Biden hints at Israeli plan to hit Iran oil industry

Joe Biden said yesterday that his administration had been "discussing" possible Israeli plans to attack Iran's oil industry in retaliation for the Iranian ballistic missile attack on Tuesday.

- Julian Borger, Patrick Wintour

The US president's off-the-cuff remark did not make clear whether his administration was holding internal discussions or talking directly to Israel, nor did it clarify his attitude to such an attack.

"First of all, we don't allow Israel, we advise Israel," he told reporters outside the White House yesterday. "And there is nothing going to happen today."

Nonetheless, at a time of high tension across the Middle East, the comment triggered a surge in global oil prices, with potentially damaging effects on Biden's vice-president Kamala Harris's presidential election campaign.

US and Israeli officials have been talking about an appropriate Israeli response to an Iranian salvo of 181 ballistic missiles on Tuesday, most of which were intercepted, though some landed on or around military bases. Satellite imagery published by the Associated Press yesterday showed damage from four distinct impacts to buildings at Israel's Nevatim airbase.

The Iranian attack was in turn a response to the Israeli killing of the Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, in an airstrike on Beirut last Friday, with what started as a war in Gaza a year ago igniting in recent days into a major regional conflict.