Trump Threatens Further Attacks on Iran's Kharg Island for "Fun"
US President Donald Trump has threatened to conduct further attacks on Iran’s Kharg Island. He has also urged US allies to deploy warships to secure the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial shipping lane for global energy supplies, whilst Iran has pledged to intensify its response.
According to Al-Jazeera reporting on Sunday (15 March 2026), Trump told NBC News that US attacks have “completely destroyed” much of Iran’s major oil export centre on the island. He warned of further strikes against the island.
“We may attack it a few more times just for fun,” he said.
The statement marks an escalation for Trump, who previously stated that the US only targeted military sites on Kharg. Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran would respond to any attack on its energy facilities.
Araghchi told MS NOW news channel that the US attacked Kharg Island from two locations in the United Arab Emirates, namely Ras Al-Khaimah and a location “very close to Dubai.”
He described this as “dangerous” and stated that Iran “will try to be careful not to attack populated areas” there. US Central Command, the American military combat command responsible for operations in the Middle East, declined to comment on Araghchi’s claims.
An adviser to UAE President Anwar Gargash stated on social media that the country has the right to self-defence but “continues to prioritise common sense and logic, and remains restrained.”
The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps stated it had conducted missile and drone attacks against targets in Israel and three US military bases in the region. Iran described the attacks as the first round of retaliation for workers killed in an Iranian industrial zone.
On Saturday (14 March), a missile strike on an industrial zone in the central Iranian city of Isfahan killed at least 15 people as workers were inside a factory. Meanwhile, Teheran’s capability to disrupt shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, through which one-fifth of global oil cargo passes, has triggered the largest disruption in global oil supplies, shaking markets and governments.
The war launched by Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on 28 February has killed more than 2,000 people, mostly in Iran, according to reports from government and state media sources.