Israeli-owned cargo ship attacked in Indian Ocean by Iranian drone, US official says

A cargo ship owned by an Israeli billionaire was attacked by a suspected Iranian drone in the Indian Ocean, a US defence official has said.

Friday's attack on the CMA CGM Symi comes as global shipping increasingly finds itself targeted amid Israel's war with Hamas – fuelling fears of an escalation into a wider regional conflict.

The defence official, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said the Malta-flagged vessel was suspected to have been targeted by a triangle-shaped, bomb-carrying Shahed-136 drone while in international waters.

The drone exploded, causing damage to the ship but not injuring any of its crew. “We continue to monitor the situation closely,” said the official, who declined to elaborate on what intelligence the US military gathered to assess that Iran's was paramilitary Revolutionary Guard was behind the attack.

The same drones have been used by Russia in its invasion of Ukraine, including in a barrage launched on Saturday that Kyiv described as Moscow's biggest drone attack since the war began. Al-Mayadeen, a pan-Arab satellite channel that is politically allied with the Iranian-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, reported that an Israeli ship had been targeted in the Indian Ocean. The channel cited anonymous sources for the report, which Iranian media later cited. CMA CGM, a major shipper based in Marseille, France, referred questions to the Symi's owner, Singapore-based Eastern Pacific Shipping. That company is ultimately controlled by Israeli billionaire Idan Ofer. A statement issued on behalf of Eastern Pacific acknowledged the company being “aware of claims that a container ship under the company’s management was targeted in a possible security incident overnight on Friday”. “The vessel in question is currently sailing as planned,” the statement said, adding that "all crew are safe and well”.

The company, through representatives, declined to answer any questions. The Israeli military referred questions to the Israeli Foreign Ministry, which did not respond. In November 2022, the Liberian-flagged oil tanker Pacific Zircon, also associated with Eastern Pacific, sustained damage in a suspected Iranian attack off Oman. In recent days, the Symi’s crew had been behaving as though they believed the ship faced a threat. The ship had its Automatic Identification System tracker switched off since Tuesday when it left Dubai's Jebel Ali port, according to data from MarineTraffic.com.

Ships are supposed to keep their AIS active for safety reasons, but crews will turn them off if it appears they might be targeted.

The same had done when traveling through the Red Sea past Yemen, home to the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, who recently seized a vehicle transport ship in the waters. Iran's mission to the United Nations didn't respond to a request for comment. However, Tehran and Israel have been engaged in a yearslong shadow war in the wider Middle East, with some drone attacks targeting Israeli-associated vessels traveling around the region. Meanwhile on Saturday, Bahrain's state-run news agency reported that its national carrier, Gulf Air, had been targeted in a hack that may have seen “some information from its email and client database” accessed. A statement posted online by a self-described group calling itself Al-Toufan, or “The Flood” in Arabic, claimed the hacking of Gulf Air.

Days earlier, another statement claimed that it hacked the Foreign Ministry and other government websites purportedly over the island kingdom’s stance on the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.

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