CAIRO (AP) — Iran launched a barrage of missiles at American forces in the Middle East early Wednesday as the U.S. partnered with Saudi Arabia to strike Tehran-backed militias in neighboring Iraq, killing at least 20 fighters.
The flare-up on multiple fronts, after several days of relative calm, raised the risk of a return to all-out war. It also underscored the difficulty of winding down a five-month conflict that has jolted the world economy and
is unpopular among Americans. It was also likely to add to concerns that the U.S. is further drawing down already diminished stockpiles of sophisticated munitions needed to defend its bases and allies.
Saudi Arabia had accused the Iraqi militias of firing drones against its oil facilities over the past two days. An umbrella group of Iraqi militias initially denied the allegations, while another Iran-backed group — the Houthi rebels in Yemen — said they had attacked Saudi energy facilities as part of a separate but related conflict.
Before the latest eruption, mediators had expressed optimism about bringing the U.S. and Iran back to the negotiating table. An interim agreement collapsed in recent weeks over renewed fighting in the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway for global energy supplies that Iranian attacks have again effectively closed.
The renewed hostilities sent oil prices spiking. Brent crude, the international standard, jumped 3.1% to $84.58 a barrel.
Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard said it fired ballistic missiles at the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base and the headquarters of the U.S. military’s Central Command in Jordan, in a statement carried by the state-run IRNA news agency.
Jordan’s military said five Iranian missiles had been intercepted and destroyed. There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.
The U.S. military later announced that American and Saudi fighter aircraft had struck multiple logistics and weapons sites in eastern Iraq in response to the alleged drone attacks on Saudi Arabia. The Saudi Defense Ministry warned that it “does not seek escalation but will respond to any aggression.”
The Popular Mobilization Forces, a coalition of primarily Shiite, Iran-backed armed groups that is officially under the command of the Iraqi military, said at least 20 fighters were killed and 32 others wounded in the overnight strikes.
The groups making up the PMF joined in the fight against the Islamic State group after it seized large sections of Iraq in 2014. The Iraqi government later designated PMF as an “independent military formation” within the armed forces, but in practice the militias have significant autonomy, and some have attacked U.S. facilities.
The office of Iraqi President Nizar Amidi condemned Wednesday’s U.S.-Saudi airstrikes, calling them “an unacceptable attack and a blatant violation of Iraq’s sovereignty, targeting its official security institutions.”
The statement also said Iraq should not be a “launching pad or arena for attacks against neighboring countries or for settling regional and international scores.” It called for dialogue and de-escalation.
Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi called an emergency meeting of the country’s National Security Council Wednesday to discuss the strikes.
Two Iraqi government officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly said a visit to Saudi Arabia by al-Zaidi that had been scheduled for Thursday had been postponed indefinitely.
Saudi Arabia is also locked in a renewed conflict with the Houthis. The rebels have declared a blockade of Saudi shipping that could choke off another crucial trade route in the Middle East running through the Bab el-Mandeb strait between the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea.
On Monday, the Houthis said they had launched drones targeting oil facilities used to transport oil from Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Region to the Red Sea port city of Yanbu, a key bypass for Saudi exports blocked by Iran’s chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz.
The rebels said their attack was in response to a Saudi drone that they said had breached Yemen’s airspace.
Planet Labs satellite imagery from Monday analyzed by The Associated Press showed damage to Saudi Aramco’s Abqaiq oil processing facility in the kingdom’s east. The massive facility is capable of processing approximately 7 million barrels of crude oil per day.
Attacks on Abqaiq claimed by the Houthis in 2019 disrupted production of 5.7 million barrels per day, spiking global oil prices and providing an initial demonstration of the vulnerability of Saudi oil facilities to missile and drone attacks.
Separately, a regional official said an oil refinery in Jazan, on Saudi Arabia's Red Sea coast, has temporarily shut down due to “relatively significant” damage from a Houthi attack on Saturday. The official, who was not authorized to brief journalists and spoke on condition of anonymity, said it would take several days to be repaired. The refinery produces 400,000 barrels per day.
The Texas-based IIR Energy consultancy said the facility shut down on Monday after initially operating at reduced rates since the attack two days earlier. Repairs and a tentative restart of the refinery were expected for Aug. 15, it said.
The Strait of Hormuz has been a major flashpoint in the conflict. Iran's deputy foreign minister said his country rejected a proposal by Oman, which lies on the other side of the strait, for jointly managing ship traffic.
In an interview with Iran’s state-run television that aired Tuesday night, Kazem Gharibabadi said the Omani proposal included dividing the strait into two routes, each allowing the transit of 50% of shipping passing through the waterway.
Iran offered a counterproposal with a temporary plan for transit of vessels through its territorial waters, he said, adding that Iran’s policy is for the strait “never to return to its prewar situation.” Before the conflict, ships transited freely.
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Becatoros reported from Athens, Greece. Associated Press writers Qassim Abdul-Zahra in Baghdad, Iraq, Abby Sewell in Beirut, David McHugh in Frankfurt and Konstantin Toropin in Washington contributed to this report.
