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Iran launched more attacks on Washington’s Gulf allies on Saturday after the seventh consecutive night of US strikes against Iranian military sites, including shipping facilities.
The exchange of attacks escalates the war a week after the ceasefire agreement fell apart.
Kuwait has been under constant attacks, with a desalination plant hit and operations at Kuwait’s airport suspended due to repeated missile and drone threats.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it raided a US military base at Camp Arifjan and destroyed a radar site at Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait.
The IRGC also identified an area in Bahrain where American aircraft were gathered at the Sheikh Isa Air Base and an intelligence data center, Iranian state media reported.
Iranian media say the US attack killed several people, destroyed bridges and hit a train station. The US says it hit military infrastructure.
The Guards said they also destroyed at least two American planes and three other planes during a missile and drone attack early Saturday on the US base in Al Azraq, Jordan, according to Iranian state TV.
Reuters could not confirm the reports.
Oil prices hit a monthly high
“Since there is no international agency to prevent the brutality of the American military, we have no way before us except the command of the Quran which says: ‘Whoever attacks you, attack them in the same way,'” said the IRGC in a statement warning the American allies in the region to expect more strikes.
On Friday, the two sides were targeting traffic, with the US saying it was enforcing a shipping blockade while Iran said it was targeting vessels that violate its rules of passage through the Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway for one-fifth of the world’s oil supplies.
Oil prices rose more than four percent on Friday to their highest level in more than a month, putting political pressure on US President Donald Trump as his Republican Party tries to retain power in November’s congressional elections.
Desalination plants have been affected in the region
Washington and Tehran have been testing the limits of escalation since their ceasefire agreement backfired last week, raising the prospect of a return to endless war.
Public infrastructure has been under attack despite concerns about possible war crimes.
In June, CBC’s senior international reporter Margaret Evans and videographer Lyza Sale were granted rare access to report inside Iran. Where they could go and what they could report on was tightly controlled, but Iranian authorities had no editorial influence on content and were not given access to CBC News material before it was published.
Iranian media reported that several missiles hit power plants and desalination pumps in the southern city of Jask on Saturday, citing a local official. About 10,000 people in 20 villages were without water, Tasnim news agency reported.
A power plant and desalination plant in Kuwait was attacked by Iran, the country’s Ministry of Electricity, Water and Renewable Energy said in a statement. It was the second attack on Kuwait’s desalination facilities in two days.
The US military’s Central Command said earlier that it had completed its seventh day of strikes by hitting Iran’s surveillance facilities, military infrastructure, underground weapons storage and naval forces.
Guterres of the UN is concerned about the infrastructure of the people
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is concerned about the escalation of the conflict, especially “attacks on the infrastructure of the people of Iran and the entire region,” his spokesman said on Friday.
Iranian media reported on strikes early Saturday in the province of Hormozgan in the Strait of Hormuz. State TV said three people died and eight were injured when two bridges and a road tunnel were damaged.
Pascal Larose is the vice president of Desgagnés, a shipping company with two ships stuck in the Strait of Hormuz since the war between the US, Israel and Iran. Larose says it is unclear when the ships will be able to complete their journey.
A day earlier, Iranian state media said US strikes had hit at least five bridges in the south. It was reported that seven people were killed when the bridges were attacked in the southern port of Bandar Khamir, where a railway station was also hit. An airport was reportedly hit in the east in Iranshahr.
Trump has threatened to launch air strikes against Iran’s infrastructure and has refused to ban ground attacks on Iran’s coast or islands. US officials said the attack on southern Iran was designed in part to give Trump options.
Such measures risk Iran attacking the critical infrastructure of vulnerable Gulf states or having its allies in Yemen continue to disrupt international power by attacking ships from the Red Sea.
