Tehran launched strikes against several countries across the Gulf and the wider region overnight as the United States military stepped up its attacks on Iran.
Reports on Friday morning said that Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman and Qatar, as well as Jordan and Syria, had been forced to take defensive action against Iranian missiles and drones, amid a sixth night of US strikes on Iran.
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Later in the day, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) claimed responsibility for strikes against US military assets across the region.
The escalating US air campaign targeted civilian infrastructure in the south of Iran on Thursday night into Friday, including telecommunications networks, railway systems, and the Bandar-e Khamir bridge in Hormozgan province. Iranian media reported that at least eight people were killed in the latest attacks.
Tehran has justified its strikes against Gulf and other states by saying it is targeting US facilities in the region, insisting that Washington has used its bases there as launchpads to strike Iran.
In Qatar, which hosts major US military facilities, the security threat level was elevated as loud explosions were heard across parts of the capital, Doha, early on Friday morning. Warning sirens sounded as residents received security alerts on their mobile phones. Qatar’s security threat level was raised again after the initial alert, but the situation later returned to “normal” after the threats were cleared.
The IRGC claimed it struck Al Udeid Air Base, which is located in the desert outside Doha. The facility hosts Washington’s largest base in the region. Neither the US nor Qatar confirmed whether it was struck by Tehran. Doha has repeatedly said throughout the conflict that the base has not been used by the US to launch attacks on Iran.
The Qatari Ministry of Interior confirmed on Friday that a child was injured by falling shrapnel during Iran’s assault and received medical care. On Thursday, Qatar rejected Israeli reports that it was planning to join military action against Iran.
Kuwaiti officials confirmed that Iran struck a power and water desalination plant in the country on Friday. The Ministry of Electricity, Water and Renewable Energy said in a statement posted on X that the attack sparked a fire, damaging a large number of electricity generation units. The fire has since been extinguished and technical teams are assessing the damage with the intention of restoring power to the affected units as soon as possible.
Citizens and residents have been urged to ration electricity until further notice. About 90 percent of Kuwait’s water supply comes from desalination plants. Severe damage to its water infrastructure risks severe humanitarian consequences.
The IRGC also reported that it hit a US military base in Kuwait early on Friday. It said that the attack targeted a missile defence radar, several key weapons depots and two HIMARS surface-to-surface missile launchers.
Iran’s army said it targeted US helicopters and reconnaissance aircraft at the Sakhir airbase in Bahrain, according to a report from the country’s semi-official Tasnim news agency.
The IRGC claimed early on Friday to have successfully targeted US monitoring assets in Oman.
In a statement, the military said it destroyed a US air control radar in the northern Ghanim region and a maritime surveillance radar positioned on rocks in the Strait of Hormuz.
The IRGC declared that the critical shipping waterway – which has become the key issue in the latest outburst of conflict between the US and Iran – “remains in the hands of the IRGC Navy’s admirals”.
In northern Iraq, Kurdish counterterrorism forces reported that US coalition forces shot down eight explosive drones over the city of Erbil, according to the Iraqi News Agency (INA). No casualties were reported.
The Jordanian army announced its air defence systems shot down three Iranian missiles transiting its airspace on Friday morning. No casualties were reported as engineering teams dealt with falling debris.
The IRGC also claimed to have attacked a US special operations command centre at the al-Tanf military base in Syria, according to a Tasnim news agency report.
Call to return to ‘hard-won’ deal
As hostilities between the US and Iran continue to escalate, threatening to spread across the region and curb the global economy, efforts to convince Washington and Tehran to return to negotiations are accelerating.
China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Pakistani counterpart Ishaq Dar called on Friday for an immediate ceasefire and the resumption of dialogue, hoping to save the tentative ceasefire agreed upon last month.
Both countries have sought to mediate in the months-long conflict, which rekindled with renewed fighting over the Strait of Hormuz a month after the signing of a preliminary deal aiming to end the war.
That agreement was “hard-won”, Wang said, adding: “Peace is before our eyes, [we] cannot fall at the last hurdle and even more so cannot lose what we have gained.”
Iran has said 38 people have been killed, and more than 400 injured, in the US attacks since the two sides met in Switzerland on June 22 for talks to end the war through a 60-day negotiation period, the AFP news agency reported.
