Iran threatens Gulf energy facilities after Israeli attack on its largest gasfield
Revolutionary Guards say they will strike infrastructure in Saudi Arabia, UAE and Qatar after South Pars field hit
Iran has threatened to attack energy infrastructure across the Gulf region in retaliation for Israeli strikes on its largest gasfield, marking the first targeted attacks on its fossil fuel production since the war began.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have threatened counterstrikes on several energy facilities across Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar “in the coming hours” after state media reports that missiles had targeted its gas facilities at the giant South Pars field, the largest gas reserves in the world.
The strikes on Iran’s South Pars gasfield, which it shares with Qatar, were widely reported in Israeli media to have been carried out by Israel with the consent of the US.
The attack against the heart of Iran’s gas infrastructure marks a key escalation in US and Israeli military operations. The two countries have until now largely spared Iran’s oil and gas sector and helped to keep a lid on the global oil price surge.
The oil price climbed towards $110 a barrel on Wednesday afternoon as the mounting threat to the Gulf’s oil and gas infrastructure fuelled concerns over more disruption to global supplies, amid the continuing blockade of the strait of Hormuz.
Iran’s state media identified Saudi Arabia’s Samref refinery and Jubail petrochemical complex, the UAE’s al-Hosn gasfield and Qatar’s Mesaieed petrochemical complex and holding company, and the Ras Laffan refinery as targets for the regime.
“These centres have become direct and legitimate targets and will be targeted in the coming hours. Therefore, all citizens, residents, and employees are requested to immediately leave these areas and move to a safe distance without any delay,” the warning said.
The US-Israeli escalation was condemned as “political suicide” by Eskandar Pasalar, the governor of Iran’s capital Assaluyeh. He told Iran’s state media that “the pendulum of war has swung” to a “full-scale economic war”.
A Qatari government spokesperson, Majid al-Ansari, warned that targeting energy infrastructure “constitutes a threat to global energy security, as well as to the peoples of the region and its environment”.
The international oil benchmark climbed by as much as 5% to a high of $108.60 (£81.48) a barrel, while Europe’s gas benchmark jumped by more than 7.5% to over €55.50 (£47.95) a megawatt hour.
The third week of war began with Iranian attacks on the UAE’s Shah natural gasfield, one of the largest in the world. An oilfield in Iraq, Majnoon, and the UAE’s biggest port and oil storage facility, Fujairah, were also hit by Iranian drones and missiles.
Daily oil exports from the region have fallen by at least 60% from prewar levels due to the impact of drone and missile strikes and Iran’s effective chokehold on exports through the strait of Hormuz. This has forced its Gulf neighbours to curtail oil and gas production as pipelines and storage facilities reach their capacity.
But Iran’s hydrocarbon infrastructure has been largely spared. The US attack on Kharg Island, the home of Iran’s oil processing hub and the heart of its economy, took aim at military assets while leaving its oil export facilities untouched over the weekend.
Iran has continued to ship tankers of crude through the strait of Hormuz without interruption in the weeks since the war began while threatening to set ablaze vessels carrying crude from neighbouring Gulf states.
The global oil price pushed past $116 a barrel early last week, for the first time since May 2022, as traders began to count the cost of the war on global supplies of oil and gas.
Fossil fuel tankers have struggled to leave the Gulf since the start of the month when the IRGC wrested control of the strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s seaborne oil trade flowed before the war began.
In addition to the chokehold on deliveries, Gulf producers have been forced to shut their own oil and gas fields after rerouting as much oil as possible via pipelines to bypass the strait and filling storage facilities.