The United States intensified its military campaign against Iran early Thursday, launching strikes that reached areas around the capital Tehran for the first time in the current round of fighting and firing on a vessel it accused of attempting to breach its reimposed naval blockade of Iranian ports. U.S. Central Command said the strikes, carried out over multiple waves, targeted Iranian command centers, air defense sites, missile and drone capabilities, coastal surveillance facilities, and cruise missile storage and launch sites, including on Greater Tunb Island in the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran retaliated before dawn, launching missiles and drones at U.S. allies in the region, striking Bahrain, Jordan, and Kuwait. Iranian military spokesperson Col. Ebrahim Zolfaghari warned that if the United States follows through on President Donald Trump's threats to strike Iranian bridges and power plants, Iran would retaliate by destroying regional infrastructure broadly, stating that the Strait of Hormuz represents Tehran's "invincible red line." Iran's top negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, told state media that Tehran had "no reason" to abide by the existing interim deal if it did not benefit from its terms.

The escalation comes after Washington reimposed a naval blockade on Iranian ports Wednesday, a move that reignited strikes and accelerated the unraveling of a preliminary agreement meant to pause the conflict that began when the U.S. and Israel launched military operations against Iran on Feb. 28. When that war started, Tehran closed the Strait of Hormuz to commercial shipping, causing the price of oil, fertilizer, and other goods to surge globally. Iranian officials said U.S. strikes since the latest round of fighting began have killed more than 35 people and wounded over 300.

Trump, speaking at the U.S. Army War College in Pennsylvania on Wednesday, suggested Iran was seeking a resolution but did not detail any concrete progress. "They want to settle so badly. They don't like what we're doing," he said, adding the U.S. would either reach a deal or "finish it off." Trump also acknowledged what he called a goodwill gesture from Tehran: the release of Dena Karari, a U.S.-Iranian citizen who runs a nonprofit and had been detained in Iran since late 2024 on espionage charges, according to her attorney, human rights lawyer Jared Genser.

Mediation efforts to calm the conflict have so far failed, and the exchange of strikes shows no sign of abating. Trump has threatened to broaden targets to Iranian civilian infrastructure, a move that previously drew condemnation from UN human rights chief Volker Türk, who said such strikes would constitute a war crime. With the interim deal in effective collapse, regional governments hosting U.S. forces now face direct Iranian retaliation, raising the risk of a broader regional war.