Morning, and welcome to the Guardian’s Middle East live blog.
The US said it carried out strikes on Iranian military targets after an attack on three American destroyers in the strait of Hormuz, while Tehran accused Washington of striking first. The exchange of fire threatens to unravel a fragile ceasefire in effect since 8 April – but Donald Trump insisted the truce remains intact.
“The ceasefire is going. It’s in effect,” the US president told ABC News, describing the strikes as “just a love tap”.
He repeated this stance when asked during a visit to see renovations of the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool whether the ceasefire was still on despite the attacks. “Yeah it is,” he said. “They trifled with us today. We blew them away. They trifled. I call that a trifle.”
Writing on his Truth Social platform, he said “there was no damage done” to the US warships “but great damage done to the Iranian attackers”.
He added: “We’ll knock them out a lot harder, and a lot more violently, in the future, if they don’t get their Deal signed, FAST!”
The deal he was referring to is the one-page proposal from the US that would have both sides reach an agreement to reopen the strait of Hormuz and end fighting for 30 days while they work on a longer term truce, the New York Times reported.
Iranian navy fires a missile, at an unknown location, in this image taken from a video. Photograph: WANA/ReutersIran, meanwhile, accused the US of violating the ceasefire by attacking an oil tanker and another ship on Thursday, saying its forces “immediately and in retaliation attacked American military vessels”.
Reacting to the attacks in the Gulf, Ebrahim Azizi, head of the Iranian parliament’s national security committee, wrote on X: “Making the same mistake again and again won’t get you a different answer; only a stronger one. Respect the new maritime regime of Iran.”
The tit-for-tat attacks came as explosions shook the Iranian capital Tehran and coastal city of Bandar Abbas, as well as Qeshm, an island in the strait of Hormuz, according to state media. The reported attacks were blamed on the US and “enemy units”, with the semi-official Tasnim news agency suggesting UAE involvement.
