Iran live updates: Iran war has cost at least $29 billion, Pentagon official says
Iran live updates: Iran war has cost at least $29 billion, Pentagon official says
DAVID BRENNAN and NADINE EL-BAWABTue, May 12, 2026 at 1:44 PM UTC
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President Donald Trump announced "major combat operations" against Iran on Feb. 28, with massive joint U.S.-Israeli strikes targeting military, government and infrastructure sites.
Following the announcement of a two-week ceasefire, initial U.S.-Iran talks in Pakistan in April failed to reach a peace deal.
Trump later announced the open-ended extension of the ceasefire and the continuation of a U.S. blockade until negotiations are concluded "one way or the other."
The Iran war is estimated to have cost $29 billion, acting Pentagon comptroller Jules W. Hurst III told lawmakers Tuesday morning during a House Appropriations hearing.Two weeks ago, Hurst testified it was $25 billion, much of which was attributed to munitions costs.Hurst said the number comes after accounting for, "replacement of equipment costs and also just general operational costs keep people in theater."Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., asked Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth when Congress would get a more detailed accounting for war costs.“When it's relevant and required, we will share it,” Hegseth responded. -ABC News' Steven Beynon
The Israel Defense Forces said in a post to X on Tuesday that it hit 45 alleged Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon over the past day.The IDF claimed that its targets included command posts, observation posts, assembly points, warehouses and other buildings it alleged were being used by Hezbollah forces in the area.Hezbollah on Tuesday claimed a rocket attack on Israeli forces deployed in southern Lebanon.Lebanon's Ministry of Public Health said on Monday that at least 2,869 people have been killed and 8,730 people wounded in Lebanon since cross-border fighting resumed on March 2.
Kawnat Haju/AFP via Getty Images - PHOTO: A photograph taken from the southern Lebanese area of Tyre shows smoke rising from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the area of Ras Al-Ain on May 12, 2026.
Ebrahim Rezaei, a member of the Iranian parliament and the spokesperson for the body's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, suggested in a post to X on Tuesday that renewed attacks on the country may prompt lawmakers to consider a higher level of uranium enrichment."One of Iran's options in the event of another attack could be 90% enrichment," Rezaei wrote in a post to X. "We will review it in the parliament."Weapons-grade uranium -- enriched to a high enough level to use as fuel in a nuclear weapon -- is generally considered to require enrichment of 90% and above. Iran has amassed a stockpile of uranium enriched to 60%, the fate of which is a key issue in ongoing peace talks.The U.S. has estimated that Iran amassed around 1,000 pounds of 60% enriched uranium. President Donald Trump has said that the stockpile was buried underground during the U.S. strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities last year, saying this weekend that the site is "very well surveilled."
The speaker of the Iranian parliament, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, wrote in a post to X on Monday that Tehran's 14-point peace plan is the only option for ending the war with the U.S. and Israel."There is no alternative but to accept the rights of the Iranian people as laid out in the 14-point proposal," Ghalibaf -- who led the Iranian negotiating team at April negotiations in Islamabad, Pakistan -- wrote on Monday."Any other approach will be completely inconclusive; nothing but one failure after another," he added. "The longer they drag their feet, the more American taxpayers will pay for it."-ABC News' Desiree Adib
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During an Oval Office event about maternal health on Monday, President Donald Trump continued to rail against the Iranian proposal response that he received Sunday, calling it “unacceptable” and “a piece of garbage” that he didn’t even finish reading, adding that the current ceasefire with Iran is “unbelievably weak.”Trump said he has the “best plan ever” which requires that Iran does not develop a nuclear weapon-- something he said Iran’s latest proposal did not explicitly agree to.“It was just unacceptable. You know, a lot of people said, ‘Well, does he have a plan?’ Yeah, of course I do have a plan. I have the best plan ever,” Trump said.He later added, “But the plan is, they cannot have a nuclear weapon, and they didn't say that in their letter.”The president also declared the ceasefire is now at its “weakest” point because of the unsatisfactory response.“It's unbelievably weak, I would say. I would call it the weakest right now. After reading that piece of garbage they sent us. I didn't even finish reading it," he said.But Trump continued to insist that he is facing “no pressure” to secure a deal or end the war, pushing back on claims that he would “get tired” of the operation.“Are they stupid people? They didn't want to believe it. They think that, well, I'll get tired of this, or I'll get bored or I'll have some pressure, but there's no pressure. There's no pressure at all. We're going to have a complete victory,” Trump said.Trump pointed to disagreement over the removal of enriched uranium from Iran as one of the biggest issues with Iran’s latest response.“They changed their mind, because they didn’t put it in the paper,” Trump said of removing the uranium.-ABC News’ Emily Chang
President Donald Trump told Fox News journalist John Roberts he is considering restarting Project Freedom, but noted that the U.S. Navy’s role in allegedly “guiding” ships through the Strait of Hormuz would “only be a piece of it."Further details of the president's plans with the operation were not immediately available.Project Freedom went into effect exactly one week ago before Trump abruptly paused it Tuesday evening.According to Fox News, Trump expressed confidence in Iran complying with his demands, saying “they’re going to fold.” On Sunday, Trump blasted Iran's response to the U.S. proposal, calling it "totally unacceptable."Asked whether he wishes to negotiate with a new round of leaders in Iran, Trump told Fox News, "I will deal with them until they make a deal.”Trump has repeatedly criticized Iran’s leadership, saying they’re disjointed and not able to communicate with each other. In recent weeks, the president has also suggested that he doesn’t need to make a deal with Iran at all.Trump also reportedly told Fox News that Iranian negotiators said Iran does not have the technology to retrieve their nuclear dust and that the U.S. must go into Iran to obtain it.-ABC News’ Emily Chang
The U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) reported on Monday that a student accused by the Iranian government of "intelligence cooperation with Mossad and the CIA" was executed.Erfan Shakourzadeh, 29, was an aerospace engineering student at the Iran University of Science and Technology in Tehran, HRANA said.The Iranian judiciary alleged that Shakourzadeh "received payments in cryptocurrency" for providing "information regarding the location of his workplace, ongoing projects and certain details related to the organization where he worked," HRANA added.-ABC News' Zoe Magee
The death toll from Israeli strikes on Lebanon since March 2 rose to 2,846 people as of the Ministry of Public Health's latest update on Sunday, with 8,693 people also reported as wounded.Sunday's figure showed 51 additional deaths from Israeli strikes since the previous update on Saturday. The continued Israeli attacks come despite a ceasefire agreed by Israeli and Lebanese leaders last month.Hezbollah -- the Iranian-aligned Lebanese militia -- on Monday claimed fresh attacks on Israeli forces operating in southern Lebanon.
Kawnat Haju/AFP via Getty Images - PHOTO: This photograph taken from the southern Lebanese area of Tyre shows smoke rising from the site of Israeli bombardment that targeted the village of Tair Harfa on May 11, 2026.
Oil prices climbed after President Donald Trump rejected Iran's latest proposed peace deal as "totally unacceptable," with the U.S. and Iran still appearing far apart on any resolution to the war.Oil was at nearly $98 a barrel -- up 2.5% -- in U.S. trading as of Monday morning, with global oil at $104, up nearly 3%.The average price of a gallon of regular gas on Monday was $4.48, down 3.7 cents compared to Sunday and up $1.54 since the war started, according to GasBuddy.
Jenny Kane/AP - PHOTO: An American flag flies near a sign for fuel prices at a gas station on May 6, 2026, in Portland, Oregon.
-ABC News' Zunaira Zaki
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei told a press conference on Monday that Tehran is "serious" about ongoing negotiations to end the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, and after President Donald Trump on Sunday dismissed Tehran's latest proposal as "totally unacceptable.""Diplomatic processes have their own rules, and parties to any negotiation must decide based on their national interests," Baghaei said, as quoted by the semi-official Mehr News Agency."The Islamic Republic of Iran has shown it is serious in pursuing its national interests and legitimate rights, while at the same time participating in diplomatic processes with good faith and reason," he added.Rather, Baghaei said, it is the U.S. that still needs to prove its commitment to a diplomatic process, citing the U.S. withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action nuclear deal in 2018 and its previous launching of military action despite ongoing talks."We fight whenever necessary, and we use the weapon of diplomacy whenever we deem it right," Baghaei said.
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Source: “AOL Breaking”
