The US completed its strikes on the Iranian president on Wednesday Donald Trumpin the direction, reported the US Central Command.
The strikes were completed at 9:04 p.m. ET, CENTCOM saidadding that it hit Iran’s military surveillance capabilities, communications systems and air defense facilities. US forces fired on Iranian targets that “posed a threat to US forces and international commercial vessels transiting through regional waters.”
CENTCOM began “conducting additional self-defense strikes today at 5:15 p.m. ET against multiple targets in Iran as directed by the Commander-in-Chief,” according to its publish on X. The strikes were carried out “in response to Iran’s unprovoked and sustained aggression,” CENTCOM said.
Iranian state media reported that Iran launched missile and drone strikes against US ships in the Strait of Hormuz. Reuters later reported that Iran’s high military command had completely closed the Strait of Hormuz, warning that any vessel attempting to pass through would be targeted.
Trump later said Fox News that he spoke directly to Iranian officials, who he said asked him to end the strikes. He said the bombing would stop soon and that the Israelis were not involved in the strikes, but left the door open to further military action, Fox reported.
Asked if the truce had ended, Trump reportedly said it was the most frequent ceasefire violation in history.
Strikes follow Trump said earlier on Wednesday that the US would strike Iran again “very strongly,” stepping up his public threats as he pressed Tehran to sign the deal.
“We hit them hard yesterday and we’re going to hit them hard again today,” Trump said at a signing event at the White House The Secure America Act. “We’re going to attack them, and we’re going to attack them very hard.”
Trump said Iran “must sign the deal“and said that the US wants the agreement “it makes sense and it works.”
“We’ll see what happens with the agreement,” Trump said.
In response on Wednesday afternoon, the head of the national security commission in Iran’s parliament, Ebrahim Azizi, wrote that “this time the war will not be limited to the region.” publish on X.
The comments came after Trump warned on Truth Social that Iran had been negotiating for too long and would “pay the priceamid escalating military tensions between Washington and Tehran.
“Iran’s armed forces are a complete and utter mess,” Trump said wrote Wednesday morning. “A lot of them, like their navy and air force, don’t even exist anymore — they’ve been completely defeated. Iran is all talk, no action.”
Oil prices rose while U.S. stock futures fell after Trump’s comments, with USA is raw rising nearly 2% to $89.72 a barrel, while Brent rose 1.3% to $92.74. The Dow Jones industrial index decreased more than 600 points since the comments.
“This is a military operation,” Trump said, repeating his assertion that oil prices would return to pre-war levels in February. “When it’s all over, you’re going to see the oil fall back to where it was before.”
Oil can reach 150 dollars per barrel over the next few months if fighting in the Middle East continues as inventories are now at very low levels, Claudio Galimberti, chief economist at Rystad Energy, told CNBC earlier this week.
Tensions in the Middle East escalated on Tuesday after US forces launched strikes against Iran, which the US Central Command said were “in response to the downing of a US Army Apache helicopter yesterday”.
Iran has not directly claimed responsibility shoot down the helicopter. Iran’s state broadcaster IRIB reported that there had been no offensive military operations in the strait over the past 24 hours.
Iran’s foreign ministry did not respond to a request for comment.