“Revolutionary Guard”: Two tankers burn in Hormuz after crossing an “unpermitted route”

The Revolutionary Guards' naval unit announced, on Tuesday, that two oil tankers stopped moving and caught fire in the Strait of Hormuz, after they took an "unpermitted route" in the waterway.

It said, in a statement, that the two “violating” tankers were stopped “following a majestic explosion,” and that they were “left to burn” near the southern coast of the strait.

She explained that one of the two ships, a giant tanker, “collided with a sea mine and exploded.” She added that the second “was under the protection of the aggressor’s American army fighters” and was trying to cross “secretly” through the “illegal” route, and that she “met in an accident” and stopped in her place after a “majestic fire.”

The unit said that the two tankers turned off all navigation and identification systems before they collided with what it described as “the firewall of the Strait of Hormuz.” The unit warned that “the unauthorized route is unsafe,” and that all ships “cooperating with the terrorist army and the American aggressor” that attempt to take it “will meet the same fate,” according to Agence France-Presse.

The statement did not reveal the names of the two tankers nor the countries to which they belong, nor did it clarify the nature of the “accident” that befell the second. The Iranian account could not be independently verified.

The Chief of the General Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces and Commander of Operations, Major General Ali Abdullah, said that Iran will “inevitably” destroy Israel, during an inspection tour of one of the “strategic missile sites” of the missile unit of the “Revolutionary Guard.” Iranian state television broadcast scenes from Abdullahi’s tour on Tuesday, hours after US President Donald Trump said that Iran was “effectively finished militarily,” and days after the Revolutionary Guards announced the lifting of the restriction that limited the range of its ballistic missiles to two thousand kilometers.

Abdullah was accompanied by the commander of the missile unit in the Revolutionary Guard, Brigadier General Majeed Mousavi. The television said that the tour witnessed the unveiling of new weapons, including one of the “surprise” missiles, without revealing its name, range, or specifications. Government agencies described it as a new underground “missile city.”

The Iranian government said on Tuesday that it hopes to present its candidate for the Ministry of Intelligence to Parliament “soon,” about eight months after the killing of Minister Ismail Khatib, and after representatives stipulated that the candidate’s loyalty to the leader be “one hundred percent.” Government spokeswoman Fatima Mohajerani told reporters in a weekly press conference that the selection of the minister enjoys “the highest level of consensus” within the government, other authorities, and “the entire governance system,” adding: “We hope that this will happen soon.”