American attacks reached areas near Iran’s capital and multiple provinces as Tehran retaliated against U.S. allies, threatened regional infrastructure and renewed warnings over the Strait of Hormuz.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
The United States expanded its military campaign against Iran early Thursday, striking targets farther north near Tehran and across several provinces while disabling an oil tanker that American officials said had ignored warnings and attempted to breach a U.S. naval blockade.
Iran responded before dawn with missile and drone attacks directed at Bahrain, Jordan and Kuwait, three countries that host U.S. forces. Authorities in those nations did not immediately report damage or casualties.
The widening exchange marked another escalation in days of American and Iranian attacks across the Middle East, further weakening an interim agreement intended to halt the Iran war and increasing concern that the fighting could spread into a broader regional conflict.
Iranian officials said U.S. strikes in the latest round of violence had killed more than 35 people and wounded over 300.
For the first time during the renewed fighting, American strikes reached areas around Iran’s capital, Tehran, signaling that the United States had expanded both the geographic range and potential scope of its target list.
Iranian state media also reported U.S. attacks in Semnan province, a region associated with Iran’s ballistic missile production and space program. Additional strikes were reported Thursday morning in Hamedan, Hormozgan, Khuzestan, Lorestan, Markazi, and Sistan and Baluchistan provinces.
The current confrontation has centered increasingly on the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow maritime passage through which a significant portion of the world’s oil supplies moves.
When the United States and Israel launched the war against Iran on Feb. 28, Tehran effectively closed the strait to shipping. The disruption drove up prices for oil, fertilizer and numerous other products well beyond the Middle East while giving Iran significant leverage in subsequent negotiations.
Col. Ebrahim Zolfaghari, a spokesman for the Iranian military’s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, warned that Iran could broaden its retaliation to infrastructure throughout the region if the United States followed through on President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to strike Iranian bridges and power plants.
“All the infrastructure in the region will be crushed under the steel blows of the powerful armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran” if Trump’s threat is carried out, Zolfaghari said.
He also declared that Iran would not accept American control or intervention in the Strait of Hormuz.
“Under no circumstances and in no way will we allow America, as a foreign and extra-regional country, to interfere in the Strait of Hormuz,” Zolfaghari said. “This is Iran’s invincible red line.”
The United States had already accelerated its operations Wednesday by resuming strikes during daylight hours, an indication of the increasing pace of the campaign.
One American attack targeted Iranian defense and missile installations on Greater Tunb Island, a strategically positioned island in the Strait of Hormuz, according to U.S. Central Command.
American forces also opened fire on the Curacao-flagged oil tanker Belma as it sailed toward Kharg Island, Iran’s principal oil export terminal in the Persian Gulf.
The U.S. military said the merchant vessel “ignored multiple warnings.” An American aircraft then fired a missile into the tanker’s smokestack, disabling the ship.
The operation came as Iran continued attacking vessels traveling through a U.S.-controlled route in the Strait of Hormuz. Washington has threatened to reopen the full waterway by force, though some military analysts have warned that such an effort could require significantly more naval assets and ground resources.
A separate U.S. attack Wednesday struck a barracks used by Iran’s 388th Mechanized Infantry Brigade in Sistan and Baluchistan province, according to Iranian state television.
The brigade operates tanks and armored vehicles. Iranian television reported that American forces fired at least 13 missiles at the facility, killing seven people and wounding an unspecified number of troops. Those killed included both conscripts and career soldiers.
Iran’s retaliation Thursday extended beyond direct attacks on American forces, targeting regional nations aligned with Washington.
Officials in Bahrain, Jordan and Kuwait reported Iranian missile and drone attacks, although none of the countries immediately confirmed whether the strikes caused injuries or physical damage.
In Iraq, Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi condemned an overnight drone attack against Irbil, the capital of the country’s semiautonomous northern Kurdish region.
Authorities said the drone was intercepted.
The attack occurred while al-Zaidi was visiting the United States, where he said Iraq would work to disarm armed organizations operating outside the state, including groups supported by Iran.
The renewed combat has placed the Strait of Hormuz at the center of both military and economic pressure.
Iran’s earlier effective closure of the waterway sent Brent crude oil, the international pricing benchmark, to nearly $120 per barrel at the height of the conflict. Brent traded above $85 per barrel Thursday, more than 15% higher than its prewar price but still substantially below the earlier peak.
The increase presents a domestic political problem for Trump and the Republican Party as they seek to retain control of Congress in the November elections.
Washington has so far struggled to fully reopen the shipping route. Trump reimposed the naval blockade Wednesday after mediation efforts failed to reduce tensions.
Despite the widening strikes, Trump continued to say that Iran wanted an agreement.
“They don’t like what we’re doing, and they do want to settle,” Trump said Wednesday during remarks at the U.S. Army War College in Pennsylvania. “We’ll find out whether or not we settle with them, or we just finish it off.”
Trump separately announced on social media that Iran had released an American citizen who had been wrongfully detained since 2024, describing the release as a goodwill gesture by Tehran.
He did not initially identify the detainee or provide additional details.
Human rights attorney Jared Genser later identified the freed detainee as his client, Dena Karari, a dual U.S.-Iranian citizen who operates a nonprofit organization and had been charged with espionage.
Iran did not immediately confirm her release. Karari’s detention had not previously been publicly disclosed, a circumstance that sometimes occurs in cases involving Americans held by the Islamic Republic.
The prisoner release offered one indication that diplomatic communication remained possible even as both countries intensified their military operations.
However, the simultaneous expansion of U.S. strikes, Iran’s attacks on neighboring countries and renewed threats involving critical infrastructure showed that the conflict was continuing to move away from the terms of the interim agreement.
The United States is now striking military sites across a broader portion of Iran, including locations near Tehran and provinces associated with missile production, armored forces and strategic infrastructure. Iran, meanwhile, is threatening regional facilities, firing toward U.S.-allied countries and attempting to challenge American control of shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
With mediators unable to restore calm and neither side backing away from its stated demands, the confrontation has left the region facing continued military escalation, disrupted trade and the possibility of a wider war.
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