- Violence has escalated across the Middle East amid Iran and US attacks.
- Jordan, Bahrain and Kuwait also came under attack.
- Iran accused US forces of targeting civilian infrastructure.
Bahrain’s army said its air defences repelled a wave of Iranian attacks on Saturday, as an AFP journalist in Manama reported hearing blasts after sirens sounded.
“Air defence systems thwarted” the attacks, the army said in a statement, adding that they “intercepted and destroyed a number of treacherous Iranian aerial assaults”.
Kuwait on Saturday said Iran struck another of its power and water plants, leading to the deactivation of several power generation units, a day after a similar attack.
“Another electricity and water distillation plant was targeted by a hostile attack that led to a fire erupting in one of the plant’s components,” which resulted in the deactivation of some power generation units, the ministry of electricity and water said in a statement.
Bombing intensified in the Middle East for the seventh consecutive night, with Iran threatening a “full-scale offensive” in response to American strikes and hitting several US military sites in Kuwait, Jordan and Bahrain.
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Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Saturday that two oil tankers directed by “deceptive American intelligence agencies” exploded after hitting mines in the Strait of Hormuz, which the US military quickly denied.
The Revolutionary Guards also said on state television they “stopped” four ships trying to transit the critical waterway.
Major General Mohsen Rezaei, a senior military adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, said Tehran would resume “full-scale offensive operations” if US strikes against it continue for another two or three days.
“Iran will no longer limit itself to retaliatory, like-for-like responses... and no political border will be safe,” Rezaei said, according to the Iranian news agency IRIB.
US forces reported striking Iran with attacks designed to “continue degrading Iranian military capabilities”, according to a statement on X by US Central Command.
In the biggest escalation since the foes resumed hostilities, Iran accused US forces of targeting civilian infrastructure, including an airport, a railway station and two bridges, and said it had struck US assets across the region.
US President Donald Trump has threatened to hit Iranian infrastructure, but there was no confirmation from the US side on Friday that US forces have begun to do so.
The war began on 28 February with deadly US-Israeli strikes on Iran, which retaliated by effectively closing the Strait of Hormuz, a vital shipping channel for much of the world’s oil, and launching attacks on Israel and American interests across the Gulf.
Traffic in the Strait of Hormuz hit a three-week low on Thursday, according to maritime trackers Kpler and MarineTraffic.
Iranian state news agency IRNA reported on Saturday that US attacks killed three people and wounded eight in the southern Iranian province of Hormozgan.
Iran’s army said it targeted multiple sites in Kuwait, Jordan and Bahrain associated with the US military.
In Jordan, Iran targeted fuel tanks at the Al-Azraq base, the state broadcaster said on Telegram.
Jordan’s army said it had shot down 10 Iranian missiles with no casualties or damage.
David Khalfa, a Middle East specialist at the Jean-Jaures Foundation, a Paris-based think tank, noted that a “widening range of strategic infrastructure” is being drawn into the conflict.
“The paradox is that, while the conflict continues to escalate, neither side has a strategic interest in allowing this dynamic to continue. Yet both perceive any compromise as a form of capitulation,” Khalfa told AFP.
Iranian authorities said the supply of drinking water to several villages in the south had been cut off, accusing the US of launching missiles that “struck the power facilities and desalination plant pumps located at the Bonji village pier”, according to the Tasnim news agency.
Iran’s energy ministry urged citizens to reduce electricity use and switch off air conditioners in peak hours, even as temperatures in some areas soared, after the power grid came under strain from what it said were US strikes.
Mediators have attempted to bring both sides back to the negotiating table, and China and Pakistan called for the US and Iran to stop fighting and resume talks.
The US has also reimposed its blockade of Iran’s ports as part of the wider escalation, and attacks on ships in the Strait of Hormuz have continued.
