US confirms ‘defensive strikes’ on Iranian targets near Hormuz as Qeshm Island rocked

A US official has confirmed that American forces carried out a series of “defensive strikes” on Iranian targets near the Strait of Hormuz, with explosions reported on Qeshm Island late on Monday, a day before the US midterm elections.

US officials told CBS, the BBC’s American partner, that the action was limited and came in response to Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) fire at a US aircraft. According to US media accounts cited by Euronews, an Air Force jet destroyed an IRGC surface-to-air missile launcher on the island after a missile was fired from Qeshm toward a US aircraft over the strait.

Tehran’s response

Iranian news agencies IRNA and Fars reported that residents of Qeshm, Hengam and Bandar Abbas felt successive blasts and tremors overnight. The IRGC did not address the strike directly, but said it had brought down two US MQM-170 reconnaissance drones south of the island and an MQ-9 drone east of the strait. Euronews noted that US Central Command had neither confirmed nor denied the accounts publicly, and that no Iranian official had formally acknowledged an attack on the island.

Speaking in parliament on Tuesday, speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who leads Iran’s negotiating team, said any strategic error by Washington would open “a new battlefield in the war”. He said Iran was at its highest level of defensive readiness and that the “ball is in America’s court to prevent war”.

Ghalibaf added that commanders and new supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei had agreed on “a response without geographical limits”. Euronews reported that the Tehran newspaper Hamshahri said Iran had updated its “target bank” to consider hitting US support bases in Europe, while former foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki said a new war would be “extraregional”.

Low-profile campaign

CNBC, citing the Wall Street Journal, reported that US officials say Washington has been conducting “limited strikes” against Iran in recent weeks. The campaign has reportedly been kept deliberately low-profile so as not to signal a major escalation.

President Donald Trump told Axios he was in “no rush” to expand attacks, though “one way or the other, we will do something”. He told Fox News the US might need to go after Pickaxe, an underground site tied to Iran’s nuclear programme. The Associated Press, cited by the BBC, reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged Trump in a weekend call to order another wave of strikes after the midterms. Trump rejected the suggestion when a reporter asked whether that was planned.

Diplomacy and oil

Talks continue in parallel. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said “very intensive” negotiations were under way through Qatari and Pakistani mediators. Vice President JD Vance told CNN that he and Trump felt “really good” about a possible negotiated settlement. The BBC reported that Iranian negotiators last week discussed a plan to reopen the strait within two days once Washington met seven conditions, reportedly including lifting the naval blockade of Iranian ports and releasing frozen assets.

Markets reacted quickly. CNBC reported that Brent crude gained 1.75% on Tuesday to $106.60 a barrel and West Texas Intermediate rose 1.7% to $98.10, rebounding after a drop of more than 7% on Monday when both sides signalled openness to a diplomatic route.

The war began in February, when the US and Israel attacked Iran. A preliminary deal in June to end it and reopen the strait collapsed within weeks. About a fifth of global oil and gas shipments normally pass through the waterway, which has been effectively shut. What remains unclear is whether Washington will widen its operations once the midterm vote is over, or whether the mediated talks can produce a breakthrough first.