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ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The US and Iran exchanged another round of military strikes overnight into Thursday following Iranian drones launched against targets in the Kurdistan Region late Wednesday, marking a further escalation in renewed confrontations.
The US Central Command (CENTCOM) said it concluded a new wave of strikes at 9 p.m. ET. on Wednesday, targeting Iranian command centers, air defense sites, missile and drone capabilities, and coastal surveillance facilities.
The strikes, which included targets in the southern Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas, were intended "to further degrade Iran's ability to threaten innocent mariners crewing commercial vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz," CENTCOM said in a post on X early Thursday.
Late Wednesday, the Erbil-based Counter-Terrorism Directorate had confirmed that the US-led Coalition had “intercepted and shot down eight explosive-laden drones” over Erbil “between 8:53 pm and 9:20 pm,” local time.
The latest exchange follows renewed military escalations between the two countries after the US reinstated a naval blockade on vessels transiting Iranian ports in the Strait of Hormuz after Iran struck American command centers in Bahrain, Kuwait and Jordan on Wednesday as well as two oil tankers on Tuesday to which US forces launched a five-hour operation on military targets in southern Iran in addition to a seven-hour operation on Wednesday.
"During the seven-hour wave of strikes, US fighter jets, drones and Navy ships launched precision-guided munitions at Iranian missile and drone bases, naval forces and coastal defense systems to further degrade Iran's ability to threaten commercial shipping and civilian crews," the command said.
"The U.S. military is holding Iran accountable at the Commander in Chief's direction," the command said. Iran announced retaliatory attacks hours later.
Iran's army announced early Thursday it launched the ninth phase of its Saegheh (Thunderbolt) operation, targeting US military communication systems and fuel storage facilities at an American base in Jordan with attack drones in response to what it described as US aggression, according to the semi-official Mehr News Agency.
In a separate statement on Thursday, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it carried out combined strikeson the Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait, targeting the base's C-RAM early warning radar system and an area where US troops were gathered, Mehr reported.
The latest tit-for-tat attacks further deepen tensions over the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway through which roughly one-fifth of global oil and gas shipments pass. Recent fighting has also raised further uncertainty over the future of the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding, signed by the two countries in mid-June to halt military operations and resume negotiations.
