The United States has launched strikes on Iranian targets in the Strait of Hormuz, just hours before the country votes in the mid-term elections.

US officials told several American news outlets that the strikes were defensive in nature and meant to protect US assets in the region.

The officials added that the strikes were also in response to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) firing at a US aircraft.

The last confirmed US strikes on Iran were in September.

Trump previously said attacks would not resume until after the mid-terms.

On Saturday, Iranian Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei instructed the country’s military to respond to any threats, without geographical restrictions.

Khamenei also ordered an expansion of the list of potential American and Israeli targets.

At the time, Marco Rubio, US secretary of state, said Trump had yet to decide whether to launch new missiles on Iran but would prefer to resolve the conflict diplomatically.

Trump has been facing plunging poll numbers and pressure from within his party to end the war, which began when the US and Israel attacked Iran in February.

Mohammad Ghalibaf, Iranian parliamentary speaker who is leading negotiations with the US, issued a fresh warning early Tuesday.

“The Iranian nation will not surrender to the enemy’s threats and military actions,” he said.

Ghalibaf added that Iran’s military and strategic response “will be unpredictable”.

An award-winning University of Cambridge researcher, Dr Marta Shahbazi has been identified as one of the victims in the Spanish train disaster last week Wednesday, where over 60 people died. She died while on her way to collect a prize for scientific excellence.

Dr Shahbazi was travelling to an awards ceremony on Wednesday when the train she was on crashed into another near Urda, south of Madrid, killing 69 people.

The mother of two was an affiliate associate professor leading a group of researchers at MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology (LMB) in Cambridge and had earned several awards for work on human embryos and cell biology.

In a statement, the LMB paid tribute to the “inspiring, talented and passionate scientist” and described her death as a “profound shock and a huge loss”.

The expert in cell biology ran the Shahbazi Laboratory at the LMB, based on the Cambridge Biomedical Campus.

She had been announced as the winner of a Spanish Society for Developmental Biology award for her contributions to the study of early human development and was due to collect the award at a conference in El Rompido in Andalusia.

The LMB said: “As a wife and mother of two young children, Marta wrote eloquently about balancing her family and career, serving as a much-admired role model for a ‘mother scientist’, a term she used to describe herself.

“Marta was an inspiring, talented and passionate scientist whose research shed light on the earliest steps in the development of human embryos and how errors occur that lead to failed pregnancies,” the LMB said.

The institute said her death was “a profound shock and a huge loss for LMB”.

Her work had been recognised with “many awards and prizes”, the laboratory added.

Shahbazi is listed on the University of Cambridge website as a principal investigator at its Stem Cell Institute (CSCI).

Institute director Prof Bertie Gottgens said its community was “shocked and deeply saddened” by her death.

The crash in Spain happened when a state-operated Renfe high-speed train smashed into the back of a stationary train operated by the Iryo company.

It is one of the worst rail disasters in Europe’s modern history, and Spain’s worst crash since 2013.

Three days of national mourning were declared in the country.

More than 540 people were on board both trains.

Emergency crews on Sunday afternoon responded to the scene of a plane crash in Greenacres, a city in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States.

The Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office, in a statement, said the incident occurred in the area of Military Trail, between Cresthaven Boulevard and 10th Avenue North.

All northbound and southbound lanes of Military Trail are currently closed until further notice, with motorists advised to avoid the area and seek alternate routes.

Videos online show the aircraft taking a sharp turn before nosediving into the ground near a mobile home park, demolishing one trailer in a huge fireball.

There are reports of “several fatalities,” although the figure is still unconfirmed. It is also not yet clear whether anyone on the ground was killed or injured.

The aircraft, a Learjet 60, had departed Austin-Bergstrom International Airport in Texas and was heading to North Eleuthera Airport in the Bahamas.

Learjet 60, a business jet manufactured by Bombardier Aerospace, is typically configured to accommodate six to seven passengers alongside a two-person crew.

The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the crash, according to the FAA.