The US military called the strikes "a powerful response" to Tuesday's firing by Iran on US bases in Jordan.

The US military says it has begun launching strikes against Iran in retaliation for an attempted surprise attack on American forces in the Middle East. Centcom said on X the strikes were "a powerful response" to Tuesday's firing by Iran on US bases in Jordan and at ships in the Strait of Hormuz. The latest hostilities came a day after the conflict expanded, with the first publicly announced joint US-Saudi strikes, which targeted Iranian proxies in Iraq. When the US and Israel launched military strikes on Iran in February, US President Donald Trump said the war would last only a few weeks, but it has now gone on for five months with no end in sight. On Wednesday, Axios reported, citing an unnamed US official, that Trump had met with Saudi defence minister Prince Khalid bin Salman, who had conveyed that Saudi Arabia wants to de-escalate tensions. The BBC has contacted the White House for comment. For days, both sides halted strikes as talks apparently restarted in hopes of some type of diplomatic solution. Trump called them "very friendly negotiations", though Tehran denied any discussions were happening. Hours before the announced strikes on Wednesday, Trump vowed to retaliate against Iran for their attempted attack on US troops a day earlier. The US president told reporters at the White House: "We're going to be hitting them very hard because it's our turn to hit them.