By DAVID RISING and SAMY MAGDY Associated Press
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran fired on U.S. allies in the Gulf early Wednesday following a night of American bombardment that Iranian officials say included a deadly strike on a wedding party.
The latest violence ended a monthlong lull in fighting between the U.S. and Iran and raised new questions about how to end a war that has led to a spike in oil prices, roiled the global economy and is posing increasing political problems for U.S. President Donald Trump’s Republican Party ahead of November midterm elections.
Fighting between the U.S. and Iran has increased since the weekend after the American military hit Iranian rocket launchers on an island in the Strait of Hormuz, saying Iran was planning to use them to shoot mines into the waterway. Iran retaliated by firing missiles at American bases in Jordan, which were all intercepted.
American military resources are stretched and political pressure in Washington is mounting, while Iran’s economy falters and its currency collapses. Neither side can continue indefinitely in this zone between full-scale war and a truce, said Hamidreza Azizi, senior Iran analyst at the Crisis Group, a think tank.
“At some point, one of the sides may see a need to escalate in order to break this cycle,” he cautioned. “So that could bring the two sides to a point that they have been trying to avoid until now, which is a full-scale war.”
U.S. allies in the region fend off Iranian attacks
Iran also fired drones at Kuwait late Tuesday that were intercepted. On Monday, the United Arab Emirates said it had intercepted an incoming Iranian drone over its waters.
Bahrain, which hosts an important U.S. naval base, said its air defense systems intercepted incoming fire from Iran early Wednesday, accusing Iran of “attacks targeting civilians” in a statement issued by its military.
Also on Wednesday, Kuwait’s government communications center said a fire broke out at a residential complex in the capital after it was hit by an Iranian drone at dawn. It said the blaze had been contained and there were no casualties.
“You will soon see that Iran’s new strategy on the battlefield, in diplomacy, and in confronting the economic blockade will shatter your foundations,” the recently appointed head of Iran’s powerful Supreme National Security Council, Mohsen Rezaei, said defiantly on X.
Elsewhere in the region, in Iraq where Iranian-backed proxy forces are active, Kurdistan’s Counter-Terrorism Directorate said it had intercepted 10 drones laden with explosives in the Irbil area. Iranian television reported that American bases in Irbil had been targeted.
Israel’s military also said that Iran-backed Hezbollah fired two explosive drones at its soldiers in southern Lebanon but there were no casualties.
The U.S. Central Command said Tuesday’s strikes focused on Iranian military targets including air defense sites, radar systems and maritime assets.
Casualties in Iran include people at a wedding party
One U.S. strike hit a home hosting a wedding in Kuhestak, a small town on the coast overlooking the Strait of Hormuz, according to Iranian media. At least five people were killed, including two women and two children aged four and 16, and at least 68 were wounded, Iranian officials said.
Images from Iran’s semiofficial Tasnim news agency showed several hospitalized children being treated for injuries at a hospital in the nearby town of Minab.
Footage from the Iranian Red Crescent showed rescue workers entering a damaged home in the wake of the strike, with debris scattered all around. It showed a hole in the roof of one house in a neighborhood of densely packed homes.
“Make no mistake: these crimes will not go unpunished,” Ebrahim Azizi, chairperson of the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said on X.
The U.S. military said it was aware of the report but that it “never targets civilians.”
On the opening day of the war, more than 100 children were killed in a U.S. missile strike that hit a primary school in Minab, about 30 kilometers (18 miles) from Kuhestak.
Separately, Iran has said four members of its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard and 10 members of the Guard’s volunteer Basij forces died in the U.S. attacks.
The Strait of Hormuz remains largely shut down
During last month’s lull in fighting, the U.S. ramped up economic pressure on Iran, which is suffering from soaring inflation, negative growth and a collapsing currency, as Washington sought to win concessions to fully open the Strait of Hormuz to international shipping traffic.
About a fifth of the world’s traded oil was shipped through the key waterway before Israel and the U.S. attacked Iran on Feb. 28 and Iran largely shut it down. Despite many pronouncements from Washington that the strait is open, only a handful of ships are making the passage each day and Iran has regularly attacked vessels.
On Wednesday, Saudi shipping company Bahri said two Filipino sailors were killed in an attack late Monday as their vessel transited the strait.
Since the fighting resumed, the price of Brent crude oil, the international standard, climbed above $95, up more than 30% from the start of the war.
In launching its latest attacks, U.S. Central Command said it was responding to Tehran trying to hit commercial ships and American forces in the Middle East.
Trump offered an additional explanation, telling Fox News in a phone call that U.S. forces struck radar systems that Iran had been trying to rebuild.
“We waited until it was almost built and then we hit it,” he said.
A ceasefire deal reached in June quickly fell apart amid exchanges of strikes that same month. Mediator Pakistan has been working to restart talks and said Wednesday it remains engaged with both the United States and Iran.
Late Tuesday, Trump said he would not force Iran to the bargaining table.
“I couldn’t care less if they sign a worthless, to them, agreement. I like our position now much better, with almost total control of the Hormuz Strait, and their economy totally collapsing. They are just playing out the inevitable. When are the Iranian people going to rise up and fight?” Trump wrote on social media.
Earlier, Trump had appeared to pivot toward trying to bend Iran to his will through economic sanctions. He warned that if Iran retaliated for the new strikes, “they will be hit again at a much harder and higher level.”
Magdy reported from Cairo.