Israel targets Iranian oil, escalating conflict
Israel on Sunday struck southern Lebanon, Beirut and oil storage facilities in Tehran as the war in the Middle East keeps escalating, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised “many surprises” for the next phase of the conflict.Iran also hit a desalination plant in Bahrain. Earlier Sunday, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said a US airstrike damaged an Iranian desalination plant on Qeshm Island, warning that in doing so “the U.S. set this precedent, not Iran.” Such infrastructure is critical for drinking water supplies in the parched deserts of the Gulf.
An Israeli attack on oil storage sites in Tehran sent up pillars of fire that could be seen in Associated Press video as a glow against the Saturday night sky. It appeared to be the first time a civil industrial facility has been targeted in the war.But before Tehran might even consider a ceasefire, Abbas Araghch said “they have to explain why they started this aggression.” Araghch did not specify about whom he was speaking.
Araghchi also told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that “there should be a permanent end of the war and unless we get to that, I think we need to continue fighting for the sake of our people and our security.”He says the war “was imposed on us” by the United States and Israel, and that “what we are doing is legal acts of self-defense and we have every right to do that.”
Meanwhile, an Iranian official deplored the US-Israeli strikes on oil facilities in Iran, saying they pushed the war into a “dangerous phase.”“These attacks on fuel storage facilities amount to nothing less than intentional chemical warfare against the Iranian citizens,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said in a social media post. He said such attacks will have “devastating the environment, and endangering lives on a massive scale” because of hazardous materials and toxic substances they release into the air.
“The consequences of this environmental and humanitarian catastrophe will not be confined within Iran’s borders,” he said.President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi of Egypt on Sunday expressed concerns about the war in the Middle East and its “grave repercussions, including rising energy prices and disruptions to supply chains and air and maritime traffic.”
He warned of the dangers of the conflict expansion which he said could plunge the entire region into chaos, the Egyptian president said.He called for intensified international efforts to stop the war which was triggered by U.S. and Israeli strikes against Iran on Feb. 28.El-Sissi’s comments came in a phone call with French President Emmanuel Macron.
