Vicky Baftiri

Me & @DUALIPA are now bff’s. Lol 🇦🇱

"Between October 2023 and December 2025, more than 38,000 women and girls were killed in #Gaza, the result of Israeli air bombardment and land military operations. 𝙏𝙝𝙖𝙩'𝙨 𝙖𝙣 𝙖𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙖𝙜𝙚 𝙤𝙛 47 𝙬𝙤𝙢𝙚𝙣 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙜𝙞𝙧𝙡𝙨 𝙠𝙞𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙙 𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙮 𝙙𝙖𝙮." - @UN_Women

Doctors are exploring a different approach to a specific type of breast cancer tumor called cryoablation. It destroys the tumor tissue with extreme cold in a short outpatient procedure that can let them go home the same day

53-year-old court interpreter Meenu Batra was heading to Milwaukee, Wisconsin for work last month when she was suddenly apprehended and arrested by ICE. The single mom, who fled to the U.S. from India as a teenager after her parents were killed for their religion, was granted "withholding of removal" status, which does not offer a path to citizenship. Batra is now being held at a detention center in Texas. She tells CBS News' Shanelle Kaul she is afraid to sleep at night, "because you're afraid when you go to bed, where you're going to wake up." cbsn.ws/4mCDSur

Israel, which wasn’t formally part of the Iran negotiations, wasn’t happy that it got word that a deal was finalized at a late stage and wasn’t consulted, according to mediators and a person familiar with the matter. on.wsj.com/47SjiQO

BREAKING: Iran shot down a fighter jet on Friday, Iranian state media reported, in what would be the first time that Tehran downed an American jet since the war broke out five weeks ago. A search and rescue effort is underway, U.S. officials say.

TIME’s new cover: Inside Trump's search for a way out of the Iran war time.com/article/2026/0…

The Municipal Police of Madrid has published the video of Paco's training exercises, the hero dog who saves and performs cardiac massage (CPR) on the officer who fainted (as a simulation), and it's winning hearts worldwide. ❤️

More than half a million dollars has been raised via a viral GoFundMe for 78-year-old delivery driver after a customer’s doorbell video showed him struggling to make ends meet. He returned to work after losing key retirement income and says rising costs left him with no choice but to keep delivering. Donations from around the world are now giving him a chance to finally rest.

The U.S. may be responsible for the bombing of a girls' school in Iran that killed at least 168 people, many of them children, on Feb. 28, sources told CBS News. A U.S. assessment suggests that the United States was "likely" responsible for the deadly attack but did not intentionally target the school and may have hit it in error, possibly due to the use of dated intelligence which wrongly identified the area as still part of an Iranian military installation, a person briefed on the preliminary intelligence told CBS News. Israel's military told CBS News last week that it was also not operating in the area. The assessment contradicts President Trump's assertion over the weekend that "Iran" was responsible. White House spokesperson Anna Kelly told CBS News in a statement that the "investigation is ongoing," and "There are no conclusions at this time, and it is both irresponsible and false for anyone to claim otherwise." cbsn.ws/4syHWO2

We asked people around the world to rate the morality and ethics of others in their country. The U.S. is the only place we surveyed where more adults describe the morality and ethics of others living in the country as bad than good. See our full morality report here: pewresearch.org/religion/2026/…

The CIA is working to arm Kurdish forces with the aim of sparking a popular uprising in Iran, multiple people familiar with the plan told CNN. cnn.it/4rshoNP

Pentagon tells Congress no sign that Iran was going to attack US first, sources say reut.rs/4siKbF4 reut.rs/4siKbF4

An Iranian man left this comment on my YouTube channel. This is without a doubt the single best explanation of the reality facing Iranian people today👇 "As an Iranian, I can tell you the situation is no longer just political—it's existential. We are trapped between two collapsing structures: one internal, one external. On one hand, we face a deeply dysfunctional government, led by the Supreme Leader and the Islamic Republic’s unelected institutions. Decades of economic mismanagement, suppression of dissent, and brutal ideological control have alienated multiple generations. No one believes in reform anymore—because every attempt has either been co-opted or crushed. But here's the paradox: We are also terrified of regime collapse—because we've watched the aftermath of Western intervention in countries like Iraq, Libya, Syria, and Afghanistan. Each was promised freedom; each descended into chaos, civil war, or foreign occupation. So no, we don't trust the U.S. or Israel. Not because we support our regime—but because we know how imperial powers treat ‘liberated’ nations in the Middle East. Freedom, in their language, often means vacuum, fire, and permanent instability. Right now, many Iranians live with three truths at once: The Islamic Republic is morally and politically bankrupt. The alternatives offered by foreign actors are not liberation—they’re collapse. A bad government is survivable. No government is not. We are not silent because we agree. We are cautious because we’ve learned—too well—what happens when superpowers decide to "help." In a sentence: Iran is a nation held hostage by its own regime, but haunted by the fate of its neighbors. We are stuck in a house we hate, surrounded by fires we fear more."

President Trump launched strikes on Iran after a weeks-long lobbying effort by Israel and Saudi Arabia, according to four people familiar with the matter. U.S. intelligence assessments saw no imminent threat, but regional allies argued to strike. wapo.st/4s23KC9

BREAKING: US strikes on Iran used Anthropic's Claude, just hours after it was banned by Trump, according to WSJ report.

I am a diplomatic aide in the Sultanate of Oman's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. My job is logistics. When two countries that cannot speak to each other need to speak to each other, I book the rooms. I prepare the briefing materials. I make sure the water glasses are the right distance apart. You would be surprised how much of diplomacy is water glasses. Too close and it feels informal. Too far and it feels like a tribunal. I have a chart. We had a very good month. Since January, Oman has been mediating indirect talks between the United States and Iran on Iran's nuclear program. The talks were held in Muscat and in Geneva. The Americans would sit in one room. The Iranians would sit in another room. I would walk between them. My Fitbit says I averaged fourteen thousand steps on negotiation days. The hallway between the two rooms at the Royal Opera House conference center is forty-seven meters. I walked it two hundred and twelve times in February. This is good for my cardiovascular health. It was less good for my knees. Both are in the service of peace. By mid-February, we had something. Iran agreed to zero stockpiling of enriched uranium. Not reduced stockpiling. Zero. They agreed to down-blend existing stockpiles to the lowest possible level. They agreed to convert them into irreversible fuel. They agreed to full IAEA verification with potential US inspector access. They agreed, in the Foreign Minister's phrase, to "never, ever" possess nuclear material for a bomb. I have worked in diplomacy for seven years. I have never seen a country agree to this many things this quickly. I made a spreadsheet of the concessions. It had fourteen rows. I color-coded it. Green for confirmed. Yellow for pending. By February 21 the spreadsheet was entirely green. I printed it. It is on my desk in Muscat. It is still green. That phrase took eleven days. "Never, ever." The Iranians initially offered "not seek to." The Americans wanted "will not under any circumstances." We landed on "never, ever" at 2:14 AM on a Tuesday in Muscat. I typed the final version myself. I used Times New Roman because Geneva prefers it. The document was fourteen pages. I was proud of every comma. Here is what they said, in the order they said it. February 24: "We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity." — The Foreign Minister, private briefing to Gulf Cooperation Council ambassadors. I prepared the slide deck. Slide 14 was the implementation timeline. Slide 15 was the signing ceremony logistics. I had reserved the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Room XX. It seats four hundred. We discussed pen brands for the signing. The Iranians preferred Montblanc. The Americans had no preference. I ordered twelve Montblanc Meisterstucks at six hundred and thirty dollars each. They arrive on Tuesday. February 27, 8:30 AM EST: "The deal is within our reach." — The Foreign Minister, CBS Face the Nation. He sat across from Margaret Brennan. He said broad political terms could be agreed "tomorrow" with ninety days for technical implementation in Vienna. He said, and I wrote this line for the briefing card he carried in his breast pocket: "If we just allow diplomacy the space it needs." He praised the American envoys by name. Steve Witkoff. Jared Kushner. He said both had been constructive. I watched from the Four Seasons Georgetown. The minibar had cashews. I ate the cashews. They were nineteen dollars. The most expensive cashew I have ever eaten. But it was a good morning and we were within our reach. February 27, 2:00 PM EST: Meeting with Vice President Vance, Washington. The Foreign Minister presented our progress. Zero stockpiling. Full verification. Irreversible conversion. "Never, ever." The Vice President used the word "encouraging." His aide took notes on an iPad. The aide did not make eye contact for the last nine minutes of the meeting. I noticed this. Noticing things is the only part of my job that is not water glasses. February 27, 4:00 PM EST: "Not happy with the pace." — President Trump, to reporters. Not happy with the pace. We had achieved zero stockpiling. Full IAEA verification. Irreversible fuel conversion. Inspector access. And the phrase "never, ever," which took eleven days and cost me two hundred and twelve trips down a forty-seven-meter hallway. Every American president since Carter has failed to get Iran to agree to this. Forty-five years. Not happy with the pace. February 27, 9:47 PM EST: The Foreign Minister's flight departs Dulles for Muscat. I am in the seat behind him. He is reviewing Slide 14 on his laptop. The implementation timeline. Vienna technical sessions. The signing ceremony. The pens. I fall asleep over the Atlantic. I dream about water glasses. February 28, 6:00 AM GST: I wake up to push notifications. February 28: "The United States has begun major combat operations in Iran." — President Trump. Operation Epic Fury. Coordinated airstrikes. The United States and Israel. Tehran. Isfahan. Qom. Karaj. Kermanshah. Nuclear facilities. IRGC bases. Sites near the Supreme Leader's office. Israel called their half Operation Roaring Lion. Someone in both governments spent time choosing these names. Epic Fury. Roaring Lion. I spent eleven days on "never, ever." They spent it on branding. The President said Iran had "rejected American calls to halt its nuclear weapons production." Rejected. Iran had agreed to zero stockpiling. Iran had agreed to full verification. Iran had agreed to "never, ever." Iran had agreed to everything in a fourteen-page document that I typed in Times New Roman. The President said they rejected it. I do not know which document the President was reading. I know which one I typed. February 28, 18:45 UTC: Iran internet connectivity: four percent. — NetBlocks, confirmed by Cloudflare. Ninety-six percent of a country went dark. You cannot negotiate with a country at four percent connectivity. You cannot negotiate with a country that is being struck. You cannot negotiate. This is not a political opinion. This is a logistics assessment. February 28: The governor of Minab reported forty girls killed at an elementary school. I do not have logistics for that. There is no slide for that. The water glass chart does not cover that. February 28: Lockheed Martin: up. Northrop Grumman: up. RTX: up. Dow futures: down six hundred and twenty-two points. Gold: five thousand two hundred and ninety-six dollars. An analyst at AInvest published a note titled "Iran Strikes: Tactical Plays." The note recommended positions in oil, defense stocks, and gold. The most expensive cashew I have ever eaten was nineteen dollars. The most expensive pen I have ever ordered was six hundred and thirty dollars. The math suggests I have been working in the wrong industry. Defense stocks do not require water glasses. Defense stocks do not require eleven days. Defense stocks require one morning. February 28: Israel closed its airspace and its schools. Iran launched retaliatory missiles toward US bases in the Gulf. The Supreme Leader promised a "crushing response." Israel's defense minister declared a permanent state of emergency. Everyone is using words I recognize in an order I do not. I recognize "permanent." I recognize "emergency." I do not recognize them next to each other. In diplomacy, nothing is permanent and everything is an emergency. In war it is the reverse. February 28: The Foreign Minister has not made a public statement. The briefing card is still in his breast pocket. It still says "within our reach."

The toll from a strike on a girls’ elementary school in Minab, Iran, has risen to 57 students dead and 60 others injured, according to Iran's semiofficial Tasnim News Agency, which cited the local governor. Follow live updates: abcnews.link/9iPXPAh

Israel has now killed more journalists than any other government since the Committee to Project Journalists began collecting records in 1992. The Israel-Gaza war is the deadliest conflict on record for journalists, the CPJ found. wapo.st/4qVc6tB

BREAKING: 51 Iranian children killed, 60 students wounded after joint US-Israel strikes hit girls' school in Iran.

BREAKING: Israel has assessed that Ayatollah Khamenei was killed, Channel 12 reports.