• Possible strikes may focus on key Iranian infrastructure sites.
• Another plan involves securing Strait of Hormuz shipping route.
• Operation could include ground forces to reopen key oil passage.
  

President Donald Trump will receive a briefing on Thursday from the leader of the US Central Command, Brad Cooper, on new plans for potential military action against Iran, Axios reported on Wednesday.

The report cited unidentified sources. The White House and the US Central Command did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Centcom has prepared a plan for a “short and powerful” wave of strikes on Iran, likely including infrastructure targets, Axios reported, citing sources.

A fragile ceasefire in the Iran war began three weeks ago.

The war began when the US and Israel attacked Iran on February 28. Iran responded with its own strikes on Israel and the Gulf states with US bases. US-Israeli ⁠strikes on Iran and Israeli attacks in Lebanon have killed thousands and displaced millions.

Trump has previously threatened to destroy Iran’s civilian infrastructure. International law experts say such strikes may amount to war crimes. The 1949 Geneva Conventions on humanitarian conduct in war prohibit attacks on sites considered essential for civilians.

Another plan expected to be shared with Trump is focused on taking over part of the Strait of Hormuz to reopen it to commercial shipping, the report added, saying such an operation may involve ground forces.

The Iran war, which remains unpopular in the US, has shaken markets and raised oil prices. The war has brought traffic through the strait, a chokepoint for about 20% of global oil and liquefied natural gas shipments, close to a standstill.

Washington hopes to make Iran more flexible at the negotiating table on nuclear issues, Axios reported.

Another option that might come up in the briefing is a special forces operation to secure Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium, Axios said.

Trump has cited Iran’s nuclear programme as an imminent threat. Tehran denies seeking ⁠nuclear weapons but says it has the right to develop nuclear technology for peaceful purposes, including enrichment, as a party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine is also expected to attend Thursday’s briefing, Axios reported.

Goldie Hawn has no plans to rush back in front of the camera, and she has been remarkably clear-eyed about why.

The 80-year-old spoke to PEOPLE in an interview published on 29 April, explaining that after a career full of beloved performances, she simply hasn’t found anything worthy of bringing her back. 

“It’s about the content,” she said. 

“Acting for acting’s sake, taking things… I’ve read a lot of shows, a lot of scripts that I didn’t like or I didn’t think I’d fit. The one thing about acting is that I’ve done it, and I had a great career, and I honor that.”

Hawn last appeared on screen in The Christmas Chronicles 2 in 2020, alongside her longtime partner Kurt Russell. 

The decision to step back began long before that, however, she traced it to her mid-fifties. 

“I think ultimately every life has to have its sections. Doing the same thing over and over again for your whole life is not as interesting to me. And I decided at probably 55 or something, ‘What are you going to do for this next part of your life?’ And I knew that there was more out there to learn and to do.”

The right script could change everything. 

“I would love to get a material that could actually be like, ‘Oh my God, I want this so bad. This is so funny. She’s so crazy. She’s so interesting.’ But I haven’t come across it.” 

She also floated the idea of a project with her famously talented family, children Kate Hudson, Oliver Hudson and Wyatt Russell, with characteristic openness. 

“It’s such a great idea because we have so much talent. Never say never, because that could happen at any time.”

Hawn and Russell have also stepped back from Hollywood geographically, spending much of their time at their home in Colorado.

Russell has described waking up each morning looking at the mountain, riding horses and sitting by the living-room fireplace as the rhythm of their life there, a far cry from the pace of the film industry they both helped define.

Christopher Nolan has revealed that his upcoming epic The Odyssey will be shorter than Oppenheimer, offering a small reassurance to audiences ahead of what is shaping up to be one of the most ambitious films of the decade.

Speaking to the Associated Press, the Oscar-winning filmmaker confirmed the news simply: “It’s an epic film, as the subject matter demands. But it is shorter.” 

Oppenheimer ran to 180 minutes, so The Odyssey will clock in at under three hours, though the exact runtime has yet to be announced.

The scale of the project is extraordinary by any measure. 

Nolan has previously revealed to Empire magazine that he shot over two million feet of film across 91 days of production. 

The Odyssey also marks the first Hollywood feature to be shot entirely on Imax cameras, a technical challenge that required a newly developed casing called a “blimp” to reduce the cameras’ noise enough to capture dialogue-driven scenes on large-format film.

Matt Damon headlines the film as Odysseus, reuniting with Nolan after Interstellar and Oppenheimer. 

Tom Holland plays his son Telemachus, with a cast that also includes Anne Hathaway, Zendaya, Lupita Nyong’o, Robert Pattinson, Charlize Theron and Jon Bernthal.

Nolan spoke candidly about the weight of adapting one of the most celebrated stories in human history. 

“There’s a massive amount of pressure. Anyone taking on The Odyssey is taking on the hopes and dreams of people for epic movies everywhere and that comes with a huge responsibility.” 

He drew on lessons learned from The Dark Knight trilogy when thinking about how to approach beloved source material. 

“What people want from a movie about a beloved story, a beloved set of characters, is they want a strong and sincere interpretation. They want to know that a filmmaker has gone to the mat for it.”

He also explained why he felt the story had never truly been done justice on screen. 

“What I saw is that all of this great mythological cinematic work that I had grown up with, Ray Harryhausen movies and other things, I’d never seen that done with the sort of weight and credibility that an A-budget and a big Hollywood, Imax production could do.”

The Odyssey opens in cinemas on 17 July from Universal Pictures.