Fighting over the Strait of Hormuz intensifies
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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) -- The U.S. reimposed a naval blockade on Iran and intensified its airstrike campaign Wednesday in retaliation for Tehran’s attacks on ships trying to pass through the Strait of Hormuz. The American strikes hit an Iranian army barracks, killed at least seven troops and wounded hundreds of people across the country, Iranian officials said.
Days of back-and-forth strikes by the U.S. and Iran across the Middle East -- and renewed threats to the waterway crucial to global energy supplies -- have shredded the interim deal to end the conflict and the region could tip back into all-out war.
The U.S. first imposed a blockade in April and lifted it last month after signing the interim deal that paused the fighting and set a 60-day period for negotiations over issues such as Iran’s nuclear program. Those talks have stalled as fighting over the Strait of Hormuz has intensified.
When the U.S. and Israel launched the war on Iran on Feb. 28, Tehran effectively closed the waterway 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 U.S. President Donald Trump and his Republican Party, which hopes to retain control of Congress in November elections. But Washington has struggled to successfully reopen the waterway.
About 24 hours after the blockade went into effect, the U.S. military opened fire on and disabled a merchant vessel Wednesday.
Iran’s parliament speaker and lead negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, said Iran was prepared for a fuller military confrontation if the U.S. 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.
Soon after the U.S. launched its third wave of strikes in 24 hours, Trump said 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 a defense summit at the U.S. Army War College in Pennsylvania.
The U.S. carried out a wave of strikes, hitting dozens of targets overnight, the military’s Central Command said Wednesday, and then resumed striking Iran during daylight -- an unusual move that further signaled the increasing tempo of the attacks. Another wave of strikes began late Wednesday.
Central Command said it spotted Curacao-flagged oil tanker Belma sailing toward Kharg Island and, after the ship “ignored multiple warnings,” a U.S. aircraft disabled the merchant vessel by firing hellfire missiles into the ship’s smokestack.
In addition to the now-disabled Belma, the U.S. military said it also had to speak with two other commercial vessels, but they complied with their instructions to turn away.
The U.S. military disabled at least eight merchant vessels during the first round of the blockade, including one strike that left three sailors dead.