Fighting between the U.S. and Iran has expanded, with the American military striking a broader range of targets and moving jet fighters into the Middle East while Tehran launches attacks across the Persian Gulf.
The fighting is focused on control of the Strait of Hormuz but this round raises the risk of a return to a larger war. The U.S. is hitting bridges and other targets in Iran's interior to increase pressure across Iran to force an end to attacks on Gulf shipping, after a deal to open the waterway collapsed last week. Iran has responded with broader and deadlier attacks.
A return to a wider conflict would put upward pressure on oil prices -- which have already risen more than 10% this week -- and weigh on the global economy, risks President Trump has made clear concern him. Iran also faces a massive rebuilding challenge and a population deeply unhappy with the government.
So both sides have incentives to avoid a major flare up. But each is pushing for leverage, raising fear of an escalatory spiral that gets out of hand, said Saeid Golkar, an expert on Iran's security services who teaches at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.
"This escalation is rapidly intensifying and getting out of control," he said. "There is a risk we will go back to a total war even if neither side wants it."
The strait was supposed to be opened under a memorandum of understanding Trump signed with Iran a month ago. The deal fell apart amid new Iranian attacks on shipping aimed at shutting down a U.S. effort to shepherd traffic through the strait along the coast of Oman.
Iran believes the agreement gives it the right to manage traffic through the strait and wants ships to pass through a northern route along the Iranian coast.
U.S. officials said earlier this week that Trump was leaning toward expanding U.S. military operations to break the diplomatic logjam. The U.S. was moving jet fighters back to the Middle East from Europe, according to flight tracking data and a person familiar with the matter.
More than 2,000 Marines from the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit are also operating in the region after spending time in the Pacific. The military released photos of the Marines boarding and searching a commercial vessel in the Gulf of Oman as the U.S. ramps up enforcement of its blockade of Iranian ports.
The U.S. has now carried out seven consecutive days of strikes, the biggest escalation since the preliminary deal was signed in June. Like other days, U.S. Central Command said Friday afternoon, Eastern time, that the new round of strikes are "designed to continue degrading Iranian military capabilities."
Recent targets have included multiple bridges in an effort to cut off supply routes to the port and naval base at Bandar Abbas on the Strait of Hormuz. The port normally handles 90% of the country's container traffic. Iran also uses the facilities to attack ships, The Wall Street Journal has reported, citing a senior U.S. official.
Several attacks on bridges were reported in and around Bandar Abbas during Thursday night's U.S. strikes, and highways connecting the port city to nearby provinces were declared closed, according to Iran's state broadcaster IRIB.
Iranian state media and a U.S. defense official said the U.S. has been striking targets throughout the country and not just along the coast. The official said the targets include weapons and surveillance systems that Iran has used to attack commercial shipping. Among the targets are small boats, coastal-radar sites, air-defense systems and missile- and drone-storage facilities.
The U.S. has repeatedly hit Chabahar, Iran's only deep water, oceanic port. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted a picture of the collapse of a maritime-communications tower in Chabahar, which sits more than 350 miles east of the strait near the Pakistan border.
Iranian authorities have confirmed the facility was struck and insisted it was used for civilian purposes, such as search-and-rescue operations for fishermen at sea. Chris Long, a former British naval officer in the Persian Gulf, said the tower could also have served as an observation and intelligence post.
"We are likewise winning big in Iran, and you will see the fruits of that labor very, very shortly," Trump said in a prime-time address Thursday night.
Throughout the war, Tehran's strategy has been to out-escalate and outlast the U.S. It now says it is broadening the geographical reach of its attacks in response to the intensification of U.S. attacks.
In recent days it has expanded beyond routine attacks on U.S. bases in Bahrain and Kuwait.
Overnight, Iran fired a ballistic missile at a U.S. base in Saudi Arabia after avoiding hitting the kingdom, a more sensitive target, in exchanges of fire under the interim deal to stop the fighting. U.S. troops were injured by attacks on Jordan but returned to duty, a senior U.S. official said.
On Friday, Kuwait said Iranian strikes damaged a power and desalination plant, a provocative escalation particularly at the height of summer that forced it to activate emergency plans. The country's military said 32 drone attacks had been intercepted since early Thursday.
Iran also has begun attacking Qatar and Oman -- two countries involved in efforts to find a diplomatic solution -- and stepped up its attacks on shipping.
On Thursday, officials in Iraq said drones had targeted a tanker and a containership at its southern ports, as well as Iraq's northern Kurdish region. The area's biggest natural-gas field was shut amid credible threats it would be attacked. Iraqi Kurdish authorities said more drones were intercepted above the regional capital of Erbil on Friday.
No one has claimed the strikes in Iraq, but Iran and its local allies have frequently launched drones there.
Another vessel was attacked by an unknown projectile near the Strait of Hormuz on Friday, according to the U.K. Maritime Trade Operations, which is affiliated with the Royal Navy.
Ship tracker Kpler said traffic through Hormuz has dropped to a three-week low. Half were Iranian ships, and most of the traffic went through the Iranian route.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
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