Iran war is ‘retribution against their ayatollah and his death cult’, Hegseth says

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth Monday defended the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran, calling the widespread and ongoing attacks a necessary response to threats of nuclear and terror attacks even as the conflict showed signs of spreading across the Middle East.

“We didn’t start this war but under President Trump we will end it,” Hegseth said. “Their war on Americans has become our retribution against their ayatollah and his death cult,” Hegseth said.

The Pentagon leader vowed the conflict would destroy Tehran’s capacity to launch missiles against Western allies and its effort to build nuclear weapon. “We’re hitting them surgically, overwhelmingly and and unapologetically,” Hegseth said.

Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the military objective was to “prevent Iran from projecting power outside its border,” and conceded the fighting was not anywhere near ending. “This work is just beginning,” Caine said.

—New York Daily News

‘I just really saw his greatness’: People come to SC capital to bid Jesse Jackson goodbye

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Soldrea Roberts grew up around the corner from the late civil rights icon Rev. Jesse Jackson’s nonprofit, Rainbow PUSH Coalition, on the south side of Chicago.

She remembers seeing him around in coffee shops, waiting rooms and at marches in her Chicago neighborhood. Roberts also said she went to the same school as his grandchildren.

Now, Roberts is an OBGYN in Orangeburg, where she moved to escape the Chicago weather. Paying respects to Jackson, who will lie in state at the South Carolina State House on Monday, was important to her. “I just feel like we have limited opportunities in life to pay respects to people that laid the foundation,” Roberts said. “For me to be able to get to where I am, go to medical school and be successful.”

Jackson, a South Carolina native, died Feb. 17, 2026, at the age 84 from a rare neurological disorder. A civil rights leader, Jackson was with Martin Luther King Jr. when King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1968.

—The State

UNC Rex Healthcare settles lawsuit that claimed religious discrimination over COVID vaccine

RALEIGH, N.C. — Rex Healthcare has agreed to pay $150,000 to settle a federal lawsuit that claimed it discriminated against an employee who refused to get vaccinated against COVID-19 for religious reasons.

Rex had granted the employee a religious exemption for the flu vaccine in 2019 and 2020, according to the lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. But Rex denied four requests for an exemption for COVID-19, according to the EEOC, “rejecting her sincerely held religious belief that receiving vaccines is inconsistent with God’s will.”

Rex fired the employee, Heather Goeller, in 2021 for refusing to get vaccinated, according to the EEOC’s lawsuit. Goeller was working remotely during the pandemic and did not have direct contact with patients, according to the lawsuit.

The EEOC sued Rex in late 2024 after failing to reach a settlement with the nonprofit, which is part of the UNC Health system.

—The News & Observer (Raleigh)

Russia, Ukraine plan for US-led peace talks despite war in Iran

Russia and Ukraine still expect planned U.S.-led peace talks to take place this week, even as President Donald Trump’s administration continues a military campaign against Iran.

With airspace in the United Arab Emirates currently closed amid the risk of missile and drone attacks, the talks are unlikely to take place in Abu Dhabi, according to a person in Moscow with knowledge of the situation. Istanbul is one possible alternative venue, the person said, asking not to be identified because the matter is sensitive.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told reporters Monday that talks he said were planned for around March 5-6 in Abu Dhabi haven’t yet been canceled. Turkey and Switzerland could be alternative locations, he said.

This would be the fourth meeting between the sides this year after two rounds of talks in Abu Dhabi and one in Geneva, as the U.S. seeks to broker a deal to end Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Russian demands for Ukraine to cede territory in the eastern Donetsk region that Moscow’s troops have failed to capture in fighting since 2014 is a key unresolved issue in the negotiations.

—Bloomberg News