The United States carried out strikes on Iran's Qeshm Island on Monday, according to U.S. officials cited by the Wall Street Journal, Reuters and the Associated Press, in what officials described as limited, defensive actions near the Strait of Hormuz.
The strikes targeted Iranian forces using surface-to-air missiles against U.S. assets, one official told the AP. In one incident on Monday, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps fired a surface-to-air missile at a U.S. fighter jet, which fired back in self-defense, officials told the Wall Street Journal. In a separate incident the same day, U.S. forces intercepted an IRGC missile launched from Qeshm that was targeting commercial shipping, one of the officials said.
Iranian state media reported several explosions on Qeshm Island on Monday. Qeshm, at the mouth of the Strait of Hormuz, hosts Revolutionary Guard naval and missile bases, a large underground missile site and a major desalination plant.
The strikes were the latest in a series of smaller strikes the United States has carried out against Iran in recent weeks, officials told the Journal, a campaign Washington has kept quiet so as not to signal an intention to resume major combat operations. Officials said Monday's strikes did not mark a resumption of major combat operations.
The Defense Department referred questions to U.S. Central Command, which did not immediately respond to requests for comment, according to Reuters. No casualty figures had been reported as of Monday night.
The strikes came on the eve of the U.S. midterm elections. President Donald Trump said Monday that a deal with Tehran could happen and raised doubts about whether he would follow through on a threatened resumption of larger strikes, according to Reuters, and Tehran said contacts between Iran and the United States to end the war are continuing. Oil prices rose in early Asian trading on Tuesday after the strike was reported, Reuters said.
The U.S.–Iran conflict began in late February and has sharply reduced traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, which previously carried about a fifth of the world's crude oil and natural gas supplies, according to Reuters.
This is a developing story. NCN will update this article as officials confirm additional information.
- National Correspondent Network
