The US military said early Thursday it had completed “a heavy wave of strikes against Iran” conducted in response to an earlier Iranian missile attack on a US base in Jordan. The latest barrage came after the US partnered with Saudi Arabia to strike Iran-backed militias in neighboring Iraq, killing at least 20 fighters and six Iranian advisers.
Central Command said in a social media post that over two hours the US struck “dozens” of targets belonging to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, including military command centers as well as missile and drone facilities, and coastal surveillance and defense sites, The Associated Press said.
The new strikes came hours after US President Donald Trump vowed to hit Iran “very hard” after it targeted a base in Jordan that hosts US troops.
Iranian state media said two people were injured in attacks on the island of Qeshm in the Strait of Hormuz and that explosions were also reported in Khuzestan province to the northwest.
Elsewhere, drone strikes ignited fires on two natural gas vessels at the Egyptian port of Damietta, according to British maritime security firm Ambrey. It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the strikes on a US-owned floating storage facility and a Greek-owned tanker. No injuries were reported.
The flare-ups on multiple fronts after several days of relative calm raised the risk of a return to all-out war. It also underscored the difficulty of winding down a five-month conflict that has jolted the world economy and is unpopular among Americans. The fighting was also likely to add to concerns that the US is further drawing down already diminished stockpiles of sophisticated munitions needed to defend its bases and allies.
Egypt, a close US ally and regional mediator, is one of the only countries in the Middle East to have been spared direct military action during the war. A strike by Iran or its allies, if confirmed, would mark a significant widening of the conflict.
Asked during an Oval Office event if Iran was responsible for the strikes on the natural gas vessels, Trump responded: “It's a little more of the same.”
“In the meantime, we’re going to be hitting them very hard because it’s our turn to hit them," he added.
Saudi Arabia had accused the Iraqi militias of firing drones against its oil facilities over the past two days. An umbrella group of Iraqi militias initially denied the allegations, while another Iran-backed group — the Houthis in Yemen — said they had attacked Saudi energy facilities as part of a separate but related conflict.
Before the latest eruption, mediators had expressed optimism about bringing the US and Iran back to the negotiating table. An interim agreement collapsed in recent weeks over renewed fighting in the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway for global energy supplies that Iranian attacks have again effectively closed.
A regional official said mediators are “still trying with both sides” to restore calm and get the ceasefire back on track. He gave no details on whether progress was being made and spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the closed-door diplomacy.
The renewed hostilities sent oil prices spiking. Brent crude, the international standard, jumped 7.3% to $88.093 a barrel.
Jordan intercepts missiles and US strikes militias in Iraq Iran's paramilitary
Revolutionary Guard said it fired missiles Tuesday at Jordan's Muwaffaq Salti Air Base, a key US military hub for the region, in a statement carried by the state-run IRNA news agency.
Jordan’s military said five Iranian missiles had been intercepted and destroyed.
The US military later announced that American and Saudi fighter aircraft had struck multiple logistics and weapons sites in eastern Iraq in response to the drone attacks on Saudi Arabia.
The Popular Mobilization Forces, a coalition of primarily Shiite Iranian-backed armed groups that is officially under the command of the Iraqi military, said at least 20 fighters were killed and 32 wounded in the overnight strikes.
Six Iranian advisers were also killed, according to two Iraqi militia officials, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly. Iran's deputy governor for political, security and social affairs in Markazi province told Iranian state media that four advisers were killed.
The coalition joined the fight against the ISIS group after it seized large sections of Iraq in 2014. The Iraqi government later designated the coalition as an “independent military formation” within the armed forces, but the militias have significant autonomy and some have attacked US facilities.
On Monday, the Houthis said they had launched drones targeting oil facilities used to transport oil across Saudi Arabia to the Red Sea port city of Yanbu.
