Iran says targeted Haifa oil refinery after Tehran oil depot hit

CAIRO/ KUWAIT CITY: Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Saturday they had targeted Israel’s Haifa oil refinery after Iran’s Tehran oil depot was targeted, state media reported.

Air raid sirens had sounded earlier on Saturday in the area of Haifa, but there were no reports in Israel of anything being hit.

Earlier, US and Israeli strikes hit an oil depot in Tehran, Iranian state media said, marking the first reported attack on the Islamic republic’s oil infrastructure. “An oil depot in southern Tehran was targeted by the US and Zionist regime,” the official IRNA news agency said.

The depot was in an area close to a key oil refinery but the ILNA news agency reported that the refinery’s facilities “were not damaged in the military attacks”. Separately Kuwait’s national oil company on Saturday announced a cut to its production of crude due to Iranian attacks and threats to the Strait of Hormuz, a key transit point for Gulf hydrocarbons.

“In light of the ongoing aggression by the Islamic Republic of Iran against the State of Kuwait, including Iranian threats against safe passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz, KPC (Kuwait Petroleum Corporation) has implemented a precautionary reduction in crude oil production and refining throughput as part of its risk management and business continuity strategy,” it said, adding that it would be “reviewed as the situation develops”.