U.S. President Donald Trump announced over the weekend that US forces carried out strikes on military facilities on Iran’s Kharg Island, an island key to Iran’s oil network, echoing statements Trump made decades ago, as early as the late 1980s.

A resurfaced 1988 newspaper article shows a younger Trump voicing an uncompromising stance toward the Islamic Republic.

“I would be tough on Iran,” Trump said in the interview at the time. “They are waging psychological terror against us and making us look like a bunch of fools. If they fired even a single shot at our people or our ships, I would attack Kharg Island, move in, and take it. Iran cannot even defeat Iraq, yet they provoke the United States. A firm confrontation with them would be good for the whole world.”

Kharg Island—situated roughly 25 kilometers off Iran’s coast in the northern Persian Gulf—is one of the regime’s most sensitive strategic assets. It serves as Iran’s primary crude‑oil export hub and is effectively the country’s economic lifeline.

The strike, marking a sharp escalation in tensions with Tehran, targeted missile and naval mine storage facilities. Officials stressed that the strike was executed with precision to avoid harming the island’s civilian oil infrastructure.

Analysts say the choice of target sends a pointed message: the United States is willing to operate inside Iran’s economic “zone of immunity,” demonstrating both reach and precision—striking military infrastructure while deliberately avoiding global energy assets.

(YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)