The Daily BriefEvening Briefing · Thursday 23 July 2026 · 22:00 BST
Evening Briefing · Thursday 23 July 2026

US Presses Its Strikes as Iran Claims Hits on Gulf Bases

American forces pressed on with their bombing of Iran, with US Central Command reporting fresh strikes on “maritime capabilities, missile and drone storage facilities, coastal surveillance sites and air-defence assets”. Two people were killed and eleven injured at Shalamcheh, near the Iraqi border, and a power substation beside the Bushehr nuclear plant was hit, causing outages. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard claimed retaliatory strikes on American bases in Kuwait and Jordan.

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The Guard said it had destroyed a warehouse, a Patriot battery and a drone hangar at the Ali al-Salem base in Kuwait, and a THAAD radar in Jordan — claims that could not be independently verified and that echoed assertions made earlier in the week. Air-raid sirens sounded in Bahrain, home to the US Fifth Fleet. Central Command said its campaign was steadily degrading Tehran’s ability to threaten shipping, and that it had redirected nine commercial vessels and disabled one. With diplomacy stalled, the risk of a wider regional war is rising. Watch for Iranian retaliation against Gulf energy infrastructure.

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