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Trump 'surprised' US allies in the Gulf have been targeted
Donald Trump has said he is “surprised” that US allies in the Gulf have been targeted by Iran, in an interview with NBC News.
The president called these countries “terrific”, adding that “they got shot at unnecessarily.” When talking about Iran’s decision to target them, Trump said it was “the biggest surprise I had of this whole thing.”
For decades, Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar and Oman have allowed US military bases, infrastructure or access on their soil, and have been among the largest buyers of American weapons and technology. In return, the US has stood as the Gulf’s closest and most significant military partner and protector.
Now many of these countries have growing concerns over the relationship, analysts say, as they are pulled deeper into a war that they did not start and had diplomatically tried to prevent.
While the Gulf expected to be caught in the backlash, the scale of Iran’s campaign of revenge has left many shocked. Gulf states had assured Tehran that none of their bases would be used for attacks but that has not stopped Iran launching thousands of drones and missiles targeting airports, military bases, oil refineries, ports, hotels and office buildings.
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Frustration has been growing for days around rising fuel costs across much of the US, as Donald Trump tries to play down concerns around the surge of oil prices.
The US fuel average hit almost $3.68 per gallon on Saturday, according to AAA: up 75 cents on where it stood just a month ago.
The US president claimed this weekend to be unconcerned about the impact of higher prices at the pump as November’s midterm elections loom. “I think they’ll go lower than they were before,” he told NBC News.
For now, though, in the US – and much of the world – they remain significantly higher than just a few weeks ago.
The United Arab Emirates is responding to Iranian missiles and drones, authorities said on Sunday morning, attributing “sounds heard” to interceptions.
“UAE air defences are currently responding to incoming missile and drone threats from Iran,” the country’s defence ministry said in a statement.
On Saturday Iran issued an evacuation warning for three major ports in the UAE, claiming that the US had used “ports, docks and hideouts” in the UAE to launch strikes on Kharg Island, the vital Iranian oil export hub.
Iranian attacks on Gulf countries are “almost unhinged” the UAE’s minister for international cooperation Reem Al Hashimy told Australia’s ABC News earlier.
Iraq’s football team will travel to Mexico for a 2026 World Cup playoff match despite calls for it to be postponed due to the Middle East war, the country’s football association has announced.
“The national team will depart at the end of the week to Mexico via a private plane,” said Iraq football association president Adnan Dirjal in a statement, adding they had contacted Fifa to help facilitate the trip during the conflict in the region that has hampered flights.
“We succeeded in communicating with some of the clubs of our professional players to facilitate their joining the national team.”
The match date has been set for March 31 in the Mexican city of Monterrey.
Meanwhile the war, triggered by US-Israeli strikes on 28 February, has thrown into doubt Iran’s participation in the global spectacle.
Donald Trump warned on Thursday that the Iranian team’s “life and safety” would be at risk in the US, despite Fifa chief Gianni Infantino saying they would be welcome at the tournament.
The conflict had also cast doubt on the participation of Iraq, which neighbours Iran, due to travel disruption concerns, with its manager calling for Fifa to postpone the country’s playoff match.
Iraq’s head coach, Australian Graham Arnold, said many of the team’s players and technical staff were stranded in the Middle East due to the ongoing conflict.
Explosions rang out over Bahrain’s capital of Manama early on Sunday, the AFP news agency has reported.
Bahrain says it had intercepted 125 missiles and 203 drones since the start of Iran’s attacks, which have killed two people in the kingdom and 24 others in neighbouring Gulf nations.
Israel says it has identified missiles that were launched from Iran a short while ago, towards its territory.
In a post online, the military said defence systems are “operating to intercept the threat”, while warning citizens to enter protective spaces.
צה"ל זיהה כי לפני זמן קצר שוגרו טילים מאיראן לעבר שטח מדינת ישראל.
מערכות ההגנה פועלות ליירט את האיום. בדקות האחרונות פיקוד העורף הפיץ הנחייה מקדימה ישירות לטלפונים הניידים באזורים הרלוונטיים.
הציבור מתבקש לגלות אחריות ולפעול על פי ההנחיות - הן מצילות חיים.
יש להיכנס למרחבים…
Edward Helmore
The Trump administration’s communications licensing tsar fired a warning shot over the US broadcasting industry Saturday, threatening to cancel the spectrum permits of broadcasters pushing what he termed “hoaxes and news distortions”.
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chair Brendan Carr posted on social media that broadcasters running “fake news – have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up. The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will lose their licenses if they do not.”
Carr’s warning comes amid sustained complaints from Trump and members of the administration over its treatment by what it derisively terms “the mainstream media” and what it considers unflattering or unpatriotic coverage of the conflict in Iran.
In his post, Carr copied a Truth Social post by Trump complaining about “misleading” coverage on Iran.
Zelenskyy claims Russia is supplying Iran with drones
Russia is supplying Iran with Shahed drones to use against the US and Israel, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy told CNN in an interview excerpt aired on Saturday.
Zelenskyy told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria that it is “100% facts” that Iran has used Russian-made Shaheds to attack US bases.
Shahed drones have been linked to other attacks on countries in the region, although their manufacturers are not always clear.
Iran pioneered the Shahed drone, a much cheaper alternative to expensive missiles. They first saw mass use in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, where thousands of them have been launched by Russian forces since fall 2022, according to the Ukrainians.
Although Iran initially provided the drones, Russia now manufactures its own Shaheds. The armed forces of other countries have since adopted Shahed-type drones, including the US military, which has said they are part of the current campaign against Iran.
Britain is reportedly considering sending minehunting drones to unblock Iran’s stranglehold over the strait of Hormuz, as Donald Trump called for allied warships to protect tankers in the region.
The UK Ministry of Defence said “a range of options” were being considered to secure shipping through the strait, where some 20% of the world’s oil ordinarily passes through each day.”
The Sunday Times, which first reported the proposals, said the minehunting drones could be deployed from the Royal Navy’s Mine and Threat Exploitation Group, which is currently in the Middle East.
But the newspaper said it is not known how many drones are in service and which could be deployed.
The Sunday Telegraph meanwhile reported that interceptor drones, made in the UK for Ukraine to use against Russia, could also be used against Iran’s aerial Shahed drones.
Iran’s attacks on Gulf countries are “almost unhinged” the UAE’s minister for international cooperation Reem Al Hashimy has told Australia’s ABC news.
Iran has fired over 1,800 missiles and drones at the Emirates, more than any other country targeted by Tehran in the conflict, upending its aura of tranquillity despite its air defence intercepting a vast majority of the projectiles.
Al Hashimy called it “unprecedented”.
We’ve borne the brunt of most of the missiles and drone attacks, and it’s really quite surprising for us that Iran has taken such an irrational path to fight the Gulf states and act in this quite unlawful, quite unacceptable manner.”
The US State Department has ordered “non-emergency US government employees” and the family members of US government employees to leave Oman, citing “safety risks” in the country.
It did so on Friday, according to a update published by the US Embassy in Oman.
Trump 'surprised' US allies in the Gulf have been targeted
Donald Trump has said he is “surprised” that US allies in the Gulf have been targeted by Iran, in an interview with NBC News.
The president called these countries “terrific”, adding that “they got shot at unnecessarily.” When talking about Iran’s decision to target them, Trump said it was “the biggest surprise I had of this whole thing.”
For decades, Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar and Oman have allowed US military bases, infrastructure or access on their soil, and have been among the largest buyers of American weapons and technology. In return, the US has stood as the Gulf’s closest and most significant military partner and protector.
Now many of these countries have growing concerns over the relationship, analysts say, as they are pulled deeper into a war that they did not start and had diplomatically tried to prevent.
While the Gulf expected to be caught in the backlash, the scale of Iran’s campaign of revenge has left many shocked. Gulf states had assured Tehran that none of their bases would be used for attacks but that has not stopped Iran launching thousands of drones and missiles targeting airports, military bases, oil refineries, ports, hotels and office buildings.
Welcome summary
Hello and welcome to our continuing coverage of the US-Israel war on Iran and the widening crisis in the Middle East that it’s causing.
Donald Trump has said that the US may carry out more strikes on Iran’s Kharg Island oil export hub, saying that while Tehran appears ready to make a deal to end the conflict, “the terms aren’t good enough yet”.
He said the US strikes had “totally demolished” most of Kharg Island, telling NBC News that “we may hit it a few more times just for fun”.
The comments marked an escalation in rhetoric from the president, who had previously said the US targeted only military sites on Kharg.
Here’s what else has been happening.
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Lebanon’s health ministry said Israeli strikes have killed 826 people, including 65 women and 106 children, since the start of the war. In a statement today, the ministry said 31 paramedics were among those killed. Local health authorities reported this morning that an Israeli strike killed 12 medical staff at a clinic in the southern town of Burj Qalaouiya.
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At least 15 people were killed when a strike by Israel and the US hit a factory in the central Iranian city of Isfahan, the semi-official Fars news agency said. There were workers inside the factory, which produces heaters and refrigerators, when the strike hit, Fars reported.
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Iran issued an evacuation warning for three major ports in the United Arab Emirates on Saturday, including the busiest in the Middle East, the Associated Press reported. Iran claims the US had used “ports, docks and hideouts” in the UAE to launch strikes on Iran’s Kharg Island. It urged people to evacuate areas where it said US forces were sheltering.
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Trump renewed his call for other nations to help secure the strait of Hormuz and said the US will coordinate with them amid the US-Israeli war on Iran. “The United States of America has beaten and completely decimated Iran, both Militarily, Economically, and in every other way, but the Countries of the World that receive Oil through the Hormuz Strait must take care of that passage, and we will help – A LOT,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post.
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The Trump administration rebuffed efforts by Middle Eastern allies to start diplomatic negotiations aimed at ending the Iran war that started two weeks ago with a massive US-Israeli air assault, according to reporting from Reuters.
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The Israeli military says it killed two senior officials in Iran’s Khatam al-Anbiya Emergency Command in an airstrike on Tehran. In a post on X, army spokesperson Avichay Adraee said Abdullah Jalali-Nasab and Amir Shariat, described as senior figures in the command’s intelligence branch, were killed in the attack.
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Israel informed the US this week that it is running critically low on ballistic missile interceptors as the conflict with Iran continues, Semafor reported on Saturday, citing US officials familiar with the matter.
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The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chair Brendan Carr accused news broadcasters of “running hoaxes and news distortions” amid the war in Iran in a post on X. “Broadcasters that are running hoaxes and news distortions - also known as the fake news - have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up,” Carr wrote.
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Formula One has cancelled the Bahrain and Saudi Arabia grands prix because of the war, underlining the disruption across the Middle East. The races were due to take place on 12 April in Bahrain and 19 April in Saudi Arabia but the sport was approaching the point at which a decision on cancellation needed to be made to prevent more freight being sent to Bahrain.
