- Missile and drone strikes targeted Kuwait and Bahrain, while US struck Iranian radar sites
- Iranian military warned flights to Kuwait to change routes
- US intercepted six missiles; no US personnel harmed; Iranian damage claims denied
Tit-for-tat strikes on Saturday posed a threat to a fragile ceasefire as the US-Iran war inched towards its 100th day, with Kuwait and Bahrain coming under attacks by missiles and drones.
Visuals showed aerial projectiles being intercepted in the airspace above Kuwait, while sirens blared in Bahrain.
Iranian military spokesperson Ebrahim Zolfaghari, while holding the US responsible for the recent escalation, advised passenger planes bound for Kuwait to change their routes. He also advised citizens of the country to stay away from airports.
Per FlightRadar24, 24 flights were cancelled and 15 were delayed at the Kuwait airport, while planes are being held or diverted amid the strikes. Airspace over the country emptied rapidly.
United States military officials said Iran launched seven ballistic missiles toward Kuwait and Bahrain on Friday, hours after reporting four Iranian "one-way attack" drones were thwarted. US Central Command (CENTCOM) said it intercepted six of the missiles Iran launched and the seventh "did not reach its intended target". "There are currently no reports of harm to US personnel, and Iranian claims of damaging US 5th fleet headquarters in Bahrain are false," the statement said.
The clarification came after Iran's Revolutionary Guard said it targeted the Ali Al Salem airbase, which hosts US forces in Kuwait, and the US Navy's 5th Fleet in Bahrain, according to the state-run IRNA news agency.
The strikes came a day after an attack on Kuwait's international airport killed an Indian man and wounded dozens of people.
On Friday, the US military said it had shot down Iranian ballistic missiles and drones launched toward the Strait of Hormuz and Gulf Arab allies, while striking some of the Islamic Republic's coastal surveillance radar sites in the city of Goruk and on Qeshm Island in response. "The attack drones posed an immediate threat to regional maritime traffic," US Central Command said on social media.
US President Donald Trump and his administration continue to exert pressure on Iran to make a deal to end the conflict, with the other side quoting mistrust as the reason for a lack of headway. The US military is enforcing a blockade on Iranian ports in response to Tehran's chokehold on the crucial corridor for global oil and natural gas shipments, which has sent energy prices spiking and posed political problems for Trump.
An unfazed Trump told reporters Friday that "the situation with Iran seems to be going quite well", while also admitting that Tehran still has war-fighting capacity. "They have some missiles, they have some drones. I would say, percentage wise, maybe 21, 22 per cent of their missiles," Trump said.
Besides the drone interception in the Strait of Hormuz, the US military said that its forces boarded a sanctioned oil tanker linked to Iran in the Indian Ocean as the United States seeks to prevent Iran from profiting off its oil and other goods. The US also targeted Iran's energy sector with new sanctions on a group of people, firms and tankers.
