Trump says US will strike Iran ‘very hard tonight’ after second day of trading attacks

Dubai/Washington: US President Donald Trump has vowed to hit Iran “very hard tonight” and threatened to soon take control of its oil and gas infrastructure and markets after the two sides traded air attacks on Thursday for a second straight day.

“At some point in the not too distant future, we will be taking Kharg Island, and other oil infrastructure points, and assume total control of their Oil and Gas Markets, much like we have with Venezuela,” Trump said on Truth Social.

In an interview with Fox News’ Fox & Friends on Thursday morning (Washington time), Trump said: “There will be more bombing tonight. It will be bigger, bigger, more powerful.

“My preference has always been - take Kharg Island ... my preference would be that. I don’t know that America has the stomach for it,” he added.

Meanwhile, the US military said on Thursday it had disabled a third oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman overnight as it was trying to move Iranian oil through an American blockade. The US Central Command said an aircraft “fired two Hellfire missiles” into the engine room of the Guinea-Bissau flagged M/T Jalveer “after the crew repeatedly failed to comply with directions from US forces”.

The escalation in hostilities began earlier this week with the downing of a US Apache helicopter near the Strait of Hormuz, which sparked a series of tit-for-tat attacks across Iran and on US bases around the region.

It was the most serious threat to a fragile ceasefire agreed in April, dampening hopes for a swift end to the war that started in late February with massive US-Israeli joint air strikes on Iran.

The US military said its latest attacks targeted “military surveillance capabilities, communication systems, and air defence sites across Iran” in response to what it called Tehran’s “unwarranted and continued aggression”.

Trump told Fox News reporter Trey Yingst on Wednesday evening (Washington time) that the US strikes would stop soon but that he would resume heavy bombing if Iran’s leaders did not sign an agreement with the United States immediately, according to a post by Yingst on X.

Oil prices rose nearly $US3 ($4.30) following Trump’s threat of escalation, and extended gains in early Asian trade on Thursday.

The US military’s Central Command announced the strikes were complete about four hours after they began, soon after midnight in Tehran.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it had launched counter-attacks on 18 US military targets at airbases in Kuwait and Bahrain, as well as the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet in Bahrain.

It later said it had also targeted the al-Azr