Trump Says US Attacked Iran To Stop ‘World War III’

Washington, March 17: Flights have been temporarily suspended at Dubai’s international airport for safety reasons, the city’s aviation authority said on Monday, shortly after a drone incident sparked a fire nearby as the war triggered by the US-Israeli joint attack on Iran entered its seventeenth day.

US President Donald Trump said Sunday (local time) that he has demanded that about seven countries send warships to keep the Strait of Hormuz open, but his appeals have brought no commitments as oil prices soar during the Iran war. The president declined to name the countries heavily reliant on Middle East crude that the administration is negotiating with to join a coalition to police the waterway where about one-fifth of the world’s traded oil normally flows.

Gulf Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain, reported new missile or drone attacks a day after Iran called for the evacuation of three major ports in the United Arab Emirates — the first time it has threatened a neighbouring country’s non-U.S. assets. Tehran has accused the U.S. of launching Friday’s strikes on Kharg Island, home to Iran’s primary oil terminal, from the UAE, without providing evidence. It has threatened to attack U.S.-linked “oil, economic and energy infrastructures” if its oil infrastructure is hit.

U.S. Central Command said it had no response to Iran’s claim, and Anwar Gargash, a diplomatic adviser to the UAE president, rejected it. Gulf countries that host U.S. bases have denied allowing their land or airspace to be used for military operations against Iran.

Iran has fired hundreds of missiles and drones at Arab Gulf neighbours during the war, causing significant damage and rattling economies even as most are intercepted. Tehran says it targets U.S. assets, even as Iranian strikes are reported at civilian sites such as airports and oil fields.

In Iran, the International Committee for the Red Cross said more than 1,300 people have been killed. Iran’s Health Ministry said 223 women and 202 children are among the dead, according to Mizan, the judiciary’s official news agency. Iranian strikes have killed at least a dozen civilians in Gulf countries, most of them migrant workers. In Israel, 12 people have been killed by Iranian missile fire, and more have been injured, including three on Sunday. At least 13 U.S. military members have been killed, six in a plane crash in Iraq last week.