Washington acknowledges limited strike on Qeshm after Iranian missile targets US aircraft

Five consecutive explosions shook Iran’s Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz, as US officials said a US fighter destroyed an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps missile platform after it targeted a US aircraft. They described the strike as “limited and defensive.”

Hilal Times Editorial DeskNovember 03, 2026, 09:40 AMUpdated: November 03, 2026, 09:50 AM

Washington acknowledges limited strike on Qeshm after Iranian missile targets US aircraft

Iran’s official IRNA news agency reported hearing five consecutive explosions on Qeshm Island, the largest island in the Strait of Hormuz, on Monday evening. It suggested their intensity may have resulted from strikes inside the island, while some residents said they saw two aircraft in the sky.

Hours later, US officials disclosed that the US military had carried out a “limited” strike on the island after Iranian forces attempted to target a US aircraft with a surface-to-air missile over the Strait of Hormuz.

US fighter destroys launch platform

Axios quoted a senior US official as saying that a US fighter had destroyed an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps surface-to-air missile platform from which the missile was launched, stressing that the strike was carried out “in self-defense.” Two officials told NBC News that the objective was “to destroy the platform” and that the operation did not mean the resumption of major combat operations against Iran. The Hill reported that the strikes also hit radar equipment. The US Department of Defense referred questions to Central Command, which did not immediately comment.

Footage broadcast by Iranian media showing a US MQM-170 drone near Qeshm Island

IRGC says three US drones were shot down

The strike came hours after the IRGC Aerospace Force announced that it had shot down two US MQM-170 reconnaissance drones south of Qeshm Island using electronic warfare systems, and destroyed what it described as the 55th US MQ-9 Reaper aircraft east of the Strait of Hormuz. Iran’s Press TV broadcast footage it said documented the two operations.

Iranian authorities have not yet commented on the explosions in Qeshm or on US media reports about the strike.

A “quiet” campaign amid negotiations

According to US officials, IRGC units have spent the past several weeks firing at manned and unmanned US aircraft over the strait and its surrounding waters. The Wall Street Journal reported that the Qeshm strike was part of a series of limited military operations carried out by Washington without an official announcement, which it has sought to keep out of the spotlight.

The strike came on the eve of the US midterm elections, as Qatari mediators carried a draft proposal to Tehran to end the war that has continued for eight months. US President Donald Trump told Axios that he was “in no hurry” to decide whether to resume the fighting, before suggesting in an interview with Fox News that the site known as “Mount of the Pickaxe” (Pickaxe Mountain), linked to Iran’s nuclear program, could be targeted if no agreement was reached. “We can do that in one hour, whenever we want,” he said.

In the same Fox News interview, Trump described Iran as “the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism” and said it had killed a large number of US soldiers over the past 50 years. He also claimed that Iran’s navy, air force and air defenses “no longer exist,” while stressing that “there is no war raging” at present and that Washington was negotiating from a position of strength.

Photos and video: Press TV

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Washington acknowledges limited strike on Qeshm after Iranian missile targets US aircraft