Tehran intensifies attacks on Gulf energy facilities after Israel hits Iranian gas field

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran intensified its attacks on its Gulf Arab neighbors' energy infrastructure Thursday, setting Qatari liquefied natural gas facilities and a Kuwaiti oil refinery ablaze as it hit back following an Israeli attack on its main natural gas field, a major escalation in the Mideast war that has sent global fuel prices soaring.

A ship burned off the coast of the United Arab Emirates and another was damaged off of Qatar, underscoring the ever-present danger facing vessels due to Iran's stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz.

Qatar, a key source of natural gas for world markets, said firefighters put out a blaze at a major LNG facility after it was hit by Iranian missile attacks. Production had already been halted there after earlier attacks but it said the latest wave of missiles caused “sizeable fires and extensive further damage.”

Damage to the facility could delay Qatar in getting its supplies to the market even after the Iran war ends.

A drone attack on Kuwait's Mina Al-Ahmadi refinery sparked a fire but caused no injuries, the state-run KUNA news agency reported. The refinery is one of the biggest in the Middle East, with a petroleum production capacity of 730,000 barrels per day.

Authorities in Abu Dhabi said they were forced to shut down operations at its Habshan gas facility and Bab field, calling Iranian overnight attacks on the sites a “dangerous escalation.”

Missile alert sirens sounded in multiple other areas around the Gulf, and Israel warned of incoming Iranian fire.

Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates all denounced the Iranian attacks, with Saudi Arabia’s top diplomat saying assaults on the kingdom meant “what little trust there was before has completely been shattered.”

In morning trading, Brent crude oil, the international standard, was above $110 a barrel, up more than 50% since Israel and the United States started the war Feb. 28 with strikes on Iran.

The wave of Iranian attacks came after Israel hit South Pars, the world's largest gas field located offshore in the Persian Gulf and owned jointly by Iran and Qatar.

With some 80% of all power generated in Iran coming from natural gas, according to the Paris-based International Energy Agency, the attack directly threatens the country's electricity supplies. Natural gas is also used to supply household heating and cooking across the Islamic Republic.

Hitting the gas field is a “clear expansion of the conflict,” the New York-based Soufan Center said in a research note.

“Israel’s target selection in this war has heavily focused on the institutions, leaders and infrastructure ..." the think tank said. "It now seeks to inflict additional pressure on the regime by making the living conditions for civilians intolerable.”

Iran condemned the strike on South Pars, with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian warning of “uncontrollable consequences" that "could engulf the entire world.”

In Washington, President Donald Trump said that Israel would not attack South Pars again, but warned on social media that if Iran continued striking Qatar’s energy infrastructure, the U.S. would retaliate and “massively blow up the entirety” of the field.

“I do not want to authorize this level of violence and destruction because of the long term implications that it will have on the future of Iran,” Trump said on social media.

Qatar Energy said on X that a missile hit on its massive Ras Laffan LNG facility caused the blaze early Thursday.

A ship was also hit off the country's coast, according to the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center. It was not clear whether it was deliberately targeted of was struck by falling debris as Qatar fired off missile interceptors at incoming Iranian barrages.

Saudi Arabia also reported downing Iranian drones targeting its natural gas facilities overnight, and authorities in Abu Dhabi shut down the Habshan gas facility and Bab field after interceptions over the sites.

Another ship was set ablaze early Thursday off the UAE coast. It was also unclear whether it was targeted or hit with debris, the UKMTO said. It said the vessel was just off the coast of Khor Fakkan, near the mouth of the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's oil is normally shipped.

More than 20 vessels have been attacked during the Iran war so far as Tehran has kept a tight grip on shipping traffic through the waterway, which leads from the Persian Gulf to the open ocean.

Iran insists the waterway is open, just not to the U.S. or its allies, and while some vessels have sailed through, it has only been a trickle.

Iran announced the execution of three men detained in January’s nationwide protests, the first such sentences known to have been carried out, the judiciary's Mizan news agency reported.

The men were accused of stabbing two police officers to death in Qom, some 130 kilometers (80 miles) south of the capital, Tehran, during the protests.

Iran put down the demonstrations with intense violence that killed thousands of people and saw tens of thousands others detained, and activists have warned that authorities might carry out mass executions of those detained.

Iran long has been accused by rights campaigners of extracting coerced confessions from detainees and not allowing them to fully defend themselves in court.

More than 1,300 people in Iran have been killed during the war. Israeli strikes have displaced more than 1 million Lebanese — roughly 20% of the population — according to the Lebanese government, which says 968 people have been killed.

In Israel, 15 people have been killed by Iranian missile fire, including a Thai agricultural worker who died overnight after getting hit with shrapnel. Three people were also killed in the occupied West Bank overnight by an Iranian missile strike, the Palestinian Red Crescent said.

At least 13 U.S. military members have been killed.

Metz reported from Ramallah, West Bank, and Rising from Bangkok. Associated Press writers Natalie Melzer in Tzukim, Israel, Julie Watson in San Diego and Sally Abou AlJoud in Beirut contributed to this report.

Fuel prices are displayed at a gas station in Frankfurt, Germany, Thursday, March 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)

Palestinians inspect the damage at a beauty salon after a deadly Iranian strike in the West Bank village of Beit Awa, near Hebron, Thursday, March 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)

Damaged apartment following an Iranian missile strike in Tel Aviv, Israel, March 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Maya Levin)

FILE - Iranian Intelligence Minister Esmail Khatib attends the inauguration ceremony of the 6th term of the Assembly of Experts in Tehran, Iran, May 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi, File)

FILE - Commander of Iran's Basij paramilitary force, Gen. Gholam Reza Soleimani, gives a press conference in Tehran, Iran, Nov. 18, 2019. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi, File)

FILE - Ali Larijani, center, head of Iran's National Security Council, gestures as Hezbollah supporters throw rice to welcome him outside Rafik Hariri International Airport in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2025. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein, File)

Smoke and flame rise from a residential building following an Israeli airstrike in central Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, March 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

Israeli authorities hang Israeli and U.S. flags at the site struck by an Iranian missile that killed two people, in Ramat Gan, Israel, Wednesday, March 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty)

BRUSSELS (AP) — European Union leaders are holding a summit in Brussels on Thursday for talks on the Iran war, energy prices, migration and an enormous loan for war-ravaged Ukraine being held up by Hungary.

Many of those leaders have deflected entreaties by U.S. President Donald Trump to send military assets to secure the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway for the global flow of oil, gas and fertilizer. Rising energy prices because of the war and fears in Europe of a new refugee crisis have pushed leaders to make the Middle East one of the top priorities at the summit.

The European Commission, the EU's executive branch, has floated the idea of a “toolbox” of measures to lower energy prices for leaders to discuss because no single policy will work across the myriad markets in the 27-nation bloc to blunt economic shocks from the war, according to a senior European diplomat who wasn't authorized to be publicly named so spoke on condition of anonymity.

The summit will also focus on a long-brewing standoff between Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and most other EU nations.

The last EU summit was held in December at a Belgian castle, where the leaders including Orbán agreed to a 90 billion-euro ($104 billion) loan for Ukraine for help overcoming a budget shortfall in the country as it grapples with a grinding war with Russia.

But a month later, Orbán backtracked after the Druzhba oil pipeline was disabled in January after what Ukrainian officials said was a Russian drone attack. The pro-Russia leader, who has held office in Hungary since 2010, is running an aggressive media campaign villainizing both Brussels and Kyiv as he seeks reelection next month.

“If there is no oil, there is no money,” Orbán said in a social media post on Tuesday.

To get Ukraine the much-needed loan, EU leaders and diplomats will lobby Orbán and Slovakia's prime minister, Robert Fico, whose government has also taken pro-Russia stances.

On Tuesday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen offered for the EU to pay to repair the Druzhba pipeline and the development of alternative fuel lines for Hungary and Slovakia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that any obstruction to the loan is “absolutely unfair” and that there is “no alternative” for the embattled nation than those funds as it faces a severe budget crisis because of the war, which began on Feb. 24, 2022.

“There may be alternatives in terms of financing mechanisms, but there is simply no alternative to strengthening our army,” Zelenksyy said on Wednesday.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz told lawmakers in Berlin on Wednesday that the EU must swiftly reach an agreement on the 20th package of sanctions against Russia and the loan.

He said that he would “advocate for that emphatically” in Brussels and that “we must not take into consideration a single country in the European Union that is currently setting up this blockade in Europe now for domestic political reasons and because of an election campaign that is being conducted there.”

Merz said, in urging for more sanctions, that “the needs of the moment call for us to increase the pressure on Moscow together – the U.S. and the European partners together."

Karel Janicek in Prague, Geir Moulson in Berlin, and Illia Novikov in Kyiv, Ukraine, contributed to this report.

French President Emmanuel Macron speaks with the media as he arrives for the EU summit at the European Council building in Brussels, Thursday, March 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)

Latvia's Prime Minister Evika Silina speaks with the media as she arrives for the EU summit at the European Council building in Brussels, Thursday, March 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)

Belgium's Prime Minister Bart De Wever arrives for the EU summit at the European Council building in Brussels, Thursday, March 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)

From left, Greece's Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, European Council President Antonio Costa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen speak during a round table meeting at the EU summit in Brussels, Thursday, March 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)

Austria's Chancellor Christian Stocker speaks with the media as he arrives for the EU summit at the European Council building in Brussels, Thursday, March 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)

Germany's Chancellor Friedrich Merz, right, and French President Emmanuel Macron walk together as they arrive for the EU summit at the European Council building in Brussels, Thursday, March 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)

Prime minister of Hungary, Viktor Orbán speaks during a countryside campaign tour in Kaposvár, Hungary, Monday, March 16, 2026 ahead of April 12 parliamentary election. (AP Photo/Denes Erdos)

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen delivers a statement during a media conference at EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, March 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo)