SULAIMANI (ESTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu blamed Iran on Monday for a blast aboard an Israeli-owned ship in the Gulf but sidestepped a question on whether Israel would retaliate.
“This was indeed an operation by Iran. That is clear,” he told Kan radio, according to Reuters.
The ship, a vehicle-carrier named MV Helios Ray, suffered an explosion in the Gulf of Oman between Thursday and Friday morning. A U.S. defense official in Washington said the blast had left holes above the waterline in both sides of the hull.
Asked if Israel would retaliate, he repeated previous statements about his determination to prevent Iran from developing nuclear capacity.
“We are striking at it [Iran] all over the region,” he added.
Kan radio said the interview was recorded on Sunday night, before Syria accused Israel of carrying out missile strikes around southern Damascus.
On Saturday, Israeli defense minister Benny Gantz said his “initial assessment” was that Iran was responsible for an explosion on an Israeli-owned ship in the Gulf of Oman.
“Iran is looking to hit Israeli infrastructure and Israeli citizens,” Gantz told the public broadcaster Kan. “The location of the ship in relative close proximity to Iran raises the notion, the assessment, that it is the Iranians.”
The ship is owned by a Tel Aviv company called Ray Shipping through a company registered in the Isle of Man, according to a U.N. shipping database.
Tensions have risen in the Gulf region since the United States reimposed sanctions on Iran in 2018 after then-president Donald Trump withdrew Washington from a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and major powers.
Washington has blamed Iran for a number of attacks on shipping in strategic Gulf waters, notably on four vessels, including two Saudi oil tankers, in May 2019. Iran has denied carrying out those attacks.
