{"id":531471,"date":"2026-07-18T00:13:16","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T00:13:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/531471\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T00:13:16","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T00:13:16","slug":"us-strikes-bridges-in-iran-who-retaliates-by-targeting-neighbours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/531471\/","title":{"rendered":"US strikes bridges in Iran, who retaliates by targeting neighbours"},"content":{"rendered":"

The United States expanded its attacks against Iran early Friday (local time) by hitting more bridges and energy sites and collapsing a tower at a key Iranian port, backing up President Donald Trump\u2019s threats to target infrastructure to pressure Tehran to ease its chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n

Iran launched missiles into US-allied nations<\/a> in the Middle East, including Qatar, a mediator in the war, and Kuwait, where one of the desert nation’s water desalination plants was damaged.<\/p>\n

The interim ceasefire agreed to last month<\/a> has collapsed \u2014 though efforts remain to salvage it \u2014 and the region has endured days ofback-and-forth attacks<\/a> by the US and Iran as they battle for control of the Strait vital to world energy supplies.<\/p>\n

Iranian officials say recent US strikes have killed dozens of people and wounded hundreds, with new casualties reported Friday.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

A US F-16 carries out pre-flight checks. (Source: Supplied)<\/p>\n

When the US and Israel launched the war on Iran on February 28, Tehran effectively closed the Strait to shipping traffic, a move that sent the price of oil soaring<\/a> and gave Iran major leverage in negotiations. Crossings through the Strait have fallen to a three-week low, according to an international shipping tracker, and the price of oil rose Friday above US$86 a barrel, close to its highest level in a month.<\/p>\n

In an address to the American public on Friday, Trump insisted the war was going well. \u201cWe are likewise winning big in Iran, and you will see the fruits of that labour very, very shortly,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Before the war began, the US had been in talks with Iran over its nuclear program. Trump now faces political pressure to bring the war to a close and avoid the kind of prolonged Middle East conflict he had campaigned against.<\/p>\n

Bridges and ‘electrical infrastructure’ hit in Iran<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The aftermath of a strike carried out by US forces in Iran. (Source: Supplied)<\/p>\n

The US airstrikes hit bridges overnight into Friday (local time) in Iran\u2019s southern Hormozgan province, killing at least seven people, Iranian state television reported. The attacks hit Bandar Khamir, a city on Iran\u2019s coast on the Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n

The highway and railway bridge strikes appeared aimed at cutting off Bandar Abbas, Iran\u2019s main port, from roads leading into the Islamic Republic\u2019s central region onward to Tehran, the capital.<\/p>\n

While other routes still are open, the US strikes could expand further, potentially disrupting both the movement of military materiel and goods needed for Iran\u2019s 90 million people.<\/p>\n

Iran acknowledged \u201cattacks on power infrastructure\u201d during the US airstrike campaign for the first time Friday when its Energy Ministry issued a call for people to use less power in southern provinces “experiencing extreme heat\u201d. The ministry did not say whether it was power plants, transmission lines or other equipment that had been attacked.<\/p>\n

Tower at key port collapses in US strike<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

A tower at Iran\u2019s Chabahar port is struck by US forces. (Source: Supplied)<\/p>\n

The US military\u2019s Central Command said it hit dozens of targets in its latest airstrikes, which concluded at dawn Friday, after the sixth night in a row of American attacks.<\/p>\n

The strikes collapsed a tower at Iran\u2019s Chabahar port on the Gulf of Oman, a key trade route for landlocked, neighbouring Afghanistan, the state-run IRNA news agency reported, and the US military later confirmed.<\/p>\n

Chabahar port, which Iran had been running with support from India, has been a repeated target of American airstrikes.<\/p>\n

Iran said the tower oversees commercial traffic into the port. But Central Command said it was part of a maritime surveillance network used by Iran\u2019s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard to \u201ctrack and target\u201d commercial vessels in the Strait.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe destruction of the tower directly degrades (the paramilitary’s) ability to coordinate attacks on innocent civilian crew members,\u201d Central Command said in a social media post.<\/p>\n

As of 6am Friday (local time), the US strikes had killed at least 38 people and wounded more than 400 in Iran, Health Ministry spokesperson Hossein Kermanpour said.<\/p>\n

Iran retaliates by targeting Qatar, a mediator in the war<\/p>\n

\"Missiles<\/p>\n

Missiles are intercepted over Doha, following explosions during a missile attack on July 17. . (Source: Getty)<\/p>\n

On Friday (local time), Qatar twice warned the public to take shelter as a barrage of Iranian missiles targeted the nation. People heard explosions overhead as air defences fired to intercept the missiles. Qatar\u2019s Interior Ministry said falling debris wounded a child.<\/p>\n

Qatar, along with Pakistan, is a key mediator in trying to reach an end to the Iran war.<\/p>\n

Iran also targeted Bahrain and Kuwait early Friday. In Kuwait, authorities said Iran attacked a power and water desalination plant, causing widespread damage to the station. About 90% of the country’s drinking water comes from desalination.<\/p>\n

Kuwait said it had extinguished the blaze and was working to assess the damage and restore the station.<\/p>\n

Jordan’s military said it intercepted three incoming missiles Friday morning launched by Iran.<\/p>\n

Explosions also could be heard Friday morning in Irbil and Sulaymaniyah in northern Iraq\u2019s semiautonomous Kurdish region as air defences targeted incoming fire. The attack apparently targeted the Iranian Kurdish dissident group Komala, killing at least nine people and wounding others, said an official who spoke on condition of anonymity for security reasons.<\/p>\n

Iran did not immediately claim the attack but has targeted Komala in the past.<\/p>\n

Also on Friday, a tanker came under attack while travelling through the Strait of Hormuz, taking the route closest to Oman, the British military said.<\/p>\n

The report from the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations centre said the ship sustained minor damage without any of its crew being injured.<\/p>\n

Iran did not immediately acknowledge any attack. In recent days, it has openly targeted ships using the route, which is overseen by the US military and intended to be outside of Tehran\u2019s control.<\/p>\n

Strikes come as Iran and US vie for Strait of Hormuz<\/p>\n

\"Two<\/p>\n

Two men wade in the waters of the Strait of Hormuz with vessels anchored in the background, off Bandar Abbas, Iran, Sunday, July 12, 2026. (Source: Associated Press)<\/p>\n

Iran has said the Strait must be under its sole control and that vessels should pay fees to Tehran \u2014 even though the world for decades has considered it an international waterway.<\/p>\n

Trump has returned in recent days to his threats to target Iranian power stations and bridges to try to compel Iran to loosen its hold on the Strait, through which about a fifth of all oil and natural gas traded once passed in peacetime. The US also reimposed a naval blockade on Iranian ports to halt its shipments of crude oil.<\/p>\n

Crossings through the Strait fell to a three-week low of just eight vessels on Thursday, according to MarineTraffic.com. It said seven of the vessels used a route operated by Iran and none used the route closest to Oman.<\/p>\n

A growing amount of the region\u2019s energy is being shipped through pipelines, but not nearly enough to offset the decline in shipping through the Strait.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The United States expanded its attacks against Iran early Friday (local time) by hitting more bridges and energy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":531472,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,5107,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-531471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-middle-east","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=531471"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531471\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/531472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=531471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=531471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=531471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}