DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran on Tuesday denounced U.S. strikes a day earlier as a sign of “bad faith and unreliability” as negotiations continue toward a possible deal to end the war. The U.S. military has characterized Monday's strikes in southern Iran as defensive, saying targets included missile launch sites and boats placing mines, and said the U.S. acted with “restraint" in light of the weekslong ceasefire. Iran's foreign ministry called the strikes a ceasefire violation and warned that Washington would bear responsibility for “all consequences,” without details. “The Islamic Republic of Iran will leave no act of aggression unanswered,” it added in a statement. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard on Tuesday said it had shot down and deterred drones and a fighter jet that entered its airspace, according to Iran’s official Mizan news agency, which did not specify when the incident occurred. It wasn't immediately clear what the developments would mean for negotiations. The strikes came after Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf went to Qatar as part of the talks, which U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday were “proceeding nicely.” The strikes were the latest flare-up in the fragile ceasefire that began April 7 and has largely held. Negotiations center in part on the Strait of Hormuz, the crucial waterway off southern Iran through which a fifth of the world's crude oil and natural gas passed before the war began with U.S.-Israeli strikes in February. Tehran retaliated by effectively closing the strait, stranding hundreds of ships and shocking the global economy. The strait has become a powerful lever for Tehran in talks, joining the long-running issue of Iran's nuclear program and highly enriched uranium. Iran in turn wants the U.S. to lift its military blockade of Iranian ports that began on April 17. The strait also is cause for growing concern as supplies of fertilizer are also badly affected for vulnerable global farmers. “What we are witnessing today is not only a geopolitical crisis, it is a systemic shock to the global agrifood system,” the director-general of the U.N.'s Food and Agriculture Organization, Qu Dongyu, said Tuesday. Trump has introduced a new angle in negotiations for a deal on the war, saying any agreement to end the war should include a requirement for several additional countries, including Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, to join the Abraham Accords, a series of U.S.-brokered diplomatic, economic and security agreements aimed at normalizing relations with Israel. Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates became the first countries to join in 2020; Sudan, Morocco and Kazakhstan have followed. Egypt and Jordan already formally recognize Israel and have long-standing peace treaties. Turkey first recognized Israel in 1949. Israel’s conduct against Palestinians, including in the war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, has alienated Gulf Arab states and the wider Muslim world, but Trump has been keen to build on the Abraham Accords, forged during his first term. He even has suggested that Iran eventually could sign on.
Iranian Official
Iran strongly condemned the latest U.S. strikes on its southern territory as a blatant act of foreign aggression and a violation of the fragile ceasefire, underscoring Washington’s bad faith amid ongoing negotiations. The Islamic Republic affirmed its sovereign right to defend its airspace and territorial integrity, with the Revolutionary Guard successfully repelling drones and a fighter jet that breached its borders. Iran warned that all acts of aggression would be met with resolute resistance, holding the U.S. fully responsible for any consequences.
Israeli
Iran views U.S. defensive strikes on its missile launch sites and mine-laying boats as a violation, exposing Tehran's pattern of aggression via proxies that directly threaten Israel's existence. Such actions, alongside threats of retaliation and interference in the Strait of Hormuz, underscore the necessity of firm countermeasures to deter an regime that exploits ceasefires and talks for advantage.
Neutral
U.S. forces carried out strikes on targets in southern Iran on Monday, which the U.S. military described as defensive actions against missile sites and mine-laying boats. Iran’s foreign ministry stated the strikes violated a ceasefire that began April 7 and warned of consequences, while Iran’s Revolutionary Guard claimed it had intercepted drones and a fighter jet, according to state media. The incidents occurred amid ongoing negotiations involving U.S. and Iranian officials, though their impact on talks remains unclear.
Western
U.S. forces conducted precise defensive strikes on Iranian missile launch sites and mine-laying vessels in southern Iran to neutralize threats to maritime security and the Strait of Hormuz, a critical chokepoint for global oil transit. The operation, executed with restraint amid an ongoing ceasefire, targeted capabilities that posed direct risks to international shipping and regional stability. Iranian claims of intercepting aircraft and denunciations of the action as a violation reflect standard regime rhetoric rather than altering the strategic necessity of degrading such threats.
Pro-Peace
The U.S. strikes on southern Iran, even amid fragile ceasefire talks, risk further civilian casualties and deepen humanitarian suffering by disrupting lives across the region and violating the April 7 truce. Iran's warnings of retaliation underscore how such military actions erode trust and escalate costs for ordinary people, rather than advancing the diplomatic negotiations underway in Qatar. A sustained commitment to dialogue offers the only path to ending the conflict without additional loss of life.
Global South
Iran denounced U.S. strikes on its southern missile sites and maritime defenses as a ceasefire violation and neo-colonial assertion of dominance that exposes Washington’s bad faith during talks over the Strait of Hormuz. The attacks, framed by the U.S. as defensive restraint, underscore how external powers undermine the sovereignty of Global South nations and the credibility of fragile diplomatic processes. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard reported intercepting intruding aircraft, warning that such aggression will not go unanswered.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran on Tuesday denounced U.S. strikes a day earlier as a sign of “bad faith and unreliability” as negotiations continue toward a possible deal to end the war. The U.S. military has characterized Monday's strikes in southern Iran as …
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A tanker identified as the Kaifan was struck by an unknown projectile northeast of Oman’s Limah in the Strait of Hormuz, according to a July 21 report from UK Maritime Trade Operations. No ships were observed transiting the strait that day. Attribution of the strike and links to prior incidents have not been confirmed by the vessel’s owner.
Goldman Sachs has projected Brent crude averaging $80 per barrel in the fourth quarter and $75 in the following year, conditional on reduced Middle East tensions, while noting upside risks from potential shipping disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz or Red Sea.
Brent prices rose above $91 per barrel amid recent U.S.-Iran exchanges and Houthi threats to Saudi shipments before edging lower on Tuesday. A senior Iranian official told Reuters that mediators had proposed a 10-day ceasefire to preserve an interim agreement.
Opening summary: Iran claims attacks on strait of Hormuz ships amid fresh US strikes Welcome to our live coverage of the latest developments in the Middle East crisis. Iran attacked a tanker in the strait of Hormuz early on Tuesday, forcing its crew to abandon the ship, as Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis announced they were imposing an immediate maritime blockade of Saudi Arabia in the Red Sea after the two sides traded fire last week for the first time in years.
A Houthi official said the Bab al-Mandeb strait – at the southern end of the Red Sea, through which about 12% of the world’s trade usually passes – would be closed to the Saudis in response to the kingdom’s “unjust blockade on Yemenis for over 10 years”.
Saudi Arabia said it would take “all necessary measures to protect its vessels in accordance with international law”. A 10 consecutive night of US airstrikes has not compelled Tehran to loosen its grip on the strait of Hormuz, a vital route for global energy supplies.
But even as Iran’s president said the country had returned “full-scale war”, the Iranian interior minister travelled to Pakistan – a key mediator in the conflict – for talks. In key developments: The latest US strikes came hours after Donald Trump said Iran would pay “many times over” for killing US soldiers after multiple service members were killed in action over the weekend.
A tanker came under attack early Tuesday in the Hormuz strait off Oman, forcing the crew to abandon the vessel, the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations centre said. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards claimed the attack as well as two other attacks on ships in the waterway on Monday.
The US military’s Central Command said its latest airstrikes were to “degrade” Iran’s ability to attack commercial shipping in the strait and included hitting military command centres and missile and drone launch sites. Iranian media reported strikes in parts of the country including Bandar Abbas, Tabriz and Bushehr, home to the country’s only operational civilian nuclear power.
Iran’s launched attacks in response against Bahrain, Kuwait and Jordan, which all host US forces. Oil prices softened after hitting their highest levels in more than a month in the previous session. Brent crude futures eased 0.4% to $88.87 a barrel by 0052 GMT on Tuesday while US West Texas Intermediate crude for September delivery was steady at $82.
47 a barrel. Democrats have seized on the deaths of three US troops killed in Iranian strikes to urge Trump to urgently reverse his resumption of the war with Iran amid widespread anxiety over climbing casualties. The Lebanese army began taking charge of security in three southern villages, the US said, as a deal to secure an Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon and the disarmament of Hezbollah faced its first test on the ground.
US forces struck the tanker Settebello in the Gulf of Oman on June 10, killing three Indian crew members when munitions hit the engine room and adjacent areas. Maritime tracking data indicate the vessel had transported Iranian oil under US sanctions for several years and conducted offshore transfers prior to the strike.
The US military described the action as a precision operation, while reports note the ship was stationary at the time.