The renewed US military campaign against Iran is a major topic in some American and British publications today.
UK
Iran has accused the US of a war crime after a missile strike on a private home in the south of the Islamic Republic killed at least four people and injured 68 at a time when another exchange of strikes raised fears of a larger-scale resumption of hostilities in the Middle East, writes the British newspaper "Guardian".
The US attacks began on Sunday and ended a month-long unstable truce between the US and Iran, the publication said. Iran responded to the attacks by launching drones and missiles at US bases in the Middle East, including in Bahrain, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.
The US is striking communications and radar infrastructure along the Iranian coast in an attempt to lift the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz – a strategic sea route through which at least 20% of the world's oil supplies passed before the war between the US and Iran, notes the "Guardian".
Senior advisers to US President Donald Trump are trying to prevent an escalation of the military conflict with Iran before the midterm elections in November in order to limit potential losses for Republicans in the elections, the "Independent" newspaper reports, citing sources in the US administration.
Limiting the scale of military action before the elections is aimed at preventing the extremely unpopular military campaign from dominating the news at a time when Trump's Republican Party is trying to maintain its fragile majority in the Senate and House of Representatives, the publication notes.
Although Trump publicly denies that the upcoming elections affect his strategy towards Iran, the White House's room for maneuver is increasingly more limited by the logistical and political realities of the war, which has been going on for seven months, the newspaper points out.
USA
President Trump seems to be mired in a conflict that he cannot abandon but cannot control, even though he has already declared complete victory several times, writes the "New York Times".
Foreign policy experts say that another resumption of hostilities demonstrates one reality for the American president: he has exhausted all other options and is now returning to the starting position from the beginning of the conflict, the newspaper comments.
"New York Times" quotes Matthew Bartlett, a Republican strategist and former State Department official during Trump's first administration, who said the president's strategy for the conflict "is to repeat the same thing over and over again, whether it's rhetoric or military action."
"It's really shocking how the United States has been exposed for not having a plan for military action and not having a plan for how to win or get out of this war," Bartlett said.
The renewed attacks call into question the administration's plans to abandon military operations in Iran in favor of economic pressure on the country through sanctions as a way to inflict damage, writes USA Today. The Trump administration last week announced new economic sanctions against Iran and threatened to impose secondary sanctions on countries that conduct financial transactions with Iran.
According to Seth Jones of the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, the new US strikes on Iran are "part of a limited "lawn mowing" strategy," the publication notes.
"I would call these preemptive measures taken to ensure that the Iranians are not able to secure a better position to strike ships transporting oil or other goods through the Strait of Hormuz," Jones said.