(AFP) – An Iranian drone strike on a passenger terminal at Kuwait’s international airport killed an Indian national and wounded 63 people on Wednesday, as conflict escalated between Tehran and US forces in the Gulf. The attacks constitute one of the more severe tests yet of a fragile April 8 ceasefire that paused more than a month of war sparked by the US-Israeli bombing of Iran and has largely held despite sporadic strikes.
Kuwait’s military dubbed the strike on the airport an act of “criminal Iranian aggression,” while the foreign ministry condemned it as having “once again targeted vital and civilian infrastructure.” Iran’s Revolutionary Guards accused US forces of provoking the strikes by targeting a tanker and a communications tower on the country’s Qeshm Island. India’s foreign ministry confirmed that one of its nationals was killed and several others wounded in the attack. “We again call upon parties to cease such attacks,” it said.
Kuwaiti health ministry spokesman Abdullah al-Sanad said 63 people were treated for injuries “including head wounds, cerebral hemorrhages, amputations and injuries resulting from explosions.” Kuwait suspended air traffic and diverted arriving planes to other destinations, but later restarted Kuwait Airways flights. The international airport has been targeted several times during the war and had only fully resumed operations on Monday. The Gulf nation said it detected a total of 30 ballistic missiles and drones launched Wednesday during the “heinous Iranian aggression.” In response, it demanded that two Iranian embassy staff leave the country within 24 hours, denying Iranian claims that Kuwaiti territory and airspace had been used to attack the country.
– ‘Not normal’ –
Hassan Sheikh, a 40-year-old Pakistani resident of Kuwait who lives near the airport, said he heard explosions throughout the night, adding: “For the first time, my children felt how serious the situation was.” With Bahrain also complaining of overnight drone attacks from Iran, the United Arab Emirates moved to rally its Gulf neighbours in opposition to Tehran. “A firm, unified, and cohesive Gulf stance is imperative,” UAE presidential adviser Anwar Gargash posted on social media, adding the aggression “targets us all.”
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards did not claim the attack on the civilian airport, but accused Kuwait and Bahrain of enabling US attacks and announced targeting a different location, “the Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait, which hosts helicopters.” The Iranian supreme leader’s military adviser, Mohsen Rezaei, said that “every attack will be met with a deluge of missiles and drones.”
– Lebanon talks –
Earlier, the US military said it had “successfully defeated” a series of Iranian missile and drone attacks on Kuwait and Bahrain and confirmed it had conducted strikes on Iran’s Qeshm Island. Bahrain authorities said they had intercepted three Iranian missiles and a number of drones. The escalation came after US, Israeli and Lebanese officials met in Washington for direct talks on ending the parallel conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed group Hezbollah. The Lebanese embassy in Washington said a US proposal to stop attacks would at first only cover Israeli strikes on Beirut and Hezbollah attacks on Israeli territory, before expanding in scope.
Israel has been fighting Hezbollah since the group dragged Lebanon into the wider Middle East war by attacking Israel on March 2 in support of Iran. Neither side has publicly accepted the deal, and senior Hezbollah official Mahmud Qomati told AFP in a written statement that the group “will not accept a partial ceasefire.”
– New strikes –
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington wanted the talks to remain independent of those with Iran aimed at ending the broader war. But Iran has repeatedly linked the two conflicts and said Israel’s campaign in Lebanon threatened the US-Iran ceasefire. In recent days, Israeli troops staged their deepest ground offensive into Lebanon in two decades. Lebanon said Israeli strikes on Wednesday killed at least nine people in the country’s south, including two paramedics, while another raid hit a car near Beirut.
Hezbollah claimed a rocket attack on Wednesday that targeted troops in northern Israel, saying it was “in response to the Israeli enemy army’s violation of the ceasefire.” A truce to halt the fighting in Lebanon was meant to take hold on April 17, but has never been observed. Israeli officials have warned it will strike Beirut’s southern suburbs if Hezbollah launches projectiles targeting northern Israeli communities, a stance they say has backing from Washington. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that US President Donald Trump shared his goal of disarming Hezbollah to “save Lebanon.”
– AFP teams in Kuwait, Dubai, Tehran, Beirut, Washington, and Jerusalem.
© 2024 AFP
