The United States launched a new round of airstrikes against Iran on July 18, escalating an already widening military campaign across the Middle East after two American service members were killed in a recent attack in Jordan.
In a July 18 post on X, U.S. Central Command said American forces began conducting strikes at 6 p.m. ET "at the Commander in Chief's direction." The military said the operation is intended to further weaken Iran's ability to threaten commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz and "swiftly punish" Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces that launched attacks against U.S. service members in Jordan the previous night.
Before the strikes, Iran's supreme leader said Washington would pay for "seeking to escalate the conflict," Reuters reported July 18.
Earlier Saturday, CENTCOM said Iranian ballistic missiles and drones struck U.S. and partner forces in Jordan on July 17, killing two American service members and leaving another missing.



Major General Mohsen Rezaee, a senior Iranian military adviser, has warned that if the US continues bombing Iran over the coming days, Tehran will launch “full-scale offensive operations”, according to state-controlled news agency IRIB.
US President Donald Trump’s "Board of Peace" has shrunk its Gaza "recovery plan" from rebuilding territory to a temporary camp of "portable cabins" under Palestinian administration, police and a small international security force.
A US federal judge this week ruled in favour of a prominent Palestinian-American academic and activist in a decision that deemed the search and seizure of his phones by customs officers to be illegal.
An employee of a company that runs an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Colorado is under arrest after shooting and injuring a woman on Thursday evening. The incident happened after the woman participated in a protest in front of the facility earlier that day, according to the Aurora police department.
More than a thousand people rallied for Justin Pearson, a Democratic state representative running for Congress, in the wake of four fatal shootings by members of the Memphis Safe Task Force over the last two months.
The Trump administration moved on Thursday to tighten the duration of visas for foreign students, cultural exchange visitors and journalists.





























