Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Wednesday doubled down on his criticism of the U.S strikes against Iran, describing the escalating Middle East conflict as a “disaster.”

His comments come after U.S. President Donald Trump pledged to cut off trade with Madrid after Spain’s government prevented two jointly operated bases in its territory from being used in the strikes.

“Spain has been terrible,” Trump said on Tuesday, during a White House news conference alongside German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. “We’re going to cut off all trade with Spain. We don’t want anything to do with Spain,” he added.

In a televised address on Wednesday morning, Sanchez said: “Very often great wars start with a chain of events spiralling out of control due to miscalculations, technical failures, and unforeseen circumstances. Therefore, we must learn from history and cannot play Russian roulette with the fate of millions,” according to a CNBC translation.

Sanchez warned of “repeating the mistakes of the past,” drawing a comparison with the invasion of Iraq in the early 2000s, and summarized the government’s position as: “No to war.”

Spain’s socialist prime minister has emerged as one of the leading critics of the U.S. and Israeli strikes against Iran among leaders of EU nations.

Trump’s latest comments follow his condemnation of Madrid’s refusal to meet the NATO defense spending target of 5% of GDP.

Spain’s Ibex 35 index traded 1.4% higher at around 10:17 a.m. London time (5:17 a.m. ET), reversing earlier losses amid U.S. trade jitters. The pan-European Stoxx 600 index, meanwhile, advanced around 1.2%.

Trump’s threat to punish Spain on trade would be challenging, given that the 27 EU nations negotiate trade agreements collectively.

“It’s naive to believe that democracy or respect among nations can spring from ruins, or to think that blind and servile obedience is a form of leadership. On the contrary, I believe this position is leadership,” Sanchez said.

“We will not be complicit in something that is bad for the world and contrary to our values ​​and interests simply out of fear of reprisals from someone,” he added.

— CNBC’s Charlotte Reed contributed to this report.

Nvidia, Amazon and Alphabet are among the big tech firms scrambling to ensure the safety of their employees who are traveling through or based in the Middle East after joint U.S.-Israel strikes on Iran over the weekend.

The massive attack on Iran killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, among others, and Iran retaliated with strikes on Israeli and U.S. bases across the Gulf. The conflict has disrupted civilian life, internet access in Iran, flight routes and energy shipments across the region.

Chip tech leader Nvidia temporarily closed its Dubai offices, with employees there working remotely, according to an email reviewed by CNBC that was sent by CEO Jensen Huang to all employees early Tuesday.

Huang said in his memo that Nvidia’s crisis management team has been “working around the clock and actively supporting affected employees and their families” in the Middle East, including around 6,000 Nvidia employees based in Israel.

In 2019, Nvidia acquired Mellanox, an Israeli company that makes ethernet switches and other networking hardware, for around $7.13 billion, the largest deal in Nvidia’s history at that time. And today, outside of the U.S., Israel represents Nvidia’s largest research and development base.

As of Tuesday morning, all Nvidia employees impacted by the conflict and their immediate families were safe, Huang said.

“Nvidia has deep roots in the region,” Huang wrote. “Thousands of our colleagues live there, and many more across the globe have family and friends affected by these events. Like you, I am watching with great concern for the safety of our Nvidia families.”

The State Department said Monday that Americans should “depart now” from countries across the Middle East using available commercial transportation, citing “serious safety risks.” By Tuesday afternoon, the agency said it was working to secure military aircraft and charter flights to evacuate Americans from the region amid escalating instability.

The disruptions to air travel meant dozens of Google employees have been stranded in Dubai after a sales conference, according to sources, who asked not to be named in order to discuss sensitive matters.

The company’s cloud unit held its “Accelerate” sales kickoff in Dubai last week.

A memo was sent to some cloud employees on Sunday morning that noted it still has team members on the ground, adding that recent attacks are “concerning,” according to employees, who asked not to be named in order to speak about internal matters.

Though most employees got out of the region, dozens remain stuck there, the sources said.

Following the attack on Iran, airlines had mass cancellations. More than 11,000 Middle East flights have been cancelled since the U.S.-Israeli strikes over the weekend, according to aviation-data firm Cirium.

Google said the majority of impacted employees are not U.S.-based but in-region employees. It added that it has security and safety measures in place for its employees in the Middle East and has advised staff to follow guidance from local authorities.

“The situation in the Middle East is evolving rapidly and we are monitoring it carefully,” a Google spokesperson said in an emailed statement. “Our focus is on the safety and well-being of our employees in the region.”

Tel Aviv, a central Israeli city that has been hit with strikes, is also a major hub for Google. The search giant is in the process of expanding into a massive new headquarters in the ToHa2 Tower, expected to be one of its largest global sites.

Google did not immediately respond to questions about how Tel Aviv-based operations and employees have been affected by the Iran conflict.

Amazon, which has grown its presence in the Middle East region in recent years, is also altering its operations there as it responds to the widening conflict in the region.

The company is instructing all of its corporate employees in the Middle East to work remotely and “follow local government guidelines.”

“The safety of our employees and partners remains our top priority, and we are working closely with local teams and local authorities to ensure they are supported,” an Amazon spokesperson said in a statement.

Amazon operates corporate offices in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Egypt, Turkey and Israel. It also operates warehouses and data centers throughout the region, and “quick commerce outlets” in the UAE to fulfill 15-minute deliveries.

Its sprawling data center footprint became a flashpoint in the conflict on Sunday. Two data centers in the UAE were “directly struck” by drones, while a facility in Bahrain was also damaged by a nearby drone strike.

The facilities sustained structural damage, power disruptions and some water damage after firefighters worked to put out sparks and fire. The sites remain offline, and some Amazon Web Services applications, such as its popular virtual server and database services, have continued to experience issues.

AWS encouraged customers to back up their data or consider migrating workloads to other regions.

“Even as we work to restore these facilities, the ongoing conflict in the region means that the broader operating environment in the Middle East remains unpredictable,” AWS said.

Social media company Snap told CNBC that it’s asking employees at its four Middle East offices to work remotely until further notice.

The company said staffers are being advised to follow advice from local authorities regarding shelter-in-place orders and departure recommendations.

— CNBC’s Jonathan Vanian contributed to this report

WATCH: Iran has many more drones than originally expected

Global defense stocks jumped on Monday as investors reacted to a dramatic military escalation in the Middle East over the weekend.

The sector was a rare bright spot amid a broader market sell-off triggered by fears of a wider regional conflict.

Germany’s Hensoldt and Britain’s BAE Systems were among the top performers in the Stoxx 600, both up around 4%. Defense names Thales, Renk, and Leonardo rose between 4% and 1%, paring earlier gains, while the broader Stoxx 600 index fell more than 1%, touching a two-week low.

Stateside, U.S. firms Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman each rose more than 5% in premarket trading. Futures tracking the S&P 500 were down 1.1%.

With South Korean markets closed Monday, regional activity in Asia-Pacific defense sector was somewhat muted. Japan’s defense heavyweights Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and IHI rose about 3% each, while Singapore’s ST Engineering climbed 2.8%.

The moves come after the U.S. and Israel launched widespread attacks on Iran over the weekend that killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, ending his 36-year rule. Retaliatory strikes by Iran against U.S. bases in the Middle East killed three U.S. service members.

Prospects of an escalation also led oil prices and energy companies’ shares to surge.

“It’s very much one of uncertainty at the moment that investors are grappling with,” said Patrick O’Donnell, Chief Investment Strategist at Omnis Investments.

“Equity markets are a little bit more uncertain about just how long this is going to drag on, for the implication for both growth and inflation that it will have the longer that it goes on,” O’Donnell told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” on Monday.

“Really, it’s a question of… what’s the duration of this conflict?”

The conflict with Iran entered a third day on Monday, with U.S. President Donald Trump warning of further American casualties and saying the conflict could last for up to four weeks. 

In June last year, the U.S. and Israel launched air strikes that damaged three Iranian nuclear sites.

Carl Bildt, former Prime Minister of Sweden and co-chair of ECFR’s Council, said it was expected that Iran would strike back at the American military facilities in the Gulf region, “but now it seems like they are striking other targets across the Gulf as well.”

“That is surprising, but also highly disturbing, because, of course, the stability of the Gulf countries is important to us all, important to the global economy, important to the region,” he said.

Anthropic’s Claude artificial intelligence assistant app jumped to the No. 2 slot on Apple’s chart of top U.S. free apps late on Friday, hours after the Trump administration sought to block government agencies’ adoption of the startup’s technology.

The rise in popularity suggests that Anthropic is benefiting from its presence in news headlines, stemming from its refusal to have its models used for mass domestic surveillance or for fully autonomous weapons.

“The Leftwing nut jobs at Anthropic have made a DISASTROUS MISTAKE trying to STRONG-ARM the Department of War, and force them to obey their Terms of Service instead of our Constitution,” President Donald Trump wrote in a Friday Truth Social post.

Department of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said he asked that Anthropic be labeled as a supply-chain risk to national security, and therefore, no U.S. defense contractor would be able to draw on Anthropic tools.

“It is the Department’s prerogative to select contractors most aligned with their vision,” Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said in a statement. “But given the substantial value that Anthropic’s technology provides to our armed forces, we hope they reconsider.”

Historically, other AI chat apps have been more popular among consumers than Claude. OpenAI’s ChatGPT sat at No. 1 on the App Store rankings on Saturday, while Google’s Gemini was at No. 3.

The Claude iOS app has gained momentum this month. On Jan. 30, it was ranked No. 131 in the U.S., and it bounced around the top 20 for much of February, according to data from analytics company Sensor Tower. The data shows ChatGPT has held on to the No. 1 spot for most of February.

In the past year, Anthropic — which was formed in 2021 by former OpenAI employees — has gained momentum as a supplier of models for coding and general corporate use. OpenAI, whose ChatGPT now has over 900 million weekly users, has been responding to Anthropic’s surge in business by striking partnerships with consulting firms such as Accenture and Capgemini.

On Friday night, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the startup had reached an agreement with the U.S. Defense Department on the deployment of its models.

Hours later, pop singer Katy Perry posted a screenshot of Anthropic’s Pro subscription for consumers, with a heart superimposed over it.

WATCH: Sec. Pete Hegseth directs Pentagon to designate Anthropic supply-chain risk

President Donald Trump said Friday that he was ordering every U.S. government agency to “immediately cease” using technology from the artificial intelligence company Anthropic.

Trump in a Truth Social post said there would be a six-month phase-out for agencies such as the Defense Department, which “are using Anthropic’s products, at various levels.”

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, soon after Trump’s order, said on X that he was ordering the Pentagon to “designate Anthropic a Supply-Chain Risk to National Security” after the AI startup refused to comply with demands about the use of its technology.

Anthropic said in a statement late on Friday that it is “deeply saddened by these developments.” The company said it will challenge any supply chain risk designation in court. 

“We believe this designation would both be legally unsound and set a dangerous precedent for any American company that negotiates with the government,” Anthropic said.

Anthropic, which signed a $200 million contract with the Pentagon in July, wanted assurances that its AI models would not be used for fully autonomous weapons or mass domestic surveillance of Americans.

The Pentagon, which strongly resisted that request, set a deadline of 5:01 p.m. ET Friday for Anthropic to agree to its demands that the U.S. military be allowed to use the technology for all lawful purposes.

That deadline passed without an agreement.

“Anthropic’s stance is fundamentally incompatible with American principles,” Hegseth said in a statement on X.

“Their relationship with the United States Armed Forces and the Federal Government has therefore been permanently altered.”

“Anthropic will continue to provide the Department of War its services for a period of no more than six months to allow for a seamless transition to a better and more patriotic service,” the Defense secretary said. “America’s warfighters will never be held hostage by the ideological whims of Big Tech. This decision is final.”

Trump, in his Truth Social post, wrote, “The Leftwing nut jobs at Anthropic have made a DISASTROUS MISTAKE trying to STRONG-ARM the Department of War, and force them to obey their Terms of Service instead of our Constitution.”

“Their selfishness is putting AMERICAN LIVES at risk, our Troops in danger, and our National Security in JEOPARDY.”

“Therefore, I am directing EVERY Federal Agency in the United States Government to IMMEDIATELY CEASE all use of Anthropic’s technology,” Trump wrote.

“We don’t need it, we don’t want it, and will not do business with them again!”

Sen. Mark Warner, the Virginia Democrat who is vice chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, condemned Trump’s action.

“The president’s directive to halt the use of a leading American AI company across the federal government, combined with inflammatory rhetoric attacking that company, raises serious concerns about whether national security decisions are being driven by careful analysis or political considerations,” Warner said in a statement.

“President Trump and Secretary Hegseth’s efforts to intimidate and disparage a leading American company — potentially as the pretext to steer contracts to a preferred vendor whose model a number of federal agencies have already identified as a reliability, safety, and security threat — pose an enormous risk to U.S. defense readiness and the willingness of the U.S. private sector and academia to work with the IC [Intelligence Community] and DoD, consistent with their own values and legal ethics,” Warner said.

Elon Musk, the mega-billionaire who had been Trump’s biggest financial backer in the 2024 election, owns xAI, which aims to compete directly with Anthropic and another major AI company, OpenAI.

Musk in recent weeks has repeatedly bashed Anthropic on his social network X, writing on Friday that the company “hates Western civilization.”

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said Thursday that his company “cannot in good conscience” allow the Pentagon to use its models without limitation.

In a statement on Thursday, Amodei said, “It is the [Defense] Department’s prerogative to select contractors most aligned with their vision. But given the substantial value that Anthropic’s technology provides to our armed forces, we hope they reconsider.”

“Our strong preference is to continue to serve the Department and our warfighters — with our two requested safeguards in place,” Amodei said.

“Should the Department choose to offboard Anthropic, we will work to enable a smooth transition to another provider, avoiding any disruption to ongoing military planning, operations, or other critical missions. Our models will be available on the expansive terms we have proposed for as long as required.”

On Friday, another major AI company, OpenAI, said it has the same “red lines” as Anthropic regarding the use of its technology by the Pentagon and other customers.

“We have long believed that AI should not be used for mass surveillance or autonomous lethal weapons, and that humans should remain in the loop for high-stakes automated decisions,” Open AI CEO Sam Altman wrote in a memo seen by CNBC.

OpenAI last year signed its own $200 million contract with the Pentagon.

OpenAI’s contract is for AI models in non-classified use cases, which include everyday office tasks.

Anthropic’s contract with the Defense Department included classified work.

The Defense Department had no comment on Friday other than pointing to Trump’s announcement.

Hegseth, in a post on X, included a screengrab of Trump’s post, and cc:ed Anthropic and Amodei with the message, “Thank you for your attention to this matter.”

— CNBC’s Lora Kolodny contributed to this article

Congressional Democrats will force a vote on a war powers resolution relating to Iran next week, Democratic leadership announced Thursday, as President Donald Trump engages in a massive military buildup in the region. The resolution would limit Trump’s ability to conduct military action there.

Reps. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., and Thomas Massie, R-Ky., have introduced a measure known as a war powers resolution that would compel the administration to seek congressional approval before engaging in any further activity in Iran. Congress has the sole authority to declare war under the U.S. Constitution, though that authority has been stretched in recent years by the executive branch.

“As soon as Congress reconvenes next week, we will compel a vote of the full House of Representatives on the bipartisan Khanna-Massie War Powers resolution,” the Democratic leaders led by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., said in a statement.

“The Iranian regime is brutal and destabilizing, seen most recently in the killing of thousands of protestors,” the statement read. “However, undertaking a war of choice in the Middle East, without a full understanding of all the attendant risks to our servicemembers and to escalation, is reckless.”

The war powers resolution would also need to be approved by the Senate if it is passed by the House. But passage from the House is far from a guaranteed outcome as bipartisan lawmakers have recently lined up against the resolution.

Reps. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., and Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., released a statement last week opposing the measure, citing concerns about Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities.

“We respect and defend Congress’s constitutional role in matters of war. Oversight and debate are absolutely vital,” the pair wrote. “However, this resolution would restrict the flexibility needed to respond to real and evolving threats and risks, signaling weakness at a dangerous moment.”

Trump has overseen a massive military buildup in the Middle East and has threatened strikes against Iran. His administration is also negotiating with Tehran over the country’s nuclear program. The two countries held a third round of talks in Geneva on Thursday.

Omani Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi in a post on X described the day’s negotiations as having made “significant progress.” He said that technical discussions will continue next week in Vienna and that the principals would reconvene “soon after consultation in the respective capitals.”

The president said during his State of the Union address Tuesday that he prefers to resolve the Iran situation diplomatically but did not take military force off the table.

“I will never allow the world’s No. 1 sponsor of terror, which they are by far, to have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said.

European defense companies must take a stronger lead on collaborating to help the continent become independent of the U.S. security umbrella, Leonardo‘s CEO told CNBC.

Speaking with CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” on Wednesday after Leonardo’s annual results statement, Roberto Cingolani said European defense companies have “all the capabilities and technical skills” and should not wait for governments to fix the sector, which he warned was “fragmented.”

Companies should take the lead in a process of “aggregation”, which European governments would follow, he said, adding that this approach “pays a lot” and helps enable companies to become “better, faster, more profitable.”

He pointed to Leonardo’s partnership with the U.K.’s BAE Systems and Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries as co-founders of the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP) to jointly develop the Tempest stealth fighter.  

Leonardo has also developed joint agreements with German defense giant Rheinmetall for land defense systems, and with Turkish drone maker Baykar, he said.

Last October, Leonardo also unveiled plans for a combined space and satellite company with Airbus and Thales to rival Elon Musk’s Starlink.

“I’m firmly convinced nobody can make it on their own,” Cingolani told CNBC. “We need to deploy synergies, we need to understand joining forces in a competitive industry like defense is fundamental to be successful, to be fast in responding to the needs of our societies.”

U.S. President Donald Trump’s bid to annex Greenland contributed to fractures in the NATO alliance, as the war in Ukraine focuses attention on Europe’s defense.

His comments came after Leonardo reported an 18% annual increase in core profits — topping 1.75 billion euros ($2.1 billion) — in its latest earnings statement on Wednesday.

New orders rose 14.5% last year, to 23.8 billion euros, powered by its aeronautics division, as net debt sat at 1 billion euros — a 44% decrease for the Rome-headquartered, Milan-listed company.

Its shares finished Wednesday’s session 3.5% down after the earnings.

Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. defended President Donald Trump’s executive order spurring the domestic production of the weedkiller glyphosate, as his Make America Healthy Again movement reels from the president’s embrace of the chemical they despise.

Trump on Wednesday night signed an executive order invoking the Defense Production Act to compel the domestic production of elemental phosphorus and glyphosate-based herbicides. Glyphosate is the chemical in Bayer-Monsanto’s Roundup and is the most commonly used weedkiller for a slew of U.S. crops. Trump, in the order, said shortages of both phosphorus and glyphosate would pose a risk to national security.

Kennedy backed the president in a statement to CNBC Thursday morning.

“Donald Trump’s Executive Order puts America first where it matters most — our defense readiness and our food supply,” he said. “We must safeguard America’s national security first, because all of our priorities depend on it. When hostile actors control critical inputs, they weaken our security. By expanding domestic production, we close that gap and protect American families.”

But Kennedy’s MAHA coalition that supported Trump in the 2024 presidential election hates glyphosate, which has been alleged to cause cancer in myriad lawsuits. Now, the executive order threatens to unravel that coalition ahead of the 2026 midterm elections that could loosen the president’s grip on Washington.

“Just as the large MAHA base begins to consider what to do at midterms, the President issues an EO to expand domestic glyphosate production,” Kelly Ryerson, a prominent MAHA activist known as Glyphosate Girl, said in a post on X. “The very same carcinogenic pesticide that MAHA cares about most.”

Ken Cook, president of the Environmental Working Group, a watchdog that has pushed back against chemicals in food for years, said in a statement that he “can’t envision a bigger middle finger to every MAHA mom than this.”

“Elevating glyphosate to a national security priority is the exact opposite of what MAHA voters were promised,” Cook said. “If Secretary Kennedy remains at HHS after this, it will be impossible to argue that his past warnings about glyphosate were anything more than campaign rhetoric designed to win trust — and votes.”

Kennedy, a former environmental attorney, notably once won a nearly $290 million case against Monsanto for a man who claimed his cancer was caused by Roundup. The executive order came down one day after Bayer proposed paying $7.25 billion to settle a series of lawsuits claiming Roundup causes cancer.

Former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., knocked Trump for signing “an EO protecting cancer causing Glyphosate in our foods.”

Glyphosate is a critical chemical to American agriculture. It’s applied to many key cash crops, such as corn and soybeans, and has been defended by agricultural trade organizations. Phosphorus is a key input to the creation of glyphosate, which the White House argues is necessary to maintain food security. Elemental phosphorus is also used in the manufacture of some military materials.

“Thank you, President Trump, for acknowledging the importance of glyphosate-based herbicides in American agriculture,” the House Agriculture Committee said Wednesday night in an X post. “This is a vital step forward in ensuring a domestic supply of this critical crop input remains available for our producers.”

House Agriculture Chair Rep. G.T. Thompson, R-Pa., is trying to push a farm bill through Congress this year — a legislative package that covers federal farm support and nutrition subsidies. He’s also come under fire from MAHA recently for a provision in that bill that would block state and local pesticide regulations from differing from federal guidance.

Many European policymakers appear to still be smarting from U.S. Vice President JD Vance’s tough words about the region at last year’s Munich Security Conference.

So, it’s perhaps not too surprising that U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s comments on Saturday at this year’s event underscoring the U.S. and Europe’s common heritage, goals and challenges have come as something of a relief in European capitals.

“[Rubio] delivered a speech which still assured us that we stand together in this partnership between Europe and the United States,” German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul told CNBC in an interview on the sidelines of the conference. “Of course, there are some questions which we will have to discuss, but in the end of the day, his message was clear that we were so successful in the past, and we should do the job once again with new threats, with new tests in the 21st century.”

On Saturday, Rubio said the U.S. has no intention of abandoning its deep alliance with Europe and wants the region to succeed.

“We want Europe to be strong,” he told the gathering of defense and security officials in the German city. “We believe that Europe must survive, because the two great wars of the last century serve, for us, as history’s great reminder, that ultimately, our destiny is, and will always be, intertwined with yours.”

Contrast that to Vance’s message to the same crowd last year, when he spoke of the “retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values, values shared with the United States of America.” He lambasted his audience about the health of their democracies, their migration policies and freedom of speech.

While Rubio’s tone might have been more conciliatory than Vance’s, the underlying issues remained the same, as some conference attendees acknowledged.

“Of course, there were some issues he raised. We would answer differently when it comes to the migration problem, when it comes, of course, to question how we organize our legal framework here in Europe with regard to the digital services. And of course, also with the question of freedom of speech and so,” Wadephul said.

U.S. President Donald Trump has frequently criticized Europe for its open migration policies, for being too reliant on the U.S. for its security and has pushed NATO allies to boost defense spending. His pursuit of ownership of Greenland, a Danish territory, has also rattled European leaders in recent months.

“The message we heard (from Rubio) is that America and Europe are intertwined, they have been in the past and will be in the future,” the EU’s chief diplomat, Kaja Kallas, said at a panel discussion on Sunday. “I think this is important. It is also clear that we don’t see eye-to-eye in all the issues and that this will remain the case. But I think we can work from there.”