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Blockade, tanker disabled
The United States enforced naval blockade measures against Iran on July 15 by disabling an unladen oil tanker attempting to sail toward an Iranian port in the Arabian Gulf, with U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) observing Curacao-flagged M/T Belma transiting international waters toward Kharg Island.
CENTCOM said the commercial vessel ignored multiple warnings as it attempted to violate the U.S. blockade, and a U.S. aircraft disabled the vessel after firing hellfire missiles into the ship’s smokestack, leaving it no longer transiting to Iran.
The Guardian reported that the new strikes followed another wave of US strikes earlier on Wednesday during daylight hours, and Iranian state media reported explosions heard in the port cities of Bandar Abbas and Chabahar, and in Ahvaz near the border with Iraq.
CNN said the US military launched two more waves of strikes aimed at Iranian targets “used to threaten vessels freely transiting through the Strait of Hormuz,” and it described the tanker disablement as the first vessel disabled since the naval blockade of Iranian ports went back into effect Tuesday.
In parallel, CNN reported that Iran currently has no plans for negotiations, citing a Foreign Ministry spokesperson who said Tehran would not adhere to any agreement if the US “breaches its obligations.”
Hospitals evacuated, deaths
As the US strikes continued, CNN reported explosions heard in several areas across Iran, including the port city of Bandar Abbas and the southern cities of Ahvaz and Chabahar, late Wednesday evening local time.
CNN said families and patients at Shahid Baghaei Hospital in Ahvaz were temporarily evacuated after a projectile from a US strike landed nearby, and an unnamed healthcare worker told IRIB that “even patients who depended on oxygen, ventilators, and other life-support equipment were affected.”
The Washington Post reported that the American strikes hit an Iranian army barracks, killing at least seven troops and wounding hundreds of people across the country, according to Iranian officials.
Separately, Al Jazeera reported that the United States military has launched hundreds of air attacks across Iran over the past week, killing at least 35 people and wounding 300, according to Iranian health officials.
Fox News also quoted Trump predicting that Iran will be “defeated very soon,” while CNBC reported Trump saying “They always want to meet” in a Fox Business interview as CENTCOM announced a second wave of strikes at 3 p.m. ET.
Escalation stakes and diplomacy
The Guardian reported that Donald Trump said he does not like giving deadlines when asked by reporters if Iran had a deadline before the United States starts attacking Iranian bridges, adding, “they better behave,” and it also cited Iran’s top negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf saying that if Iran did not benefit from its memorandum of understanding, “We have no reason to adhere to such an understanding.”
CNN said Vice President JD Vance defended attempting diplomacy with Iran amid renewed hostilities, arguing the war will not be won through military force alone, and it quoted Vance saying, “I’m very frustrated by the Americans and frankly by people in other countries who are like, you cannot negotiate with the Iranians.”
Al Jazeera reported that the US has reimposed a naval blockade on Iran and targeted military sites along the country’s southern coast and near the Strait of Hormuz despite a ceasefire agreement, while Iran carried out attacks on US military facilities across the region.
Al Jazeera also described how ship traffic remained well below normal after the waterway reopened after the preliminary US-Iran agreement announced on June 17, with PortWatch data cited as showing only 603 ships transited the strait in the first 25 days after it reopened between June 18 and July 12.
In the same reporting, Al Jazeera warned that with the US blockade of Iranian ports, the strait could once again come to a standstill, and it listed Strait of Hormuz figures of “27 percent of the global maritime oil trade” and “20 percent of global LNG trade.”
