American officials say the vessel held two holes on the side of its port and two on its starboard side just above the waterline.
An Israeli cargo ship that suffered a mysterious explosion in the Gulf of Oman has arrived at the port of Dubai for repair work, days after the explosion revived security concerns about Middle East waterways amid increased tensions with Iran.
The Israeli MV Helios Ray sat at dry dock facilities at Dubai’s Port Rashid on Sunday. Although the crew was not damaged in the explosion, the vessel held two holes on the side of its port and two on the side of the star just above the waterline, according to American defense officials.
It is not clear what caused the explosion, but the incident comes amid a sharp and rising tension between the United States and Iran over their growing 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. Iran has tried to put pressure on the administration of President Joe Biden to grant the sanctions relief they received under the agreement, which was abandoned by former President Donald Trump.
The cargo ship was hit by an explosion in the Gulf of Oman while en route to Singapore [Ali Haider/EPA]
Emirati officials did not immediately recognize or respond to requests for comment on the incoming ship.
The explosion on the ship, a cargo ship rolling away with a Bahamian flag, recalled a series of attacks on foreign oil tankers in 2019 that the U.S. Navy blamed on Iran. Tehran denied any involvement in the suspected attacks, which took place near the Hormuz Strait, a major oil choke site.
On Saturday, Israeli defense minister Benny Gantz said an initial assessment found that Iran was to blame for the explosion.
Gilad Erdan, Israel’s ambassador to the U.S. and the United Nations, told Israeli Army Radio on Sunday “it was no secret that the Iranians are trying to harm Israeli targets”, adding to the explosion on the ship signs of other attacks from Iran.
Haaretz newspaper reported that Israeli defense officials flew to Dubai on Saturday to investigate the incident.
‘Spirit’ mission
The Helios Ray deployed cars at various ports in the Gulf before heading out of the Middle East to Singapore. The explosion struck as the ship was sailing from the Saudi Dammam port out of the Gulf of Oman, forcing it to turn to Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, for inspection.
Iranian authorities have not commented publicly on the ship. The country’s hard-line Kayhan daily, whose editor was named by Supreme Director Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, says the Helios Ray was “probably” on an “espionage” mission in the region, without any evidence offer to support the application. The report on Sunday states that the vessel may have been “caught in an ambush with a branch of a front axis”, citing Iranian agents in the area.
Iran has also blamed Israel for a series of recent attacks, including a mysterious explosion last summer that destroyed an advanced centrifuge assembly plant at its Natanz nuclear facility and killed Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, a leading Iranian scientist who founded Iran’s nuclear weapons program two decades ago. .
Iran’s renewed promises to avenge Fakhrizadeh’s killing have raised warnings in Israel, especially as the Gulf sees an increase in traffic from Israel following its normal contracts with the Israeli government. UAE and Bahrain.