Iran attacks Al Udeid Air Base housing US troops in Qatar
Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) officially confirmed on Monday that it launched a retaliatory missile attack targeting the Al Udeid base, Iran's Tasnim news agency reports.
Tasnim said the operation is called 'Annunciation of Victory'.
US military officials said that Al Udeid Air Base was the only US military base targeted by Iran, according to Reuters news agency.
The official confirmed there was no impact on the base just outside Qatar's capital Doha.
A US defence official added that 'al Udeid Air Base was attacked by short-range and medium-range ballistic missiles originating from Iran today'.
'At this time, there are no reports of US casualties. We are monitoring this situation closely and will provide more information as it becomes available.'
Flares were visible over Qatar's capital, Doha, on Monday. It was initially not immediately known if this was the air defence system or missiles.
Loud explosions were also heard, although so far no injuries have been reported. Qatar's Defence Ministry says its air defence systems successfully intercepted missiles targeting Al Udeid Air Base.
In a statement, the ministry said the incident resulted in no deaths or injuries, crediting 'the vigilance of the armed forces and precautionary measures taken'.
Al Jazeera's correspondent Ali Hashem, reporting from Tehran, said, 'It seems that this is the beginning of an Iranian retaliation against US bases in the Gulf.'
'For now, we are unsure about the scope, the timing, or how long this will continue — or if it will be a one-off strike,' said Hashem, adding that 'nobody knows whether this will also serve as a pretext for the US to retaliate or enter the war'.
'Many analysts think this could be a kind of choreographed attack – that is, the US was informed in advance, just like in 2020 when Iran retaliated for the killing of General Qassem Soleimani, and Iran was reportedly aware in advance of the attack on Fordow. But these are just speculations,' noted Hashem, adding that 'this is, of course, unprecedented'.
Iran's Supreme National Security Council says that the missile strike against the Al Udeid Air Base was far away from residential areas in Qatar.
'This action does not pose any threat to the friendly and brotherly country, Qatar, and its noble people, and the Islamic Republic of Iran remains committed to maintaining and continuing warm and historic relations with Qatar,' the council said in a statement.
Iran and Qatar enjoy fraternal relations and the Qatari government has condemned both the Israeli and US attacks on Iran.
Qatar, nevertheless, condemned the attack as a blatant violation of its sovereignty.Al Jazeera's correspondent Dorsa Jabbari, reporting from Doha following the Iranian attack said 'people here have never experienced this kind of environment, so it was certainly a very dramatic experience.'
'But it's important to understand that this was not intended to harm the civilian population, but it was a clear message to the US government and military that Iran has the capability to launch direct attacks on US military personnel in the Middle East,' added Jabbari.
'It really is up to the United States now if this conflict moves forward whether or not we are going to see a trajectory of war engulfing this regionor whether they will choose this as an opportunity to see it as off-ramp to deescalate the situation,' noted Jabbari.
Al Jazeera's correspondent, Kimberly Halkett, reporting from Washington, DC said that the US President Donald Trump is currently in the Situation Room of the White House.
Initially, his national security briefing had been scheduled for the Oval Office, but it was moved due to thse developments involving attacks on US bases – specifically in Qatar.
'We also know that the US was aware and informed in advance that the attacks would take place. As a result, it was able – just as the Qatari Foreign Ministry did – to alert civilians and personnel at Al Udeid, allowing flights to be diverted and casualties to be minimised,' Halkett added.
Reports from the White House indicate that the Iranian attack on the air base appears to have been calibrated to mirror the US strike in terms of the number of missiles used.
'However, the US president had cautioned Iran against taking this action – and now it has occurred,' said Halkett.
The embassies of the US and United Kingdom in Qatar had earlier released statements recommending that citizens in Qatar shelter in place until further notice. Qatar said it shut down its airspace temporarily as part of the measures taken to ensure the safety of residents and visitors.
The countries with the most US troops include Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. These installations serve as critical hubs for air and naval operations, regional logistics, intelligence gathering and force projection.
Gulf countries, including Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain and United Arab Emirates, announced they had closed their airspace.
Al Udeid is the largest US military base in the Middle East, established in 1996. Covering an area of 24 hectares (60 acres), the base accommodates almost 100 aircraft as well as drones. This base, which houses some 10,000 troops, serves as the forward headquarters for US Central Command (CENTCOM) and has been central to operations in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
NBC News
4 hours ago
- NBC News
U.S. envoy Witkoff's visit to Gaza criticized as a publicity stunt
Weeks of rising anger over Palestinians starving due to Israel 's offensive and aid restrictions had reached all the way to the White House, with President Donald Trump lamenting the sight of emaciated children on the brink of starvation. On Friday, his Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, entered Gaza in a rare visit by high-level U.S. officials to the besieged enclave. Accompanied by the Israeli military, Witkoff visited an aid distribution site in southern Gaza run by the U.S. and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, where hundreds of Palestinians waited desperately behind barbed wire for food. 'Incredible feat!' Mike Huckabee, the U.S. ambassador to Israel, who accompanied Witkoff, said in a post on X on Friday, after touring GHF's operations and speaking to "folks on the ground." Palestinians and others inside Gaza have criticized the visit as a public relations stunt for GHF, whose aid distribution process has been marked by chaos, looting and deadly shootings, often by Israeli soldiers, that have killed hundreds of hungry Palestinians seeking aid. 'It was a PR stunt, a controlled visit supervised and dictated by the Israeli military,' Ellie Burgos, an American critical care nurse volunteering at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, told the NBC News crew. 'What they saw was not the reality.' Burgos had earlier called for Witkoff to visit Gaza, urging him to witness the conditions on the ground for himself, but felt his limited tour did little to change the situation on the ground. 'Food is still incredibly difficult to find, people are still being shot at aid distribution sites, and violence continues,' she said. On the day of the visit, at least 92 people were killed on Friday across Gaza, including 51 people who were seeking aid, Dr. Mohammed Saqr, Director of Nursing at Nasser Hospital, told NBC News. Mohamed Saddak, 47, who was hoping to collect food for his family of nine, told a NBC News' crew on the ground that tanks had advanced toward him and others as they sought to receive our aid. 'They are constantly shooting at us,' he said, 'firing from tanks, and sometimes by drones.' The IDF did not immediately respond to a request for comment from NBC News on the shootings at aid sites following Witkoff's visit. Israeli officials continued to deny claims of widespread hunger inside Gaza, though in a sign of shifting discourse, top U.S. officials have begun to acknowledge the crisis. 'You've got little kids who are clearly starving to death,' Vice President JD Vance told reporters on Monday. In a post on X, Witkoff said the visit's purpose was to give Trump a "clear understanding of the humanitarian situation and help craft a plan to deliver food and medical aid to the people of Gaza." After Gaza, Witkoff on Saturday visited Hostages Square in Tel Aviv, where families of Israeli hostages held captive by Hamas were demanding that the Israeli government secure a deal to release the remaining hostages. Fifty hostages remain in Gaza, about 20 of whom are believed to be alive. According to a statement by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, Witkoff told them, 'We will get your children home and hold Hamas responsible for any bad acts on their part.' He added, 'We will do what's right for the Gazan people.' The protests came after a video of an Israeli hostage in Gaza, Rom Braslavski, was released by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad on Thursday. A day later, Hamas released a video of another Israeli hostage, Evyatar David, showing him alive but frail. It is unclear when the videos were filmed. 'We cannot endure even one more minute without bringing him home,' Braslavski's cousin Adam Hajaj said in a statement. 'This video tore my family apart!' Huckabee, meanwhile, hailed GHF's distribution of over a million meals a day, which at Gaza's population of roughly 2 million people, averages to half a meal per person per day. GHF stepped in to distribute food in the weeks after Israel lifted its nearly three-month total blockade on all food and supplies entering the enclave. But the aid GHF distributed, alongside some limited quantities by other international organizations, fell far short of the needs of the population. On Sunday, Israel said it was expanding aid access into Gaza after outrage mounted over the widespread starvation and surging deaths from malnutrition. GHF runs four aid sites in Gaza and even though it claims independence from any government, it runs the sites inside Israel's militarized zone with the backing of the Israeli military. Witnesses and aid agencies have decried the aid delivery process, which, according to the U.N., has resulted in deaths of nearly 1,400 people while collecting aid, including 859 in the vicinity of the GHF sites. The Israeli military and the GHF have acknowledged that some shots have been fired but said only as warnings. 'US-backed Israeli forces and private contractors have put in place a flawed, militarized aid distribution system that has turned aid distributions into regular bloodbaths,' New York-based Human Rights Watch said Friday. Burgos's colleague, Dr. Tom Adamekiewicz, urged the diplomats to see "what's happening to the children, the families, to these young boys and women and men that are being basically shot at like rabbits."
San Francisco Chronicle
5 hours ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
I was Palestinian activist Awdah Hathaleen's rabbi and friend. He was not killed in my name
My friend, Awdah Hathaleen, was killed on Monday — supposedly in my name. I was one of his rabbis; he was my teacher. On Monday, unarmed and posing no danger to anyone, he was killed by an Israeli settler who believes that Palestinians have no right to live in the West Bank, or in any of Israel/Palestine, and that Judaism requires Jews to expel them from it. I disagree, and furthermore, claiming that my religion justifies Awdah's death is a sacrilege. I had known Awdah for eight years, since I first visited to his village, Umm al-Khair. I came as a rabbi who was disturbed by the many reports of how the Palestinians were treated in the occupied West Bank by Jewish settlers. Maybe it was my Jewish ethics, or maybe it was a guilty conscience that called me to see the situation for myself. Once I saw that degrading behavior, I could not turn away. What had been abstractions gleaned from daily news reports turned into real people trying to keep their children safe, to raise them with love even while living under a Damocles sword. These Palestinians became people with names: Awdah, Eid, Tariq. The villagers were happy to have visitors who would, like me, inevitably join them in any way we could to help them in their nonviolent resistance to the encroachment of Carmel, the illegal Jewish settlement growing ever bigger every year that abuts the village and threatens its future existence. When I met Awdah, I was so touched by what a good soul he had and what a creative organizer he was. He was diligently studying English. He wanted to communicate the plight of Palestinians under occupation. He believed that when people understood what was happening, they would become allies. That is why he was active in the creation of the acclaimed film 'No Other Land,' to let the world to know what was taking place in his neighborhood. Piedmont's Kehilla Community Synagogue became allies when we formed Face-to-Face under the inspiration of our founder, Rabbi Burt Jacobson. Every month we would meet with Awdah on Zoom and get often-depressing updates from the village. We raised money for Umm al-Khair when its cars and equipment were destroyed by settlers or the Israeli military. We raised money for school books. It was the least that we could do. In June, Face-to-Face worked with Awdah and Eid Suleiman to bring them to the Bay Area. After the many times they welcomed me in their village, I looked forward to greeting them at our shul. Finally, they would be face-to-face with our congregants and be able to talk to audiences at other places around the United States. Phil Weintraub, a Kehilla member who worked on the lengthy effort to obtain visas for Awdah and Eid, went to pick them up at the airport. Hours passed after their plane landed, but they did not emerge from customs. We were finally told that they were being detained. We asked public officials to intervene, and demonstrated at the airport. All to no avail. After 26 hours the two men were put on a plane to return them home. Despite their absence, we gathered that evening to share our anger and disappointment, and to affirm our conviction to keep supporting the village. From my own interactions with him, I know that Awdah, who was just 31, was dedicated to the principles of nonviolent resistance to end the occupation. Yinon Levi, identified in videos shooting at the villagers and killing Awdah, is a settler famous for his zeal in terrorizing Palestinians. President Joe Biden had him sanctioned in 2024 for his alleged role in violence against Palestinian civilians. President Donald Trump lifted that sanction on the first day of his second term. When the Israeli authorities finally showed up to the scene where Awdah had been murdered, Levi himself pointed out the people that he wanted arrested. Amazingly, his wishes were granted. Eid Suleiman and 13 others are in detention in Ofer prison as of this writing. Levi was briefly detained overnight and released to house arrest, but no one, not the villagers nor the settlers, expects him to suffer any serious consequences. No consequences is what killed my friend. Israel won't impose them, nor the United States. Neither will our American Jewish legacy institutions, who, while claiming to support a two-state solution, have never seriously criticized the expansion of the occupation. In my final in-person conversation with Awdah last August, he confided he was struggling with what to tell his children. 'I can't tell them that everything will be OK and I can't say that they'll be fine.' I'd never seen sadness disrupt his optimism. And I never expected that his children would be fatherless within a year. David J. Cooper is rabbi emeritus at Kehilla Community Synagogue, which he co-founded with Rabbi Burt Jacobson in 1984.
Los Angeles Times
6 hours ago
- Los Angeles Times
Ivy League universities paid hundreds of millions to settle with Trump. Is UCLA next?
University of California leaders face a difficult choice after the U.S. Department of Justice said this week that UCLA had violated the civil rights of Jewish students during pro-Palestinian protests and federal agencies on Wednesday suspended more than $300 million in research grants to the school. Do they agree to a costly settlement, potentially incurring the anger of taxpayers, politicians and campus communities in a deep-blue state that's largely opposed to President Trump and his battle to remake higher education? Or do they go to court, entering a protracted legal fight and possibly inviting further debilitating federal actions against the nation's premier public university system, which has until now carefully avoided head-on conflicts with the White House? Leaders of the University of California, including its systemwide president, James B. Milliken; UCLA Chancellor Julio Frenk and UC's 24-member Board of Regents — California Gov. Gavin Newsom is an ex-officio member — have just days to decide. In findings issued Tuesday, U.S. Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi and the Justice Department said UCLA would pay a 'heavy price' for acting with 'deliberate indifference' to the civil rights of Jewish and Israeli students who complained of antisemitic incidents since Oct. 7, 2023. That's when Hamas attacked Israel, which led to Israel's war in Gaza and the pro-Palestinian student encampment on Royce Quad. The Justice Department gave UC — which oversees federal legal matters for UCLA and nine other campuses — a week to respond to the allegations of antisemitism. It wrote that 'unless there is reasonable certainty that we can reach an agreement' to 'ensure that the hostile environment is eliminated and reasonable steps are taken to prevent its recurrence,' the department would sue by Sept. 2. A day after the Justice Department disclosed its findings, the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, Department of Energy and other federal agencies said they were suspending hundreds of grants to UCLA researchers. A letter from the NSF cited the university's alleged 'discrimination' in admissions and failure to 'promote a research environment free of antisemitism.' A Department of Energy letter cutting off grants on clean energy and nuclear power plants made similar accusations, adding that 'UCLA discriminates against and endangers women by allowing men in women's sports and private women-only spaces.' Initial data shared with The Times on Thursday night showed the cuts to be at least $200 million. On Friday, additional information shared by UC and federal officials pointed to the number being greater than $300 million — more than a quarter of UCLA's $1.1 billion in annual federal funding and contracts. UCLA has not released a total number. In a campuswide message Thursday, Frenk, the UCLA chancellor, called the government's moves 'deeply disappointing.' 'This far-reaching penalty of defunding life-saving research does nothing to address any alleged discrimination,' Frenk said. In a statement to The Times Friday, an official from the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the NIH, said it would 'not fund institutions that promote antisemitism. We will use every tool we have to ensure institutions follow the law.' An NSF spokesperson also confirmed the UCLA cuts, saying Friday that the university is no longer in 'alignment with current NSF priorities.' A Department of Energy spokesperson also verified the cuts but did not elaborate outside of pointing to the department's letter to UCLA. The Times spoke to more than a dozen current and former senior UC leaders in addition to higher education experts about the rapid deliberations taking place this week, which for the first time have drawn a major public university system into the orbit of a White House that has largely focused its ire on Ivy League schools. Trump has accused universities of being too liberal, illegally recruiting for diversity in ways that hurt white and Asian American students and faculty, and being overly tolerant of pro-Palestinian students who he labels as antisemites aligned with Hamas. Universities, including UCLA, have largely denied the accusations, although school officials have admitted that they under-delivered in responding to Jewish student concerns. In the last two years, encampments took over small portions of campuses, and, as a result, were blamed for denying campus access to pro-Israel Jews. In a major payout announced Tuesday — before the Justice Department's findings — UCLA said it would dole out $6.45 million to settle a federal lawsuit brought by three Jewish students and a medical school professor who alleged the university violated their civil rights and enabled antisemitism during the pro-Palestinian encampment in 2024. About $2.3 million will be donated to eight groups that work with Jewish communities, including the Anti-Defamation League, Chabad and Hillel. Another $320,000 will be directed to a UCLA initiative to combat antisemitism, and the rest of the funds will go toward legal fees. Through spokespersons, Frenk and Milliken declined interviews on what next steps UCLA might take. Friday was Milliken's first day on the job after the long-planned departure of former UC President Michael V. Drake, who will return to teaching and research. But in public remarks this week, Newsom said he was 'reviewing' the Justice Department's findings and that UC would be 'responsive.' The governor, who spoke during an event at the former McClellan Air Force Base in Sacramento County on Thursday, said he had a meeting with Drake scheduled that day to discuss the Trump administration's charges. Newsom did not respond specifically to a question from The Times about whether UC would settle with Trump. 'We're reviewing the details of the DOJ's latest and then that deadline on Tuesday,' the governor said. 'So we'll be responsive.' In a statement Friday, Newsom said, 'Freezing critical research funding for UCLA — dollars that were going to study invasive diseases, cure cancer, and build new defense technologies — makes our country less safe. It is a cruel manipulation to use Jewish students' real concerns about antisemitism on campus as an excuse to cut millions of dollars in grants that were being used to make all Americans safer and healthier.' Senior UCLA and UC leaders, who spoke on background because they were not authorized to discuss legal decisions, said the university has been bracing for this moment for months. The university and individual campuses are under multiple federal investigations into alleged use of race in admissions, employment discrimination against Jews, and civil rights complaints from Jewish students. At the same time, leaders said, they were hoping the multimillion-dollar settlement with Jewish students would buy them time. 'It backfired,' said one senior administrator at UCLA, reflecting the sense of whiplash felt among many who were interviewed. 'Within hours of announcing our settlement, the DOJ was on our back.' Other senior UC officials said the system was considering suing Trump. It has already sued various federal agencies or filed briefs in support of lawsuits over widespread grant cuts affecting all major U.S. universities. UC itself, however, has not directly challenged the president's platform of aggressively punishing elite schools for alleged discrimination. It's unclear if a suit or settlement could wipe out all remaining investigations. Mark Yudof, a former UC president who led the system from 2008 to 2013, said he felt the Trump administration was targeting a public university as a way to 'make a statement' about the president's higher education aims going beyond Ivy League institutions. 'But this is not Columbia,' Yudof said, referring to the $221-million settlement the New York campus recently reached with the White House to resolve investigations over alleged antisemitism amid its response to pro-Palestinian protests. On Wednesday, Brown University also came to a $50-million agreement with the White House. The Brown payment will go toward Rhode Island workforce development programs. Harvard is also negotiating a deal with the government over similar accusations regarding antisemitism. 'The University of California is much more complex,' said Yudof, who lives in Florida and also led the University of Texas and University of Minnesota. 'For one, an issue that may affect UCLA is not going to affect UC Merced or UC Riverside. But do you come to an agreement on all campuses? If there is a settlement payment, does it affect all campuses, depending on the cost?' George Blumenthal, a former chancellor of UC Santa Cruz, said he 'just can't see UC making the kind of deal that Columbia did or that Harvard contemplates. Committing public funds to Washington to the tune of tens or hundreds of million dollars strikes me as politically untenable in California.' Pro-Palestinian UCLA groups said they don't agree with the premise of negotiations. They point out that many protesters in last year's encampment were Jewish and argue that the protest — the focus of federal complaints — was not antisemitic. 'We reject this cynical weaponization of antisemitism, and the misinformation campaign spinning calls for Palestinian freedom as antisemitic. We must name this for what it is: a thinly-veiled attempt to punish supporters of Palestinian freedom, and to advance the long-standing conservative goal of dismantling higher education,' said a statement from Graeme Blair, a UCLA associate professor of political science, on behalf of UCLA Faculty for Justice in Palestine. Higher education experts say UC's decision would set a national precedent. The university's finances include more than $50 billion in operating revenues, $180 billion in investments — including endowment, retirement, and working capital portfolios — and smaller campus-level endowments. The funds support facilities across the state, including multiple academic health centers, investment properties and campuses, as well as tens of thousands of former employees enrolled in retirement plans. Dozens of public campuses across the U.S. are under investigation or pressure from the White House to atone for alleged wrongdoing to Jewish students or to change admissions, scholarship programs and protest rules and more. But UC has long been a standard-bearer, including in academic and protest freedoms. 'If you are Trump, your target of Harvard or Brown is much easier — a snooty elite — than a public, even a UCLA or Berkeley,' said Rick Hess, an education expert with the conservative American Enterprise Institute. Kenneth Marcus, who served as assistant secretary for civil rights in the Education Department during Trump's first term, said there would be benefits for UCLA and the UC system to enter into a 'systemwide agreement that would enable everybody to put this behind themselves.' The Justice Department's Tuesday letter said it was investigating all campuses but only issuing findings of violations so far at UCLA. Marcus, chairman of the Washington, D.C.-based Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, said a systemwide agreement would 'provide the federal government with assurances that the regents are making changes across the board.' Staff writer Taryn Luna in Sacramento contributed to this report.
