Iran escalated its retaliation Thursday by striking energy infrastructure across the Gulf, hitting a Saudi refinery on the Red Sea, setting LNG facilities in Qatar and oil refineries in Kuwait ablaze, after an Israeli attack on its main gas field triggered a surge in global fuel prices.
Brent crude oil, the international standard, spiked to $114 a barrel as global fears of an energy crisis rose, up more than 57% since Israel and the U.S. started the war Feb. 28 with strikes on Iran.
A ship was set ablaze off the coast of the United Arab Emirates and another was damaged off Qatar, underscoring the ever-present danger also facing vessels due to Iran's stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway through which a fifth of the world's oil is transported.
Saudi Arabia had begun pumping large volumes of oil west to avoid the strait and ship it from the Red Sea, but the security of that route was called into question after Iran's drone hit the country’s SAMREF refinery in the Red Sea port city of Yanbu.
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 missiles. Production had already been halted there after earlier attacks, but it said the latest wave of missiles caused "sizable fires and extensive further damage."
