Jordan’s air defenses intercepted five missiles launched from Iran early Wednesday, hours after US Central Command downed a separate ballistic barrage aimed at American forces, shattering a days-long pause, the Associated Press reported. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard said it targeted the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base and CENTCOM’s Jordan headquarters.
Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces said at least 20 members were killed and 32 wounded when the US and Saudi Arabia struck its sites across seven provinces, CNN reported, noting it was the first time Riyadh had claimed strikes inside Iraq.
The strike was Iran’s first ballistic missile launch at US targets since Trump paused strikes Friday, following an earlier attack on the same base that, according to Axios, killed two US service members and triggered a 13-night US campaign.
Analysts Jonathan Hackett and Zaid Eyadat told The National that repeated Iranian strikes on Jordan’s bases, astride Iran’s most direct flight path into Israel, fit the pattern of a “shaping operation” to wear down defenses.
The exchange came the same day Netanyahu met Trump at the White House, and a US official told Ynetnews that aides were frustrated by Israel’s use of leaks about the Pickaxe Mountain site to force the meeting onto Trump’s schedule.
Trump dismissed the site as “not a big problem,” telling reporters, per the Times of Israel, that the US would strike it if diplomacy with Tehran fails.
