Jordan says it stopped 18 of 20 Iranian missiles aimed at a U.S.-used air base

Jordan's armed forces said they intercepted 18 of 20 ballistic missiles that Iran fired overnight on 8-9 September toward a Jordanian air base used by U.S. forces. Two missiles fell in unpopulated areas. Amman reported no casualties.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps named the target as the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base at Al-Azraq, also called Al-Azraq Air Base. In a statement carried by Iranian state media, the Guard said its aerospace force used solid-fuel and liquid-fuel missiles against maintenance hangars, aircraft preparation areas, shelters and ground used by U.S. F-35, F-16 and F-15 aircraft. It called the strike a punitive operation and said the fight would continue.

A U.S. official said the Jordan strikes were ineffective and that all American troops were accounted for. Washington has not published its own damage assessment. Video circulating from the area shows explosions near the base. Those clips do not, on their own, prove which buildings were hit.

The barrage followed a U.S. Central Command announcement that American forces had destroyed five Iranian oil tankers. CENTCOM released video of those strikes and said they answered two days of Iranian ballistic-missile fire at a U.S. Navy warship. No Americans were harmed in the tanker action, the command said.

Iran's Guard added a second claim on Wednesday. It said it attacked ten ships trying to cross what it called a prohibited and unsafe stretch of the Strait of Hormuz, including two U.S. vessels and eight oil tankers. Independent confirmation of those ship attacks was still thin as Wednesday afternoon passed in the region. Hormuz is the choke point for a large share of seaborne crude. Any new firing there feeds the same price spike already visible in Brent futures, which approached $100 a barrel on Tuesday.

Jordan sits in a tight spot. It is not a U.S. base host in the same legal sense as some Gulf states. Officials in Amman have long said foreign forces use Jordanian facilities under restrictions. The kingdom still hosts a U.S. Air Force hub at Muwaffaq Salti and has taken repeated Iranian fire in recent months. In July, Jordan said it shot down eight missiles aimed at the same base and reported no casualties. This week's count was higher: twenty inbound, eighteen stopped.

Al Jazeera correspondents described interceptions over Irbid in the north, over Amman, and over eastern and northern cities. Syrian television said missiles were tracked over Sweida before they crossed into Jordan. Mehr News Agency, citing Arab sources, said Jordanian jets scrambled because U.S. air-defence systems on the ground could not engage the incoming rounds. That claim has not been confirmed by Amman or by CENTCOM.

Some open-source accounts said a portion of the missiles carried cluster warheads meant to spread damage across hangar roofs and parking aprons. The Jordanian military statement did not mention warhead type. It stuck to the interception tally and the empty-ground impact of the two missiles that got through.

The wider war is now more than six months old. Iranian leaders have said they will not yield under U.S. economic pressure. The tanker strikes cut into Tehran's ability to move crude. The Jordan barrage answers that cut by putting a U.S. logistics node at risk and by forcing Amman to spend interceptors. Patriot batteries are expensive. A night that requires dozens of shots is a bill as well as a military event.

Bahrain also featured in early Iranian reports of explosions. Those reports were thinner than the Jordan file. Treat them as unconfirmed unless Manama or CENTCOM speaks.

What can be said with confidence is narrower. Iran fired at a named Jordanian base used by U.S. aircraft. Jordan says it stopped most of the salvo. The United States says its people on the ground are safe. Five tankers are gone. Hormuz is again a live military problem, not only a shipping lane. Energy desks will price that combination before any government publishes a full bomb-damage study.

Jordan's next decision is political as much as military. Each interception proves the air-defence net still works. Each new night of fire also raises the cost of hosting U.S. operations on Jordanian soil. That cost is now measured in missiles expended, in public anxiety in Amman and Irbid, and in the chance that a future round lands on a populated street rather than empty ground.