Aamer Madhani, Samy Magdy, Cara Anna and Michelle L. Price
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The United States has conducted defensive strikes on Iranian targets in the Strait of Hormuz, a US official has said on the eve of crucial midterm elections.
Iranian state television reported that explosions were heard on Qeshm Island. The official, who was not authorised to comment publicly and spoke on Monday (US time) on condition of anonymity, said, “Iranians using surface-to-air missiles against US assets” had been targeted.
The strikes appeared to be limited as opposed to a return to full hostilities but followed President Donald Trump previously saying the US would not launch strikes on Iran before Tuesday’s midterms. The strikes were reported earlier by The Wall Street Journal.
The unpopular Iran war and the resulting impact on US oil prices and other parts of the economy have been a vulnerability for Republicans as they try to keep control of Congress.
The administration was last known to have carried out attacks in early September, but thousands of US troops remain in the waters off Iran to maintain a naval blockade aimed at preventing tankers carrying Iranian oil from getting to the global market. A third aircraft carrier and thousands of additional troops are on their way to the Middle East.
Earlier, Vice President JD Vance offered measured optimism that a deal can still be struck to prevent Trump from following through on his threat to potentially order new strikes on Iran after the midterm elections.
Vance sent a letter to Iran’s security chief, Mohsen Rezaei, last week, but the White House has offered scant details about the contents. Trump said the letter was focused on assisting Iran with “medical supplies and various things”.
But Vance suggested on Monday that there was reason to believe the US and Iran could still come to an agreement.
“We’ve had a number of good conversations with the Iranians,” he told reporters when asked about the letter. “I actually just spoke with the president of the United States about an hour ago about this. Look, the president and I both feel pretty good about the prospects for potentially coming to a negotiated settlement. We’re going to keep on working at it.”
Vance’s comments came as the region remained on edge about the prospects of the US resuming full-scale operations against Iran. The back-channel efforts are playing out as Israel and some Middle East allies lobby Trump on the way ahead in the eight-month-old war that’s rattled global markets and wreaked havoc on Iran.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is pushing for another wave of strikes on Iran after Tuesday’s elections in the United States, according to two regional officials and a third person familiar with the matter.
A return to full-scale war with Iran could help Netanyahu to form an emergency government after he and his far-right allies lost their parliamentary majority in last week’s elections. Trump has alternated between threatening major strikes and pushing for a deal with Iran.
The two officials said diplomatic efforts have made progress, with Qatari mediators holding two rounds of talks last week with Iranian officials. The two officials said the mediators were trying to advance a framework for Iran to cease its attacks in the Strait of Hormuz in return for the US lifting its blockade on Iran’s ports.
They said more talks were planned for this week. The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were discussing classified briefings they had received from American, and in one case Israeli, officials.
One official said Netanyahu was working with senior officials in the US administration to persuade Trump to launch a quick but extensive air campaign and that the president did not appear to have made a decision.
Netanyahu pressed for strikes during a call over the weekend with Trump, who would not commit to taking military action, according to a person who was briefed on the call.
Other US allies in the Middle East are warning against more strikes, saying that would destabilise the region and could lead Iran-allied Houthi rebels in Yemen to step up their attacks on Saudi Arabia and Red Sea shipping, a third regional official said. Iran-backed militias in Iraq could also get involved.
The Israeli government did not immediately comment. The White House did not directly respond to questions about Netanyahu and Trump’s discussion of potential new strikes during the weekend call.
Saudi Defence Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman said he spoke by phone on Monday with US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth about “the latest regional and international developments” and the Houthis’ continued attacks on Saudi Arabia.
The war has loomed large for American voters ahead of the midterm elections. Trump sought to minimise the conflict, which has cost US taxpayers at least $US47 billion ($67.3 billion), during a speech in Washington on Monday that was billed as his closing argument to voters.
“I don’t know if you even call it a war, because we haven’t been doing any fighting for months,” Trump said. Netanyahu has not commented on Iran since the Israeli election, and there was no word from his office on the latest call with Trump.
Iran wants guarantees that the US will implement its side of any agreement. The US and Israel have twice attacked Iran while it was engaged in negotiations over its disputed nuclear program.
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, recently met with Iran’s military chiefs and said the response to “any kind and level of threat” from the US or Israel should be immediate and without “geographic limits”. He urged an expansion of the list of potential targets.
A recent analysis by the Associated Press found that Iranian strikes on more than two dozen US bases since the start of the war have caused billions of dollars in equipment damage.
October saw the most attacks on commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz since March, as Iran has tried to increase economic pressure on the US to get it to lift its blockade.
Gulf nations have spent billions of dollars to boost their defence capabilities since the war began. Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty told the gathering in Bahrain that the next escalation “will be more dangerous, more destructive, and it will lead to nowhere”.
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