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Iran attacked desalination sites in Kuwait twice in two days over the weekend, authorities in the arid Gulf state said, while Iran reported strikes on one of its plants that supplies drinking water to thousands of people.
The second Iranian attack on a desalination plant caused a fire which spread through a “large number” of electricity generation units, Kuwait’s electricity, water and renewable energy ministry said in a statement.
Kuwaiti officials had said one of the country’s joint desalination and power plants had come under “hostile attack,” setting fire to part of the site and forcing authorities to disconnect several electricity generation units.
Residents were told to cut down their electricity and water use.
Iran’s military on Monday said it had attacked an air base and port in Bahrain, as well as a Kuwaiti military base housing U.S. special forces.
Meanwhile, Iranian media reported the U.S. had struck a desalination plant on Iran’s coastline on Saturday, severing water access for around 10,000 people.
Experts have long warned the desalination plants in the Gulf and broader Middle East region are very vulnerable to attacks or natural disasters.
The attacks are a “massive” escalation in the conflict, said Yossi Mekelberg, a senior consulting fellow with the Chatham House think tank in London. Attacks on desalination plants are “bound to bring a response,” he told Newsweek.
Both Iran and the U.S. have accused one another of striking critical infrastructure that supports civilians, which is generally considered a war crime under international law unless there’s a military objective in targeting this type of site.
What Are Desalination Plants and Why Are They So Important In The Gulf?
Water desalination plants work by taking out salts and other minerals in seawater, then churning out fresh water that Gulf state residents can drink or use in their everyday lives.
They also provide water for growing crops and for keeping hotels and hospitals running. The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that if the Gulf states lose access to their desalinated water supply, diseases could spread and many people could be forced from their homes.
The process to strip out salts from the water is called reverse osmosis.
Tens of millions of people in the Gulf rely on desalination for their drinking water. There are an estimated 5,000 desalination plants scattered around the Middle East, and the vast majority of the Gulf’s desalinated water comes from just 56 of these facilities.
In Kuwait, roughly 90 percent of the country’s drinking water comes from desalination plants.
Bahrain—which said one of its desalination plants was struck by Iran in March but not significantly damaged—is similarly dependent on these facilities for its drinking water.
In Qatar, this number surges to 99 percent, meaning desalination plants are critical for keeping its population supplied with drinking water.
However, the country has built massive storage facilities to make sure there would be enough water for several days if desalination plants are damaged or destroyed.
Some other countries in the Middle East, like Saudi Arabia, also use desalination plants, but supplement these facilities with other clean water sources.
Experts say water desalination plants are very expensive to run and suck up a lot of energy to stay operational. They can also be an obvious weakness for the Gulf states during wartime or if a natural disaster strikes, because of how many people are dependent on them.
Many desalination plants are also hooked up to power plants, meaning damage to one part of the site, like facilities which make seawater drinkable, can have a ripple effect on electricity supplies.
“If Iran successfully destroyed the Gulf’s desalination infrastructure, then the consequences could be devastating,” the Atlantic Council think tank said in a report released earlier this year.
Plants Targeted in Iran
Back in March, Iran‘s top diplomat, Abbas Araghchi, accused the U.S. of striking a plant in the country and cutting off water flow to 30 villages. The U.S. denied intentionally targeting the desalination facilities on Qeshm Island, which sits in the vital Strait of Hormuz shipping lane.
Araghchi called the alleged U.S. strike a “dangerous move with grave consequences.”
An Iranian lawmaker claimed the U.S. had attacked a desalination plant in the southern Hormozgan region late on Friday, saying pumping stations and equipment used to bring seawater into the facility had been damaged.
Tehran’s energy ministry said on Monday all the desalination plants along the southern edge of the country were working, and said none of Iran’s islands were short of water, according to the IRNA state news agency.
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Frances Mao and Tony Phillips
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