Combatants in Mid-East war trade more air strikes as Iran clamps down on dissent

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DUBAI/TEL AVIV/WASHINGTON – The United States and Israel traded air strikes with Iran’s military across the Middle East as the besieged Tehran government warned that its state security forces were ready with “fingers on the trigger” to confront any revival of anti-government protests.

Following an exchange of some of the heaviest bombardments in the region yet on March 10, the combatants renewed their attacks on opposing targets in Israel, Lebanon and the Gulf early on March 11 as the war stretched into its 12th day.

The conflict has effectively blocked vital shipping lanes through the Strait of Hormuz, halting the flow of one-fifth of the world’s fossil energy supplies from the petroleum-rich Gulf.

But after a major surge in crude oil prices on March 9, global energy prices have tumbled and stock markets rebounded as investors bet that US President Donald Trump would seek to end the war soon.

Adding to market optimism, the International Energy Agency has proposed the largest release of oil reserves in its history to further stabilise crude prices, The Wall Street Journal reported on March 10, citing officials familiar with the matter. Reuters could not immediately verify the report.

Nevertheless, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps vowed to block oil shipments from the Gulf unless US and Israeli attacks ceased. Air strikes between the two sides showed no immediate sign of abatement.

The Revolutionary Guard said it fired missiles on the evening of March 10 at Qatar’s US-operated Al Udeid base and the Al Harir base in Iraq’s Kurdistan, followed by drone attacks on a gathering of US troops at Al Dhafra airbase in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Juffair naval base in Bahrain.

Early on March 11, the Iranian state media reported that another round of attacks was unleashed on US military installations in Bahrain.

A drone struck a major US diplomatic facility in Iraq on March 10, but there were no injuries and everyone was accounted for, according to a US official and an internal US State Department alert.

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations said it had received a report of an incident off the UAE coast, with the master of a vessel reporting it was damaged by a suspected but unknown projectile.

Iranian missile barrage drives Israelis to shelters

Overnight into the morning of March 11, millions of Israelis were repeatedly driven into bomb shelters as the military warned that Iran had launched missiles towards Israel, a sign that Tehran retains the capacity to strike Israel after nearly two weeks of hostilities.

The sound of explosions from air defences intercepting the rockets punctuated the pre-dawn darkness as air raid sirens blared and Israelis scrambled to safe rooms and shelters.

There was no immediate word on whether any of the missiles reached the ground.

The latest attacks from Iran roughly coincided with a new Israeli barrage on Beirut aimed at rooting out the Iran-backed group Hezbollah, which has fired into Israel from Lebanon in solidarity with the Tehran government.

The night before, Tehran residents contacted by Reuters described what they called the war’s most intense night of bombardment.

“It was like hell. They were bombing everywhere, every part of Tehran,” a resident said by phone, speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons. “My children are afraid to sleep now.”

Ending the war quickly would appear to preclude toppling Iran’s leadership, which held large-scale rallies on March 9 in support of its newly named supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei, a hardliner chosen to succeed his father, who was killed on the war’s first day.

Many Iranians want change and some openly celebrated the death of the elder Khamenei, weeks after his security forces killed thousands of people to put down anti-government protests.

Tehran warns against protests

There has been little sign of protest during the war, and Iran moved to clamp down further on internal dissent days after Mr Trump exhorted Iranian citizens to seize an opportunity afforded by the US-Israeli attack to rise up and overthrow their government.

Fearing a revival of anti-government demonstrations, Iran’s police chief Ahmad-Reza Radan warned that “anyone taking to the streets at the enemy’s request will be confronted as an enemy, not protester”.

“All our security forces have their fingers on the trigger,” Mr Radan told state television.

Iran also arrested dozens of people, including a foreign national, accused of spying for the country’s “enemies”, the Intelligence Ministry said on March 10.

The White House on March 10 reiterated Mr Trump’s threat to hit Iran hard over moves to stop the flow of energy supplies through the Strait of Hormuz. The US Central Command said 16 Iranian mine-laying vessels had been “eliminated” near the strait on March 10.

More than 1,300 Iranian civilians have been killed since the US and Israeli air strikes began on Feb 28, according to Iran’s UN ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani.

He said nearly 8,000 homes have been destroyed, along with 1,600 “commercial and service centres” and dozens of medical, educational and energy-supply facilities.

Scores have also been killed in Israeli attacks on Lebanon, while Iranian strikes on Israel have killed 12 people.

Iran has struck US military bases and diplomatic missions in Arab Gulf states but also hit hotels, closed airports and damaged oil infrastructure.

In addition to the six US soldiers killed at the outset of the conflict, the Pentagon on March 10 estimated that about 140 American troops have been wounded. REUTERS