The United States says it\u2019s completed a series of strikes against Iran, which has retaliated by launching drones and missiles.<\/p>\n
The US military said it targeted air defence systems, ground control stations and radar sites in response to the downing of an American helicopter on Monday.<\/p>\n
In response, Iran\u2019s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it launched strikes on 21 targets at US bases in the region, one in Bahrain and the other in Jordan, while Kuwait\u2019s army said it was also intercepting an attack.<\/p>\n
The US has described its strikes as \u201ca proportional response\u201d for the Apache helicopter downing, while the IRGC described the attacks as \u201cvicious\u201d.<\/p>\n
The exchange of fire comes after two crew members of the downed helicopter were rescued by an American sea drone on Monday, Centcom said. It was the first time the US military publicly confirmed that type of vessel was used in such an operation.<\/p>\n
According to US officials, Iran used a drone to launch the attack on the helicopter. But it\u2019s not clear whether the Iranian drone had deliberately attacked, an unnamed US official told CBS News, the BBC\u2019s US partner. The semi-official Mehr News Agency reported that Iran had not claimed responsibility for the downed aircraft.<\/p>\n
In response, Centcom said US fighter jets \u201cstruck Iranian air defense, ground control stations, and surveillance radar sites near the Strait of Hormuz\u201d.<\/p>\n
The IRGC said US strikes had damaged a telecommunications tower and two water tanks.<\/p>\n
Iran said the US had targeted the cities of Jask and Sirik, and Qeshem \u2013 an island in the Gulf.<\/p>\n
Centcom released the statement saying the mission was \u201ccompleted\u201d just over three hours after it announced an initial wave of strikes triggered by the downing of the US helicopter on Monday.<\/p>\n
US officials are yet to comment on reports of attacks on its bases and it is unclear if there has been any damage. However, an air raid alert was issued in Bahrain, according to local authorities who said Iranian attacks had been repelled.<\/p>\n
US President Donald Trump said earlier on Tuesday the downed helicopter had been patrolling the Strait of Hormuz, a critical shipping channel that was effectively closed days after the US launched its first strikes on Iran in late February.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were two pilots involved, both are safe and uninjured,\u201d Trump wrote on Truth Social. \u201cNevertheless, the United States must, of necessity, respond to this attack.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Washington, US House Speaker Mike Johnson said he was in the room with Trump when he decided that US attacks on Iran should resume.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe lament that it became necessary,\u201d said the top Republican in Congress, adding that \u201cwe\u2019re gonna have to take care of this business\u201d.<\/p>\n
Iran\u2019s foreign minister issued a threat to the US in the aftermath of the renewed US attacks, saying the country \u201cwill leave no attack or threat unanswered\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cDespite its defeats on the battlefield, the US opted to test our determination,\u201d Iran\u2019s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote on X.<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cLeave our region if you want to be safe.\u201d<\/p>\n
Araghchi said on Tuesday that foreign forces near Iran\u2019s territory were at \u201cconstant risk on account of their own human errors, plain accidents or potentially being caught in crossfire\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo reduce risk, best solution is for them [foreign forces] to leave,\u201d the Iranian leader said in a post on X.<\/strong><\/p>\n Minutes before Trump\u2019s comments on the downed American Apache helicopte on Tuesday, Iran\u2019s top negotiator in peace talks with Washington, Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, took to social media to signal retaliation.<\/p>\n \u201cWe prefer the language of diplomacy, but we speak other languages far more fluently. Break your commitments, and we\u2019ll switch to what we speak best.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou ride the horse you saddled!,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n The flare-up between the US and Iran comes after Israeli forces carried out strikes across southern Lebanon on Tuesday.<\/p>\n Tehran had warned that Israeli attacks on southern Lebanon would trigger another wave of retaliatory strikes.<\/p>\n Israel and Iran halted attacks on each other after exchanging fire over the weekend for the first time since April\u2019s truce.<\/p>\n Trump publicly told both countries to \u201cimmediately stop \u2018shooting’\u201d because they were jeopardising negotiations between Washington and Tehran on a deal to end the regional war.<\/p>\n He said on Truth Social that Israel and Iran are looking to do \u201can immediate ceasefire\u201d but peace is \u201csubject to ignorance or stupidity getting in its way\u201d.<\/p>\n On Tuesday he also told journalists: \u201cWe\u2019re in the final throes of what will be a very, very good deal,\u201d adding that it could take \u201ctwo or three days\u201d and the Strait of Hormuz would open immediately after.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The United States says it\u2019s completed a series of strikes against Iran, which has retaliated by launching drones and missiles. The US military said it targeted air defence systems, ground control stations and radar sites in response to the downing of an American helicopter on Monday. In response, Iran\u2019s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-143548","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143548","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=143548"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143548\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=143548"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=143548"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=143548"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}