NPR News: 03-29-2026 6AM EDT

Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Winsor Johnston.

U.S. sailors and Marines have arrived in the Middle East as Iranian officials report

airstrikes hit several areas overnight.

NPR's Emily Fang reports Tehran is now threatening to target American universities in the region

after a prominent Iranian campus was bombed over the weekend.

The USS Tripley, carrying 3,500 U.S. Marines and sailors has arrived in the region that

the U.S. military will not say where and how they might be deployed.

Social media videos from across Iran showed strikes hitting all over the country, and

Israel's military said it had completed what it called a wide-scale wave of strikes

targeting weapons production and storage sites in Iran.

Iran claimed U.S. and Israeli strikes hit a Tehran University, and in a statement in

Iranian media, Iran's revolutionary guard corps threatened American campuses in the

Middle East and retaliation.

Iran continues to fire drones and missiles at Middle Eastern countries with Kuwait, saying

it was intercepting missile and drone attacks early Sunday.

Emily Fang and Pyrrhenu's van Turkey.

Three Lebanese journalists covering the invasion of their country's south have been killed

in an Israeli airstrike.

Israel is accusing one of them of being a Hezbollah militant but has not provided evidence,

and PR's Lauren Fair reports.

Two of the journalists were siblings, TV correspondent Fatima Fattuni and her cameraman brother

Muhammad Fattuni, afterward their father appeared on TV, saying he was proud of his children.

The journalist Israel says it targeted was Ali Shahib, a veteran TV correspondent, and

a household name in Lebanon.

After killing him, Israel's military issued a statement accusing him of exposing the locations

of Israeli troops.

All three had been covering Israel's invasion of southern Lebanon.

These officials call the attack a flagrant violation of international law and say they're

complaining to the UN Security Council, hundreds of fellow journalists marched at a protest

vigil in Lebanon's capital.

Lauren Friar and Pyrrhenu's Jazeen in southern Lebanon.

Demonstrations against President Trump took place across the nation on Saturday, as part

of the No Kings movement.

Minnesota Public Radio's Faving Geresger reports protests were held in St. Paul, the site

of the flagship rally.

An overwhelming mass of people demonstrated against President Trump at the Minnesota

State Capitol.

Remus Zhang, a 30-year-old mental health practitioner from St. Paul, was among them.

He says while progress may be slow to come, the turnout was a good sign.

Zhang says he wanted to be the voice for Minnesotaans afraid to step outside after the surge

and federal immigration enforcement for NPR News and Faving Geresger, St. Paul.

This is NPR News in Washington.

A mass of oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is spreading, now stretching more than 300 miles

and reaching several protected areas.

Officials believe this bill came from an offshore vessel, along with what they describe

as natural seabed.

Vishing crews say it's disrupting one of their busiest seasons of the year.

Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Raphael are considered the three great masters of the

high renaissance.

Now for the first time, a major retrospective of Raphael's work is in the United States.

NPR's Jennifer Vinesco reports.

Raphael has been called the Prince of Painters.

His portraits of Madonna's and other religious figures are known for their harmony and balance.

He became an extraordinary narrative painter, a storyteller who instantly knew how to capture

the plot of a story or a scene at the moment of its greatest drama.

That's Carmen Bambach.

She's the curator of the exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

She's collected more than 170 of his drawings, paintings, prints and tapestries from museums

and private collections around the world.

Many of them here for the first time.

The show will run until the end of June.

Jennifer Vinesco and PR News, New York.

The Illinois men's basketball team is heading to the final four after a 71-59 win over

Iowa Saturday night.

They'll take on the winner of the Duke Connecticut match-up next week.

The win marks the school's sixth final four appearance and its first since 2005.

This is NPR News.

Listen to this podcast sponsor-free on Amazon Music with a Prime Membership or any podcast

app by subscribing to NPR News Now Plus at plus.npr.org.

That's plus.npr.org.