Israel and Iran trade strikes, threatening to drag region back to war

Monday marked the 100th day of the Iran war, launched Feb. 28 when Israel and the United States killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other senior Iranian leaders. The war raged until reaching a nominal ceasefire on April 8, but a permanent end to the hostilities have been challenged by Iran’s chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of all traded oil and natural gas once passed in peacetime, as well as fighting between Israel and the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah.

With global energy supplies threatened, Iran still holding a vast stockpile of highly enriched uranium and even Yemen’s Houthi rebels apparently getting involved in the fighting Monday, the risks of the war fully erupting again appears to be rising.

Israel strikes Iran

Iranian state television reported the sound of explosions being heard in Isfahan, Karaj, Tabriz and Tehran, without immediately elaborating. A witness in Tehran described hearing at least one large blast somewhere to the west of the country’s capital city. Iran closed the airspace around Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport, the country’s main airfield, after the Israeli attack.

Officials offered no details on what had been struck, nor any damage information. Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard said that Israel used air-launched ballistic missiles in its attack Monday morning, without elaborating.

The semiofficial Fars and Mehr news agencies said Israeli strikes had hit a petrochemical factory in city of Mahshahr in Khuzestan province. It did not elaborate on damage.

The Israeli military later confirmed the strike on the petrochemical plant.

Earlier Monday, sirens sounded across Israel after its military said a missile launched from Yemen targeted the country, without elaborating. Israel’s rescue services said there were no reports of casualties or impacts from the launch from Yemen.

Yemen is home to the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels. The Houthis have fired missiles at Israel during the Israel-Hamas war and later, but haven’t been fully involved in the Iran war. The Houthis did not immediately claim the attack, though it can take them hours or even days to acknowledge their assaults.

In Saudi Arabia, missile alert sirens sounded Monday morning in an area home to an air base that hosts U.S. forces. Saudi state media reported the alert around its Al Kharj governorate, home to Prince Sultan Air Base. The alert came after Israel’s strikes on Iran. Saudi Arabia shortly after said the missile danger in the area had passed, without elaborating.

Trump says ‘I call the shots,’ not Israel

The White House did not respond to messages about the Israeli strikes and whether they were done in coordination with the U.S.

A senior U.S. official on Sunday said U.S. President Donald Trump had called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to urge him not to retaliate immediately for the Iranian missile attack. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe a private phone call, said that Trump believed he had convinced Netanyahu to wait.

Trump “got Bibi to hold off for the time being,” the official said. The official would not offer any other details of the call, and there was no immediate comment from Netanyahu’s office.

For days, negotiations between Iran and the United States over the fragile ceasefire in the war had been stalled by the fighting between Israel and the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah. Israel now occupies southern Lebanon and had moved into areas of the country it hadn’t held in a quarter century — leading to fears about them further widening their campaign.

On Sunday, Israel launched airstrikes in Beirut’s southern suburbs. Iran retaliated with its own strike on Israel, which led to Monday morning’s attack by Israel on Iran.

Trump earlier told a Fox News Channel reporter that he wanted the Iranians to stop firing missiles and return to the negotiating table. He also said that Israel’s strikes in Lebanon earlier Sunday were not coordinated with the U.S. and “I’m not happy about it.”

Speaking to The Financial Times before the Israeli strikes on Iran, Trump insisted he dictated terms to Netanyahu on how the war should be prosecuted.

“He won’t have any choice,” Trump told the newspaper in a telephone interview. “I call the shots. I call all the shots. He (Netanyahu) doesn’t call the shots.”

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Associated Press writers Matthew Lee in Washington and Michelle L. Price in Bridgewater, New Jersey, contributed to this report.

Jon Gambrell, The Associated Press

by The Canadian Press

Israel and Iran trade strikes, threatening to drag region back to war

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