The United States military launched a new round of airstrikes against Iran, the military announced on Sunday.
“CENTCOM began conducting a new wave of strikes against Iran at 7 p.m. ET today for the ninth consecutive night,” U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) wrote in a post on X. “The strikes will continue degrading Iranian military capabilities used to attack commercial vessels and civilian mariners transiting the Strait of Hormuz.”
CENTCOM said the latest round of strikes were completed at around 10 p.m. ET, targeting Iranian military command centers, air defense and coastal surveillance sites, maritime capabilities, missile and drone launch sites, and communications networks.
President Donald Trump said the latest strikes were carried out in honor of three American service members killed in recent Iranian attacks in the Middle East.
“We hit them very hard again tonight, and we did that in honor of the probably three, as opposed to two, great patriots,” Trump told reporters at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on July 19.
Two other U.S. service members died in Jordan, and a third remains missing following an Iranian attack launched on July 17. CENTCOM said that unidentified remains have been found at the site and the examination process to identify them is ongoing.
Multiple explosions were heard in Iran’s southern Hormozgan Province and the northwestern city of Tabriz on Sunday, according to Tehran’s news agencies.
The Iranian Army retaliated by carrying out drone attacks targeting two U.S. military sites in Kuwait on Sunday, state media reported.
Kuwait’s military said in a post on X that its forces responded to “hostile ballistic missiles and drones” from Iran.
It accused Iran of targeting the nation’s civilian and critical infrastructure, saying the strikes hit facilities affiliated with the Kuwait Ministry of Electricity, Water, and Renewable Energy, causing severe damage.
Meanwhile, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) agency said it received a report on July 20 that a vessel in the Strait of Hormuz caught fire about eight nautical miles northwest of Kumzar, Oman.
UKMTO said the cause of the fire had not been verified and urged vessels transiting the region to exercise caution.
The United States and Iran have traded strikes after Iran attacked several commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz despite a ceasefire reached last month that called for the full reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, a critical waterway through which a significant share of global oil and gas shipments passes.