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Key events
Nearly all the missiles and drones launched by Iran over the last few hours were intercepted, a US officials has told the Reuters news agency.
The US official said that the military was not aware of any reports of harm to US personnel, or known damage to US locations at this time.
According to the official, the US struck nearly 20 targets in Iran on Wednesday morning.
We’ll bring you more on this when we have it.
Jordan says Iranian missiles shot down before they reached their target
Jordanian armed forces said on Wednesday they intercepted and shot down five missiles launched from Iran toward the al-Azraq area in Jordan.
The military said that debris from the interception operation fell on Jordanian territory but caused no injuries or material damage.
Earlier Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they had launched a missile attack at an airbase in Jordan hosting US forces, after also targeting Kuwait and Bahrain. The missiles targeted the Muwaffaq Salti airbase, which is known to host US F-35 fighter jets and other aircraft.
As the US launched several waves of strikes on Iran, Asian share markets fell and oil prices surged.
Escalating tensions in the Middle East have unsettled markets, dimming hopes for an end to the months-long war that has pushed commodities higher and stoked inflation worries.
Japan’s Nikkei fell 0.9% while the tech-heavy South Korean KOSPI slumped 2%.
Oil prices climbed about 1% in early trade, moving away from a seven-week low touched in the previous session. Brent futures rose 0.9% to $92.29 a barrel, while US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude climbed 0.8% to $88.97.
“Oil holding around $90 despite fresh Iran headlines suggests markets are not pricing a sustained supply disruption. That leaves room for a bigger repricing if energy infrastructure, shipping routes or U.S. involvement escalate,” said Charu Chanana, chief investment strategist at Saxo in Singapore.
US investor will be focused on inflation data, which is set to be released later on Wednesday. The report – covering the last 12 months through to May – will gauge the impact of the war, with a Reuters survey of economists predicting that inflation likely increased 4.2% in the perdiod.
Opening summary
Welcome to our live coverage of the crisis in the Middle East.
Iran says it has launched a missile attack at an airbase in Jordan hosting US forces, after also targeting Kuwait and Bahrain. The Revolutionary Guards said missiles have targeted the Muwaffaq Salti airbase, which is known to host US F-35 fighter jets and other aircraft.
Neither Jordan nor the US has acknowledged any attack, but if confirmed it would likely be the first time that Iran has targeted Jordan since the start of the ceasefire in April.
The US strikes on Iran followed the downing of a US Apache helicopter over the strait of Hormuz, from which two crew members were rescued in a stable condition. In a post on social media Trump said the US “must” respond to the helicopter crash.
Here is the latest:
The US launched multiple waves of strikes on Iran in response to a military helicopter crash off the strait of Hormuz that Donald Trump said Iran had downed. The Associated Press reported that the Apache helicopter that crashed went down after colliding with an Iranian drone, but it was not clear whether the collision was intentional.
US strikes were reported across Iran’s southern coast, on the strait of Hormuz. After more than three hours of military action, US central command (Centcom) said strikes were “completed”, adding that the US remained ready to defend against “unjustified Iranian aggression.”
Soon after, Iran launched retaliatory attacks against the US, according to the countries state media, which said American bases in the region and the US fifth fleet in Bahrain were targeted with drones. Kuwait and Bahrain issued air raid alerts and reported that air defences were active in repelling attacks. Iran also claimed it had targeted a US base in Jordan with long range missiles.
Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said no attack would go “unanswered”, soon after the US launched strikes on Iran. Posting an image of the strait of Hormuz with the label, “Forever Persian Gulf”, Araghchi says that “despite its defeats on the battlefield, the U.S. opted to test our determination.”
Five hours before the airstrikes, Trump had posted on social media that the US “must” respond to the helicopter crash, from which two crew members were rescued in stable condition. Before his social media post, however, Trump appeared to downplay the crash, telling the Wall Street Journal in a phone interview that it “wasn’t a big deal” and that “the pilot is fine.”
Iranian state media reported that no air military operations have taken place in the strait of Hormuz over the past 24 hours, according to Reuters.
Lebanon’s health ministry said 11 people were killed in Israeli airstrikes on the southern city of Tyre on Tuesday. The state-run National News Agency (NNA) had reported the first strike taking place not long before Israel’s military issued an evacuation warning for the entire city and surrounding areas ahead of strikes there.
