United States President Donald Trump said the U.S. would strike back at Iran after a recent attack that targeted a military base in Jordan, as the war in the Middle East flared up once again following a recent pause in hostilities. “We’ll be hitting them hard,” Trump said in a phone interview, Fox News reported Wednesday, adding that “they’re going to get a beating.” The comments sent oil surging back above US$90 a barrel. A days-long halt to strikes ended Tuesday night after U.S. forces said they were targeted by Iran — in what Trump called a “surprise attack” — while Iran’s state-run IRIB News said the U.S. struck a location in the country’s West Azerbaijan province. Iranian media said the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps targeted a base in Jordan in response to “aggressive U.S. actions,” without giving details. The U.S. and Saudi Arabia also struck Iran-backed militants in Iraq, after Riyadh said it intercepted drones launched by Iraqi groups that were targeting its oil facilities. Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces, an umbrella organization for Shia militias in the country, said the U.S.-Saudi strikes killed 20 people. Four members of IRGC were also killed, the semi-official Mehr news agency reported. The U.S. and Iran had paused tit-for-tat strikes at the end of last week to allow time for a diplomatic conclusion to the five-month war, leading to a significant drop in energy prices. That hiatus now looks over. Futures have been whipsawed this month as the U.S. and Iran went from escalation to diplomacy and now back to fighting. “We’re going to let them keep talking,” Trump told Fox News about the possibility of future discussions with Iran. A formal resumption of negotiations looks a distant prospect, however. That means the conflict looks set to drag on, possibly for months, with the different sides unable to break a deadlock over the strait, according to several current and former officials from the U.S., Iran and Europe, who asked not to be named discussing sensitive matters. That’s causing plenty of frustration for Trump, who reveled in the signing of an interim peace deal in June that now appears obsolete. With U.S. gasoline prices having soared and Americans increasingly against the war, his standing is taking a hit ahead of midterm elections in November. The latest strikes came hours after Trump said he’d prefer to avoid escalating the conflict and sounded optimistic about the chances of a diplomatic breakthrough. The Strait of Hormuz remains effectively shut, with hardly any ships traveling through — at least with their transponders on. Early Wednesday, Iran’s state-run IRIB News said the IRGC claimed to have “struck and brought to a halt” three tankers in recent hours. They were, according to the report, “moving along an unsafe and illegal route.” Talks between Iran and Oman to get more traffic through the waterway, a vital conduit for flows of energy and other commodities such as aluminum and helium, seem to have faltered. Iranian negotiators rejected an Omani proposal that they open a channel equally controlled by each country, according to Iran’s media. Instead, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi said Tehran wants to have sole control over vessels coming into the Persian Gulf. Oman had hoped to be able to make a statement in the coming days signaling progress, Bloomberg reported on Monday. Omani officials believe a shipping agreement with Iran would enable Washington and Tehran to get back to the negotiating table. The decision by Iraqi militias to join the fray adds to the risk of a new front opening and the war escalating. Saudi Arabia isn’t known to have attacked Iraqi territory in years. Iran has funded and trained Shia militant groups in Iraq, its western neighbour, since around 2003, when the U.S.’s invasion toppled dictator Saddam Hussein and led to chaos in the Arab country. Washington is trying to dilute Iran’s influence over such groups. This month, at the White House, Trump hosted Iraq’s new Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi, who’s promised to try to disarm the militias. They remain powerful — politically as well as militarily — and many of them have members who are elected lawmakers. Iran denied having any role in the Iraqi groups’ strikes on Saudi Arabia. “Attributing every action against U.S. interests in the region to the Islamic Republic of Iran is a major miscalculation,” IRIB reported an unnamed source as saying. The Iraqi militias’ actions follow attacks on Saudi Arabian oil facilities and ships in the Red Sea by the Houthis, an Iran-backed group based in Yemen. The Islamist organization announced a blockade of Saudi ports and struck some ships last week. The kingdom’s forces then attacked Houthi military sites, with the group retaliating by firing drones and missiles at the Saudi port cities of Yanbu and Jizan on Saturday. Trump says there’s a ‘good chance’ of an Iran deal amid pauseThe widening Middle East war is threatening your mortgage rate again The Houthi operations opened a new front in the war and may effectively close the Bab el-Mandeb strait at the southern tip of the Red Sea, another important chokepoint for the global oil market. While some ships are still going through Bab el-Mandeb, several have turned away. With assistance from Arsalan Shahla, Patrick Sykes, Eltaf Najafizada and Carla Canivete Bloomberg.com
Trump says U.S. will strike Iran hard as war escalates again
