Tehran (AFP) – Iran deployed troops and offered a bounty as it launched a hunt for a US pilot whose jet Iranian media said had been downed by the Islamic Republic’s air defense systems Friday. US Central Command (CENTCOM), responsible for military operations in the Middle East, did not immediately respond to an AFP request for comment on the first such report in the war engulfing the region. The war started more than a month ago with US-Israeli strikes on Iran, triggering retaliation that spread the conflict throughout the Middle East, convulsing the global economy and impacting millions of people worldwide.
“Military forces have launched a search operation to find the American fighter pilot who was hit earlier today,” Iran’s Fars news agency said. “Dear and honorable people of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province, if you capture the enemy pilot or pilots alive and hand them over to the police and military forces, you will receive a valuable reward and bonus,” said an Iranian television reporter on the official local channel. The report of the downed jet came as fresh strikes hit Israel, Iran, and Gulf countries. Large blasts rocked northern Tehran Friday afternoon, an AFP journalist said. It was not immediately clear what was hit.
Earlier, Israel’s military reported a new missile salvo from Iran, activating its air defenses. Strikes by all sides have increasingly targeted economic and industrial sites, raising fears of wider disruption to global energy supplies and deepening the conflict’s impact beyond the battlefield. The Iranian fire came as Trump said the US military “hasn’t even started destroying what’s left in Iran. Bridges next, then Electric Power Plants!” on his Truth Social platform, after the United States struck Iran’s tallest bridge. About 70 percent of Iran’s steel production capacity, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday, after Iran’s two largest steel plants earlier this week said they were forced out of action by several waves of US and Israeli air attacks.
– Ex-FM urges peace deal – Writing in the US journal Foreign Affairs, Iran’s former top diplomat said that Tehran should make a deal with the United States to end the war by offering to curb its nuclear program and reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for sanctions relief. Tehran could “declare victory and make a deal that both ends this conflict and prevents the next one,” wrote Mohammad Javad Zarif, foreign minister from 2013 to 2021. Iran has virtually blocked the Strait of Hormuz since the war began, where in peacetime one-fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas passes through. As a result, fuel prices have skyrocketed worldwide. Of the few ships that have managed to cross, most have had links to Iran, with sixty percent of commodity-bearing ships crossing the strait either coming from Iran or heading there, an AFP analysis of maritime data showed.
In the first known transit by a major European shipping group since March 1, the Maltese-flagged Kribi, belonging to the French maritime transport group CMA CGM, crossed the strait to exit the Gulf on Thursday, according to Marine Traffic data analyzed by AFP. Iranian military spokesperson Ebrahim Zolfaghari warned that in response to Trump’s threats to attack infrastructure, Iran would increase its own attacks on energy sites in the region. A drone attack on a refinery owned by Kuwait’s national oil company on Friday sparked fires at several of its units, state media said. Later, an Iranian attack damaged a power and desalination complex, Kuwait’s water and electricity ministry said. In Abu Dhabi, a gas complex shut after a fire broke out, following an attack that resulted in “falling debris” upon interception, the government media office said.
– Trump wants bigger defense budget – Meanwhile, the Israeli military said Friday it had struck more than 3,500 targets across Lebanon in the month since fighting with the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group. It added that it would attack two bridges in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa region “in order to prevent the transfer of reinforcements and military equipment.” Lebanon’s health ministry said on Thursday that 1,345 people had been killed and 4,040 wounded since the start of the war, including 1,129 men, 91 women, and 125 children. The ministry said the toll also included 53 healthcare workers. Hezbollah has so far not announced its losses. The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon said a blast hit one of its positions and wounded three peacekeepers, the third such incident in a week. A UNIFIL spokesperson said the origin of the explosion was unknown.
The war’s economic impact is rippling far beyond the Middle East, as energy and oil costs surge. Analysts said Trump’s recent address to the nation failed to provide clarity on an exit strategy from the war. Meanwhile, the White House on Friday sent a spending proposal to lawmakers calling for a massive hike to the US defense budget. It remains to be seen what Congress will ultimately approve, but US media reported the $1.5 billion budget request—a 42 percent hike—would be the largest year-on-year increase in Pentagon spending since World War II. As energy costs skyrocket worldwide, Egypt has ordered shops, restaurants, and shopping malls to close from 9:00 pm on weekdays. Dozens participated in a protest in the Pakistani city of Lahore, calling on the government to reverse fuel price hikes. “The government, overnight, has dropped a ‘petrol bomb’ on its people,” Naveed Ahmed, a 39-year-old protestor, told AFP.
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