Drone strike near Suez Canal raises new security threat

DUBAI: A drone strike on gas vessels in Egypt’s Mediterranean port of Damietta signalled a potential new front in the US-Iran war, raising the prospect of threats to navigation through the Suez Canal, one of the last remaining export routes for Saudi oil.

Egypt’s cabinet said on Thursday that an initial investigation found an unidentified drone caused a fire on two vessels at Damietta port on Wednesday. The port lies near the Suez Canal, which links the Mediterranean and Red seas.

No group has claimed responsibility, the cabinet said. Trading sources familiar with the incident said the drone hit US-owned gas storage tanker Energos Winter, causing a fire that spread to a second vessel.

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Overnight, the US military said it struck Iran’s Revolutionary Guards’ military command centres and drone facilities after Tehran fired at US forces in the region.

Iranian state media, quoting the Guards, said US strikes killed three civilians and wounded two children on Qeshm Island, while three Guards members were killed in Zanjan province.

The governor of Khuzestan province, also quoted by state media, said two student dormitory complexes in the southwestern city of Ahvaz were damaged in the attacks. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it struck the Azraq military base in Jordan in response, attacking US F-35 fighter jets and killing US service members. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

US bases in Jordan have lately become primary Iranian targets. Jordan’s armed forces said earlier on Thursday they had intercepted five Iranian missiles. The Guards also struck US assets at Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait, destroying two drone hangars and a fuel storage facility, according to Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency.

An Iranian attack hit a building owned by a Chinese company in northern Kuwait, killing a worker and inflicting significant damage, Kuwait’s Defence Ministry said.

Saudis join us strikes

In a first in the five-month war, Saudi Arabia on Wednesday publicly joined strikes alongside US forces, targeting Iran-aligned groups in eastern Iraq, in retaliation for drone attacks on Saudi oil targets launched from Iraq.

Yemen’s Iran-allied Houthis carried out attacks on Saudi Arabia from Iraq this week in coordination with Iraqi groups, according to assessments by Saudi Arabia and regional partners. After the joint Saudi-US attacks, Saudi Arabia’s defence minister met Vice President JD Vance in Washington to urge the Trump administration not to escalate the conflict, two sources told Reuters.

The war began in February, when the US and Israel launched a bombing campaign in Iran that President Donald Trump said would last only a few weeks. A temporary ceasefire agreement in June collapsed amid renewed fighting over the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway that Iran says it now controls.

The latest strikes in Iraq and Egypt threatened to draw more Middle Eastern countries into the conflict after the Houthis in Yemen declared a naval blockade last week on Saudi Arabia, threatening the alternative Red Sea route for its oil to Asia. Attacks on ships by the Houthi militants prompted London’s marine insurance market to widen its “high risk” zone in the Red Sea to include more of the coast adjacent to Saudi ports.

Trump said he would hit Iran hard for firing missiles at US forces, but that Washington was also still seeking a peace deal to end a conflict that has roiled global energy and finance markets. Oil prices soared more than 8 percent on Wednesday, before easing by about 1 percent on Thursday in volatile trade, with benchmark Brent crude trading just below the $90 mark.

Iran controls crucial shipping waterway

Iran said on Wednesday that it struck three tankers attempting to transit through the Strait of Hormuz along an unauthorised route. However, a QatarEnergy-controlled liquefied natural gas tanker exited the strait overnight, the first such vessel recorded by ship-tracking data leaving the waterway since July 11. Iranian news agency Fars said Tehran had given its permission for the tanker to pass.

Oman has presented Iran with a plan backed by Gulf states to manage the Strait of Hormuz, including collecting voluntary fees for using it, sources told Reuters on Tuesday.

Tehran rejected the Omani proposal on Wednesday, but Iran’s semi-official ILNA news agency quoted the country’s foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei as saying that talks with Oman over the Strait of Hormuz were continuing.

After the war exposed gaps in Iran’s ability to protect military sites and strategic infrastructure, Tehran was expected to receive within weeks a first shipment out of up to 400 Chinese-made shoulder-fired air-defence missile launchers, three sources familiar with the deal told Reuters. Iran’s Foreign Ministry did not immediately reply to a request for comment, while China’s Foreign Ministry denied the report.