Trump calls for Iran’s ‘unconditional surrender’ and threatens its supreme leader.

Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, wants the United States to drop its largest bunker-busting bombs on Iran’s Fordo nuclear site, which lies deep underground. Israel has neither bombs that big nor warplanes big enough to carry them.

In a post on Truth Social, Mr. Trump wrote, “we know exactly where” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, “is hiding,” but added, “we are not going to take him out (kill!), at least for now.” Boasting of Israel’s air superiority, which he suggested was based on American technology, he wrote, “We now have complete and total control of the skies over Iran,” associating himself with Israel’s war effort.

Earlier in the day, Mr. Trump said he was looking for something “better than a cease-fire” between Israel and Iran — “a real end, not a cease-fire.” Speaking to reporters on Air Force One, Mr. Trump, who departed Monday, a day early, from a meeting of leaders of the Group of 7 nations in Alberta, Canada, said he wanted Iran to give up while insisting that Tehran abandon any effort to develop nuclear weapons. “I’m not too much in the mood to negotiate,” he added.

Here’s what else to know:

• Iranian general: Israel said it had killed Maj. Gen. Ali Shadmani in an airstrike, describing him as Iran’s top military commander, just four days after he was appointed to replace another general killed in a separate airstrike. Iran has not confirmed the death of General Shadmani, but its military hierarchy has been decimated by the Israeli bombing.

• Nuclear site: Israeli airstrikes achieved “direct impacts” on the underground area of the Natanz nuclear site, where Iran enriches uranium, the United Nations’ chief nuclear monitor said on Tuesday, based on new satellite images. That indicates more serious damage than previous assessments of the attack on Friday.

• Syria’s silence: As other Arab countries condemn Israeli attacks on Iran, Syria has remained notably silent. Syria was once among Iran’s closest allies in the region, and the country’s recent silence reflects how much geopolitics have shifted in the country since rebels toppled the Assad regime in December, analysts say.

• G7 statement: Mr. Trump unexpectedly joined with the leaders of the Group of 7 countries in signing a joint statement on Monday night calling for de-escalation in the Middle East. The statement criticized Iran and backed Israel’s right to defend itself while affirming the importance of protecting civilians. Mr. Trump had refused to sign an earlier draft.

While Mr. Trump suggested that the United States had control of Iran’s skies, the only visible combatant has been Israel, which has been using American-made fighter jets. Israeli officials have said that they have been able to destroy much of Iran’s air defenses.

In one of his messages Tuesday, Mr. Trump threatened Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, saying “we know exactly where” he is. But he added that “we are not going to take him out (kill!), at least for now.” Killing foreign leaders is against the law in the United States.

He added, “Our patience is growing thin.”

In his own social media post, Vice President JD Vance also hinted that the United States could step up its engagement. Mr. Vance said that Iran has no need for nuclear fuel enriched above the level needed for commercial power. Mr. Trump, he wrote, “has shown remarkable restraint,” but “may decide he needs to take further action to end Iranian enrichment.”

“That decision ultimately belongs to to the president,” Mr. Vance wrote.

The vice president acknowledged the sentiments of some in the Republican Party who have called for staying out of conflicts in the Middle East, writing “of course, people are right to be worried about foreign entanglement after the last 25 years of idiotic foreign policy,” a period of time that encompasses Mr. Trump’s first term and the Bush, Obama and Biden administrations. But, he added, “I believe the president has earned some trust on this issue.”

On his flight back to Washington from Canada, Mr. Trump told reporters on Air Force One that he was not in the mood to continue negotiations with Iran, which were scheduled for last Sunday before Israel began mounting its attacks.

But as Israel pounds Iran with airstrikes that it says are aimed at the country’s nuclear and missile programs, analysts say the assault increasingly threatens the survival of Iran’s government and may in effect be turning into a regime change operation.

That could leave Mr. Trump trying to avoid entanglement in the sort of conflict he has spent years portraying as the definition of insanity.

Israeli officials say their attacks are an urgent response to Iran’s advances in its nuclear program. But there are growing signs that their aims are expanding.

During an interview on Fox News on Monday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel was asked whether regime change was an explicit goal.

“It could certainly be the result, because Iran is very weak,” he said. He added that “the decision to act, to rise up, at this time, is the decision of the Iranian people.”

But Mr. Netanyahu has also appealed to Iran’s population — which has risen in protest many times in recent years, only to be brutally repressed — to do just that. “The time has come for you to unite around your flag and your historic legacy by standing up for your freedom from an evil and oppressive regime,” he said last week.

In a Monday interview with ABC News, Mr. Netanyahu also said that Israel might choose to “end the conflict” by killing Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

“This is the name of the game,” said Vali Nasr, a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

“It’s not how successful Israel is in taking out Fordo,” the Iranian nuclear facility buried deep in a mountain. “It is now measured by how successful they can be in taking out the Iranian state.”

Mr. Nasr noted that Israel has been striking targets with no direct connection to Iran’s nuclear program, including a Monday attack on the headquarters of Iran’s state broadcasting network. “They are trying to take away the coherence of the state — not only to conduct the war, but to function,” he said.

While Mr. Trump may be limiting America’s role, for now, to the defense of Israel, a collapse of the Iranian state would create new risks — including the need to secure Iran’s nuclear material — that would greatly increase the prospects of American involvement in the conflict.

Israel’s primary goal may be the destruction of Iran’s nuclear program, said Michael Makovsky, president and chief executive of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, which has backed military action against Iran.

Mr. Makovsky added, however, based on his conversations with senior political and military officials there, that Israel has always known that such a campaign could also have broader political consequences.

“They’ve hoped that, because the regime was so weak, military action could lead to the people bringing down the regime,” he said.

Iran’s leadership may share that assessment. In April, The New York Times reported that Mr. Khamenei agreed to nuclear talks with President Trump earlier this year only after top Iranian officials warned him that failure to negotiate could lead to attacks by Israel or the United States. That, they said, could threaten the survival of their government.

Even some supporters of using force to seek a change in Iran’s government are careful to avoid the catchphrase that was used often during the Iraq War and subsequent Western interventions in the Middle East. They include the 2011 NATO air campaign in Libya that overthrew the dictator Muammar Gaddafi but triggered years of chaos and civil war.

Mr. Trump himself has tried to engineer the fall of at least one foreign government, the leftist dictatorship of Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro, which he choked with economic sanctions in his first term. But he never described his policy as regime change.

“I use the term ‘regime collapse,’ versus ‘change,’” Mr. Makovsky said, “because the term ‘regime change’ is toxic in Washington. Everyone thinks about 2003.”

In March of that year, President George W. Bush invaded Iraq and deposed its strongman, Saddam Hussein. The ensuing effort to install a friendly democratic government in Baghdad cost thousands of American lives and hundreds of billions of dollars, and to many, discredited U.S. interventionism.

The key distinction, Mr. Makovsky said, is that a regime collapse strategy does not presume to remake Iran’s government. “My view is that we shouldn’t do that. But our objective should be to pressure the regime every way possible so that the Iranian people bring it down.”

For now, Mr. Trump has kept some distance from Israel’s war. But his supporters are divided on his approach, with some accusing Mr. Trump of betraying his principles.

On Monday, two of Mr. Trump’s most prominent supporters, the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson and the former Trump White House aide Steve Bannon vented their frustration on a radio show hosted by Mr. Bannon.

“The point of this is regime change,” Mr. Carlson insisted, arguing that Mr. Trump was being led by Israel into what could become a “world war.” “I don’t want the United States involved in another Middle East war,” he added.

Mr. Bannon agreed, citing Mr. Netanyahu’s comments on Fox and saying, “This is a total regime change.”

“This thing has not been thought through,” he added. “It does not have the support of the American people.”

Analysts said it would be especially difficult for Mr. Trump to avoid being drawn into the aftermath of a government collapse. “The U.S. just can’t not be involved,” said Mr. Nasr, noting that, among other things, it would be essential to secure Iran’s stockpile of uranium amid any political chaos.

Some analysts fear that Iran could descend into chaos and even civil war, radiating instability throughout the Middle East. Although one U.S. official said that Mr. Khamenei had put in place a succession plan, and that in the event of his killing or overthrow Iran’s religious-military establishment would be likely to retain control — possibly with an even more extreme figure.

Even so, few in Washington would mourn the fall of a theocracy that sponsors terrorism and has spent 40 years calling for the destruction of America and Israel. And some prominent Republicans are calling for that outcome.

“I think it is very much in the interest of America to see regime change,” Senator Ted Cruz of Texas said on Fox News on Sunday. “I don’t think there’s any redeeming the ayatollah.”

Another Republican senator, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, told CBS News on Sunday he would “love for the regime to fall,” but added that “is not the purpose of this attack — yet.”

Ben Rhodes, a former deputy national security adviser under President Obama who was deeply involved in Iran policy, said that even some Democrats are wondering whether to root for Iran’s government to collapse.

Mr. Rhodes fears that initial success of Israel’s military campaign has created the illusion of a simple solution, something that reminds him of the early stages of another Middle East conflict more than 20 years ago.

“It looked great when the statue of Saddam Hussein fell” in the spring of 2003, Mr. Rhodes said.

A pro-Israel hacking group called Predatory Sparrow, or in Farsi, Gonjeshke Darand, claimed responsibility, saying that the bank had financed terrorism using money from the accounts of the Iranian people.

But this time, the American intelligence assessment was that Mr. Netanyahu was preparing not just a limited strike on the nuclear facilities, but a far more expansive attack that could imperil the Iranian regime itself — and that he was prepared to go it alone.

The intelligence left President Trump facing difficult choices. He had become invested in a diplomatic push to persuade Iran to give up its nuclear ambitions, and had already swatted down one attempt by Mr. Netanyahu, in April, to convince him that the time was right for a military assault on Iran. During a strained phone call in late May, Mr. Trump again warned the Israeli leader against a unilateral attack that would short-circuit the diplomacy.

But over the last several weeks, it became increasingly apparent to Trump administration officials that they might not be able to stop Mr. Netanyahu this time, according to interviews with key players in the administration’s deliberations over how to respond and others familiar with their thinking. At the same time, Mr. Trump was getting impatient with Iran over the slow pace of negotiations and beginning to conclude that the talks might go nowhere.

Contrary to Israeli claims, senior administration officials were unaware of any new intelligence showing that the Iranians were rushing to build a nuclear bomb — a move that would justify a pre-emptive strike. But seeing they would most likely not be able to deter Mr. Netanyahu and were no longer driving events, Mr. Trump’s advisers weighed alternatives.

At one end of the spectrum was sitting back and doing nothing and then deciding on next steps once it became clear how much Iran had been weakened by the attack. At the other end was joining Israel in the military assault, possibly to the point of forcing regime change in Iran.

Mr. Trump chose a middle course, offering Israel as-yet undisclosed support from the U.S. intelligence community to carry out its attack and then turning up the pressure on Tehran to give immediate concessions at the negotiating table or face continued military onslaught.

Five days after Israel launched its attack, Mr. Trump’s posture continues to gyrate. The administration at first distanced itself from the strikes, then grew more publicly supportive as Israel’s initial military success became evident.

Now Mr. Trump is seriously considering sending American aircraft in to help refuel Israeli combat jets and to try to take out Iran’s deep-underground nuclear site at Fordo with 30,000-pound bombs — a step that would mark a stunning turnabout from his opposition just two months ago to any military action while there was still a chance of a diplomatic solution.

The story of what led up to the Israeli strike is one of two leaders in Mr. Trump and Mr. Netanyahu who share a common goal — preventing Iran from getting a nuclear bomb — but who are wary of each other’s motives. They speak often in public about their strong political and personal bonds, and yet the relationship has long been beset by mistrust.

Interviews with two dozen officials in the United States, Israel and the Persian Gulf region show how Mr. Trump vacillated for months over how and whether to contain Mr. Netanyahu’s impulses as he confronted the first foreign policy crisis of his second term. It was a situation he faced with a relatively inexperienced circle of advisers handpicked for loyalty.

This year he told a political ally that Mr. Netanyahu was trying to drag him into another Middle East war — the type of war he promised during his presidential campaign last year he would keep America out of.

But he also came to believe the Iranians were playing him in the diplomatic negotiations, much as President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia did as Mr. Trump sought a cease-fire and peace deal in Ukraine.

And when Israel chose war, Mr. Trump cycled from skepticism about attaching himself too closely to Mr. Netanyahu to inching toward joining him in dramatically escalating the conflict, even bucking the view that there is no immediate nuclear threat from Iran.

As he rushed back to Washington from a Group of 7 summit in Canada early on Tuesday morning, Mr. Trump took issue with an element of public testimony of Tulsi Gabbard, his director of national intelligence, that the intelligence community did not believe Iran was actively building nuclear weapons even as it enriches uranium that could ultimately be used for a nuclear arsenal. “I don’t care what she said,” Mr. Trump told reporters. “I think they were very close to having them.”

For Mr. Netanyahu, the last several months brought to an end years of trying to cajole the United States into backing or at least tolerating his long-held desire to deal Iran’s nuclear program a crippling blow. He appears to have judged, correctly, that Mr. Trump would ultimately come around, if only grudgingly.

Beyond the lives lost and destruction wrought, the crisis has also laid bare schisms within Mr. Trump’s party between those inclined to reflexively defend Israel, America’s closest ally in the region, and those determined to keep the United States from getting further mired in the Middle East’s cycle of violence.

In the middle was Mr. Trump, determined to block Iran’s path to a bomb and caught between cultivating his own image of strength and the potential strategic and political consequences of acting aggressively against Iran.

Asked for comment, a White House spokesman pointed to public comments made by Mr. Trump about not allowing Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon.

‘I Think We Might Have to Help Him’

When Mr. Trump met with his top advisers at the wooded presidential retreat of Camp David late on Sunday, June 8, to review the fast-evolving situation, the C.I.A. director, John Ratcliffe, provided a blunt assessment.

It was highly likely, he said, that Israel would soon strike Iran, with or without the United States, according to two people familiar with the briefing, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a confidential discussion.

The president sat at the head of the table in a rustic conference room inside Laurel Lodge. There were no slides, only maps prepared by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Dan Caine. For two and a half hours, he and Mr. Ratcliffe described their expectation of an imminent Israeli attack. Ms. Gabbard was on National Guard duty that weekend and was not included in the meeting.

Mr. Trump’s advisers had been preparing for this moment. In late May, they had seen intelligence that made them concerned that Israel was going to move ahead with a major assault on Iran, regardless of what the president was trying to achieve diplomatically with Tehran.

Based on that intelligence, Vice President JD Vance and Marco Rubio, in his joint role as secretary of state and national security adviser, encouraged an effort to give the president a range of options so he could make quick decisions if necessary about the scope of American involvement.

Mr. Ratcliffe’s intelligence-gathering efforts went into overdrive. And in the two weeks leading up to the Camp David meeting, Mr. Trump’s top advisers met multiple times to get on the same page about what the menu of potential options might be.

The day after the Camp David meeting, Monday, June 9, Mr. Trump got on the phone with Mr. Netanyahu. The Israeli leader was unequivocal: The mission was a go.

Mr. Netanyahu laid out his intentions at a high level, according to three people with knowledge of the call. He made clear that Israel had forces on the ground inside Iran.

Mr. Trump was impressed by the ingenuity of the Israeli military planning. He made no commitments, but after he got off the call, he told advisers, “I think we might have to help him.”

Still, the president was torn over what to do next, and quizzed advisers throughout the week. He had wanted to manage Iran on his own terms, not Mr. Netanyahu’s, and he had professed confidence in his deal-making abilities. But he had come to believe that the Iranians were stringing him along.

Unlike some in the anti-interventionist wing of his party, Mr. Trump was never of the view that America could live with, and contain, an Iran with a nuclear bomb. He shared Mr. Netanyahu’s view that Iran was an existential threat to Israel. Mr. Netanyahu, he told aides, was going to do what was necessary to protect his country.

The Diplomatic Route

Israel had begun preparing in December for an attack on Iran, after the decimation of Hezbollah, an Iranian proxy, and the collapse of the Assad regime in Syria, opening up airspace for a bombing campaign.

Mr. Netanyahu made his first visit of the second Trump term to the White House on Feb. 4. He presented a gold-plated pager to Mr. Trump and a silver-plated pager to Mr. Vance — the same devices the Israelis had secretly packed with explosives and sold to unwitting Hezbollah operatives who would later be maimed and killed in a devastating remote-control attack on the Iran-backed Lebanese group. (Mr. Trump later told an ally he was disturbed by the gift.)

Mr. Netanyahu gave Mr. Trump a presentation about Iran in the Oval Office, walking him through images of the country’s various nuclear sites.

Israeli intelligence showed that Iran was making cruder and faster efforts to get to a nuclear weapon, and the weaker the Iranians got, the closer they moved to the bomb. In terms of the enrichment of uranium, Iran was days away from where it needed to be, but there were other components it required to complete the weapon.

The Israelis made an additional argument to Mr. Trump: If you want diplomacy to succeed you have to prepare for a strike, so there is real force behind the negotiations. Privately, they fretted that Mr. Trump would take what they viewed as an inadequate deal with Iran, similar to the 2015 deal negotiated by President Barack Obama, and that he would then declare mission accomplished. Mr. Netanyahu told Mr. Trump that the Iranians would be able to rebuild their air defenses that were destroyed during an Israeli attack in October, adding to the urgency.

After his election in November, Mr. Trump had named a close friend, Steve Witkoff, as his Middle East envoy, and gave him the job of trying to reach a deal with Iran. Mr. Trump, elected on a platform that promised to avoid military entanglements abroad, seemed to relish the idea of coming to a diplomatic resolution.

From the beginning of the administration, the Iranians were putting out feelers from a handful of countries to open a diplomatic path with the new administration. Then Mr. Trump made his own dramatic move: He sent a letter to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

In early March, visitors to the Oval Office or guests on Air Force One were regaled by Mr. Trump about his “beautiful letter” to the ayatollah. One visitor treated to a live rendition recalled the letter’s basic message as: I don’t want war. I don’t want to blow you off the map. I want a deal.

Mr. Trump knew he was wading into dangerous political territory. More than perhaps any other subject, the Israel-Iran issue splits Mr. Trump’s coalition, pitting an anti-interventionist faction, led by media figures like the influential podcast host Tucker Carlson, against anti-Iran conservatives like the radio host Mark Levin.

But inside the administration, despite much hype about disagreements between “Iran hawks” and “doves,” ideological divisions were far less important than they were in Mr. Trump’s first term, when officials like Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson viewed the president as reckless and in need of being restrained from his impulses.

This time, nobody on Mr. Trump’s senior team played anything like that role. The new team generally supported Mr. Trump’s instincts and worked to carry them out. There were differences of opinion, to be sure, but few if any heated showdowns over Iran policy.

Mr. Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth were always deferential to the president’s views, even if Mr. Hegseth, who has a close relationship with Mr. Netanyahu, was more trusting of the Israelis than some of his colleagues.

Mr. Vance warned repeatedly about the prospect of the United States getting entangled in a regime change war, but even those on the team who had historically supported a more muscular stance against Iran backed Mr. Witkoff’s diplomacy. Mr. Trump’s tough-on-Iran national security adviser at the time, Mike Waltz, nonetheless had a close working relationship with the more dovish Mr. Witkoff.

On the intelligence side, Mr. Ratcliffe delivered information without weighing in on one side or the other. And while everyone knew that Ms. Gabbard was as anti-interventionist as they come, she rarely pushed that view on the president.

In April, the Trump team began a series of negotiations in Oman, with the U.S. side of the talks led by Mr. Witkoff, along with Michael Anton, the director of policy planning at the State Department. By the end of May, the Trump team had delivered a written proposal to the Iranians.

It called for Iran to ultimately stop all enrichment of uranium and proposed the creation of a regional consortium to produce nuclear power that would potentially involve Iran, the United States and other Gulf states like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Keeping Military Options

Even as Mr. Trump pursued a diplomatic solution, he seemed persuaded by one thing the Israelis had said to him: having credible military options would give him a stronger hand in negotiations with Iran.

Options for taking out Iran’s nuclear sites already existed inside the Pentagon, but after taking office in January the president authorized U.S. Central Command to coordinate with the Israelis on further refining and developing them.

By the middle of February, in coordination with the Israelis, Gen. Michael Erik Kurilla, the head of Central Command, had developed three main options. The first and most minimal was U.S. refueling and intelligence support for an Israeli mission. The second was Israeli and American joint strikes. The third was a U.S.-led mission with Israel in a supporting role. It would have involved American B-1 and B-2 bombers, carrier aircraft and cruise missiles launched from submarines.

There was also a fourth option, quickly discarded, that included, in addition to large-scale U.S. strikes, an Israeli commando raid with air support from American Osprey helicopters or other aircraft options.

But as Mr. Witkoff pursued negotiations with Tehran, mediated by Oman, the Israelis grew impatient.

Mr. Netanyahu made a quick visit to Mr. Trump at the White House in April. Among other requests, he asked for the American bunker-buster bomb to destroy the underground nuclear site at Fordo.

Mr. Trump, intent at the time on giving diplomacy a chance, was unpersuaded and in the days after the meeting, his team made a full-court press to stop the Israelis from launching pre-emptive strikes against Iran. The message from Mr. Trump’s team was blunt: You cannot just go and do this on your own. There are too many implications for us. These were tense conversations, but Mr. Trump’s advisers thought the Israelis had absorbed their message.

The president was concerned that Israel would strike out on its own or scuttle his diplomacy if Mr. Netanyahu did not like where his deal was heading. The Trump team also worried about what would happen if Israel launched strikes against Iran but failed to destroy all of its nuclear facilities.

But planning in Israel went ahead, driven in part by concern that Iran was rapidly building up its store of ballistic missiles that could be used for retaliatory attacks. Soon, U.S. intelligence agencies had amassed enough information to present it to Mr. Trump. The briefings got the president’s attention, and became the backdrop to the tense phone call in late May, during which Mr. Trump vented his unhappiness at Mr. Netanyahu.

Patience With Diplomacy Wears Thin

By that point, Mr. Vance was telling associates that he was worried about a potential regime change war, which he considered a dangerous escalation that could spiral out of control.

Mr. Vance had come to view a conflict between Israel and Iran as inevitable. The vice president was open to the possibility of supporting a targeted Israeli strike, but his concerns that it would grow into a more drawn-out war increased as the likely date of a strike approached, according to two people with knowledge of his thinking.

He turned his attention toward trying to keep America out of the conflict as much as possible beyond intelligence sharing. He worked closely with Mr. Trump’s inner circle, including Mr. Rubio, Mr. Hegseth and Susie Wiles, the White House chief of staff, to figure out contingency plans to protect American personnel in the region.

As May turned to June, Mr. Witkoff told colleagues that the United States and Iran were on the brink of a deal. But on Wednesday, June 4, Mr. Khamenei rejected the U.S. proposal. Mr. Trump was beginning to feel as if the Iranians were not serious about a deal, advisers said.

That same day, Mr. Levin, the conservative radio host, met with Mr. Trump and several of his advisers in the dining room adjoining the Oval Office. He had been an influential force in presenting an anti-Iran view to the president. The conversation with Mr. Levin appeared to have made an impression on the president, advisers said.

After that meeting, Mr. Trump told aides he wanted to give the deal talks a bit more of a chance. But his patience was wearing thin.

That Friday, his team scheduled a Sunday meeting in the privacy of Camp David.

A Rapid Change in Posture

Publicly, Mr. Trump was still stressing the importance of giving diplomacy a chance. And while doing so was not intended to deceive the Iranians about the immediacy of a potential attack from Israel, the possibility that it might keep Iran from going on heightened alert was a welcome side effect, a U.S. official involved in the discussions said.

But last Wednesday, there was no indication of any negotiated breakthrough, and by that point Mr. Trump’s inner circle knew the attack would start the next day.

In some private conversations, Mr. Trump questioned the wisdom of the Israeli decision to attack. “I don’t know about Bibi,” he told one associate, adding that he had warned him against the strikes.

Mr. Trump joined his national security team in the White House Situation Room on Thursday evening as the first wave of strikes was unfolding, and was still keeping his options open. Earlier that day he was telling advisers and allies that he still wanted to get a deal with Iran.

The first official statement from the administration after the strikes came not from Mr. Trump but from Mr. Rubio, who distanced the United States from the Israeli campaign and made no mention of standing by an ally, even though the U.S. intelligence community was already providing support.

But as the night wore on and the Israelis landed a spectacular series of precision strikes against Iranian military leaders and strategic sites, Mr. Trump began to change his mind about his public posture.

When he woke on Friday morning, his favorite TV channel, Fox News, was broadcasting wall-to-wall imagery of what it was portraying as Israel’s military genius. And Mr. Trump could not resist claiming some credit for himself.

In phone calls with reporters, Mr. Trump began hinting that he had played a bigger behind-the-scenes role in the war than people realized. Privately, he told some confidants that he was now leaning toward a more serious escalation: going along with Israel’s earlier request that the United States deliver powerful bunker-busting bombs to destroy Iran’s nuclear facility at Fordo.

As recently as Monday, Mr. Trump held out the possibility that Mr. Witkoff or even Mr. Vance could meet with Iranian officials to seek a negotiated deal. But as Mr. Trump abruptly left the Group of 7 summit in Canada to rush back to Washington, there was little indication that the conflict would be brought to a quick end through diplomacy.

Helene Cooper, Julian E. Barnes and Eric Schmitt contributed reporting.

It said that it issued its updated assessment on the basis of continued analysis of high resolution satellite imagery. The I.A.E.A. also said that there was still no evidence of damage at Iran’s nuclear plant near the city of Isfahan or at Fordo, a facility hidden in a mountain in the northwest of the country.

The extent to which Iran’s nuclear facilities were degraded was a critical issue in the assault that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel launched on Friday. Israel wants to force the government in Tehran to abandon its well-established nuclear program.

Mr. Netanyahu said last week that the nuclear program was an existential threat to his country, but Tehran maintains that it is solely for peaceful purposes and has given no hint that it would shut its atomic industry. Decades-long efforts to keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons have yielded uneven results.

President Trump said on Monday that Iran wanted to make a deal over its nuclear program, and the country’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, signaled an openness to resuming talks with U.S. representatives about curtailing its nuclear development program. However, it remains unclear whether a diplomatic resolution is likely.

Iran has launched deadly waves of missiles and drones at Israel in retaliation for Israel’s campaign, which has killed Iranian nuclear scientists as well as military commanders and civilians.

Last week, the I.A.E.A. said that Iran was not complying with its nuclear nonproliferation obligations, the first time the agency had passed a resolution against the country in 20 years.

Iran has taken steps over the years to shield its nuclear industry from the possibility of Israeli attacks. The main site for uranium enrichment is at Natanz, which is roughly 140 miles south of Tehran. Other sites include Fordo; Isfahan; Parchin, a military complex southeast of Tehran where Iran has tested high explosives; and Bushehr, which is on the coast of the Persian Gulf.

Israeli airspace has been closed for commercial flights since Friday morning, and roughly 100,000 to 150,000 Israelis who left the country before its surprise attack on Iran have been stranded overseas. Regularly scheduled El Al flights will be canceled until at least Monday, the airline said.

It was unclear when people who were visiting Israel when the strikes began would be able to leave the country. Citing a “government decision,” El Al said there were no outbound passenger flights from Israel to international destinations at the moment.

About 38,000 tourists are currently in Israel, the Israeli Ministry of Tourism said on Tuesday. It said it would be opening a service to help them register for outbound flights, but did not specify when those flights would depart or how many passengers they would be able to take. The tourism ministry also suggested that visitors could use land border crossings to Jordan and Egypt to leave, though the Israeli National Security Council has advised Israeli citizens not to use those crossings to return home because of security risks.

In addition to the Israelis who are expected to return home via El Al, some stranded Israeli tourists will be returning to Israel from Cyprus via a cruise ship operated by the Israeli cruise company Mano Maritime. The company said a ship would leave Limassol, Cyprus, on Thursday.

The Times of Israel, citing a statement from Mano Maritime, said the ship could carry 2,000 passengers and that after the first trip, the ship would return to Limassol to pick up more Israelis. The journey, which the Times of Israel said would be run in coordination with Israel’s transportation ministry, takes about 16 hours each way. Mano Maritime did not respond to a request for comment.

Some Israelis travelers are considering remaining abroad for now, given that there are few signs the fighting will end soon. Civilian casualties are rising in both Iran and Israel, where 24 people have died and about 600 were injured. Israeli strikes in Iran have killed more than 200 people and injured 1,400.

Anushka Patil contributed reporting.

“It’s very puzzling,” said Shira Efron, director of research at Israel Policy Forum, a New York-based research group. “You’re seeing him say one thing and then another.”

On Friday, the first day of the war, Mr. Trump initially called Israel’s attacks “excellent” and “very successful,” but he also said that he believed a diplomatic solution between Israel and Iran was possible.

“There has already been great death and destruction, but there is still time to make this slaughter, with the next already planned attacks being even more brutal, come to an end,” the president said. “Iran must make a deal, before there is nothing left.”

The following day, Mr. Trump recounted a call with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, saying that both he and Mr. Putin said the battle between Israel and Iran should end. And on Sunday, he reinforced his stated position by saying Israel and Iran should make a deal.

“We will have PEACE, soon, between Israel and Iran! Many calls and meetings now taking place,” he said in a post on Truth Social.

But late on Monday, Mr. Trump appeared to be adopting a more hawkish position as he left a Group of 7 summit in Canada early, saying he needed to return to Washington to deal with the conflict.

Speaking to reporters on Air Force One on his way back from Canada, Mr. Trump said that he was seeking a result that was “better than a cease-fire” between Israel and Iran. Asked what would qualify, he said “an end, a real end, not a cease-fire, a real end,” and said he wanted a “complete give-up” by Iran, but he did not make clear whether he meant an end to the conflict or a resolution to the Iranian nuclear issue, or both.

As for American involvement, Mr. Trump reiterated that the United States would not hesitate to use force against Iran if it attacked any U.S. targets. The United States has roughly 40,000 troops across the Middle East.

But he was more forceful on social media, saying that he was not returning to Washington to work on a cease-fire but rather something “much bigger” and that “AMERICA FIRST means many GREAT things, including the fact that, IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON.”

He also indicated more violence was coming for Iran’s capital, which Israel has repeatedly struck with missiles: “Everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran!”

The president has declined to say whether the United States would get involved militarily in the war in Iran. The United States, unlike Israel, possesses a 30,000-pound bomb that is believed to be capable of inflicting damage on Iran’s nuclear site in Fordo, which is built deep inside a mountain.

On Air Force One, Mr. Trump alluded to the possibility of sending administration officials — Vice President JD Vance and Steve Witkoff, his Middle East envoy — to meet with Iranian officials but later said on the flight, “I’m not too much in the mood to negotiate” with Iran.

The aid sites began operating a few weeks ago under a new Israeli-backed system run by an American-led company, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. It replaces a system overseen by the United Nations and aims to provide food to civilians without the supplies falling into the hands of Hamas.

The United Nations and other international groups have condemned the new initiative, however, partly because civilians must pass Israeli soldiers to reach the sites, putting them in greater danger. They have also said the amount of aid getting through is woefully inadequate for the population’s needs.

“The danger is too high for me to go to these centers,” Awni Abu Hassira, 38, from Gaza City, said in a phone interview. “I don’t want to face death this way.”

The Gaza Health Ministry said that at least 20 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and more than 200 wounded early Monday when a crowd gathered near an aid distribution site in southern Gaza. Israel said it was still looking into the reports.

The ministry reported a similar event on Tuesday morning that it said had resulted in more than 50 deaths. On both days, the victims were taken to a hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis.

Thanos Gargavanis, a World Health Organization emergency officer and trauma surgeon, told reporters in a briefing from Gaza that the violent episodes this week were “again the result of another food distribution initiative by a non-U.N. actor,” an apparent reference to the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.

Asked for comment on Tuesday’s violence, the Israeli military said that “a gathering was identified adjacent to an aid distribution truck that got stuck in the area of Khan Younis” near Israeli forces operating in the area. The statement, using the abbreviation for the Israel Defense Forces, added that it was “aware of reports regarding a number of injured individuals from I.D.F. fire following the crowd’s approach” and was reviewing the matter.

It said the military “regrets any harm to uninvolved individuals.”

Israel also said that two of its soldiers had been killed in combat in southern Gaza in recent days.

Videos shared on social media and verified by The New York Times showed the aftermath of deadly violence on Tuesday in Khan Younis, where crowds of people had gathered around the Tahlia traffic circle to wait for aid early in the day.

In one video filmed by a local photographer, at least 20 bodies are visible on darkened ground where blood is pooling, and many are bleeding. Two of the bodies are severely mangled, and two other people have bleeding head wounds.

Other footage circulating on social media and reviewed by The Times shows people screaming and yelling as crowds run through the area.

Saleem Abdul Kareem, 32, a displaced father of four who said he is sheltering in a tent along the southern coast of Gaza, said he set out overnight to get food aid at the Tahlia traffic circle in Khan Younis. He said he walked for about two hours only to witness a deadly scene early Tuesday.

“I saw so many dead and injured, but all I could think about was running,” Mr. Kareem said. “This was my second attempt to get aid. I got nothing either time, and after what I saw, I’ll never try again.”

On Monday, Naseem Hassan, a medic at a hospital in Khan Younis, described the difficulty of aiding people who were shot as they tried to collect food from a nearby aid distribution point. He said scores of Palestinian victims had been rushed to his hospital.

“People who are injured have to crawl or be carried for over a kilometer to reach us,” said Mr. Hassan, who works at Nasser Hospital. “We couldn’t reach the aid centers, ambulances can’t get there,” he added.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said on Monday that one of its field hospitals had treated more than 200 people after the shootings near the aid site.

The United Nations has warned that Gaza’s population is on the brink of famine, with thousands of children already severely malnourished.

“The facts speak for themselves,” said Volker Türk, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights. Speaking in Geneva on Monday, he called Israel’s military campaign in Gaza a source of “horrifying, unconscionable suffering” and urged governments to “wake up” and pay attention.

“All those with influence must exert maximum pressure on Israel and Hamas to put an end to this unbearable suffering,” he said.

Ameera Harouda, Nick Cumming-Bruce and Sanjana Varghese contributed reporting.

Mr. Macron had told reporters covering the G7 meeting in Calgary, Alberta, that the United States had given assurances that “they will find a cease-fire, and since they can pressure Israel, things may change.”

The speculation about his intentions clearly infuriated Mr. Trump, who said, without elaborating, that the real reason for his departure was “much bigger than that.” In an earlier Truth Social post, he had said that “everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran.”

There was no immediate response from the French presidency.

Mr. Macron — who said last week that Israel had legitimate reasons to defend itself against Iran’s nuclear program but that France did not support its decision to bombard Iran — has repeatedly called for a cease-fire.

But Mr. Trump, facing pressure from Israeli officials to more forcefully back their campaign against Iran, seems to be of two minds. He must decide whether to help Israel destroy the buried Iranian nuclear enrichment facility at Fordo, which only American B-2 bombers dropping the U.S. military’s biggest “bunker buster” can reach. Israel has no such weapon in its arsenal.

But such action would drag the United States into a war of a kind that Mr. Trump has suggested he would prefer to avoid.

Since Mr. Trump took office for a second term in January, the French and American leaders have strained to preserve the friendship they established during his first. Mr. Macron still calls Mr. Trump on a casual basis. But their stark differences over Israel, Gaza, Ukraine and now, it seems, Iran have made the veneer of camaraderie untenable.

Mr. Macron is now the European leader closest to Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, whom Mr. Trump chose to humiliate in a White House meeting in February and missed seeing at the G7 summit because of his early departure. Mr. Trump spent much of the gathering regretting the absence of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, calling the group’s decision to expel Russia in 2014 “a mistake.”

Most recently, Mr. Trump has clashed with Mr. Macron over a planned United Nations conference to explore the creation of a Palestinian state, which the French leader has said he will recognize, most likely on that occasion. The Trump administration urged countries to shun the meeting, which was to have taken place this week but was postponed because of the fighting between Israel and Iran.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a statement on Friday saying that he had named General Shadmani to command the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, the most important economic arm of Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.

General Shadmani had replaced Lt. Gen. Gholamali Rashid, one of several top Iranian military leaders killed by Israel in recent days. So far, Israel has killed at least 11 senior Iranian generals, as well as several scientists, in its campaign to cripple Iran’s nuclear program.

If confirmed, the killing of General Shadmani so soon after his predecessor would likely further destabilize what remains of Iran’s besieged military leadership.

The killing would also mirror Israel’s approach in Lebanon last fall, when its forces decimated Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia, and degraded its military arsenal. Israeli forces not only assassinated Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, but they also killed his expected successor, Hashem Safieddine, as well as the man next-in-line to succeed Mr. Safieddine.

It was not immediately clear who might replace General Shadmani. He had previously served as the deputy coordinator of the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, according to an August report from Iranian state media and Open Sanctions, a sanctions data provider. General Shadmani was born in Hamedan, in western Iran, according to Open Sanctions.

In the statement announcing his appointment, Ayatollah Khamenei praised General Shadmani’s “merits and valuable experience.” He said that General Shadmani was “expected to provide strategic, operational planning and guidance in confronting threats and accurately identifying the combat readiness” of Iran’s armed forces.

Samuel Granados contributed reporting.

United States — The U.S. Embassy in Israel said it was not in a position to evacuate or directly assist Americans in departing the country. That came as the State Department this week raised its travel advisory for Israel to Level 4, “Do Not Travel” — its highest level, signaling extreme risk — after authorizing the voluntary departure of family members and nonemergency U.S. government employees. In March, the State Department warned U.S. citizens not to travel to Iran.

China — Beijing has started to evacuate its nationals in Israel and Iran to neighboring countries, a spokesman for China’s Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday. The spokesman, Guo Jiakun, told a news briefing that Chinese embassies and consulates have activated “emergency consular protection mechanisms” and demanded both Iran and Israel “ensure the safety of Chinese citizens and institutions.” On Monday, the Chinese embassy in Tel Aviv urged its citizens to leave Israel via land border crossings to Jordan.

South Korea — The foreign ministry on Tuesday urged its nationals to leave Iran. South Korea’s government had earlier encouraged citizens to cancel or postpone trips to Israel and parts of Iran.

Britain — The foreign secretary, David Lammy, told Parliament on Monday that British nationals in Israel should register with the British Foreign Office to receive “important information on the situation and leaving the country.” Britain’s government has advised its citizens to avoid travel to Israel and the occupied territories, telling nationals there to follow local guidance. It also has advised against travel to Iran and said it can provide limited consular assistance.

Russia — The country’s ambassador to Israel, Anatoly Viktorov, on Monday advised Russian nationals to leave until the situation normalizes, according to the state news agency, Tass. Moscow said over the weekend that it had evacuated several citizens from Iran and halted activity at its consulate in Tehran.

Australia — The government has advised against travel to Israel and the occupied territories. “Terror attacks can occur anywhere at any time, including by lone actors,” it said in an advisory, urging citizens to follow the guidance of local authorities and be alert. Australians should not travel to Iran and those already there should shelter in place, the government said.

Canada — On Monday, the government warned its citizens to avoid all travel to Israel and issued a similar warning for Iran.

India — The country’s embassy in Iran has urged its citizens there to avoid unnecessary travel within the country. On Sunday, the Indian embassy in Israel told citizens to stay vigilant and avoid unnecessary travel.

Japan — Citizens were advised by the foreign ministry on Friday to avoid travel to the Iranian capital, Tehran, as well as to the Israeli cities of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Around 380 Japanese citizens have notified the embassy in Iran of their presence and around 1,000 did the same in Israel, Japanese media reported on Monday.