Oil prices surged more than 5% on Tuesday as tensions in the Middle East intensified, with Iran targeting crude-producing neighbours and multiple countries rebuffing US President Donald Trump’s demand to help secure the strategic Strait of Hormuz.
US benchmark West Texas Intermediate was up 5,16% at $98,32 a barrel whilst Brent Crude also rose above 5% before easing back.
The price spike came as a fresh drone strike hit the Fujairah oil complex on the UAE’s east coast on Tuesday, causing a fire but no injuries, local authorities said. The facility, which sits on the Gulf of Oman and enables the UAE to bypass the Strait of Hormuz for some exports, had already been struck on Monday.
Missile attacks across Gulf states
Qatar said Tuesday it had intercepted a missile attack after an AFP journalist reported hearing several explosions in Doha. In nearby Dubai, an AFP journalist heard three explosions after a mobile phone alert warned residents of the United Arab Emirates’ most populous city to “immediately seek a safe place” over “potential missile threats”.
In Abu Dhabi, falling shrapnel from an intercepted missile killed a Pakistani national, city authorities said.
An “unknown projectile” struck a tanker off the coast of Oman, a UK maritime agency said Tuesday, noting there were no reported injuries and only “minor structural damage”.
Israeli strikes on Tehran and Beirut
Israel’s army said Tuesday it had launched a “wide scale wave of strikes” in the Iranian capital Tehran and started striking Hezbollah targets in the Lebanese capital Beirut.
Lebanese state media later said Israeli strikes hit three neighbourhoods in Beirut, including a residential apartment building. An Ethiopian woman was wounded in the Beirut strikes, media said, quoting the health ministry.
US embassy targeted in Baghdad
A drone and rocket attack targeted the US embassy in Baghdad early Tuesday, a security official said. The security official said that “three drones and four rockets attacked the embassy, with at least one drone crashing inside it”.
Separately, a missile strike on a house in Iraq’s capital Baghdad killed four people, with initial reports suggesting two of the victims were “Iranian advisors” to Tehran-backed groups, a security official told AFP.
Iraq was drawn into the Middle East war after having long been a proxy battleground between the United States and Iran, with strikes targeting Iran-backed groups that have claimed daily attacks on US interests in Iraq and the region.
Trump demands ‘enthusiasm’ for Hormuz mission
The US president demanded that allies help secure the Strait of Hormuz, but European powers pushed back on a possible mission to reopen the vital waterway shut by Iran in response to US-Israeli attacks.
Trump criticised the lukewarm response to his call for world powers to send warships to escort tankers through the strait, which normally carries a fifth of global crude oil, demanding nations “get involved quickly and with great enthusiasm”.
Israel seeks European support
Israel’s President Isaac Herzog told AFP that Europe should back his country’s fight against Hezbollah, as Israeli forces carried out ground operations in Lebanon.
Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war when Hezbollah attacked Israel on 2 March in response to the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei in US-Israeli strikes.
“Europe should support any effort, any effort, to eradicate Hezbollah now,” Herzog said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sent wishes to Iranians for the coming Nowruz holidays, marking the Persian new year. “This year this holiday has special meaning… I take this opportunity to wish you a happy Nowruz — a year of freedom. A new beginning of hope to all of you,” he added, referring to the holiday that will be celebrated Friday.
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Kataeb Hezbollah commander killed
Iraq’s powerful armed group Kataeb Hezbollah said its senior security commander Abu Ali al-Askari had been killed, without providing details on the circumstances of his death. He was also the spokesperson in charge of issuing all key statements in the group’s name.
Two drones targeted a major southern Iraqi oil field late Monday, an oil ministry spokesperson told AFP, after the second attack in four days. Majnoon oil field was “targeted by two drones, one hit a telecommunication tower,” oil ministry spokesperson Saheb Bazoun said, adding that there had been no damage.
A drone sparked a fire Monday at a luxury hotel frequented by foreign diplomats in Baghdad’s fortified Green Zone shortly before air defences foiled a rocket attack at the US embassy.
Shrapnel falls on Jerusalem holy sites
Israeli police said they found missile and interceptor fragments at holy sites in Jerusalem’s Old City, including areas near the Al-Aqsa mosque and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
“During the recent missile salvo fired from Iran towards Jerusalem, several intercepts occurred over the city,” the police said.
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