DUBAI: The United States intensified its strikes targeting Iran early Thursday, hitting targets further north as American forces also fired into a ship it accused of trying to break its naval blockade on the Islamic Republic.
Iran retaliated with missile and drone fire targeting Bahrain and Kuwait before dawn.
Days of back-and-forth strikes by the US and Iran across the Middle East and renewed threats to the Strait of Hormuz have shredded the interim deal to end the Iran war and could tip the region back into all-out war. Already, Iranian officials say US strikes have killed more than 35 people and wounded more than 300 others. Strikes also reached into areas around Iran's capital, Tehran, for the first time of this latest round of violence.
When the US and Israel launched the war on Iran on Feb. 28, Tehran effectively closed the strait to shipping traffic a move that sent the price of oil, fertilizer and many other goods soaring far beyond the region and gave Iran major leverage in negotiations.
Those rising prices pose a particular challenge to US President Donald Trump and his Republican Party, which hopes to retain control of Congress in elections in November. But Washington has struggled to successfully reopen the waterway, leading to Trump reimposing the naval blockade Wednesday.
Iran's parliament speaker and lead negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, said Iran was prepared for a fuller military confrontation if the US does not live up to the terms of the interim deal, and Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened to halt all energy exports from the Middle East over the blockade.
“The export of oil and gas from the region will be either for everyone or for no one,” the Guard said.
Trump again insisted Iran was ready to strike a peace deal, but he did not elaborate.
“They don't like what we're doing, and they do want to settle. We'll find out whether or not we settle with them, or we just finish it off,” he said Wednesday at the US Army War College in Pennsylvania.
The US strikes early Thursday hit around Tehran, state media reported. It also reported American attacks targeted Semnan province, home to Iran's ballistic missile production and space program.
On Wednesday, the US resumed striking Iran during daylight further showing the increasing tempo of the attacks. Its attack on Greater Tunb Island, a strategic point in the Strait of Hormuz targeted Iranian defense and missile sites, Central Command said.
Meanwhile, the US military said it opened fire on the Curacao-flagged oil tanker Belma sailing toward Kharg Island, Iran's main oil export terminal in the Persian Gulf. After the ship “ignored multiple warnings,” a US aircraft disabled the merchant vessel by firing a missile into the ship's smokestack.
Another American strike Wednesday targeted a barracks for Iran's 388th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, which operates tanks and armoured vehicles, in Sistan and Baluchestan province, Iranian state television reported. The report said Americans fired at least 13 missiles in the attack and the seven dead included conscripts and career soldiers. A number of troops were wounded.
The latest round of fighting is focused on the Strait of Hormuz. How to reopen the strait has bedeviled the US since Iran choked it off in the early days of the war.
During the interim deal, some ships began moving through the passage using a route near Oman overseen by the US military that is outside Tehran's control.
In recent days, Iran attacked ships using that route and back-and-forth attacks ensued. The US has threatened to reopen the strait by force but experts say that would require a much bigger armada if not tens of thousands of ground troops. Imposing the blockade is another way to put pressure on Iran.
But in the meantime, oil prices are rising. The price for Brent crude oil, the international standard, traded above $85 a barrel on Thursday — more than 15 per cent higher than the price before the war, but still well below the nearly USD 120 reached at the height of the conflict.