Oil approached $110 a barrel Wednesday as the energy confrontation between Iran and Israel reached a crisis point following Israeli strikes on the South Pars gasfield and Iran’s sweeping threats against Gulf energy infrastructure. The Revolutionary Guards named specific facilities in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar as targets and ordered immediate evacuation. The crisis was unlike any the global energy market had seen in years.
South Pars, the world’s largest natural gas reserve shared between Iran and Qatar, had been kept off the battlefield throughout the conflict. The Israeli strike on the field — reportedly with US backing — ended months of restraint and immediately provoked Iran’s most detailed and time-bound retaliatory threat of the war. Both countries had previously avoided this step, but the decision to proceed marked a turning point with potentially catastrophic global consequences.
Iran’s state broadcaster named Saudi Arabia’s Samref refinery and Jubail complex, the UAE’s al-Hosn gasfield, and Qatar’s Mesaieed and Ras Laffan facilities as targets. Workers and residents were told to leave immediately. Asaluyeh governor Eskandar Pasalar called the US-Israeli attack “political suicide” and declared the war had moved into a full-scale economic phase.
Brent crude climbed to $108.60 per barrel — close to $110 — while European gas prices surged more than 7.5%. Gulf oil exports had already fallen 60% from pre-war levels, the product of sustained infrastructure damage and Iran’s Strait of Hormuz blockade. Iran had continued to ship its own crude through the strait while blocking Gulf neighbors from doing so — a strategic imbalance that had persisted throughout the conflict and threatened to be compounded by a devastating new wave of strikes.
Qatar’s government spokesperson Majid al-Ansari warned that targeting energy infrastructure threatened global energy security and regional populations. As oil approached $110 and Iran’s retaliatory clock ran, the confrontation between the two sides had reached a level of intensity that left little room for diplomatic resolution in the short term. The world watched with mounting alarm and braced for what the next hours would bring.