle that, then, with all of your experience in counter extremism? you know, when you see calls, for example, to ban the afd as a political party, do you think that that would tackle the cause here, the root? 0bviously, democracy needs to show that it has teeth when it comes to defending itself, right? you do not have to tolerate intolerance indefinitely. however, banning a party is an extremely difficult process in germany, and for good reasons. we had a fascist and a communist dictatorship in germany in the last century. the parties are highly protected by the german constitution article 21. that's why very, very, very rarely this has been used and even fewer times, it has worked — only in �*52, a right—wing extremist party and �*56, the german communist parties were banned. the attempts to ban another right—wing extremist party,

the npd, founded in 2003 and in 2017. although the constitutional court had stated in 2017 that, indeed, the npd is a right—wing extremist, anti—constitutional party, its poor showing in the votes — it was polling around 3% — were not justifiable enough to use this final sharpest instrument of democracy. in — of course, everyone is nervous in germany right now because we have several key state elections this year in some of the states where the afd is polling exceptionally well but a party banning process in front of the constitutional court takes anywhere — if it's fast — between 11—5 years, so it's not an appropriate instrument to deal with the immediate problem. that's why the federal president steinmeier called this weekend at demonstrations for focusing on what we can do now politically to get the votes for the afd down and don't obsess about the legal possibility of banning the party. hans—jakob schindler, senior director of the counter

extremism project. very interesting to talk to you. thank you. voters in new hampshire are getting ready to cast ballots in the 2024 us presidential primary. the vote on tuesday comes afterformer president, donald trump, dominated the iowa republican caucuses. he won 51% of the vote there, well ahead of florida governor ron desantis and former un ambassador and south carolina governor, nikki haley. three days out from new hampshire, the latest major poll suggests mr trump holds a significant edge over ms haley in the state — 53% to 36%. ron desantis is polling at just 7%. in new hampshire on saturday, mr trump surrounded himself with officials from south carolina — — nikki haley's home state — including the governor. it also comes after south carolina senator tim scott endorsed mr trump this week, having dropped out of the presidential race in november. ms haley's campaign is depending on victory in new hampshire. haley has ramped up her

criticism of mr trump. today, she even questioned mr trump's mental fitness for office, after he confused her with the former house speaker, nancy pelosi, during a campaign speech. here's mr trump's apparent blunder, followed by ms haley's response. nikki haley is in charge of security. we offered her 10,000 people, soldiers, national guardsman — whatever they want — they turned it down. they don't want to talk about that. these are very dishonest people. these things happen because guess what? when you're 80, that's what happens. you just aren't as sharp as you used to be. this isn't personal. i voted for him twice. i was proud to serve in his administration. this is the fact that have a country in disarray and a world on fire and we need to know that we not giving our kids the option of two 80—year—olds going into presidency. earlier, i spoke with hannah knowles,

reporter for the washington post, currently in manchester, new hampshire. good to have you, we just saw there, nikki haley, taking more aim at donald trump than we've seen previously, what do you think? any indications that she can close the gap on donald trump? you know, it's not looking like she is seeing much movement. i think there is a lot of excitement in recent weeks, as she was really moving up the polls, and it was as closest that anyone had got to beating donald trump, and something could still happen, but at this point we are seeing her in double digits behind in some cases and she could certainly help cement her status as that main rival to trump, but it is not looking great in terms of beating him out right here and we might have to move to south carolina. talking about south carolina, we know ron desantis has put a lot of his attention there —

what does the path ahead look like for him? the path ahead is even more bleak for desantis. he put all his eggs in the iowa basket and counted on a strong showing there, that is where he wanted to pierce the sense of inevitability around donald trump's renomination, and what happened is trump gets a little bit over 50% of the vote, desantis behind at around 20%, so not the show of force of force he wanted. it it kind of effort the disaster would've been if he can buy nikki haley, so we had this rationale to keep on going, but lots of people wonder how he could make it if you didn't come closer and iowa. talk to us a bit about the new hampshire electorate here, largely seen as more moderate, of course you have independent voters as well in this particular election. some people see new hampshire as something of a wild card

that can recast the race, but this time around, do you think that is the case? i think it will be the most interesting contest ahead. obviously we have only had one, which is iowa, but it feels like if trump is going to be beat somewhere, new hampshire seems the best place to do it right now so it could be the be—all and end—all for the stop trump movement, which is really struggled to land on a message that works. i think the challenge is, even if nikki haley does come close in new hampshire, or even beats trump, the next states, they do look different in terms of the make—up. they are more conservative, trump has a lot of support in south carolina even though it it is nikki haley home state, so it will be a tough road ahead. if there was an upset here. just talking about new hampshire and trump then, currently facing for criminal

trials, speaking to caucus goers there in new hampshire, are they concerned about trump's considerable legal battles? there's a segment of voters that want to move on from trump for sure, and they do — that's part of it, they don't want someone with baggage, even if they liked a lot of trump's policies, but the majority of the republican party here does seem willing to look past that. sometimes it is because they think it is all a witch hunt, because all these people have been coming after trump for all these years and nothing has happened and they don't just believe it will drag him down after everything they think he has fought through. so, yeah, i don't — right now we see those indictments working in his place. briefly, if you don't mind,

hannah, any particular counties — bellwethers, for example — you might be watching come election night? oh, gosh. that's a good question. you know, i don't have a specific — i think we are really interested in what happens with independents — it's such a key group for it nikki haley and she's doing a strange balancing act of trying to be the candidate that can excite those more moderate republicans and independents but also, we've seen her kind of trying to reassure reassure republicans that's not the only think i am, i actually am quite conservative, and i think she said quite recently, i'm not a moderate, and so, she's — you know, its tough to speak to both ends of the spectrum at once, i think. hannah knowles, campaigns reporter for the washington post. great to talk to you, hannah. thank you. now, before we go, take a close look at this. these are some of the best images of our world from a micro—perspective, recognised at this year's close—up photographer of the year awards. the global competition draws thousands of entries from those who share a passion for life's smaller details. you are watching bbc news. i will have more at the top of

the hour. join me then. hello there. we're in for a very stormy spell of weather for the second half of sunday into the first part of monday, all thanks to storm isha. met office have a number of amber wind warnings in force for northern and western areas. heavy rain could lead to localised flooding along with snowmelt, as it will be turning very mild indeed. but we could be looking at some significant disruption from this storm as it continues to hurtle across the atlantic towards our shores later on sunday. but sunday starts off on a fine note for many, england and wales dry with some sunshine. same, too, for north east scotland. the winds will continue to pick up, though, through the day and rain across northern ireland will spread across the irish sea into much of scotland, northern and western england and wales, so it will be turning downhill as we head through the afternoon but very mild for the time of year — up to 13 degrees in many parts of england, wales, northern ireland. storm isha continues to plough through during sunday evening and overnight. a real squeeze in the isobars across western scotland, northern ireland but lots of isobars across the charts. amber warnings in force.

gusts of 60—70 mph south west england, particularly irish sea coasts, much of wales, maybe up to 80mph north—west wales, 60—70 for northern england, maybe 80 mph in excess for northern ireland. some very strong winds expected across scotland through the night — perhaps in excess of 85mph across western scotland — so these are damaging gusts and likely to cause some disruption. there'll be some heavier rain and showers rattling through as well and we'll also see amber warning for the southeast of england for strong winds. sussex and kent could see gusts in excess of 60 or 70 mph early on monday. a mild night to come across the south, taking a little bit fresher further north. into monday, storm isha continues to push across the norwegian sea. lots of isobars on the charts, so monday will be another windy day as well — not as windy as sunday night — and there'll be lots of showers rattling into northern and western areas. best of the sunshine towards the east. some wintriness over the higher ground of scotland and northern england. it won't feel particularly warm in the north if you factor in the wind but still double

figures in the south. stays pretty unsettled for the upcoming week. tuesday, we see another spell of wet and windy weather and then, a ridge of high pressure for wednesday will bring some fine conditions. another spell of wet and windy weather, perhaps, for thursday and friday. so, the weather really will be up and down through this week, interspersed with fine spells. generally staying on the mild side. stay tuned to the forecast, though, for the effects of storm isha.