Israel strikes major Iranian gas field; Tehran vows to hit Gulf energy sites !!!!
The Israeli Air Force struck Iranian gas infrastructure in the country’s south on Wednesday, in a coordinated effort with the United States that experts warned would send ripples through the global economy and further expand the regional conflagration.
The strikes, launched on the 18th day of the US-Israeli offensive against the Iranian regime, targeted Iran’s massive offshore South Pars natural gas field, located in the Bushehr Province. Iranian state media reported additional strikes targeting oil facilities in Asaluyeh.
The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the strikes on the gas facility, but an Israeli official confirmed the strike was carried out by the IAF.
It marked the first time that Israel attacked natural gas facilities in Iran during the ongoing campaign, after the US struck the Islamic Republic’s oil export hub on Kharg Island over the weekend, although it said it hit only military sites on the island.
A US defense official confirmed to the Axios news site that the South Pars strike was coordinated with and approved by Washington. However, Gulf nations, which were likely to bear the brunt of any Iranian retaliation, slammed the move as “dangerous and irresponsible.”
Iran’s Fars news agency reported that gas tanks and parts of a refinery had been hit, workers had been evacuated to a safe location and emergency crews were trying to put out a fire. State media later said the fire was under control.
Iran warned that it would retaliate by targeting energy installations across Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, whose own North Field gas field is connected to South Pars.
It specifically threatened Saudi Arabia’s Samref Refinery and its Jubail Petrochemical Complex. It also threatened the UAE’s Al Hasan Gas Field and the petrochemical plants and a refinery in Qatar.
A source familiar with the matter later told Reuters that Qatar’s Ras Laffan LNG installations were being evacuated as a precaution.
Knock-on effect felt abroad
The impact of the strikes was felt immediately, both in the region and beyond, as gas imports to neighboring Iraq were halted, and the price of Brent crude oil jumped to just shy of $110 a barrel, around a six percent increase in price.
The price of crude oil had already skyrocketed since February 28, as Tehran shuttered the Strait of Hormuz, where 20% of oil and liquefied natural gas is normally shipped past its coast, but consuming nations have hoped the disruption will be short-lived as long as production infrastructure is spared.
Iran’s offshore South Pars gas field makes up around a third of the world’s largest reservoir of natural gas, and the country’s gas production totalled 276 billion cubic meters in 2024, with 94% consumed in Iran, according to data by the Gas Exporting Countries Forum.
Sanctions and technical constraints have meant that most of the gas Tehran produces from South Pars is for domestic use, although a portion is also exported across the border to Iraq, which is highly dependent on it. Around 30% to 40% of Iraq’s gas and power needs are supplied by Tehran.
Following the attack, however, Iran diverted its gas domestically, halting the flow to Iraq. Iraqi authorities said they were expecting a knock-on effect on power supplies there.
“Depending on the damage to the South Pars, it will likely affect Iran’s ability to send gas to power electricity plants domestically and domestic energy supplies for gas processing,” explained Karen Young, senior research scholar at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, to The Times of Israel.
“Iran has promised to retaliate mostly on petrochemical facilities and refineries in UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia,” she said, in what would be “one step further to disruption of global energy markets,” this time focused “less on crude transit and more on refined products.”
“Iran does not export LNG [liquified natural gas], rather it exports gas through pipelines to neighboring countries,” she explained. “So, if there is a disruption to domestic supply, it could shift to stop exports to Turkey and Iraq.”
Turkey, unlike Iraq, did not immediately acknowledge any changes to its gas imports from Iran.
Iraq’s state news agency said later on Wednesday that the country’s state oil company SOMO had signed contracts with international carriers and buyers to export crude oil via Turkey, Jordan and Syria.
The regional response to the Israeli strikes was not a warm one, as the Gulf states found themselves once again in the line of fire as Iran warned it would retaliate by striking their own gas facilities.
Dangerous and irresponsible
Qatar, in a statement published by foreign ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari on X, panned Israel for the “dangerous and irresponsible” action.
As a close US ally and host to the largest US airbase in the region, Qatar blamed the attack on Israel without mentioning any US role.
“The Israeli targeting of facilities linked to Iran’s South Pars field, an extension of Qatar’s North Field, is a dangerous & irresponsible step amid the current military escalation in the region,” he wrote.
“Targeting energy infrastructure constitutes a threat to global energy security, as well as to the peoples of the region & its environment,” he continued, calling on all sides not to target “vital facilities.”
The UAE, like Doha, noted that Iran’s South Pars field is connected to Qatar’s North Field, and warned that the strikes “represented a dangerous escalation.”
The targeting of energy facilities, it said, “entails serious environmental repercussions and directly endangers civilians.”
While neither Israel nor the US commented directly on the strike or took responsibility for it, a US official and a second source familiar with the matter told The Times of Israel that Jerusalem coordinated its strikes on the South Pars natural gas field with the US.
The source familiar with the matter said the US was aware of the attack ahead of time, but did not take part in it.
Channel 12 cited an unnamed official who said the goal of the attack was to communicate to Tehran that the longer it blocked the Strait of Hormuz, the worse it would be for Iran’s energy infrastructure.
“It was a signal to the Iranians about what might come next,” the official said.
Another official told Ynet that the strike was intended to increase domestic pressure on the regime by ramping up the anger against it.
“There will be power and gas outages,” the unnamed official predicted. “The regime will probably reduce the supply of gas to consumers, and from there, the pressure will increase.”
The official predicted that Iran would likely try to target Israeli national infrastructure in retaliation, on top of the Gulf facilities it has already threatened.
Strategic significance
Beyond the material damage feared by the Gulf states, experts warned that the consequences of the Israeli strike could be far-reaching and impact global markets.
“This could have strategic significance — even [marking] a turning point in the war — not because of the importance of this specific facility for Iran, significant as it may be, but because this is the first time gas facilities in Iran have been meaningfully struck,” explained Yoel Guzansky, a Gulf expert at Tel Aviv’s Institute for National Security Studies.
“Iran is capable of, and may now choose to, target gas and oil facilities in the Gulf states,” he said. “This could escalate the war to a new level, severely impacting international markets and the ability of Gulf states to export oil and gas.”
This, in turn, he predicted, could “trigger a further response from the United States and Israel, potentially including strikes on even more significant Iranian oil infrastructure — chief among them Kharg Island.”
Trump has already threatened to carry out additional strikes on Kharg Island “just for fun,” after the US struck military targets on the oil export hub on Saturday.
“This could mark a very dangerous escalation [in] the war,” Guzansky said.
Hinting at the potential for this scenario to play out, Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Qhalibaf warned on X on Wednesday evening that Tehran would be seeking “an eye for an eye.”
“A new level of confrontation has begun,” he added.