DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) – An explosion hit an Israeli cargo ship sailing out of the Middle East on Friday, an unexplained explosion that renewed concerns about shipping safety in the region amid mounting tensions between the US and Iran.
According to the British maritime trade operations, which are managed by the British navy, the crew and the vessel were safe. The explosion in the Gulf of Oman forced the vessel to drive to the nearest port.
The incident is reminiscent of the summer of 2019, when the same website saw a series of suspected attacks accusing the U.S. Navy of Iran, which Tehran denied. Meanwhile, US President Joe Biden has been trying to revive nuclear talks with Iran, but has ordered airstrikes. about facilities in Syria belonging to a powerful Iraqi Iraqi armed group.
Dryad Global, a maritime information firm, identified the wrecked vessel as the MV Helios Ray, a cargo ship with the start of the Bahamian flag and the unrolling. Another private security officer, who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters, also identified the ship as the Helios Ray.
Satellite tracking data from the website MarineTraffic.com showed that the Helios ray almost entered the Arabian Sea around 0600 GMT before suddenly turning around and on its way back to the Strait of Hormuz. It comes from Dammam, Saudi Arabia, and still lists Singapore as its destination on its tracker.
Israel’s Channel 13, in an unpublished report, said the assessment in Israel was that Iran was behind the explosion. Israeli officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The blast comes as Tehran increasingly violates its nuclear deal with world powers in 2015 to create leverage over Washington. Iran wants to put pressure on Biden to provide the sanction relief it received under the agreement that former President Donald Trump abandoned almost three years ago.
Iran also blames Israel for a recent series of attacks, including a mysterious explosion last summer that destroyed an advanced centrifuge assembly plant at its Natanz nuclear facility and the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, a top Iranian scientist who founded the Islamic Republic’s military nuclear program two decades ago.
Capt. Ranjith Raja of data firm Refinitiv told the AP that the vessel owned in Israel left the Persian Gulf on its way to Singapore on Thursday. On Friday at 02:30 GMT, the vessel stopped at least 9 hours east of a major Omani port before making a 360-degree turn and sailing to Dubai, likely for damage assessment and repairs.
The vessel was loading with cargo from Europe. It has left vehicles at several ports in the region, Raja added, including in Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, with its last port of call in Dammam.
While details of the blast remained unclear, two U.S. defense officials told the AP that the ship sustained two holes on its port side and two holes on the starboard side just above the waterline in the blast. Officials said it remained unclear what caused the holes. They spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity to discuss unreleased information about the incidents.
In a United Nations ship database, the owners of the vessel are identified as a Tel Aviv firm called Ray Shipping Ltd. Calls to Ray Shipping called unanswered Friday.
Abraham Ungar (74), who goes to “Rami”, is the founder of Ray Shipping Ltd., and is known as one of the richest men in Israel. He earns his fortune in shipping and construction.
According to the Nikola Y. Vaptsarov Naval Academy, where Ungar provides support and maritime training, it owns dozens of car-carrying ships and employs thousands of engineers.
The U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet in Bahrain said it was “aware and monitoring” the situation.
Although the circumstances of the explosion are unclear, Dryad Global said it was very possible that the explosion stemmed from ‘asymmetric activities by the Iranian army’.
“While Iran is trying to put pressure on the United States to lift sanctions, it could possibly pursue a military diplomacy,” Dryad said. Iran did not immediately acknowledge the incident.
In the tense summer of 2019, the U.S. military blamed Iran for explosions on two oil tankers near the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most strategic ships. The U.S. has also attributed a series of other alleged attacks to Iran, including the use of slap mines – designed to be magnetically attached to a hull – to paralyze four oil tankers from the nearby port of Fujairah in the Emirates.
Since the assassination of Iranian nuclear scientist Fakhrizadeh in November last year, Israeli officials have sounded the alarm over possible Iranian retaliation, including by its local proxies such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
Over the years, Iran has been linked to attacks on Israeli and Jewish civilian targets in Latin America, Europe and Asia. Israel has not commented on its alleged role in the assassination of the scientist.
Friday’s incident also follows normalization agreements between Israel and the UAE and Bahrain. The agreements, with critical criticism from Iran, have strengthened an emerging regional alliance against the Islamic Republic.
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Associated Press authors Laurie Kellman in Tel Aviv, Israel, Joseph Federman in Jerusalem and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report.