US and Iranian forces exchanged heavy missile and drone assaults with Tehran targeting US facilities in states across the Gulf on Sunday and saying it had again closed the vital Strait of Hormuz.
A series of attacks between the US and Iran over the past several days led President Donald Trump to declare the end of a ceasefire meant to halt the fighting that the US and Israel began on February 28, though Trump has left the door open to continued negotiations.
The escalation followed several attacks on commercial ships in the area. Iran said it had closed the strait after firing a warning shot that struck a vessel traveling on an unapproved route, and said on Sunday it had disabled a second vessel.
The strait will remain closed until “the end of US interference in this region,” Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said.
US Central Command, however, said commercial vessels continue to transit through the waterway that carried one-fifth of the world’s oil and LNG shipments before the war.
Central Command said U.S. forces hit 140 Iranian military targets on Saturday, out of more than 300 during three nights of strikes “to degrade Iran’s ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial vessels freely transiting the strait.”
Iranian state media reported explosions in a number of port cities.
In response, the Guards said they had destroyed a command and control center and drone hangars at US ally Jordan, targeted a US radar site in Kuwait, attacked US aircraft carrier support and refueling platforms in Oman and destroyed a jet maintenance centre and command facility in Qatar.
Qatar’s government said three people, including a child, had been injured by falling shrapnel from the attack.
The United Arab Emirates said its defense systems engaged missiles and drones from Iran, while warning sirens sounded in Bahrain and explosions were heard in Doha. The UAE’s National Emergency Crisis and Disaster Management Authority later said that missile threats detected earlier in the day were outside the country’s borders.
Three missiles from Iranian territory landed in Jordan early on Sunday, causing minor material damage and no casualties, Jordan’s state news agency reported.
Sites in Oman’s Musandam region were targeted with drones on Sunday, its state news agency reported, without saying if there were any casualties.
One Indian national is missing after an on the commercial vessel GFS Galaxy off the coast of Oman earlier on Sunday, the Indian Ministry of External Affairs said. “Of the 11 Indian nationals on board, 10 have been rescued so far, while one Indian National is reportedly missing,” the ministry said, while condemning the attack.
Tehran’s strikes marked a sharp escalation in pace and targets, after it had warned that any retaliation over the container ship incident would be met with a “severe response.”
