DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The U.S. military launched airstrikes Sunday targeting Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard to retaliate for the killing of American troops in Jordan, further widening the exchange of fire between them as an interim deal seeking an end to their war has collapsed.
The strikes are part of a weeklong campaign that began with a struggle over control of the Strait of Hormuz and has seen Iran strike U.S.-allied countries
across the Middle East.
The U.S. has targeted bridges, electrical facilities and other targets in Iran, and Tehran has retaliated by hitting power and desalination plants in Kuwait, threatening daily life in that small, oil-rich desert nation.
Kuwait, Jordan and Bahrain again activated air defenses Sunday morning as they warned of incoming Iranian drones and missiles. Israel warned Iran missiles launched toward neighboring Jordan could cause fire to spill over into its territory for the first time since fighting reignited.
The U.S. military’s Central Command in its statement also said it hit “Iranian military coastal surveillance and air defense facilities, maritime capabilities and missile and drone storage sites.” It said the attack was designed to degrade Iran's ability to control the Strait of Hormuz and “swiftly punish Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces,” a key power base in Iran's theocracy that controls its ballistic missile arsenal.
Footage released by the U.S. military appeared to show strikes carried out by fighter jets and by Tomahawk cruise missiles launched from the sea. One target site appeared to be in a valley of a mountainous region. The Guard often has missile bases and other military equipment tucked into mountain ranges.
An Iranian attack on a base in Jordan killed two American service members, left one missing and four requiring hospitalization, the U.S. military said on Saturday. Since the war began, 16 U.S. service members have been killed and over 430 wounded.
Iranian authorities said on Sunday that at least 50 people have been killed and 517 wounded in the latest U.S. strikes.
Iran has provided no overall information on its materiel losses in the American campaign, which is now in its eighth day as the nations vie over control of the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of all oil and natural gas traded passes in peacetime.
Iran’s atomic energy agency said that U.S. strikes early on Sunday morning targeted a construction site of a planned nuclear power plant in southwest Iran, according to Iranian state television.
Satellite images from Planet Labs PBC of the planned site of the Darkhovin Nuclear Power Plant show earth clearing but very little construction having taken place there as of July 9. There is no radiological material known to be at the site, which Iran had not previously announced as targeted throughout the war.
The United States' regional allies activated their air defenses or reported incoming Iranian attacks on Sunday as the reignited conflict spilled further across the region.
Israel said on Sunday that Iran has launched missiles toward neighboring Jordan, warning people to expect the first air raid sirens in weeks. It said Iran launched missiles toward the nearby Jordanian port city of Aqaba.
Israel, which joined the United States in launching the war with airstrikes on Iran on Feb. 28, has refrained from reentering the renewed fighting. Iran has focused its attacks on U.S.-allied Arab states in the Gulf as well as Jordan. But an Iranian strike on Israeli territory could risk widening the conflict once again.
Kuwait said on Sunday that one of the country's power and water desalination plants was attacked for the second time in two days, causing fires. Its Ministry of Electricity, Water and Renewable Energy said that the power grid remains stable, yet the attack marked the latest instance in which strikes — by both the United States and Iran — have targeted civilian infrastructure relied on by millions of people.
In Kuwait, about 90% of drinking water comes from desalination.
The secretary-general of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, Jasem Mohamed al-Budaiwi, accused Iran of war crimes for strikes on infrastructure and civilian facilities. International humanitarian law generally protects civilian infrastructure, such as bridges and power plants, from attack, but such sites can lose these protections if used for military purposes. In such cases, attacks must be proportionate and minimize harm to civilians.
Trump has threatened to target Iran’s power stations and bridges to try to compel Tehran to loosen its hold on the Strait of Hormuz. Recent attacks suggest the U.S. military is carrying out that plan, beginning first with coastal areas of Iran on the strait.
The U.S. in the past week also reimposed a naval blockade on Iranian ports to halt its shipments of crude oil, and the military on Saturday said it had redirected five ships and disabled one since then.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, in a statement Saturday, warned of “unforgettable lessons” if the U.S. keeps attacking the Islamic Republic. An Iranian negotiator said Tehran was suspending its commitments to the interim deal signed about a month ago and aimed at permanently ending the fighting.
Iran’s joint military command said that U.S. “covetousness, bullying, totalitarianism or brutality” would meet with a “devastating response.”
__ Metz reported from Ramallah, West Bank.
