Iran threatens Hormuz internet cables as it says the ball is in Washington's court

A senior commander in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards has warned that undersea internet cables running beneath the Strait of Hormuz could be destroyed if Iran’s own infrastructure comes under attack, widening the list of targets Tehran says it is prepared to hit.

Brigadier General Yadollah Javani, political deputy to the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), told the Arabic-language channel Al-Alam on Wednesday that Iran would use all its capabilities to answer any strike on its infrastructure. “The United States and its allies have substantial investments,” he said, and the cables in the strait “could also be targeted and destroyed”. Iran’s responses, he said, would be “calculated and, in some cases, offensive”.

The threat moves the confrontation from oil and shipping to data. IRGC officials have spoken of seven major cables crossing the strait. Systems in the area include Asia-Africa-Europe-1, FALCON and Gulf Bridge International, which link Gulf states to Europe, Africa and Asia. The International Cable Protection Committee puts the number of active segments through the strait at five, carrying less than 1% of international bandwidth. Cutting them would cause regional disruption and congestion rather than a global blackout, but repairs in a war zone could take a long time.

Plan on the table, says Tehran

Alongside the threats, Iran says it is still waiting for Washington. “Our response is clear. We have submitted our plan to the US,” Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told the state broadcaster IRIB. The plan, first put forward in September, would reopen the strait on the sixth day of a seven-day sequence if the US lifts its blockade of Iranian ports, removes sanctions on Iranian oil and ends hostilities across the region. Washington wants Iran’s nuclear programme on the agenda from the start. Talks continue through Pakistan and Qatar.

President Masoud Pezeshkian said: “Dialogue with the language of threats and pressure has no meaning.” Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, told Pakistan’s army chief Asim Munir in Tehran on Tuesday that “not a single gram of enriched uranium will be removed from Iran.”

In Washington, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said a peace deal was “extremely difficult” and that economic pressure would continue until Tehran stopped attacking shipping. President Donald Trump said high fuel prices were “a small price to pay” to stop Iran getting a nuclear weapon.

Ships still at risk

At sea, the dangers keep growing. An unknown projectile hit a tanker about 11 nautical miles west of Bukha in Oman, near the strait, on Wednesday. The fire was put out and the crew were safe. Iran said earlier this week that two tankers, each carrying about two million barrels, caught fire after hitting mines.

Arsenio Dominguez, Secretary-General of the International Maritime Organization, said he “cannot guarantee” that a ship using the route will not hit a mine, and that he has been trying to open lines to Tehran. For India, which has already had two seafarers go missing after tanker attacks off Oman this month, the warning is a direct concern for crews on Gulf routes.