June 10, (THEWILL) — The United States on Tuesday launched what it described as “self-defense” military strikes against Iran following the downing of a U.S. Army Apache attack helicopter near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, in a major escalation of tensions between Washington and Tehran.
The strikes came hours after President Donald Trump vowed that the United States would respond to what U.S. officials described as an Iranian attack on an AH-64 Apache helicopter conducting patrol operations near one of the world’s most critical maritime trade routes.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said the operation began at approximately 5 p.m. Eastern Time and was carried out under the President’s direction as a “proportional response to unjustified Iranian aggression.”
According to U.S. officials, the helicopter went down near the coast of Oman while patrolling the Strait of Hormuz.
Both crew members were rescued and were reported to be in stable condition following a recovery operation that involved a U.S. Navy unmanned surface vessel.
While CENTCOM did not immediately disclose the full scope of the operation, reports indicated that the strikes targeted Iranian military infrastructure, including radar installations and air-defense systems believed to be linked to operations around the Strait of Hormuz.
Explosions were reported in Iran’s southern Hormozgan Province, including areas around Qeshm Island overlooking the vital shipping corridor.
Iran condemned the attacks and warned that any military action against its territory would not go unanswered. Iranian officials disputed Washington’s account of events surrounding the helicopter incident and accused the United States of jeopardising efforts aimed at reducing tensions in the region.
Tehran subsequently vowed retaliation, raising fears of a broader confrontation between the longtime adversaries.
As Washington and Tehran traded accusations over the latest military confrontation, U.S. authorities also scored a major legal victory in a long-running terrorism case.
A federal court in New York sentenced former Taliban commander Haji Najibullah to 42 years in prison for orchestrating the 2008 kidnapping of Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist David Rohde, his Afghan interpreter, and their driver, and for providing material support for terrorist attacks that resulted in the deaths of U.S. soldiers.
The U.S. Department of Justice said Najibullah, a former Taliban commander and spokesman in Afghanistan’s Wardak Province, played a central role in the hostage-taking operation that kept the victims captive for more than seven months across Afghanistan and Pakistan.
He pleaded guilty in 2025 to hostage-taking and terrorism-related charges.
Federal prosecutors described the abduction as a calculated operation aimed at extracting ransom payments and securing the release of Taliban prisoners.
Rohde, then a reporter with The New York Times, had travelled to meet Najibullah in November 2008 for what he believed was an interview. Instead, he and his companions were ambushed by heavily armed Taliban fighters, blindfolded, bound, and transported between multiple safe houses.
During their captivity, the hostages were repeatedly threatened and forced to record proof-of-life videos while armed militants pointed weapons at them.
Prosecutors said the recordings were intended to pressure both the U.S. government and the victims’ families into meeting Taliban demands.
“Every day of their captivity, the hostages and their families lived in fear that they would never see their loved ones again,” prosecutors said in court filings.
The hostages’ ordeal ended in 2009 when Rohde and his interpreter escaped from a Taliban compound by scaling a wall with a rope after waiting for guards to fall asleep. Rohde later chronicled the experience in his memoir, A Rope and a Prayer.
Najibullah was arrested in Ukraine in 2020 and extradited to the United States.
U.S. District Judge Katherine Polk Failla, who imposed the sentence, said the punishment reflected the gravity of crimes that included hostage-taking and support for deadly attacks against American troops.
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