US launches fresh strikes on Iran around Strait of Hormuz
Posted Wed 2 Sep 2026 at 3:41amWed 2 Sep 2026 at 3:41amWed 2 Sep 2026 at 3:41am
In short:
The US has launched fresh strikes on Iranian targets in the Strait of Hormuz.
US Central Command said the strikes “follow recent attempted attacks by the IRGC against commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and against American service members”.
Tehran has warned it would prevent oil being exported from the Gulf.
The US has launched new air strikes on Iranian targets, quashing hopes that an exchange of fire last weekend might not presage a wider renewal of hostilities.
Oil prices had already risen after that first exchange of direct attacks since July and after reports of two tankers being hit leaving the Strait, the global oil supply waterway that Iran has effectively closed to shipping.
US President Donald Trump confirmed on his social media site Truth Social that strikes were underway on Tuesday, local time.
“The United States is, as we speak, striking Iranian Targets near the Strait of Hormuz,” he said.
“The strikes are large and powerful, and in retaliation for the Iranians’ failed attempt at adding sea mines to the Strait, which currently has no mines (They have been completely removed or detonated!), and the Iranians shooting eight missiles, all successfully knocked down, at our Military Base in Jordan.”
He went on to say that if Iran retaliated it would be “hit again at a much harder and higher level”.
Tehran remained defiant, warning that it would prevent oil being exported from the Gulf, despite the president’s threat and a warning from US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent that Washington was about to impose new sanctions.
Iran’s state broadcaster said there had been reports of explosions on Iran’s Qeshm Island, on the northern side of the strait.
The state-linked news agency Nour News said there had been reports of explosions in the port city of Bandar Abbas and in Chabahar, a port on the southern coast.
Scale of fresh US-Iran hostilities unclear
The six-month-old conflict had shifted into an economic standoff before the weekend strikes, in which US forces attacked Iran’s Larak Island on Sunday and Iran responded by launching missiles at two US air bases in Jordan.
Although he warned of a US response to the Iranian strikes, Mr Trump also told reporters on Monday that they did not signal a return to full-scale war, and a senior Iranian source told Reuters they were a “limited and contained confrontation”.
But pledges by both sides to respond to further attacks have highlighted how quickly a conflict that has increasingly been fought through sanctions, blockades and economic pressure could spill back into military action.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian had said early on Tuesday that Tehran would reciprocate immediately if Washington honoured its commitments under a June Memorandum of Understanding that was intended to halt the conflict.
The MOU declared an end to fighting that has now killed thousands in Iran and Lebanon since US and Israeli strikes began on February 28. But it also deferred many of the most difficult issues and paved the way for a broader 60-day negotiation period — which passed without further agreement.
“I am stating clearly that if the U.S. returns to its commitments under the Memorandum of Understanding, the Islamic Republic of Iran will immediately reciprocate,” Mr Pezeshkian said in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek at a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, which includes Russia and China.
But Iranian officials have shown no public sign of bowing to pressure.
“If the enemy wants us not to export oil from the Persian Gulf, no one will be able to export oil,” Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf was quoted as saying by Iranian media. If the US intensified its “siege”, he said Tehran would respond militarily.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei told a press conference in Tehran that Washington was “addicted to making excessive demands and has mistaken negotiations for dictating terms”.
“As long as they act in this manner, they will certainly get no result other than what they have achieved so far,” he added, warning that Tehran would “use all our capabilities, whether on the battlefield or through our diplomatic apparatus”.