Image for representation purposes only Iran’s state media reported that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps recently attacked a second MSC ship. This comes after a U.S. warplane had fired a Hellfire missile at the engine room of VLCC Lexie on 2 June. In retaliation, the IRGC carried out an attack on the MSC Panaya with navy missiles, calling the ship as belonging to the “American Zionist” enemy, something Iran has called MSC while targeting its vessels previously as well. The attack on the vessel is the second in the past few days as MSC vessels seem to have become the target of Iran, in response to U.S strikes on oil tankers trying to reach Iranian Ports amidst the U.S blockade. The MSC Panaya is presently docked at Bahrain’s Khalifa Bin Salman port, and the extent of damage has not been confirmed. Iran has also claimed to have attacked the U.S Navy’s Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain. However, US Central Command has dismissed the claim as false and baseless, stating that all Iranian attempts to attack the base with missiles and drones had failed. Iran had also attacked the MSC container ship Sariska V using two projectiles while it was leaving Iraq’s Port of Umm Qasr on June 1, 2026. IRGC said that the attack was in response to U.S forces disabling the Liam Star while it sailed through the U.S blockade towards Iran. MSC has also issued a statement emphasising that it is a neutral company with no links to the United States or Israel. MSC stated, “Founded by Italian national Captain Gianluigi Aponte, the company is headquartered and domiciled in Switzerland and is wholly owned by his children, Diego and Alexa Aponte, both Italian nationals with no other citizenship.”