Middle Eastern countries are bracing on Monday, standing in defiance to a series of Iranian warnings of further strikes on global economic hubs, US technology facilities, hotels and tourist destinations, and major seaports and airports across the region, Euronews journalists in the Gulf report.
The Tehran regime’s public threats have demonstrated Iran’s move towards an economic war in the region, with widespread impacts on global economies.
For the first time since the war erupted, Iran threatened a neighbouring country’s non-US assets, calling for the evacuation of three major ports in the United Arab Emirates.
As Tehran continues pounding the Gulf countries and the UAE was intercepting Iranian attacks, a drone hit a fuel tank in the vicinity of Dubai’s International Airport early Monday, causing a fire and forcing the brief suspension of all flights at the world’s busiest airport for international travel and a key hub for many routes linking the East and West.
The incoming flights circled in a holding pattern until operations gradually resumed after an hour.
Meanwhile, a fire broke out on Monday following a drone attack on an industrial oil facility in Fujairah, one of the UAE’s seven emirates, authorities said. The Media Office in Fujairah said a drone targeted the Fujairah Oil Industry Zone, causing an “advanced” fire.
Also on Monday, a Palestinian civilian was killed in a missile attack in the UAE capital Abu Dhabi, authorities said, when a missile fell on a civilian vehicle in the Al Bahyah area.
Other Gulf countries, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain, reported new missile and drone attacks on Monday.
Saudi Arabia’s Defence Ministry said early Monday it downed Iran’s multiple-drone barrage over the capital Riyadh and the nation’s oil-rich western region. The Saudi Defence Ministry says no casualties or damage were reported.
Most of Iran’s missile launchers gone, Israel says
The Israeli military says it has destroyed an estimated 70% of Iran’s missile launchers during the first two weeks of the war, reducing the Iranian missile capabilities.
He says Israel has carried out some 7,600 strikes in Iran, knocking out 85% of Iran’s air defences and targeting a number of Iranian nuclear sites.
Shoshani says the war will go on “for as long as needed” and says Israel still has thousands of targets it is prepared to strike.
The attacks continued as the Iranian blockade of the world’s most vital shipping lane in the Strait of Hormuz continues.
US President Donald Trump announced on Sunday evening that he has demanded that about seven countries send warships to keep the strait open, saying Washington is negotiating with countries that are heavily reliant on Middle East crude to join a coalition to police the waterway.
Meanwhile, on the other front of the war, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency says one person was killed by an Israeli airstrike early Monday on a home in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Sir.
The agency says another strike occurred after paramedics from the Islamic Health Society, Hezbollah’s health arm, arrived at the scene.
The agency says the second strike killed two paramedics and wounded another person.
The Israeli military says it sent additional ground troops into Lebanon for what it calls a “limited and targeted operation,” to defend Israeli border communities against attacks from the Tehran-backed Hezbollah militant group.
The war has killed at least 1,300 people in Iran, at least 850 in Lebanon and 12 in Israel, according to officials in those countries. At least 13 US military members have been killed, including six in a plane crash in Iraq last week.
More than 800,000 people — nearly one out of every seven residents of Lebanon — have been displaced, AP reported on Monday.