Iran’s military command said on Wednesday that the world should brace for oil to hit US$200 per barrel as three more ships were attacked in the blockaded gulf.
Iran fired on targets in Israel and across the Middle East on Wednesday, demonstrating that it could still fight back and disrupt energy supplies despite what the Pentagon described as the most intense US-Israeli strike yet.
Oil prices eased and stock markets rallied earlier this week as investors hoped U.S. President Donald Trump would find a quick way to end the war he started with Israel nearly two weeks ago.
But so far there has been no reluctance on the ground, or any sign that ships can safely sail through the Strait of Hormuz, where a fifth of the world’s oil is blocked behind a narrow channel along Iran’s coast, the worst disruption to energy supplies since the oil shocks of the 1970s.
“Be ready for $200 a barrel oil, because the price of oil depends on the regional security you destabilize,” said Ibrahim Zolfakari, a spokesman for Iran’s military command, in comments to the United States.
After the bank’s offices in Tehran were hit overnight, Zolfakari said Iran would respond with attacks on banks doing business with the United States or Israel. People across the Middle East should stay 1,000 meters away from banks, he said.
A senior Israeli official told Reuters that Israeli leaders have now privately acknowledged that Iran’s regime could survive a war. Two other Israeli officials said there was no sign of Washington ending the campaign.
An Iranian official said Mojtaba Khamenei was lightly wounded
In the latest public show of protest, huge crowds of Iranians took to the streets on Wednesday for the funerals of top commanders killed in airstrikes. They carried caskets and displayed portraits and flags of slain Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his son and successor Mojtaba.
Mojtaba Khamenei was lightly wounded early in the war when an air strike killed his father, mother, wife and one son, an Iranian official told Reuters. He has not appeared in public or given any direct message since the start of the war.
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A source said Israel believed he was lightly wounded.
Iran’s military said on Tuesday it fired missiles at a US base in northern Iraq, a US naval headquarters in the Middle East in Bahrain and targets in central Israel. Explosions rang out in Bahrain, four injured when two drones crashed near an airport in Dubai.
Bahrain’s civil aviation affairs said on Wednesday that several Gulf Air planes without passengers and some cargo planes had been diverted to alternative airports to “ensure the continuity and efficiency of air operations” during the crisis.
In Tehran, residents said they were getting used to the nightly airstrikes, which have driven hundreds of thousands of people into the countryside and polluted the city with black rain from oil fumes.
“There were bombings last night but I’m not as scared as before. Life goes on,” Farshid, 52, told Reuters by phone.
IEA to propose massive release of oil reserves
Three more merchant ships in the Gulf were hit by unidentified projectiles, according to agencies that monitor maritime security, bringing to 14 the number of ships hit since the war began.
Crews were evacuated from the Thai-flagged bulk cargo ship after the explosion caused a fire. A Japanese-flagged container ship and a Marshall Islands-flagged bulk carrier were also damaged.
Oil prices, which rose briefly to around $120 a barrel on Monday, have since stabilized around $90, indicating that investors are betting that Trump will be able to stop the war and reopen the strait soon.
But governments are still debating tougher measures. The International Energy Agency was expected to recommend the release of 400 million barrels from global strategic reserves, a record.
It takes months and only three weeks to flow through the strait.
Israel says there is no time limit to the campaign
US and Israeli officials say their goal is to end Iran’s ability to project force beyond its borders and destroy its nuclear program, although they have invited the Iranians to overthrow the country’s clerical rulers.
Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Wednesday that “the campaign will continue as long as necessary, without any time limit, until we achieve all the objectives and win the campaign.”
But as the war drags on, the global economy is at greater risk, and if Iran’s system of clerical rule survives, Tehran is sure to declare victory.
Iran’s police chief, Ahmadreza Radan, said on Wednesday that anyone taking to the streets “will be treated as an enemy, not a protester. All our security forces have their fingers on the trigger.”
Iran has said it won’t let oil through the strait and won’t negotiate until the US-Israeli attacks stop. Trump has threatened to hit Iran “twenty times harder” if it blocks the strait, but US officials have not revealed any military plan to unblock it.
In Israel, pre-dawn explosions rang out from anti-missile air defenses. The sirens sent the Israelites into refuge.
Israel launched an airstrike on Beirut aimed at rooting out Hezbollah, an Iran-backed group that has fired into Israel from Lebanon in solidarity with Tehran.
More than 1,300 Iranian civilians have been killed since US and Israeli airstrikes began on Feb. 28, according to Iran’s UN ambassador Amir Saeed Iravani. Scores died in Israeli attacks on Lebanon.
Iranian attacks on Israel have killed at least 11 people and two Israeli soldiers in Lebanon. Washington said seven US soldiers were killed and about 140 wounded.
(tags to translate)Iran
