Up First briefing: Iran-US; TPS; Election Assistance Commission; Gaza : NPR

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Today’s top stories

After two days of intense strikes, fighting between the U.S. and Iran appears to have paused. The U.S. says it hit 170 targets in Iran. Iran says it targeted U.S. military bases in the Gulf. The fighting coincided with a weeklong funeral for former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and four of his family members killed on the first day of the conflict.

• 🎧 Tensions remain high in the region, NPR’s Carrie Kahn, who is in Tel Aviv, tells Up First. In the recent series of attacks, Jordan intercepted incoming fire from Iran. Iran yesterday threatened the United Arab Emirates. Eyal Zamir, the Israeli armed forces chief of staff, said that the country is prepared if fighting resumes.

Thousands of Haitian and Syrian immigrants with Temporary Protected Status (TPS) are at risk of losing their ability to work in the U.S. due to a recent Supreme Court ruling. The court gave the Trump administration the green light to revoke TPS for more than 300,000 people. TPS allows immigrants to legally reside in the United States when conditions in their countries make it unsafe to return.

• 🎧 Many immigrants’ work permits are tied to their TPS and their driver’s licenses are linked to those permits, says reporter Kathryn Mobley of NPR network station WYSO. Reporting from Springfield, Ohio, home to a large Haitian community, Mobley says some immigrants are staying home, while others are reaching out for help. Local nonprofits are encouraging people to apply for asylum, though the process is lengthy and offers no guarantee of protection from deportation. Some Springfield residents say they have already lost manufacturing jobs following the ruling.

President Trump dismissed the remaining members of the bipartisan U.S. Election Assistance Commission, drawing criticism from Democrats and voting rights advocates. A White House official said that Trump can take this action due to the Slaughter decision. Last month, in the Slaughter Case, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a president has greater flexibility in removing members of independent federal agencies.

The U.S. brokered a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas last year, but nine months later, that agreement has stalled. The deal called for an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, new governance in Gaza and Hamas’s disarmament. Instead, Israeli forces have expanded their control from about half of Gaza at the start of the ceasefire to nearly 70%, according to Israeli officials and NPR’s analysis. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that the military is tightening its grip to surround Hamas. For Palestinians, that has meant more displacement, shrinking access to aid and another cycle of grief. More than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire took effect, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. In a new report, NPR’s Anas Baba and Aya Batrawy document what daily life looks like for families trapped between expanding military zones, with shelling at night, gunfire by day and nowhere safe to go.