Washington — The U.S. military says it hit Iranian targets on Friday over Iran’s drone attack on a commercial vessel in the Strait of Hormuz, marking the first American strikes on Iran since the two countries agreed to extend an already-rickety ceasefire last week.
The strikes targeted Iranian missile and drone storage facilities and radar sites, U.S. Central Command said in a statement posted to social media, calling it a “powerful response” to Iran’s “dangerous behavior.”
“The unwarranted aggression against commercial shipping by Iranian forces clearly violated the ceasefire,” CENTCOM said.
One day earlier, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps struck a Singapore-flagged cargo ship, a U.S. official confirmed to CBS News on Thursday. The ship’s bridge was damaged, but no casualties or environmental impact were reported, according to the U.K. Maritime Trade Operations Centre, which said the vessel was off the cost of Oman.
President Trump called the attack a “foolish violation” of the U.S.-Iran ceasefire, which was extended for 60 days in a memorandum of understanding between the two countries last week. Asked by reporters Friday if Iran would face any consequences, Mr. Trump responded: “You’ll find out.”
The Iranian drone attack — and the U.S. response — could mark a setback to the Trump administrations’ efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, which was closed to most shipping traffic for months. Shortly after the vessel was struck, the United Nations’ International Maritime Organization paused an effort to evacuate hundreds of ships and thousands of mariners who were stranded in the Persian Gulf. The organization said the ship “did not transit under IMO’s evacuation framework.”
The U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding says Iran must arrange for safe, toll-free passage through the Strait of Hormuz “using its best efforts” for 60 days. In the week after Mr. Trump signed the deal, the number of ships that sailed through the strait every day surged, while oil prices plummeted to near pre-war levels.
Still, disagreements over the strait have lingered. The U.S. favors a route through the southern portion of the Strait of Hormuz, hugging the coastline of Oman, while Iran has said ships still need to seek its permission and use a northern route closer to the Iranian coast. Iran also hasn’t ruled out collecting tolls on commercial ships after the 60-day period ends, an idea the U.S. and its allies in the region have called unacceptable.
Iran’s Persian Strait Gulf Authority said Thursday: “Any passage through routes outside the framework designated by PGSA will not be covered by safe passage guarantees and will not be entitled to insurance coverage or related liabilities.”
It’s also not clear what impact the renewed U.S. strikes on Iran will have on talks between the two countries, which are set to negotiate over Iran’s nuclear program for the next two months. The two sides first struck a ceasefire in early April, and while that arrangement was repeatedly tested by tit-for-tat strikes, U.S. forces did not reopen the large-scale bombing campaign against Iran that ran for more than a month.