An Iranian missile barrier against an American military base in Qatar caused any damage that the Pentagon said, while Tehran was looking to calibrate his reprisals for Donald Trump’s strikes against his nuclear sites during the weekend.
The United States and Qatar were aware of the imminent threat of an attack on the basic hours of Al Udeid before the launch of the missiles, a person familiar with the FT case said.
“We do not know any damage to the installation at the moment,” added the US Defense Ministry after the explosions exploded in Doha on Monday evening.
Oil prices have dropped as traders calculated that the attack was largely symbolic and could point out an effort from Iran to avoid a conflict in its own right, despite the risk that it can trigger a robust response.
In a provocative message on X, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme chief of Iran, wrote: “We have not attacked anyone and … we do not go to the assaults of person. It is the logic of the nation of Iran. ”
While Iranian state television said six missiles hit the base, the spokesman for the Qatar Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Majed Al-Ansari, said that the country’s air defenses “thwarted the attack and managed to intercept the Iranian missiles”. He added that there were no victims.
In a provocative message on X, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme chief of Iran, wrote: “We have not attacked anyone and … we do not go to the assaults of person. It is the logic of the nation of Iran. ”
The sprawling base just outside the Qatari capital is the regional headquarters of the Central Command and generally accommodates around 10,000 American soldiers. But most of the staff were evacuated last week and planes and other equipment moved when regional tensions have skyrocketed.
Qatar had previously closed its airspace pending an Iranian attack. The American and British embassies in Doha also told their citizens in the small state of the Gulf of “sheltering in place”.
The Iranian attack came a little more than a day after Trump ordered the American soldiers to drop the “Bunker Buster” bombs on Fordow and Natanz – Iran’s main nuclear sites – while Washington joined the Israel War at 10 days against the Islamic Republic.
The attack on Al Udeid, which also serves as a regional regional headquarters of the Royal Air Force, is also likely to drag the United Kingdom into the conflict. On Monday, British Foreign Minister David Lammy said that the United Kingdom was ready to defend its staff and assets in the region and that “its allies and partners”.
Shortly before the attack, Major-General Abdolrahim Mousavi, head of the Iranian armed forces, said that Trump had “raped all international standards by breaking the airspace of our beloved country” and “the crime itself and the blatant lack of respect cannot remain unanswered”.
Iran launched a similar attack on the United States in 2020 when it pulled missiles in two American bases in Iraq after Trump ordered the assassination of Qassem Soleimani, the most powerful commander in Iran. The assault was a telegraph and did not cause any damage, and both sides fell away from the edge of a full -fledged war.
But a regional official said that the attack and threat to the Gulf countries “” “will undoubtedly have an impact on the efforts to create relations that have been underway between” Iran and its Arab neighbors.
Ansari du Qatar said that the Gulf State “reserves the right to respond directly”, increasing the possibility of an expansion regional confrontation, but also called for an “immediate cessation” of military actions.
International airlines, including British Airways, Air France, Kuwait Airways and Etihad Airways, had previously canceled or released certain destinations in the Gulf.
BP, Totalengies and Eni also began to evacuate foreign staff from the oil fields in southern Iraq in the midst of fears that Iran can target energy infrastructure in the region.
The regional states have been on board since Israel launched his war against Iran 10 days ago, fearing an attack on American bases or energy facilities. They also fear that Iran can seek to block the Hormuz Strait, the navigable track through which about a quarter of the raw passes in the world at sea.
The Gulf States, including Qatar, previously told the Trump administration that they would not allow the United States to use bases in their territory to launch attacks against Iran.
The United States has around 40,000 soldiers in the Middle East in Qatar bases and military sites, Bahrain, which welcomes the fifth Navy fleet, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, as well as in Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Syria.
The United States also has 2,500 soldiers in Iraq and hundreds in Syria which could be vulnerable to attacks by Shiite activists supported by Iran as well as Iranian missiles.
Israel has widened its strikes on Iran earlier on Monday, hitting sites in Tehran, including the notorious of Evin prison, and the siege of the Basij, a force linked to the elite guards of the Revolution.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said the soldiers continue to strike Iran until the Islamic Republic has continued to shoot Israel.
But two people familiar with the thinking of the Israeli government said that, given the damage it had already caused to the ballistic missile and the nuclear capacities of Iran, it was looking for means of finishing the conflict.
“Israel can” close “this operation in the coming days and is arranged. It depends on the United States, the international community and especially the Iranians,” said one of the people.
Additional report by James Politi and David Sheppard
