Latest news with #Mehr
United News of India
11 hours ago
- Politics
- United News of India
We can block Strait of Hormuz: Iranian official
Tehran, June 19 (UNI) One of Tehran's options to respond to the attack by Israel or other countries is to close the Strait of Hormuz, which is important for oil supplies to world markets, member of the Iranian parliament's Committee for National Security and Foreign Policy, Behnam Saeedi, said on Thursday. "As for Iran's options when it comes to responding to the attack by the Zionist regime and other countries supporting it, Iran has various options ... One of the possible options is to close the Strait of Hormuz," Saeedi told the Mehr news agency. This past Saturday, another member of the Iranian parliament's Committee for National Security and Foreign Policy, Esmail Kowsari, said that Tehran was considering closing the Strait of Hormuz in response to Israeli aggression. Oil prices responded by surging. The Strait of Hormuz connects the Persian Gulf with the Gulf of Oman. Ships then enter the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean. The strait's northern coast belongs to Iran, while the southern part to Oman and the UAE. The strait is crucial for the energy security of the world as 10-20 per cent of global oil and approximately 20 per cent of the world's LNG shipments take place from here.
New Straits Times
12 hours ago
- Politics
- New Straits Times
Israel bombs Iran's nuclear sites, hospital hit in retaliation
TEL AVIV: Israel bombed nuclear targets in Iran on Thursday and Iranian missiles hit an Israeli hospital overnight, as the week-old air war escalated with no sign yet of an off-ramp. Following the strike that damaged the Soroka medical centre in Israel's southern city of Beersheba, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tehran's "tyrants" would pay the "full price." Defence Minister Israel Katz said the military had been instructed to intensify strikes on strategic-related targets in Tehran in order to eliminate the threat to Israel and destabilise the "Ayatollah regime." Israel's sweeping campaign of airstrikes aims to do more than destroy Iran's nuclear centrifuges and missile capabilities. It seeks to shatter the foundations of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's government and leave it near collapse, Israeli, Western and regional officials said. Netanyahu wants Iran weakened enough to be forced into fundamental concessions on permanently abandoning its nuclear enrichment, its ballistic missile programme and its support for militant groups across the region, the sources said. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar, speaking to reporters outside the damaged hospital, said "regime change" in Tehran was not a goal the security cabinet had set "for the time being." US President Donald Trump, meanwhile, has kept the world guessing about whether Israel's superpower ally would join it in airstrikes. Israel said it had struck Iran's Natanz and Isfahan nuclear sites. It initially said it had also hit Bushehr, site of Iran's only functioning nuclear power plant, but a spokesperson later said it was a mistake to have said this. An Iranian diplomat told Reuters Bushehr was not hit and Israel was engaged in "psychological warfare" by discussing it. Any attack on the plant, near Arab neighbours and housing Russian technicians, is viewed as risking nuclear disaster. Trump has veered from proposing a swift diplomatic end to the war to suggesting the United States might join it. On Wednesday, he said nobody knew what he would do. A day earlier he mused on social media about killing Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, then demanded Iran's unconditional surrender. A week of Israeli air and missile strikes against its major rival has wiped out the top echelon of Iran's military command, damaged its nuclear capabilities and killed hundreds of people, while Iranian retaliatory strikes have killed at least two dozen civilians in Israel. STRAIT OF HORMUZ Iran has been weighing its options in responding to its biggest security challenge since the 1979 revolution. A member of the Iranian Parliament's National Security Committee Presidium, Behnam Saeedi, told the semi-official Mehr news agency Iran could consider closing the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20pct of daily global oil consumption passes. Tehran has in the past threatened to close the strait. Shipping sources said on Wednesday that commercial ships were avoiding Iran's waters nearby. Oil prices rose after Israel and Iran continued to exchange missile attacks overnight and Trump's stance on the conflict kept investors on edge. Iran was maintaining crude oil supply by loading tankers one at a time and moving floating oil storage much closer to China, two vessel tracking firms told Reuters, as the country seeks to keep a key source of revenue while under attack. The conflict poses a fresh hurdle for Iran, which uses a shadow fleet of tankers to conceal their origin and skirt US sanctions reinstated in 2018 over its nuclear programme. Countries around the world are taking measures to evacuate their citizens from Israel and Iran and airspace in the region remains closed. Earlier, the Israeli military said it targeted the Khondab nuclear site near Iran's central city Arak overnight, including a partially-built heavy-water research reactor. Heavy-water reactors produce plutonium, which, like enriched uranium, can be used to make the core of an atom bomb. Iran's atomic energy agency said the attack caused no casualties. The Israeli military also said it attacked launch sites in western Iran after attempts to restore them were detected. Israel, which has the most advanced military in the Middle East, has been fighting on several fronts since the Oct 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel by the Palestinian group Hamas triggered the Gaza war. It has severely weakened Iran's regional allies, Hamas in Gaza and Lebanon's Hizbollah, and bombed Yemen's Houthis. 'STAY AWAY FROM OUR COUNTRY' The extent of the damage inside Iran has become more difficult to assess in recent days, with the authorities apparently seeking to prevent panic by limiting information. Iran has stopped giving updates on the death toll, and state media have ceased showing widespread images of destruction. The internet has been almost completely shut down, and the public has been banned from filming. Arash, 33, a government employee in Tehran, said a building next to his home in Tehran's Shahrak-e Gharb neighbourhood had been destroyed in the strikes. "I saw at least three dead children and two women in that building. Is this how Netanyahu plans to 'liberate' Iranians? Stay away from our country," he told Reuters by telephone. Israel has issued evacuation orders for whole sections of Tehran, a city of 10 million. Thousands of residents have fled, jamming the highways out. Samira, 11, moved in with her grandparents in the northwestern city of Urmia after her family fled Tehran when a shopping centre near their house was struck. She said she has been unable to sleep at night. "I'm afraid Israel will hit our home and my mom will die. I'm too scared. I just want to go home," she said by phone. Inside Israel, the missile strikes over the past week are the first time a significant number of projectiles from Iran have pierced defences and killed Israelis in their homes. The director general of the Israeli hospital that was damaged in Beersheba, Shlomi Kodesh, told reporters at the site that a missile strike had destroyed several wards and wounded 40 people, mostly staff and patients. Netanyahu, visiting the site, said he had issued instructions that "no one is immune" from Israeli attacks. Iran's Revolutionary Guards said they had targeted Israeli military and intelligence headquarters near the hospital. An Israeli military official denied there were military targets nearby. Missiles also hit a residential building in Ramat Gan, east of Tel Aviv. "It's very scary," said Yaniv, 34, who lives nearby. He said he heard a deafening explosion when the missile hit, shaking his apartment tower.
LBCI
15 hours ago
- Politics
- LBCI
Iran air defenses 'confront hostile targets' over Tehran: State media
Iranian state media said air defense systems were activated Thursday against "hostile targets" over the capital, Tehran, a week into a war triggered by major Israeli attacks. "Iran's air defenses confront hostile targets in northern Tehran," said the official news agency IRNA without elaborating. Another news agency, Mehr, gave the same report. AFP
Miami Herald
15 hours ago
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Iran Threatens To Close Strait of Hormuz: What Would Happen?
Iran has warned that it could shut the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world's most critical oil transit chokepoints, in retaliation for U.S. involvement in its conflict with Israel. "If the United States officially and operationally enters the war in support of the Zionists (Israel), it is the legitimate right of Iran in view of pressuring the U.S. and Western countries to disrupt their oil trade's ease of transit," Ali Yazdikhah, a senior Iranian lawmaker, was quoted as saying by the semi-official Mehr news agency on Thursday. "Iran has numerous options to respond to its enemies," Behnam Saeedi, a member of the parliament's National Security Committee presidium was quoted as saying. "Closing the Strait of Hormuz is one of the potential options." The officials spoke amid heightened tensions as President Donald Trump is reported to be inching closer to ordering military strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities. Newsweek has contacted the White House for comment by email. The Strait of Hormuz is a narrow waterway connecting the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea. At its narrowest point, the strait is about 21 miles wide, with two shipping lanes two miles wide in each direction. The strait handles around 26 percent of global oil trade, making it one of the most strategically important maritime passages in the world. The International Energy Agency notes that any disruption to flows through the strait would have significant consequences for world oil markets. Iran has long asserted that it can shut down the Strait of Hormuz. While the strait can't be "closed" in the traditional sense - like shutting a road - Iran could attempt to make the waterway too dangerous for commercial passage, effectively disrupting global shipping. During the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, Iran targeted oil tankers and oil loading facilities with mines and missiles, including Chinese-made Silkworm cruise missiles, and used speedboats to harass tankers. These actions did not fully block the strait but caused sharp increases in shipping insurance premiums and delayed maritime traffic. According to a 2012 report by the U.S. Congressional Research Service (CRS), Iran could try to obstruct the strait in phases. "Iran might begin with a less violent option and progress over time to more violent ones, or implement a combination of highly violent options from the outset," it said. Possible measures cited in the report included: Declaring the strait closed to shipping without without stating explicitly what the consequences might be for ships that attempt to transit those watersDeclaring more explicitly that ships transiting the strait or other parts of the Persian Gulf are subject to being intercepted and detained, or attackedFiring warning shots at ships transiting the strait or other parts of the GulfDeploying sea mines in the strait and other parts of the GulfUsing submarines, surface ships, shore-based cruise missiles, and aircraft to attack foreign naval ships operating in waters outside the Strait Iran moving to shut the Strait of Hormuz would likely invite a strong international military response. "An outright closure of the Strait of Hormuz... at present, this appears to be a low probability event. Were this to occur, it is not likely to be prolonged," said the CRS. "It would likely trigger a military response from the United States and others, which could reach beyond simply re-establishing strait transit," it added. "Iran would also alienate countries that currently oppose broader oil sanctions. Iran could become more likely to actually pursue this if few or no countries were willing to import its oil." President Donald Trump told reporters on Wednesday: "I'm not looking to fight. But if it's a choice between fighting and [Iran] having a nuclear weapon, you have to do what you have to do, and maybe we won't have to fight." Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of Iran, said in a public address: "The Americans should know that any U.S. military intervention will undoubtedly be accompanied by irreparable damage. The U.S. entering in this matter is 100 percent to its own detriment. The damage it will suffer will be far greater than any harm that Iran may encounter." The foreign ministers of Germany, France and Britain have scheduled nuclear talks in Geneva on Friday with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, according to Reuters. Related Articles US Support For Donald Trump Attacking Iran Revealed in PollsIranian Jewish Leader Denounces Israel's 'Savage' Attacks on IranIran Issues New Warning to US- 'All Necessary Options on The Table'Former Spy Chief: 'Good Case' for US To Strike Iranian Nuclear Site 2025 NEWSWEEK DIGITAL LLC.
Newsweek
18 hours ago
- Business
- Newsweek
Iran Threatens To Close Strait of Hormuz: What Would Happen?
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Iran has warned that it could shut the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world's most critical oil transit chokepoints, in retaliation for U.S. involvement in its conflict with Israel. "If the United States officially and operationally enters the war in support of the Zionists (Israel), it is the legitimate right of Iran in view of pressuring the U.S. and Western countries to disrupt their oil trade's ease of transit," Ali Yazdikhah, a senior Iranian lawmaker, was quoted as saying by the semi-official Mehr news agency on Thursday. "Iran has numerous options to respond to its enemies," Behnam Saeedi, a member of the parliament's National Security Committee presidium was quoted as saying. "Closing the Strait of Hormuz is one of the potential options." The officials spoke amid heightened tensions as President Donald Trump is reported to be inching closer to ordering military strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities. Newsweek has contacted the White House for comment by email. Why the Strait of Hormuz Matters The Strait of Hormuz is a narrow waterway connecting the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea. At its narrowest point, the strait is about 21 miles wide, with two shipping lanes two miles wide in each direction. The strait handles around 26 percent of global oil trade, making it one of the most strategically important maritime passages in the world. The International Energy Agency notes that any disruption to flows through the strait would have significant consequences for world oil markets. Can Iran Close the Strait? Iran has long asserted that it can shut down the Strait of Hormuz. While the strait can't be "closed" in the traditional sense - like shutting a road - Iran could attempt to make the waterway too dangerous for commercial passage, effectively disrupting global shipping. During the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, Iran targeted oil tankers and oil loading facilities with mines and missiles, including Chinese-made Silkworm cruise missiles, and used speedboats to harass tankers. These actions did not fully block the strait but caused sharp increases in shipping insurance premiums and delayed maritime traffic. According to a 2012 report by the U.S. Congressional Research Service (CRS), Iran could try to obstruct the strait in phases. "Iran might begin with a less violent option and progress over time to more violent ones, or implement a combination of highly violent options from the outset," it said. Possible measures cited in the report included: Declaring the strait closed to shipping without without stating explicitly what the consequences might be for ships that attempt to transit those waters Declaring more explicitly that ships transiting the strait or other parts of the Persian Gulf are subject to being intercepted and detained, or attacked Firing warning shots at ships transiting the strait or other parts of the Gulf Deploying sea mines in the strait and other parts of the Gulf Using submarines, surface ships, shore-based cruise missiles, and aircraft to attack foreign naval ships operating in waters outside the Strait What Would Happen? Iran moving to shut the Strait of Hormuz would likely invite a strong international military response. "An outright closure of the Strait of Hormuz... at present, this appears to be a low probability event. Were this to occur, it is not likely to be prolonged," said the CRS. "It would likely trigger a military response from the United States and others, which could reach beyond simply re-establishing strait transit," it added. "Iran would also alienate countries that currently oppose broader oil sanctions. Iran could become more likely to actually pursue this if few or no countries were willing to import its oil." What People Are Saying President Donald Trump told reporters on Wednesday: "I'm not looking to fight. But if it's a choice between fighting and [Iran] having a nuclear weapon, you have to do what you have to do, and maybe we won't have to fight." Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of Iran, said in a public address: "The Americans should know that any U.S. military intervention will undoubtedly be accompanied by irreparable damage. The U.S. entering in this matter is 100 percent to its own detriment. The damage it will suffer will be far greater than any harm that Iran may encounter." What Happens Next? The foreign ministers of Germany, France and Britain have scheduled nuclear talks in Geneva on Friday with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, according to Reuters.
