US strikes Iran for ninth consecutive night as Tehran widens attacks on Jordan, Gulf states
The US military carried out strikes on Iran for the ninth consecutive night. Image credit: X/@CENTCOM
New Delhi: US Central Command (Centcom) began a fresh wave of strikes against Iran at 7pm ET on Sunday(4.30am IST, Monday). The operation concluded around 10pm ET (7.30am IST), marking the ninth consecutive night of American attacks.
The strikes targeted Iranian military command centres, air defence systems, coastal surveillance sites, maritime capabilities, missile and drone launch sites, and communications networks. Centcom said the goal was to reduce Iran’s ability to attack commercial ships and civilian mariners transiting the Strait of Hormuz.
The escalation followed an Iranian attack on Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan on July 17. Two American service members were killed and a third was reported missing. Centcom later said unidentified remains had been found at the site, with identification still under way. Four other wounded service members evacuated to hospitals in Jordan have since been discharged.
The following night, July 18, the US carried out its eighth consecutive night of strikes. Centcom said the operation was designed to “swiftly punish” Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) forces responsible for the Jordan attack, though it gave no details on the strike’s results.
That same night, a US service member was killed in northern Iraq during a controlled detonation of unexploded ordnance from a downed Iranian one-way attack drone. A second service member was wounded. Centcom described the death as killed in action.
With this death, the total number of US military fatalities since the war began on February 28 has risen to 17, with more than 430 troops wounded.
Iran’s IRGC separately claimed it had targeted US aircraft, including C-17 transport planes and P-8 surveillance aircraft, at Aqaba airport, alleging severe damage. It also claimed it had destroyed 20 hangars housing US forces at Jordan’s Al-Azraq airbase. These remain unverified Iranian claims. Centcom has not confirmed or commented on them.
In response to the Jordan attack, Iran’s chargé d’affaires was summoned by Jordan’s foreign ministry, which demanded an immediate halt to the attacks and called them violations of its sovereignty and international law.
On the maritime front, four vessels were reported to have attempted to transit the Strait of Hormuz using what the IRGC called an “unsafe route” backed by the US, after ignoring IRGC warnings. Two of the vessels abandoned the attempt, while the other two were involved in an “accident”, the IRGC said, without elaborating, according to the Times of Israel.
A separate incident was reported by the UK Maritime Trade Operations body, which said it had received a report of a vessel on fire about eight nautical miles northwest of Kumzar, in northern Oman. The cause of the fire could not be verified, and it remains unclear whether the incident is connected to the IRGC’s tanker claim.
In Kuwait, a drone attack targeted US military assets at Al-Adiri camp and Ali Al Salem Air Base, according to reports. A desalination plant was hit for a second consecutive day, causing a fire, Kuwait’s electricity ministry said, while Kuwait’s armed forces said they had again intercepted Iranian missiles.
A naval blockade of Iranian ports has been reimposed by the US. Iran has said it is enforcing its own rules on vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz, which typically carries about a fifth of global oil supply.
Public messaging has also intensified on Iran’s side, with a new billboard unveiled in Tehran’s Palestine Square. As reported by RNA, the billboard depicts the US president, Donald Trump, his wife Melania Trump and their children standing above flag-draped coffins, alongside the slogan “Blood for Blood”.
A warning came separately from Iran’s supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, who said the US would face “unforgettable lessons” if strikes continued, and described Trump’s signature on the ceasefire agreement as “utterly worthless and invalid.”
Responding to the escalation, the US president, Donald Trump, said Iran had been “very, very badly damaged” and had “lost everything almost militarily”. He said preventing Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon remained a core objective.
Travel advisories have also followed. India has advised its citizens to avoid travel to Iran, with the Indian Embassy in Tehran citing worsening instability, and urged Indians already in the country to consider leaving.
