Tehran, July 17:
The United States expanded its airstrike campaign against Iran early Friday by increasingly hitting bridges, part of President Donald Trump’s threats to start striking infrastructure to pressure Tehran to ease its chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran launched new missile attacks against US-allied nations in the Middle East and warned that its attacks would escalate.
The US military’s Central Command said it hit dozens of targets in its latest airstrikes, which concluded at dawn Friday, the sixth night in a row of American attacks.
In Qatar, authorities warned the public to take shelter as a barrage of Iranian missiles targeted the nation. People heard explosions overhead as air defenses fired to intercept the missiles.
Qatar is a key mediator with Pakistan in trying to reach an end to the Iran war. But talks have broken down over Iran’s chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran earlier targeted Bahrain and Kuwait over US airstrikes hitting bridges in the Islamic Republic overnight.
Ceasefire in Iran war has collapsed
The interim ceasefire agreed to last month has collapsed, and the region has endured days of back-and-forth attacks by the US and Iran as they battle for control of the strait. Iranian officials say US strikes have killed more than 35 people and wounded over 300 others, with new casualties reported in Friday’s strikes.
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 soaring and gave Iran major leverage in negotiations.
Speaking in a primetime address to the American public, Trump insisted the war was going well.
“We are likewise winning big in Iran, and you will see the fruits of that labor very, very shortly,” Trump said.
Col. Ebrahim Zolfaghari, a spokesperson for the Iranian military’s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, earlier threatened that Iran could launch widespread attacks on “all the infrastructure in the region” if the US acted on Trump ‘s repeated warnings that America could hit Iranian bridges and power plants.
“Under no circumstances and in no way will we allow America, as a foreign and extraregional country, to interfere in the Strait of Hormuz,” he added. “This is Iran’s invincible red line.”
US airstrikes hit bridges in Iran
The US airstrikes hit bridges overnight into Friday in Iran’s southern Hormozgan province, killing at least seven people, Iranian state television reported. The attacks hit Bandar Khamir, a city on Iran’s coast on the Strait of Hormuz.
Iranian state media said the US strikes Thursday hit around Tehran and Semnan province, home to Iran’s ballistic missile production and space program.
Trump has returned in recent days to his threats to target Iranian power stations and bridges to try to compel Iran to loosen its hold on the strait, through which about a fifth of all oil and natural gas traded once passed in peacetime. The US also reimposed a naval blockade on Iranian ports to halt its shipments of crude oil.
Week-to-week cargo shipments through the strait dropped by almost a quarter at the beginning of the month, according to Maritime data firm Lloyd’s List Intelligence. And that was before the recent surge in tit-for-tat attacks.
Given the risks, some oil shippers are transiting the strait with their location devices turned off, but many are just staying put, Lloyd’s said Thursday. A growing amount of the region’s energy is being shipped through pipelines, but not nearly enough to offset the decline in shipping through the strait.
US forces have redirected three commercial vessels trying to run the blockade, disabled one that did not comply and boarded another “to ensure full compliance,” the US military’s Central Command said in a post on X.