President Donald Trump is threatening to destroy Iran's power plants if the Strait of Hormuz is not reopened within 48 hours.
On a Truth Social post late Saturday, the President said, “If Iran doesn’t FULLY OPEN, WITHOUT THREAT, the Strait of Hormuz, within 48 HOURS from this exact point in time, the United States of America will hit and obliterate their various POWER PLANTS, STARTING WITH THE BIGGEST ONE FIRST!”
The decision by President Trump comes just a day after he said he's considering "winding down" Middle East military action and just two days after telling Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu to stop attacks on Iranian oil and gas plants.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) is calling the shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz, through which flows about 20% of world oil and natural gas supplies, “the largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market.”
Targeting of energy infrastructure has been ratcheting up in the past couple of weeks, with Israel most recently saying Saturday that a rocket landed not far from the city of Dimona, not far from the Negev Nuclear Research Center -- and Iran reported to the IEA that one of its nuclear facilities was hit by bombs.