The US and Israel’s war with Iran is spreading to the seas, with oil tankers hit by Iranian attacks, an Omani port set ablaze, and three vessels hit by projectiles near the Strait of Hormuz – a critical waterway normally used to transport much of the world’s oil.
Meanwhile, a global body of countries has agreed to release emergency oil reserves to help absorb the shock of the oil disruption.
- Strikes target oil: Two foreign oil tankers in Iraqi waters were set ablaze in an Iranian attack, killing at least one person, with 38 other crew members rescued. Separately, emergency crews in Oman are battling a fire at a fuel storage facility, after a social media video geolocated by CNN appeared to show an Iranian drone hitting a tank at the port. And, Bahrain said that Iranian attacks targeted fuel tanks in the country’s north early Thursday local time.
- Attacks near strait: Three vessels were hit by projectiles near the Strait of Hormuz, according to the UK’s maritime agency. The strait carries roughly one-fifth of global crude oil shipments. A container ship off the coast of the United Arab Emirates was also struck by an “unknown projectile” that caused a small fire onboard early Thursday. Representatives of G7 nations met on Wednesday to discuss possibly escorting ships “when security conditions allow.”
- Iran, Hezbollah and Israel: Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it carried out a joint attack with the militant group Hezbollah on Israel, striking more than 50 targets across five hours of sustained fire on Wednesday. Israel later carried out a “wide-scale” wave of strikes targeting Hezbollah infrastructure across Lebanon, including in the capital Beirut, its military said.
- Gulf nations: Iran’s neighboring Gulf states intercepted new waves of Iranian drones and missiles early Thursday morning, including in the UAE’s global business hub of Dubai, where a drone fell on a building near the luxury neighborhood of Creek Harbour.
- Emergency oil reserves: Member countries of the International Energy Agency (IEA) agreed Wednesday to release 400 million barrels of oil into the global market – the largest release of emergency oil stocks in history. Soon after, US President Donald Trump authorized the US to release 172 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, beginning next week.
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