Israel-Iran war: Tehran hunts crew of crashed US jet F-15 and A-10, one reported rescued
While Tehran said it shot down the F-15 fighter jet, US media reported that American special forces rescued one of the two crew members.
Also read: Iran shoots down second US F-35 fighter jet, says pilot unlikely to survive
The Iranian military also said it shot down a US A-10 ground attack aircraft in the Gulf, while US media reported that the pilot was rescued.
The war broke out more than a month ago with US-Israeli attacks on Iran that killed religious leader Ali Khamenei; This attack triggered retaliation that spread the conflict across the Middle East, shaking the global economy and affecting millions of people around the world.
U.S. Central Command did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the F-15 loss, but White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said, “The President has been briefed.”
President Donald Trump told NBC that the loss of the F-15 would not affect negotiations with Iran, saying: “No, not at all. No, this is a war.”
valuable reward
“An American enemy fighter jet in central Iranian airspace was shot down and destroyed by the advanced air defense system of the IRGC Aerospace Forces,” a spokesman for the Iranian military’s central operational command said. “The jet has been completely destroyed and further searches are ongoing.”
An Iranian television reporter on a local official channel said that anyone who captured a member of the crew alive “will receive a valuable reward.”
The US military announced that many aircraft were lost during the Iran operations, including a tanker that crashed in Iraq and three F-15s shot down by friendly fire from Kuwait.
An AFP journalist, meanwhile, said that new attacks hit Israel, Iran, Lebanon and the Gulf countries, and large explosions shook the north of Tehran. Israel said it had launched a wave of attacks in the Iranian capital, alongside parallel attacks in Beirut.
Check out our live coverage of the US-Israeli war with Iran
blasted windows
Earlier, the Israeli military reported that a new missile salvo had arrived from Iran, which activated its air defenses.
Strikes by all parties are increasingly targeting economic and industrial areas, raising fears of a wider disruption in global energy supplies.
An AFP reporter saw a villa and residential buildings with blown-out windows in the area around a bridge targeted by the US in western Tehran, but there were no military facilities.
According to the Martyrs’ Foundation of Alborz province, quoted by the official IRNA agency, 13 civilians died and dozens were injured in the attack.
Meanwhile, in Iran’s Gulf neighbor Abu Dhabi, metal giant Emirates Global Aluminum said it could take up to a year for it to resume full production after its site was damaged by Iranian attacks.
Old FM calls for agreement
Writing in the US Foreign Affairs magazine, Iran’s former foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, said Iran should strike a deal with Washington to end the war by offering to halt its nuclear program and reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for sanctions relief.
Since the start of the war, Iran has virtually closed the important waterway, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and gas normally passes.
An AFP analysis of maritime data showed that most of the few ships that managed to pass had connections to Iran, with 60 percent of ships carrying goods either originating from Iran or heading there.
The Maltese-flagged Kribi, owned by French shipping group CMA CGM, crossed the strait out of the Gulf on Thursday, in the first known transit by a major European shipping group since March 1, according to Maritime Traffic data analyzed by AFP.
Three other ships, including one jointly owned by a Japanese company, passed by on Thursday.
Iranian military spokesman Ebrahim Zolfaghari warned that Iran would step up its own attacks on energy facilities in the region in response to Trump’s threats to attack infrastructure.
A drone attack on a refinery owned by Kuwait’s national oil company on Friday caused a fire in several of its units, state media said.
Kuwait’s water and electricity ministry later said the Iranian attack damaged the energy and desalination complex.
A gas complex in Abu Dhabi has closed after a fire broke out following an attack that resulted in “falling debris” upon response, the government media office said.
Bridge collapsed in Lebanon
The Israeli military said on Friday it had hit more than 3,500 targets across Lebanon in the month since the war with Iran-backed Hezbollah began.
The statement stated that two bridges in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa region would be attacked “in order to prevent the transfer of reinforcements and military equipment.”
Lebanese state media later reported that Israel destroyed a bridge in the area.
Lebanon’s health ministry said on Thursday that 1,345 people had been killed and 4,040 injured since the start of the war.
Hezbollah has not announced its losses so far.
The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon said three peacekeepers were injured in an explosion of unknown origin on Friday, the third such incident in a week.
