Iran says it hits US military targets in Gulf, buries slain leader Khamenei

Washington still committed to finding resolution with Iran, 'technical talks continue', according to US official

Iranian armed forces launched attacks on US military infrastructure in Gulf states on Thursday following U.S. strikes on Iran's southern coastal and eastern provinces, further eroding a ‌three-week-old ceasefire.

Iranian media later reported multiple explosions across southern Iran, including Bushehr, where one of the country's nuclear plants is located, along with Konarak, Choghadak and Bandar Abbas.

A US official said there had been no American strikes in recent hours.

The attacks came as Iran buried its slain Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at a shrine in Mashhad, capping a week of funeral processions and rallies.

Read: Iran holds mass funeral prayer for slain supreme leader

Khamenei was killed in an airstrike on the first day of the war on February 28, as part of a US-Israeli ​barrage against Iran that set off a months-long conflict killing thousands and throttling worldwide energy supplies.

Attacks on Qatari and Saudi shipping vessels earlier this week upended the ceasefire, with US President ​Donald Trump declaring the truce "over."

Washington was still committed to finding a resolution with Iran, and "technical talks continue", according to a second US official.

Trump's inability to end ⁠the war has frustrated the president, whose Republican Party faces midterm elections later this year amid high gas prices and voter discontent.

Khamenei's funeral procession reached the country's holiest shrine with a huge crowd packing the courtyard, ​some bearing banners denouncing the US president and reading, "We Will Kill Trump."

Iran's Revolutionary Guards Navy said the US attacks and intervention in redirecting shipping through the Strait of Hormuz were disrupting the waterway's reopening.

The Guards said ​the number of vessels transiting the strait under Iranian supervision had recovered to about 50% of pre-war levels over the past two weeks, adding that permission was being granted only to ships using routes designated by Tehran.

Any further US intervention will draw a "crushing response", the Guards said.

The US military said its strikes were aimed at keeping the strait open after it accused Iranian forces of attacking three tankers in the area.

The military said on Thursday the United States had helped facilitate the transit ​of more than 800 commercial vessels and 380 million barrels of crude oil through the strait since early May and that Iran does not control the waterway.

Oil prices fell back on Thursday after spiking on concerns ​the fighting would disrupt global supplies.

Targeting US bases in Gulf states and Jordan

US Central Command said on Wednesday its forces had struck approximately 90 Iranian military targets, including air defence systems, coastal surveillance assets, and missile and drone storage ‌sites.

Read more: US military carries out fresh strikes on Iran, prompting Iran attacks on Kuwait and Bahrain

"This is ⁠in retribution for yesterday’s bombing of ships by Iran. If it happens again, it will get much worse!" Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

The US attacks had killed 14 people and injured 78 across five provinces on July 8 and 9, Iranian state media reported. The Fars news agency said one US strike had hit a rail bridge used for trade with Russia and China.

Bushehr is home to a Russian-built nuclear power plant and a local official later told state media that a US projectile had hit the perimeter area of the facility. The perimeter had already been hit several times before an April 8 ceasefire.

Iran's ​army said in a statement released by state ​media that it had launched attacks on US ⁠Patriot systems in Kuwait, an early-warning site in Qatar and a U.S. Army fuel depot in Bahrain.

Kuwait said its armed forces had engaged a cruise missile, three ballistic missiles and 10 drones in its airspace, and that one person had been injured by falling shrapnel.

Sirens also sounded in Jordan after missiles launched from ​Iran were detected, the state news agency reported. Eight were intercepted, with no injuries or damage reported.

The Revolutionary Guards later said Iran had fired ​10 ballistic missiles at Jordan's ⁠Azraq military base, used by US forces, and also at a US military control centre in the Middle East, without elaborating.

Qatar, which hosts the largest US base in the region and has often mediated between Washington and its adversaries, including Tehran, condemned attacks on commercial shipping but also called for a return to diplomacy.

The foreign ministers of Turkey and Oman also stressed the need to avoid further military escalation in separate calls with their Iranian counterpart, ⁠Abbas Araghchi.

In a ​call with Chief of Army Staff Field Marshal Asim Munir, who has also mediated in the conflict, Araghchi condemned what he called US "warmongering ​policies".

The Strait of Hormuz handled about a fifth of global oil supplies before the war. Tehran has since largely taken control of the strait, forcing a stalemate in its confrontation with the world's most powerful military.

"The Strait of Hormuz will be reopened only under ​Iranian arrangements, not through US threats," Iran's top negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, wrote on X.