Israel launches new strikes on Tehran

Iran strikes

Israel launched a fresh wave of strikes on Monday at Iran, which threatened retaliation against vital infrastructure across the Middle East in a war that has plunged the world into its worst energy crisis in decades.

Explosions rang out in Tehran, Iranian media reported, while Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates said they were intercepting missiles and drones.At least 40 energy assets across the oil- and gas-exporting region have been “severely or very severely damaged” in the conflict, said International Energy Agency chief Fatih Birol, as the war ignited by Israel-US attacks on Iran entered its fourth week.

Tehran has met the assaults by firing missiles and drones at Israel and across the Gulf in the last weeks, hitting energy sites and US embassies alike. It has also throttled traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway through which a fifth of global crude oil transits.

With oil prices hovering above $100 a barrel over supply fears, US President Donald Trump threatened to “obliterate” Iranian power plants if Tehran failed to reopen the strait within 48 hours.

The deadline, based on the time of his social media posting, would be 23:44 GMT, early morning Tuesday in Iran.

But Iran’s response was firm, with its powerful parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf vowing that vital infrastructure across the region would “be considered legitimate targets and will be irreversibly destroyed” if Trump carried out his threat.

Laying out the scale of the crisis before the global economy, IEA chief Fatih Birol said 11 million barrels of oil are currently lost a day — more than the daily volume eradicated during two consecutive oil crises in the 1970s.

“No country will be immune to the effects of this crisis if it continues to go in this direction. So there is a need for global efforts,” Birol told journalists in Canberra.

– Iran eyes Hormuz tax –

Asian stocks slipped while oil prices rose again early Monday, with US benchmark crude briefly touching the $100-per-barrel mark. Vanguard