The US and Iran threatened to focus on critical infrastructure Sunday because the war within the Middle East, now in its fourth week, puts lives and livelihoods in danger throughout the region.
Iran said the Strait of Hormuz, crucial to grease and other exports, can be “completely closed” immediately if the U.S. follows up on President Donald Trump’s threat to attack its power plants. Trump late Saturday set a 48-hour deadline to open the strait.
Israeli leaders visited considered one of two southern communities near a secretive nuclear research site struck by Iranian missiles late Saturday, with scores of individuals wounded. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it was a “miracle” nobody was killed.
Netanyahu claimed Israel and the U.S. were well on their strategy to achieving their war goals. The goals have ranged from weakening Iran’s nuclear program, missile program and support for armed proxies to enabling the Iranian people to overthrow the theocracy.
There was no sign of an rebellion, nor of an end to the fighting that has shaken the worldwide economy, sent oil prices surging and endangered among the world’s busiest air corridors. The war, which the U.S. and Israel launched Feb. 28, has killed over 2,000 people.
The Iranian-backed Hezbollah claimed responsibility for an airstrike that killed a person in northern Israel, while Lebanese President Joseph Aoun called Israel’s latest targeting of bridges within the south “a prelude to a ground invasion.”
“More weeks of fighting against Iran and Hezbollah are expected for us,” said Israeli military spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin.
Meanwhile, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates said early Monday their air defenses were coping with missile and drone attacks as air raid sirens sounded in Bahrain.
Energy and desalination plants are threatened
Iran has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz that connects the Persian Gulf to the remainder of the world, while claiming secure passage for vessels from countries apart from its enemies. Roughly one-fifth of worldwide oil supply passes through it, but attacks on ships have stopped nearly all tanker traffic.
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Trump said if Iran didn’t open the strait, the U.S. would destroy its “various POWER PLANTS, STARTING WITH THE BIGGEST ONE FIRST!”
The U.S. has argued that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard controls much of the country’s infrastructure and uses it to power the war effort. Under international law, power plants that profit civilians will be targeted provided that the military advantage outweighs the suffering it causes them, legal scholars say.
Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf responded on X that if Iran’s power plants and infrastructure are targeted, then vital infrastructure across the region — including energy and desalination facilities critical for drinking water in Gulf nations — can be considered legitimate targets and “irreversibly destroyed.”
Qalibaf later added that “entities that finance the US military budget are legitimate targets.”
Attacks on power plants can be “inherently indiscriminate and clearly disproportionate” and a war crime, Iran’s U.N. ambassador wrote to the Security Council, in line with the state-run IRNA news agency.
Strikes in Israel and Iran bring latest nuclear concerns
Iran said its strikes within the Negev Desert late Saturday were in retaliation for the newest attack on Iran’s primary nuclear enrichment site in Natanz, in line with state-run media.
Tehran praised its attack as a show of strength, at the same time as Israel’s military asserts that Iranian missile launches have decreased for the reason that war began.
Southern Israel’s primary hospital received not less than 175 wounded from Arad and Dimona, deputy director Roy Kessous told The Associated Press.
Israel is widely believed to own nuclear weapons, though it doesn’t confirm or deny their existence.
Israel denied responsibility for hitting Natanz on Saturday. The Pentagon declined to comment on the strike.
The International Atomic Energy Agency has said the majority of Iran’s estimated 972 kilos (441 kilograms) of enriched uranium — the problem at the center of tensions — is elsewhere, beneath the rubble at its Isfahan facility.
Fighting intensifies in southern Lebanon
An Israeli civilian was killed in his automotive within the northern town of Misgav Am in what Israel’s military originally said seemed to be a rocket attack. It later was looking into the likelihood that the death was attributable to Israeli soldiers’ fire.
Israeli authorities identified him as 61-year-old farmer Ofer “Poshko” Moskovitz. Two days ago, he told a radio station that living near the Lebanese border was like “Russian roulette.”
Hezbollah launched strikes on Israel soon after the war began, calling it retaliation for the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Israel then targeted Hezbollah with airstrikes and expanded its ground presence in southern Lebanon.
Israel on Sunday expanded its goal list to incorporate bridges over the Litani River that Defense Minister Israel Katz said Hezbollah is using to maneuver fighters and weapons to the south. Israel later struck the Qasmiyeh bridge near Tyre, giving an hour’s warning. Destroying bridges further isolates residents from the remainder of Lebanon.
Katz also ordered the military to speed up destruction of Lebanese homes near the border.
Lebanese authorities say Israel’s strikes have killed greater than 1,000 people and displaced greater than 1 million. Meanwhile, Hezbollah has fired lots of of rockets into Israel.
Iran’s death toll within the war has surpassed 1,500, its health ministry has said. In Israel, 15 people have been killed by Iranian strikes. Greater than a dozen civilians within the occupied West Bank and Gulf Arab states have been killed in strikes. A Qatari military helicopter crash on Saturday, blamed on a technical malfunction, killed all seven aboard, Qatari authorities said.
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