US allies in Gulf bear brunt of attacks

Loud explosions were heard across Gulf cities yesterday as Tehran carried out strikes against countries in the region that host US bases for the third day in response to US-Israeli air raids.

AFP reporters and witnesses said they heard several loud blasts in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Doha, Manama and Kuwait City.

Iran’s continued and unprecedented bombardment of the Gulf has rattled a region long seen as a haven of peace and security in the turbulent Middle East.

Bahrain’s interior ministry said Iranian strikes killed one person, the island nation’s first fatality since the start of Tehran’s campaign, bringing the total number of deaths across the Gulf to five since Saturday.

Falling debris from an intercepted missile sparked a fire on a foreign ship in the port city of Salman, the Bahraini ministry said, killing one worker and seriously injuring two others.

Since Saturday, across the Gulf, civilian infrastructure has been hit, from airports and seaports to residential buildings and hotels.

As of Sunday afternoon, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) defence ministry said it had so far “dealt with” 165 incoming ballistic missiles, two cruise missiles and 541 Iranian drones.

In Bahrain, a friend alerted me on Sunday morning that the airport was under attack after having a sleepless night.

“Woken by huge bangs and wailing siren,” he texted. “I think maybe around 20 booms and bangs. At least two hits”.

These are not familiar scenes in this region, but since this conflict began on Saturday morning, Iran appears to have expanded its target set from just hitting military targets, like the US Navy’s 5th Fleet headquarters in Bahrain, to airports and other civilian sites.

Now luxury hotels and shopping malls, high-rise apartment blocks, state-of-the-art airport departure terminals are getting sporadically hit as gaps appear in the Arab states’ air defences in the Gulf.

These places were never built with the prospect in mind that they would one day come under attack from drones and ballistic missiles.

Iran’s Foreign Minister, Abbas Aragchi, has denied targeting his country’s neighbours, telling Al Jazeera: “We are not attacking our neighbours in the Persian Gulf countries, we are targeting the presence of the US in these countries. Neighbours should direct their grievances to the decision-makers of this war”.

Some of the damage to civilian infrastructure in the Gulf states is accidental - resulting from debris falling from intercepted missiles. But not all.

The number of attacks on airports in Bahrain and the UAE point to more than coincidence. Iran always made it clear in advance that, if it was attacked, it would retaliate at any country it considered to be complicit in that attack, reports BBC.