UK troops and civilians being put at risk by Iran strikes, Healey says

The defence secretary has said protecting UK military and civilians in the Middle East from "indiscriminate attacks" by Iran was his priority.

John Healey told the BBC that "no-one will mourn" the death of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed on the first day of US and Israeli air strikes on Iran.

Healey said some British military personnel at a base in Bahrain had been "within several hundred yards" of a retaliatory missile and drone strike on Saturday, while two missiles had been fired in the direction of Cyprus.

The UK did not participate in the US-Israeli strikes on Iran.

The defence secretary said the government was reviewing the terror threat level in the UK.

Shadow foreign secretary Dame Priti Patel told the BBC's Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg that she welcomed the US-Israeli attacks on Iran.

She said it was "absolutely astonishing" Sir Keir Starmer had not been more "proactive" when it came to the strikes given the threats posed by the Iranian regime to UK interests.

Since Saturday, Iran has launched waves of missile and drone attacks against targets across Israel, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Iraq.

Healey told the programme: "In that Bahrain military base that was hit by missiles and drones yesterday, we had 300 British personnel, some within several hundred yards of the strike."

He said two ballistic missiles were also "fired in the direction of Cyprus" but added that "we're pretty sure they weren't targeted at Cyprus".

The minister said these attacks demonstrated how British military personnel and civilians were "at risk with a regime that is increasingly indiscriminate, widespread and uncontrolled in the attacks it is mounting".

Healey said the UK was attempting to do "all we can" to prevent further regional escalation.

Force protection measures at UK military facilities in the region are at their highest level.

Meanwhile RAF F-35 jets and Typhoons based in Cyprus, along with a squadron of Typhoons based in Qatar, continue to fly over the Middle East as part of a defensive operation.

On Saturday, a British unit based in Iraq intercepted an Iranian drone that had been heading towards a coalition base housing UK military personnel.

Asked six times whether the UK backed the US-Israeli strikes or thought they were legal, Healey declined to give a direct answer.

He said the UK shared the main aim of allies in the region and the US that Iran "should never have a nuclear weapon", but added: "It is for the US to set out the legal basis of the action that it took."

Healey said he would not speculate on "hypotheticals" when pressed on whether he could rule out UK involvement in further strikes.

Dame Priti said moral basis for the US-Israeli attacks was "absolutely right".

She added that the question for the UK government now was to "protect our domestic homeland and to ensure that there are no present threats or incoming threats and dangers" to British citizens.

Dame Priti offered to work with the government to fast track any legislation through Parliament to take action against Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The IRGC is regarded as Iran's most powerful institution and is tasked with protecting the country's Islamic system.

Green Party leader Zack Polanski said he believed an "illegal and unprovoked attack" had taken place against Iran and questioned why UK ministers would not condemn it.

"I'm worried the UK is going to be pulled into another illegal war," he said.

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage wrote on X that the UK should follow the European Union in designating the IRGC as a terrorist organisation.