Iran has vowed to respond with “crushing and devastating blows” after US strikes killed five people attending a wedding party in Iran.
Iranian state media reported explosions across southern coastal areas, including Bandar Abbas and Qeshm Island. Tehran also said US strikes hit civilian sites in Hormozgan province and a civilian airport in Kerman province.
One of the strikes hit a home in Kuhestak where a wedding ceremony was taking place, killing five people, including a child, and wounding at least 68 others, according to Hormozgan provincial officials.
The US military also struck two Iranian government tankers, Axios reported, marking the first time Tehran’s tankers were hit.
Iran responded by launching ballistic missiles towards Jordan, with its military saying it had targeted a US base near the Gulf of Aqaba.
The US military said it was aware of reports of civilian casualties but stressed that it “never targets civilians”.
Centcom said it concluded its latest barrage against Iranian military targets on Tuesday night. The fresh strikes came after Donald Trump said he wants “total control of the Hormuz Strait, and their economy totally collapsing”.
Bahrain says it intercepted Iranian aerial attacks
Bahrain’s defence force said its air defence systems intercepted and destroyed several Iranian aerial attacks targeting the kingdom.
It came as Tehran is retaliating against US strikes across the region.
Shweta Sharma2 September 2026 06:17
Oil prices rise for second day after US-Iran strikes
Brent crude futures rose 1.3 per cent to $95.91 a barrel on Wednesday, marking further gains for a second day after fresh US strikes on Iran pushed oil prices higher.
The latest exchange of strikes has raised concerns over further disruptions to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
Oil prices rose to a five-week high on Tuesday after the strikes began.
“The threat of further disruptions to the Strait of Hormuz has brought about renewed anxiety over inflation, driving a selloff in stocks across most major markets and a rout in global bond markets,” Westpac analysts wrote.
The yield on the US 10-year Treasury bond hit an intraday high of 4.8122 per cent, its highest level in almost three years, while the yield on the 5-year Japanese government bond rose to 2.295 per cent, its highest level on record.
Shweta Sharma2 September 2026 06:13
The chaos inside Hegseth’s defense department as Trump ‘concerned’ by scale of purge
Army Secretary Dan Driscoll has become the latest high-ranking US military official to leave the Pentagon amid reports of tensions with Secretary Pete Hegseth.
No official reason has been offered for Driscoll’s departure following 18 months in the role but it comes after CNN and Reuters said he had been butting heads with Hegseth for several months.
According to sources cited by The Atlantic, Driscoll recently “brought up concerns with the administration surrounding Army transformation and readiness and Hegseth’s blocking those efforts specifically by firing the generals who were responsible”. His mission was seemingly unsuccessful.
Nevertheless, US President Donald Trump was said to be “surprised and concerned” about the number of the cuts to the department and the seniority of those who have left, The Atlantic reports.
Read on…
The chaos inside Hegseth’s defense department as Trump ‘concerned’ by scale of purge
Army Secretary Dan Driscoll joins long list of exits from Defense Secretary’s top team, with the president said to be ‘surprised’ by the number of senior departures. Joe Sommerlad reportsJoe Sommerlad2 September 2026 05:58
18 commodity vessels transit through Bab el-Mandeb Strait
At least 18 commodity vessels transited through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait on Tuesday, another major maritime chokepoint in the Middle East, with seven vessels entering and 11 exiting.
This compares with an average of around 24 ships going through Bab el-Mandeb over the past 10 days.
Among the vessels travelling through the strait were two Aframax tankers and one Suezmax tanker.
The United States said it had launched a series of air strikes against Iran on Tuesday, prompting Iranian retaliation, in the most serious escalation of the conflict between the two countries in weeks.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said in a statement the US attacks would “tighten the lock” on the Strait of Hormuz, a critical waterway that carried about one-fifth of global oil consumption before the conflict.
Shweta Sharma2 September 2026 05:30
ICYMI: Trump shares AI video of Kharg Island being ‘blown to smithereens’
Rachel Dobkin2 September 2026 05:04
US military struck two Iranian tankers for the first time, report says
The US military struck two Iranian government tankers during Tuesday’s attacks on Iran, Axios reported.
A US official said the strikes were carried out under a new “tanker for tanker” policy approved by president Donald Trump in response to Iranian attacks on tankers passing through the Strait of Hormuz.
According to the report, the tankers were anchored off Iran’s coast, north of the US naval blockade line.
The missiles hit the engine rooms of the vessels.US officials said around 100 targets were struck on Tuesday, including defence sites, radar systems and anti-ship cruise missile launchers.
It was the first time the US military had targeted Iranian tankers in retaliation for Iranian attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz.
Shweta Sharma2 September 2026 04:49
Shipping traffic via Strait of Hormuz stays below 10-day average, data shows
Four commodity vessels transited the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, down from 10 a day earlier and below the 10-day average of around 13, preliminary shipping data showed on Wednesday.
The four vessels that transited were one very large crude carrier, one Panamax tanker, one Kamsarmax carrier and one intermediate tanker, initial data from shiptracker Kpler showed at 0200 GMT.
Of the four vessels, one was entering the strait and three were leaving.
The figures could change as some ships typically switch off transponders during the voyage.
Shweta Sharma2 September 2026 04:21
Seven killed in missile strikes on Iran’s Khuzestan
Seven people have been killed in US missile strikes on three locations in Iran’s Khuzestan province, the province’s deputy governor for security affairs said, according to the IRNA news agency.
Eight others were wounded in the strikes, IRNA reported.
Shweta Sharma2 September 2026 04:09
Bad news for Trump as more Americans admit they regret voting for him
Buyer’s remorse is rising among Americans who voted for US President Donald Trump in 2024 — vividly illustrating the “clear, consistent signs” that his political base is crumbling, according to survey results released Monday.
About one in six Trump voters told pollsters from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst that they wouldn’t vote for him again, as the president’s overall approval rating fell to a dismal 32 percent.
“There are no takebacks in electoral politics, but around 15 percent of Trump voters now tell us they might or would vote differently or not vote at all if they had it to do over again”, the poll’s co-director, Alexander Theodoridis, said in a prepared statement.
“This is hardly a mass exodus from the Trump tent, but is enough that it certainly could’ve been decisive against Trump in what was a relatively close 2024 election”, Theodoridis added. “More notably, though, there are now clear, consistent signs of an erosion trend“.
Read on…
Bad news for Trump as more Americans admit they regret voting for him
‘There are now clear, consistent signs of an erosion trend,’ says Alexander Theodoridis, co-director of the University of Massachusetts-Amherst pollBruce Golding 2 September 2026 04:02
Iran says US attacked a wedding party, killing four
The Iranian Red Crescent said four people, including a young child, have been killed in a US attack after shrapnel struck a home where a wedding celebration was taking place in Sirik in southern Iran.
The US had resumed strikes against Iran following “recent attempted attacks” by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) against commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, Centcom said.
Iran retaliated by launching attacks at US military bases in Iraq and Jordan, according to local state media and the Jordanian Armed Forces. Attacks were also reported in Kuwait and Bahrain.
Esmaeil Baghaei, the spokesman for the Iranian foreign ministry, said the “brutal” attack hit a residence in the city of Kuhestak early on Wednesday.
Reza Shahidiyan, governor of Sirik county, later told state broadcaster IRIB that 63 others were wounded, including 50 women and children. All the injured were taken to a hospital in the nearby city of Minab and were in “stable condition”, he said.
Shweta Sharma2 September 2026 04:01NewerOlder