Iran struck Gulf infrastructure on Sunday, March 8, hitting fuel tanks at Kuwait’s airport and a desalination plant in Bahrain, with at least four reported dead in the region as Tehran pressed its campaign there into a second week. In Saudi Arabia, the civil defense said a “military projectile” killed two people – an Indian and a Bangladeshi – and injured 12 others after it fell in a residential area in Al-Kharj governorate south of Riyadh. In Kuwait, two border guards were killed “while performing their national duty,” the interior ministry said, without elaborating on the circumstances.
Gulf countries have borne much of Tehran’s response after the United States and Israel launched a massive air campaign against Iran, with 18 people, 10 of them civilians, killed in the Gulf states since the war began, according to an Agence France-Presse (AFP) tally. Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian warned Sunday that the Islamic Republic “will be forced to respond” against its neighbors if their territory was used to attack it.
Iran’s military warned on Sunday that it would target oil sites in the region if Israel continued to strike energy infrastructure in the Islamic Republic. “The governments of Islamic countries are expected to warn the criminal America and the savage Zionist regime of such cowardly, inhumane actions as soon as possible,” Ebrahim Zolfaghari, a spokesman for Iran’s central military command, told state TV. “Otherwise, similar measures will be taken in the region, and if you can tolerate oil at more than $200 per barrel, continue this game.”
Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Kuwait all reported new attacks on Sunday. Fuel tanks at Kuwait’s international airport were targeted in a drone attack, the military said. The official Kuwait News Agency said a fire at the airport was brought under control, reporting no “significant injuries.” The military called the drone attack “a direct targeting of vital infrastructure.” A separate statement said “some civilian facilities sustained material damage as a result of falling fragments and debris from interception operations.”
‘Drone threats’
Kuwait’s national oil company announced a “precautionary” cut to its crude production, as the country’s military said Sunday that it had responded to several drone and missile attacks. Authorities said Kuwait’s main building for social security was targeted, causing material damage, and that it would not receive visitors there on Sunday.
Bahrain’s interior ministry said Sunday that an Iranian drone attack damaged a water desalination plant, accusing Tehran of “randomly” targeting civilian infrastructure. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps said on Saturday that it had struck the United States’ Juffair base in Bahrain, adding it had been used to attack an Iranian desalination plant earlier in the day. Bahrain’s national communication office later said the Iranian attack on the desalination facility had no impact on water supplies or network capacity.
Saudi Arabia’s defense ministry said on Sunday that it intercepted 33 drones, adding there were no reports of damage or casualties from the attacks. Among them was a drone aimed at Riyadh’s diplomatic quarter, also thwarted with no material damage or civilian injuries, the ministry’s spokesman said, adding the capital and surrounding areas were targeted by 26 drones. One drone targeted the Shaybah oil field in the southeast of the country, according to the Saudi defense ministry.
The UAE said its air defenses detected 17 ballistic missiles on Sunday – destroying 16, while one fell into the sea – and intercepted 113 of 117 drones detected, with four falling inside the country. Despite the Iranian president’s apology to the Gulf countries for earlier strikes, hours later its judiciary chief said strikes would continue on sites in Gulf countries that were “at the disposal of the enemy.” UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan said in a rare televised address that the Emirates were in “a period of war” and “will emerge stronger” from it.