Iran targets US allies in Gulf after overnight attacks, and other Mideast news
Iran targeted Gulf allies of the United States on Wednesday, firing drones at Kuwait and Bahrain after a night of U.S. aerial bombardment of Iran.
Iranian officials said one of the U.S. strikes on the country overnight struck a wedding party, leaving at least five people dead and dozens wounded.
Fighting between the U.S. and Iran has increased this week after the U.S. hit Iranian rocket launchers on an island in the Strait of Hormuz on Sunday, saying Iran was planning to use them to shoot mines into the waterway. Iran retaliated by firing missiles at American bases in Jordan, which were all intercepted.
Here’s a look at the latest developments in the Iran war and the wider Middle East. Full coverage can be found here.
The U.S. Central Command said Tuesday’s strikes focused on Iranian military targets including air defense sites, radar systems and maritime assets.
But Iranian media said one U.S. strike hit a home hosting a wedding in Kuhestak, a small town on the coast overlooking the Strait of Hormuz. At least five people were killed, including a 4-year-old and a 16-year-old, the state news agency IRNA reported, and at least 68 people were wounded.
The U.S. military said it was aware of the report but that it “never targets civilians.”
Footage from the Iranian Red Crescent showed rescue workers entering a damaged home in the wake of the strike, with debris scattered all around and a hole in the roof of one house in a neighborhood of densely packed homes.
Bahrain said its air defense systems intercepted several Iranian air attacks early Wednesday, without providing further details.
Iranian state media said Iran’s military had launched drone attacks on U.S. bases in Bahrain and in the United Arab Emirates in response to the overnight attacks.
Kuwait’s government communications center said a fire broke out at a residential complex in the capital after it was hit by an Iranian drone at dawn. It said the blaze had been contained and there were no casualties.
Saudi shipping company Bahri said two Filipino sailors were killed in an attack late Monday as their vessel transited the Strait of Hormuz.
In a statement Wednesday, the company said its ship, named the SIDR, was “involved in a security incident” in the strait shortly before midnight on Monday that resulted in the loss of two of their seafarers.
No one claimed responsibility for the attack on the Saudi tanker.
Iran has established a chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s traded oil passed in peacetime, after the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28. Ship traffic through the waterway has slowed to a trickle, roiling the global economy and spiking prices for energy and other goods across the world.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Wednesday on “Fox & Friends” that multiple officials in President Donald Trump's administration are talking to other nations still doing business with Iran and pressuring them to stop.
He avoided mentioning Russia specifically, even when asked.
“My message to everyone is stay away,” Bessent said. “We all want this conflict to end, and the fastest way for the conflict to end is for no one to provide any support to this regime. We are going to sever every tie that they have from the outside world.”
Iran’s currency market hit a record low Wednesday, hours after the exchange of fire between the country and the U.S. over control of the Strait of Hormuz.
Traders in the Tehran market exchanged 2.20 million rials for one U.S. dollar, nearly 10% higher than last week’s record, on Aug. 25, when one dollar was sold at 2.02 million rials.
The currency had already been under pressure before the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28, as Iran faced double-digit inflation and negative growth. The rial has repeatedly hit new lows since the war began.
The Council of Arab Interior Ministers described Iran’s attacks on Kuwait, Jordan, United Arab Emirates and Bahrain as a “violation of international law.”
The council said Iran’s “brutal aggression” is part of Tehran’s efforts to destabilize security and stability in the region. The council also said the attacks threaten international peace and security.
Chinese President Xi Jinping held talks with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi in Cairo, on the second day of his visit to Egypt. The visit is his first visit to the Middle East since a series of devastating conflicts erupted in the region.
Xi arrived Wednesday morning at Cairo’s Ittihadiya palace, the seat of the Egyptian presidency, where he was greeted by el-Sissi and a 21-gun artillery salute.
Pakistan said Wednesday it remains engaged with the United States and Iran, with support from regional countries, in efforts to bring Washington and Tehran back to the negotiating table.
Foreign Ministry spokesperson Tahir Andrabi told a weekly news briefing in Islamabad that Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif met Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a political and security group billed as a counterweight to the U.S. global influence.
Andrabi said Pakistani Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar also met his Iranian counterpart, Abbas Araghchi, on the sidelines of the summit.
A man drove through a crowd gathered in the northern Iranian city of Mashhad late Tuesday, killing four people, the official IRNA news agency reported on Wednesday.
The report said more than 10 people were injured, and that police had detained the driver. IRNA did not give details about the gathering or the driver.
Quoting local traffic police, the semiofficial Fars news agency described the incident as a road accident and implied the driver might have been under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
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