By Darryl Coote UPI | Posted by TOE

The U.S. military attacked Iran’s Qeshm Island, according to reports.

The limited strikes, reported by NBC News, ABC News and CNN, all citing unidentified U.S. officials, came on the eve of midterm elections in the United States. President Donald Trump had said on Oct. 8 that the United States would not attack Iran “at any time” before Tuesday’s midterm elections.

Iran’s state-run Islamic Republic News Agency reported explosions in Qeshm, an island within the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint on a vital energy shipping route where Iran has restricted traffic through by military force since the war began after the United States and Israel attacked in late February.

Reports of the U.S. attack on Monday described the strikes as retaliatory, with an official telling NBC News that “This was a defensive measure for Iranians using surface-to-air missiles against U.S. assets.”

It was not immediately clear which U.S. assets were targeted by the Iranian missiles.

The U.S. military last publicly announced strikes against Iran was on Sept. 8, when U.S. Central Command said its forces had destroyed five Iranian crude oil carriers after Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps targeted a U.S. Navy warship with ballistic missiles twice over the previous two days.

U.S. forces had previously paused strikes for about a month between late July and late August, before resuming attacks on Iranian military installations near the Strait of Hormuz.

ABC News reported that strikes were the latest in a series by the United States in recent weeks in response to Iran increasing its attacks targeting commercial ships trainsiting the Strait of Hormuz.

The unnamed U.S. officials told ABC News that the United States has not been publicizing the attacks to prevent signaling a resumption of major combat operations.