Gulf energy infrastructure was thrust into the line of fire on Wednesday after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards threatened immediate strikes against facilities in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar following an Israeli attack on the South Pars gasfield. Specific sites were named and evacuation orders issued. The announcement sent oil prices surging toward $110 a barrel and raised fears of a broader energy infrastructure war with global implications.
South Pars is the world’s largest natural gas reserve and is shared between Iran and Qatar. The Israeli strike on the field — reportedly with US authorization — was the first direct attack on Iranian fossil fuel production since the war began. Both Washington and Tel Aviv had previously avoided such strikes, concerned that targeting Iranian energy infrastructure could spark the kind of cascading economic crisis now threatening to unfold.
Iran’s state media named Saudi Arabia’s Samref refinery and Jubail complex, the UAE’s al-Hosn gasfield, and Qatar’s Mesaieed and Ras Laffan facilities as imminent targets. Evacuation orders were broadcast to workers and residents across the region. The governor of Asaluyeh, Eskandar Pasalar, condemned the US-Israeli strike as “political suicide” and declared the war had entered a full-scale economic phase.
Oil prices rose nearly 5% to $108.60 a barrel, while European gas markets climbed more than 7.5%. Gulf oil exports had already been cut by 60% from pre-war levels, devastated by drone strikes and Iran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. Iran had continued shipping its own crude through the strait while its neighbors struggled to export anything at all. Any successful Iranian strikes on Gulf facilities would deepen an already catastrophic global supply shortage.
Qatar’s government spokesperson warned that attacking energy infrastructure constituted a direct threat to global energy security and the people and environment of the region. With Iran’s retaliatory window already open and specific targets named, the conflict had entered its most economically dangerous phase. The world waited to see whether diplomacy or military force would define the next chapter.
