US-Iran Conflict Widens: Bridges, Airport, Power Infra, Desalination Plant Hit

The US-Iran interim ceasefire agreed last month has collapsed — though efforts remain to salvage it — and the region has endured days of back-and-forth attacks by the US and Iran as they battle for control of the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran on Friday claimed to have attacked the US-operated Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, a mediator in the US-Iran war. Qatar warned its citizens twice to take shelter as a barrage of Iranian missiles targeted the nation earlier in the day. Iran also struck a power and water desalination plant in Kuwait, and carried out attacks on Bahrain and Jordan as the US military expanded its airstrike campaign against Tehran by hitting more bridges, energy sites and collapsing a tower at a key Iranian port, the Chahbahar Port, on the sixth day of strikes.

The US military struck at least five bridges and an airport in Iran on Friday. The US airstrikes hit bridges overnight into Friday in Iran’s southern Hormozgan province, killing at least seven people, Iranian state television reported.

The attacks hit Bandar Khamir, a city on Iran’s coast on the Strait of Hormuz. The strikes on the highway and railway bridge are aimed at cutting off connectivity to Bandar Abbas, Iran’s main port, reports suggested.

The strikes also collapsed a tower at Iran’s Chabahar port on the Gulf of Oman. The US military also released a video of the strike.

An airport was reported to have been hit further east and away from the coast in Iranshahr, in a province bordering Pakistan., according to Reuters.

Iran also acknowledged “attacks on power infrastructure” during the US airstrike campaign for the first time on Friday when its Energy Ministry issued a call for people to use less power in southern provinces.

It said those areas “are currently experiencing extreme heat and attacks on power infrastructure.” The ministry did not elaborate on whether it was power plants, transmission lines or other equipment that had been attacked.

Iran has claimed a major escalation in its military campaign, stating that its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Aerospace Force carried out a “heavy surprise attack” on the US-operated Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar as part of the 15th wave of Operation Nasr 2.

According to Iran’s state-linked Press TV, the strike allegedly destroyed a long-range radar system and several US aerial refuelling aircraft, with others sustaining significant damage. The reported attack follows earlier Iranian strikes targeting locations in Jordan and Kuwait.

Authorities in Kuwait said one of the country’s power generation and water desalination stations had been hit in an Iranian attack, causing damage to facilities, a fire and the disruption of a large number of electricity generation units. The authorities are assessing the damage and working to restore the power generation.