Washington:
U.S. President Joe Biden on Saturday cut short a weekend trip to Delaware to head to Washington for emergency talks on the Middle East, the White House said, as tensions rose amid growing concerns about attacks on Israel.
On April 1, a presumed Israeli attack destroyed an Iranian diplomatic building in Damascus, killing seven elite members of the Revolutionary Guards, including two generals, and Iran vowed to retaliate.
U.S. officials have warned that major attacks on Israel are expected in response.
Tensions were already rising after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards seized a container ship “linked to the Zionist regime (Israel)” near the Strait of Hormuz early on Saturday, state media reported.
The ship’s operator, Italian-Swiss Mediterranean Shipping Company, later confirmed that Iranian authorities had boarded the ship.
The White House opposed the seizure of the British ship.
“We call on Iran to immediately release this ship and its international crew,” National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said.
“The seizure of a civilian vessel without provocation is a flagrant violation of international law and an act of piracy by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.”
Biden said on Friday he expected Iranian retaliation “sooner or later” and said earlier this week that Tehran was “threatening a major attack.”
The top U.S. commander in the Middle East has traveled to Israel to hold talks with the country’s military officials about security threats, the Pentagon said on Thursday.
The Strait of Hormuz connects the Gulf to the Indian Ocean and carries more than a fifth of global oil consumption through it each year, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
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