NEW YORK (AP) - U.S. stocks eased lower as investors wait for the next signal on when the war with Iran may end. The S&P 500 fell 0.2% Tuesday after giving up an early gain. The Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 0.1%, and the Nasdaq composite was essentially flat. Oil prices pulled back from where they were in the final moments of  trading late Monday.

BEIJING (AP) – China’s President Xi Jinping on Saturday said political loyalty in the military must be ensured and called for resolutely pushing forward the fight against corruption as a military purge widened. “There must be no one in the military who harbors disloyalty to the (ruling Communist) Party,” Xi said in remarks published by the official Xinhua News Agency.

U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday that the war with Iran began because that country was starting work on a new site for developing material for nuclear weapons. Trump  told reporters that Iran was “going to take over the Middle East” if he hadn’t acted and that he was disappointed with the selection of Mojtaba Khamenei to succeed his father.

DORAL, Fla. (AP) – President Donald Trump said Saturday that the United States and Latin American countries are banding together to combat violent cartels as his administration looks to demonstrate it remains committed to sharpening U.S. foreign policy focus on the Western Hemisphere even while dealing with five-alarm crises around the globe.

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Tuesday would be the most intense day yet of U.S. strikes inside Iran as the Islamic Republic, its firepower diminished, vowed to fight on. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meanwhile said the war’s aim is a popular overthrow of Iran’s government, and “we are breaking their bones.”

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) – The travel chaos from the war in the Middle East has ensnared many of the Muslims who have converged on Saudi Arabia for the Umrah pilgrimage, leaving them stranded and scrambling to find other ways home. Others had to scrap their planned visits altogether.

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HONG KONG (AP) – A subsidiary of a Hong Kong-based company that has lost control of two critical ports on the Panama Canal said it is seeking $2 billion of compensation in damages from Panama over its “illegal” takeover of the ports.