Strait of Hormuz on Sunday<\/a>, marking its first offensive operation in a month. <\/p>\nExplosions were heard near Larak Island, which lies around 400 \u200bmiles \u2060east of Kharg, Iranian media outlets reported. Larak overlooks shipping lanes at the mouth of the Gulf, giving it a key role \u2060in tension over Iran, maritime security and global energy supplies.<\/p>\n
In a statement, the U.S. Central Command said it took “limited, precise” action against minelaying forces of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards that posed an “imminent threat” in the Strait of Hormuz. It gave no details.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Last \u2060week, Trump said all mines had been detonated or removed from the international waters of the Strait of Hormuz and Iran had \u2060been warned that any vessel placing new mines would be destroyed.<\/p>\n
In retaliation, Iran launched ballistic missiles at Jordan, targeting two U.S. bases. Jordan’s armed forces had intercepted eight missiles that entered its airspace, state television said.<\/p>\n
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said the attack killed and wounded several soldiers and citizens and vowed a “response and punishment” from Tehran, according to Iranian state media.<\/p>\n
The Trump administration had shifted away from military action in recent weeks, stepping up efforts to punish Tehran and its business partners with costly economic sanctions.<\/p>\n
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott \u2060Bessent has said new secondary sanctions are likely to be unveiled weekly in the effort to pressure Iran, with an initial focus on \u200bbanks.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe’re starting with \u2060the banks, and we’re telling the banks it’s not okay \u200cto have Iranian money and to aid the regime,\u201d Bessent said Sunday.<\/p>\n
![\"Kharg](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/TOPSHOT-IRAN-US-ISRAEL-WAR-ENERGY-OIL-owkhg2v3.jpeg\")
Kharg Island handles the vast majority of Iran\u2019s oil exports (ESA\/AFP\/Getty)<\/p>\n
After imposing penalties on the United Arab Emirates branches of Egypt’s Banque Misr on Friday over alleged financial links to Iran, Bessent said the next step may be cutting off an institution entirely from the dollar-based financial system.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou’re going \u200cto see a lot more of these every week,\u201d Bessent told Reuters, ahead of a meeting \u200cof Group of 20 finance leaders.<\/p>\n
Amid the ongoing threats to shipping, the number of visible \u200bcommodity vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz dropped to five a day over the weekend, shipping data showed.<\/p>\n
The actual number could be higher \u200cas some vessels have switched off automatic identification systems to evade attacks.<\/p>\n
While Trump has repeatedly said the Strait of Hormuz is open, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards’ navy had called those statements \u201can obvious lie\u201d, reiterating that it remained \u200cclosed to ships without Iranian permission.<\/p>\n
The waterway carried \u200bnearly a fifth of global crude oil and liquefied natural gas shipments before it \u200cwas blockaded in the six-month-old Iran war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1178972,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3163],"tags":[323,1942,53,16,15],"class_list":["post-1178971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/117190265948369507","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1178971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1178971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1178971\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1178972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1178971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1178971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1178971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"President](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/trump-kharg-2.JPG\")
President Donald Trump posted an AI video claiming an Iranian energy hub had been destroyed (@RealDonaldTrump, Truth Social)<\/p>\n