Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guard is ready for combat and “any scenario,” its chief commander said Saturday, as the country’s nuclear deal with world powers collapses and the U.S. alleged Iran was behind a weekend attack on major oil sites in Saudi Arabia that shook global energy markets.
Iran’s president urged the U.S. on Wednesday to “put warmongers aside” as tensions roil the Persian Gulf amid an escalating crisis between Washington and Tehran in the wake of the collapsing nuclear deal with world powers.
From the vast deserts of Saudi Arabia to the crowded neighborhoods of Beirut, a drone war has taken flight across the wider Middle East, raising the stakes in the ongoing tensions between the U.S. and Iran.
Britain said Monday that it would join a U.S.-led naval security mission in the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran’s seizure of merchant vessels has raised tensions with the West. Earlier, Iran’s foreign minister lambasted recent U.S. financial sanctions against him, calling the move a “failure” for diplomacy.
The British navy said Thursday it had stopped three Iranian paramilitary vessels from disrupting the passage of a British oil tanker through the Strait of Hormuz.
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