On Sunday, Iranian media reported another series of explosions on Iran’s Qeshm Island, and Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported the blasts as a US strike, though so far the US hasn’t claimed responsibility, and Tehran hasn’t officially blamed Washington.
The apparent US strikes on Qeshm came a day after US Central Command announced that its forces bombed a commercial ship in the Gulf of Oman that it claimed departed an Iranian port, as the US continues to enforce a naval blockade on Iranian ports.
The announcement came shortly after CENTCOM said that it was expanding its blockade of Iran to the Caspian Sea and land routes across its border.
CENTCOM said that it was establishing a “task force that will support ongoing US government efforts to prevent Iran from using ground routes to transport advanced weapons and other materials.” Iran has ramped up shipments by rail amid the US blockade.
It remains unclear if the expanded blockade will mean airstrikes against ground targets in Iran, though the US attacks on Qeshm Island have become quite frequent. Iranian forces have also continued targeting commercial ships and downing US drones that are helping enforce the blockade.
On Friday, President Trump said that the US carried out airstrikes against an air defense system on Qeshm, an attack he described as “minor.” More explosions were reported in Qeshm on Saturday, but it remains unclear if they were the result of US strikes.
All of the developments demonstrate the fact that the US remains at war with Iran whether or not Trump decides to escalate into a full-scale bombing campaign. Trump told reporters on Sunday that it was “highly unlikely” he would need to order major strikes on Iran but also threatened to destroy the country’s civilian infrastructure, saying the US has picked out infrastructure targets, including 38 bridges “that we can knock down in literally one hour.”