US urges citizens to immediately depart over a dozen Middle Eastern countries

Washington: The US Department of State on Monday called on Americans to immediately ⁠depart more than a dozen countries in the Middle East, ‌including Saudi Arabia and the United ​Arab Emirates, amid US-Israeli strikes against Iran.

Mora Namdar, the State Department's assistant secretary for consular affairs, said US citizens should leave using available commercial transportation "due to safety risks."

The warning came after the department, in recent days, updated its travel advisories for several ​countries in the region to ⁠recommend against travel. Monday's advisory applies to Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.

The US Embassy in Amman, Jordan, announced ⁠earlier on Monday that ‌its personnel had departed the site "due to a threat."

The US State Department has also activated an inter-agency emergency task force ‌to manage the situation and coordinate the United States' response to the conflict, a US official ⁠said.

On Saturday, the United States and Israel carried out a barrage of strikes on various targets in Iran, ‌killing many top officials, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Tehran responded ‌with its own strikes at multiple US and Israel sites across ‌the regions.

US President Donald Trump said on Monday that the ‌conflict had been projected to last four to five weeks but that it could go longer.

The conflict, which as launched the region into war, leaving scores of people dead, has resulted ⁠in a ⁠spike in energy prices as Iranian officials threatened to fire on any ship that tries to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, a key shipping route for the world's oil supply.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Energy Secretary Chris Wright are expected on Tuesday to announce US steps to mitigate the rising energy prices, according to Washington's top diplomat, Marco Rubio.

"We anticipated this could ​be an issue, and Secretary Wright and Bessent will begin to roll ​out those steps, starting tomorrow, to ​mitigate, to mitigate against the impact that could have," Rubio said ahead of a briefing congressional ​leaders about the strikes.