UK couple held in Iran speak to relatives by phone: family
Iranian authorities seized the pair in Kerman, in central Iran, in early January while they were on a round-the-world motorbike trip, claiming the following month that they were suspected spies.
Little had been known about their whereabouts or welfare since.
Distraught relatives have become increasingly vocal demanding that Iran allow the couple to phone home, and permit British officials more access to them.
"For 213 days, we waited. Hoped. Held our breath. And today, we finally got those phone calls," Lindsay's son Joe Bennett said in a statement.
"We finally heard their voices. After seven long months with no direct contact, we can now say what we've been desperate to say all this time: Lindsay and Craig are alive."
Bennett added the call lasted for around eight minutes, during which "we laughed, we cried, and for a few brief moments, it felt like the weight of the past seven months lifted".
The 31-year-old said that "while it was amazing to hear their voices, we must also keep our eyes firmly on the real issues".
"Lindsay and Craig still haven't had a consular visit in months," he added.
Bennett also urged the UK government to indicate "what it intends to do to secure their release", calling its "ongoing silence" over its strategy "deeply concerning".
Craig's son Kieran Foreman said his separate call with his dad was "a massive relief".
"It brings us back up from the hole of despair we have been in," he added, noting it gave him "hope".
In an interview Monday, Bennett, of Folkestone in southeast England, told AFP that he had learned the previous day that Lindsay had been transferred to Qarchak women's prison near the capital.
Human rights groups repeatedly criticise the dire conditions reported there.
Meanwhile, he revealed Craig had been moved to Tehran's infamous central prison, also known as Fashafouyeh, which is about 30 kilometres (18 miles) south of the capital and has similar notoriety.
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France 24
7 hours ago
- France 24
Twelve-day war: Impact of Iran's strikes censored by Israel
Sirens blared in the minutes before an Iranian ballistic missile crashed into the Tel Aviv suburb of Ramat Gan on the night of June 13, alerting residents to get into bomb shelters. The next morning, the people of Tirzah Street emerged to the sight of collapsed buildings and cars crushed into one another – hundreds of metres of destruction. One 74-year-old woman was killed. Just hours before Iran's strike on Ramat Gan, Israel had launched a surprise attack on Iran, kicking off a new armed conflict between the two nations. In a speech broadcast on June 1 3, 2025, Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu justified the attack by citing the 'clear and present danger' that the Iranian nuclear program posed to "Israel's survival'. During the conflict, Israel killed about 30 Iranian senior security officials and 11 Iranian nuclear scientists. The Israeli army attacked more than 900 military sites, and between 800 and 1,000 Iranian missiles were destroyed on the ground. 36 Iranian strikes verified by the Observers team The strike on Ramat Gan was one of the first to hit Israeli soil. Despite the Israeli strikes on Iran's military bases, Iran was still able to fire more than 500 missiles at Israel during the 12 days of the war, according to The Institute for National Security Studies (INSS), an Israeli think tank with links to the University of Tel Aviv. While most of the missiles were intercepted by the Israeli defence system, INSS reported that more than 50 missiles struck the country. The two parties, however, have had divergent narratives on the impact of the Iranian strikes both during and after the 12 days of the conflict. Iranian authorities bragged about their successes, claiming that they hit 16 strategic sites in Israel, while Israeli authorities minimised the damage caused by the Iranian strikes. The FRANCE 24 Observers team identified and geolocated 36 different Iranian strikes in Israel using open source data and by cross-referencing both amateur and professional images. The images that we verified show large swaths of destruction in several residential areas, as well as evidence that strikes hit strategic and military sites. Even though Israel incurred less damage than Iran, our investigation reveals that major strikes did take place but were kept under wraps by Israeli censorship. During the hostilities, the Israeli army ordered Israeli and international media outlets to refrain from publishing images of strikes on or near military targets. Silence around strikes on military sites Thanks to amateur images leaked online, our team was able to identify four Iranian missiles that landed on or near Israeli military zones. On June 17, an Iranian missile hit Camp Moshe Dayan, just a few hundred metres from the headquarters of the Israeli intelligence service Mossad. The camp, located in Ramat HaSharon to the north of Tel Aviv, is home to both Mossad and Unit 8200, which specialises in intercepting communications. An amateur video shows the impact of the missile on the camp, and photos taken on the ground that were published on Telegram enabled us to confirm that at least one building – a hangar – was damaged, though we don't know what the hangar was being used for before it came under fire. Three other missiles visible in the video hit civilian targets near the camp. Despite the site's strategic importance, neither the authorities nor Israeli or international media outlets reported this strike. It was the same story for a strike that hit the Kirya, a neighbourhood in Tel Aviv, on June 13. The Kirya is home to both the headquarters of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Israeli Ministry of Defence. While reporting live, Trey Yingst, a journalist with the US news channel Fox News, had just said that a building in the complex had been hit by an Iranian missile when he was interrupted by a man who told him, in English, to 'go back'. The journalist asks his cameraman to turn towards another building. However, he is interrupted again, and the cameraman is forced to turn his camera towards the ground. The video isn't visible on the social media channels of Fox News, but it was copied and then shared online. By examining photos and videos of the strike, our team was able to determine that the strike hit the Da Vinci complex, a 32-floor residential building, which is located right next to the military complex. The way that information about this attack was reported in other Israeli and international media outlets also makes it look like censorship was at play. Israeli newspaper Haaretz waited until June 29 to mention this strike in an article – a full two weeks after the attack took place, even though the images of it had already circulated online. We were also able to verify two other strikes that hit military targets thanks to data from the University of Oregon. One strike hit the airbase in Tel Nof, to the south of Rehovot. Another hit Camp Zipporit, located to the north of Nazareth. Our team asked the IDF on August 1 if they could confirm that Iranian missiles had hit Israeli military sites during the conflict. The army had not responded by the publication of this article. If the army does send a statement, we will update this article. An oil refinery that has halted operations for several months Additional Iranian strikes have hit strategic infrastructure for the Israeli economy. We identified that three Iranian attacks damaged energy infrastructure. Two hit and damaged an oil refinery in the port city of Haifa on the night of June 14. We were able to geolocate one of the impacts using images published by the press and those we found on social media. We were able to geolocate the other using satellite images. If you compare an aerial view of one building located in the western part of the oil refinery on June 21 – a few days after the strike – with another image from December 2024, you can see that it looks like the roof has caved in, leaving the building's skeleton exposed. After the wave of attacks on the night of June 14, Bazan Group – which runs the oil refinery – halted its activities for nearly two weeks. The company informed the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange that it wouldn't be back to full operations until October. It further reported that damage to the refinery caused by the Iranian missiles is estimated at between 150 and 200 million dollars. Three employees died in a fire caused by the attack. Several million dollars of damage caused to a research institute Another one of the so-called "strategic' Iranian missile strikes hit the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, south of Tel Aviv, on the night of June 14. The institute is ranked among the best in the world (outside the United States). It also has strong links to the Israeli defence industry. The AP, quoting the Institute, reported that the missile hit two buildings. One housed a biology lab. The other, which was still under construction, was to be used for chemistry research. More than 45 labs were damaged, according to the Times of Israel. Researchers at the institute estimated the damage at hundreds of millions of dollars. According to several images verified by our team, one of the buildings hit by the strike was completely destroyed. Residential areas in ruin Out of the 36 strikes that our team geolocated on Israeli soil, 28 hit civilian sites. Some hit fields, beaches, and parking lots, but others caused extensive damage across the country. The town of Rehovot, located about 20 kilometres south of Tel Aviv, was one of the cities most impacted by Iranian missiles. One strike on the night of June 14 landed downtown, damaging or destroying a number of neighbouring buildings. Drone images filmed a few hours after the impact by local media outlet News Rehovot give a sense of the scale of the damage. Videos available on TikTok show the extent of the damage, including shops with blown-out windows and crumbled facades more than 250 metres from the point of impact. Iranian strikes hit a number of residential areas in Israel throughout the month of June. A missile hit a parking lot in the southwest of Tel Aviv on June 16, tearing apart most of the surrounding buildings. speech broadcast on June 1 0, our team shows how we located damage nearly 300 metres from the point of impact. 3,500 people injured, 41,000 requests for compensation filed Farzin Nadimi, a researcher at the Washington Institute who specialises in Iranian security and defence, says that civilian areas were among the targets of the Islamic republic. 'At some point, during or from the very beginning of the campaign, they actually intended to strike residential areas,' Nadimi told our team. 'You shouldn't forget that they consider all Israelis as enemies, enemy combatants.' Nadimi says that these strikes may have been part of an Iranian strategy to negotiate an end to the conflict. 'They knew that by pressuring the Israeli civilians and by destroying the residential areas, they would pressure the Israeli government and the military to probably agree to a ceasefire,' he said. The destruction caused by Iranian missiles to Israel had a direct impact on the lives of many Israelis. Nearly 3,500 Israelis were injured during the conflict with Iran, according to INSS, and about 30 people died. More than 41,000 applications were submitted to the Compensation Fund at the Israel Tax Authority. In Israel, these funds cover some of the damage to buildings and materials caused by war. However, this damage remains minor compared to what Iran experienced. Around 935 Iranians were killed and more than 4,700 people were injured by Israeli and American bombs, according to INSS. Blind missiles Outside of the missiles that caused damage, our team also identified strikes that hit roads, parking lots, and even uninhabited zones. For example, we identified one strike that took place on June 14 in the northern Israeli city of Tirat Carmel. A video of the missile falling shows that it hit a beach, located a few dozen metres from a road and 200 metres from the closest homes. It was a full two kilometres from the Tirat Carmel military base. A missile landed in a parking lot in the town of Beersheba on June 20, damaging several nearby buildings and setting fire to a number of cars. A new military base, which houses the southern command of the army and a division specialised in cyber defence and communication technology, is just 300 metres from the point of impact. The parking lot is also close to Beersheba's so-called "cyber campus" where American companies Microsoft, IBM and Dell all have offices. The Iranian authorities have not clearly communicated what they were targeting, so it is hard to determine their intentions. Nadimi thinks that the missiles that fell a few hundred metres from military and strategic targets lacked precision. 'While they were quite 'successful' at hitting residential blocks in central Tel Aviv, for example, they still lack precision to specifically strike a certain building in a military, security, or intelligence complex.' When reporting on a strike that hit Soroka Hospital on June 19, Israeli newspaper Haaretz suggested that Iran might be following a strategy of 'ballistic terror.' This would explain the three Iranian strikes using cluster missiles. These weapons, used to hit a number of targets at once, hit buildings housing a school and nursery in southern Israel on June 20. There were no victims. Strong censorship from the authorities All of the strikes that we reported in this article were either partially or fully kept under wraps by Israeli military censorship. A Chief Censor in the Israeli military is tasked with limiting the sensitive information disseminated by both Israeli and international media outlets. Guidelines updated in May specify that information about 'the impact and results of enemy actions and attacks… carried out against the state of Israel' must be submitted to the Censor before publication. Authorities doubled down on these policies after the conflict with Iran began. In a communiqué dated June 16 and addressed to all Israeli and international newsrooms present in Israel, the Chief Censor said that 'the use of drones or fixed-position cameras to capture wide-area footage around the impact site is strictly prohibited'. On June 17, Israeli police arrested journalists from the Turkish Arabic-language channel TRT and the Egyptian channel Al Ghad TV who were filming the port in Haifa. Police also seized some of their material. And while Israel has been trying to limit the spread of information about all missile impacts on its territory, information about strikes that damaged military sites is even more tightly controlled. In the same communiqué, the Chief Censor banned 'filming damage at or near military sites' and broadcasting 'the exact address of the impact location' in 'civilian areas near security facilities'.
France 24
9 hours ago
- France 24
UK couple held in Iran speak to relatives by phone: family
It comes after their children learned over the weekend that Lindsay and Craig Foreman, both 52, have been moved to separate prisons in and near Tehran, heightening fears for their welfare. Iranian authorities seized the pair in Kerman, in central Iran, in early January while they were on a round-the-world motorbike trip, claiming the following month that they were suspected spies. Little had been known about their whereabouts or welfare since. Distraught relatives have become increasingly vocal demanding that Iran allow the couple to phone home, and permit British officials more access to them. "For 213 days, we waited. Hoped. Held our breath. And today, we finally got those phone calls," Lindsay's son Joe Bennett said in a statement. "We finally heard their voices. After seven long months with no direct contact, we can now say what we've been desperate to say all this time: Lindsay and Craig are alive." Bennett added the call lasted for around eight minutes, during which "we laughed, we cried, and for a few brief moments, it felt like the weight of the past seven months lifted". The 31-year-old said that "while it was amazing to hear their voices, we must also keep our eyes firmly on the real issues". "Lindsay and Craig still haven't had a consular visit in months," he added. Bennett also urged the UK government to indicate "what it intends to do to secure their release", calling its "ongoing silence" over its strategy "deeply concerning". Craig's son Kieran Foreman said his separate call with his dad was "a massive relief". "It brings us back up from the hole of despair we have been in," he added, noting it gave him "hope". In an interview Monday, Bennett, of Folkestone in southeast England, told AFP that he had learned the previous day that Lindsay had been transferred to Qarchak women's prison near the capital. Human rights groups repeatedly criticise the dire conditions reported there. Meanwhile, he revealed Craig had been moved to Tehran's infamous central prison, also known as Fashafouyeh, which is about 30 kilometres (18 miles) south of the capital and has similar notoriety.
France 24
10 hours ago
- France 24
Hezbollah warns of resumed missile fire at Israel if it intensifies operations in Lebanon
The leader of Lebanon's Hezbollah warned Tuesday that if Israel intensifies its military operations against his group, the Iran-backed armed faction will resume firing missiles toward Israel. Naim Kassem's comments came as Lebanon's cabinet was meeting to discuss Hezbollah's disarmament. Beirut is under US pressure to disarm the group that recently fought a 14-month war with Israel and was left gravely weakened, with many of its political and military leaders dead. Since the war ended in November with a US-brokered ceasefire, Hezbollah officials have said the group will not discuss its disarmament until Israel withdraws from five hills it controls inside Lebanon and stops near-daily air strikes that have killed or wounded hundreds of people, most of them Hezbollah members. Israel has accused Hezbollah of trying to rebuild its military capabilities. Israel's military has said the five locations in Lebanon provide vantage points or are located across from communities in northern Israel, where about 60,000 Israelis were displaced during the war. Since the ceasefire, Hezbollah has claimed responsibility for one attack on a disputed area along the border. In a televised speech Tuesday, Kassem said Hezbollah rejects any timetable to hand over its weapons. 'Israel's interest is not to widen the aggression because if they expand, the resistance will defend, the army will defend and the people will defend,' Kassem said. 'This defense will lead to the fall of missiles inside Israel.' Since the war ended, Hezbollah has withdrawn most of its fighters and weapons from the area along the border with Israel south of the Litani river. Last week, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun reiterated calls for Hezbollah to give up its weapons, angering the group's leadership. The ceasefire agreement left vague how Hezbollah's weapons and military facilities north of the Litani river should be treated, saying Lebanese authorities should dismantle unauthorised facilities starting with the area south of the river. Hezbollah maintains the deal only covers the area south of the Litani, while Israel and the US say it mandates disarmament of the group throughout Lebanon. Kassem said Hezbollah rejects a government vote over its weapons, saying such a decision should be unanimously backed by all Lebanese. "No one can deprive Lebanon of its force to protect its sovereignty,' Kassem said. Hezbollah's weapons are a divisive issue among Lebanese, with some groups calling for its disarmament. The Israel-Hezbollah war started a day after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack against Israel from Gaza. It left more than 4,000 people dead and caused damage worth $11 billion.
