US strikes on Iran reportedly hit airport and bridges – Middle East crisis live

A tanker was ⁠hit ⁠by an ​unknown projectile off the coast of Oman near the strait of Hormuz, causing minor damage to the ship but no injuries to the crew, the UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) agency said.

In an alert issued this morning, the UKMTO said it received a report of an incident 19 nautical miles (about 22 miles) east of the Omani port city of Khasab.

It added:

A tanker has reported being hit by an unknown projectile causing minor structural damage to the port side. All crew are safe and accounted for, no environmental impact has been reported and the vessel is continuing to its next port of call. Authorities are investigating.”

The Iranian health ministry said 38 people have been killed in Iran in recent US attacks, with more than 400 others injured.

Reporting the figures on X, Hossein Kermanpour, head of public relations for Iran’s ministry of health, said 22 women and nine children were among the injured.

Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency reported that last night’s US strikes on infrastructure killed eight people and wounded 20 others. IRNA’s report says six bridges were targeted in the southern province of Hormozgan, which borders the strait of Hormuz.

The interim ceasefire that was agreed last month fell apart on 8 July, with both sides engaged in back-and-forth attacks as they battle for control of the strait of Hormuz, which remains effectively shut to shipping traffic.

American forces boarded a ship in the Gulf of Oman on Thursday as part of the renewed blockade of Iran’s ports that began earlier this week, the US military said.

US Marines boarded the M/T Wen Yao “to ensure full compliance with the ongoing US naval blockade,” US Central Command (Centcom) said in a post on X.

Centcom also said it had “redirected” three commercial vessels “trying to run the blockade” since it took effect at 8pm GMT on Tuesday. The previous day, a US aircraft fired on and disabled an unladen oil tanker that tried to break the blockade.

The boarding of the vessel came as the US expanded its airstrike campaign against Iran with attacks on multiple bridges, in line with Donald Trump’s threats to destroy infrastructure, prompting Tehran to fire on Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait.

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Here are some pictures on the newswires purportedly showing the damage to a bridge in Iran after a US attack:

Welcome to our live coverage of the latest in the continuing Middle East crisis.

US strikes on Iran overnight hit an airport, a railway station and two bridges, according to Iranian state media on Friday, while American forces boarded a ship as they enforced a renewed blockade of Iranian ports.

Three blasts were heard around Iranshahr airport in the south-east and at least one US projectile hit. Bandar Abbas station in the southern port city was also targeted and an Iranian official report spoke of airstrikes on two bridges in Iran’s southern Hormozgan province that left seven people dead, according to state and semi-official media.

The attacks came as the US and Iran exchanged intensifying fire on Thursday in a week-long escalation that has largely ⁠unravelled last month’s truce, while Tehran disputed Donald Trump’s claim that it had released a detained US citizen.

Meanwhile, American forces boarded a ship, the M/T Wen Yao, in the Gulf of Oman on Thursday to ensure “full compliance” with the renewed blockade of Iran’s ports that began earlier this week, the US military’s Central Command (Centcom) said on X. A day before, US aircraft fired on and disabled an unladen oil tanker that tried to breach the blockade, it said.

In other developments:

• Authorities in Qatar warned the public to take shelter as a barrage of Iranian missiles targeted the country on Friday, with explosions heard as air defences fired to intercept them. Iran earlier targeted Bahrain and Kuwait over the US airstrikes hitting Iranian bridges overnight.

• Centcom said it hit dozens of Iranian targets in the latest strikes, which concluded at dawn on Friday – the sixth night in a row of American attacks.

• Iran accused the US of launching a “barbaric attack” near a children’s cancer hospital in Ahvaz in the country’s south-west on Wednesday night, causing a forced evacuation of the facility.

• The Gaza recovery plan being pursued by Trump’s Board of Peace has shrunk dramatically from an ambitious blueprint for the reconstruction of the whole territory to a small pilot project in the south of the strip. Even the envisaged pilot scheme is not expected to take shape before the end of the year.

• Yemen’s Houthi leader ⁠Abdul Malik al-Houthi said all Saudi ​oil and other vital facilities ⁠would be targets for the group’s ⁠missiles and drones if ​Riyadh ‌involved itself ‌in what he ‌described as “comprehensive aggression” against Yemen and moved towards escalation.

• A drone struck a ship located off the port in Iraq’s southern province of Basra, reports said on Thursday, with AFP and Reuters citing oil and security sources as saying the ship was “carrying American-branded cars” and had arrived from the United Arab Emirates.

• Oil prices are near their highest in a month amid the tensions over the strait of Hormuz and Brent crude briefly climbed above $86 a barrel on Thursday US time before falling back to $84.08, down 1% from the previous day.