00:00Iranian attacks continued to target sites across the Gulf this Tuesday.
00:05In Kuwait, power lines were hit by air defence shrapnel, causing partial electricity outages for several hours.
00:11Bahrain, meanwhile, said it was attacked with missiles and drones,
00:15and that an Emirati soldier serving with its forces had been killed.
00:19The United Arab Emirates, meanwhile, saying air defence systems responded to similar attacks,
00:24and Saudi Arabia said it destroyed Iranian drones, targeting its oil-rich eastern province.
00:31Well, for more now, we can cross to our correspondent in Doha, Hoda Abdelhamid.
00:36Hoda, the New York Times today is reporting that Saudi Crown Prince MBS,
00:41that he's pushing for the US to keep the war with Iran going.
00:46What would the thinking be, do you think, behind that reported encouragement?
00:54Well, I think the thinking for Saudi Arabia is at this stage, the Gulf is so unprotected
01:00that probably it is better to try to finish this war just to make sure, you know, that the US
01:08doesn't leave,
01:09and then Trump declares victory, and then Saudi and the other Gulf countries are left to pick up the pieces.
01:17They can come under attack, for example, by the Houthis in Yemen, which happened in the past before this war,
01:23and they can come under attack from Iran itself.
01:27But the article is based on sources who claim that Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince,
01:35would have said that this is a historic moment for the Middle East.
01:39That language is very much close to the narrative that was coming out of Israel,
01:47specifically from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the lead-in to this war.
01:54It has to be said that the Saudi government has issued a statement denying any of these claims.
02:01This is the fog of war.
02:02You know, you will have leaks everywhere, confusing people, paving the way for the public opinion for the next step
02:12of the war.
02:13Just shortly after this article came out, another leak came out with another news organization
02:21saying that 3,000 more US soldiers were on the way to this region.
02:26I think it's really to create this fog of war that happens during each and every conflict I covered.
02:33Probably the truth is somewhere in between.
02:37And Hoda, Iran this Tuesday is continuing to attack Gulf states.
02:42Have you noticed any shift in the intensity or the targets of these attacks, Hoda?
02:49Well, I have to say, I was listening to the press conference, the weekly press conference,
02:55of the spokesman of the foreign minister here in Qatar, Madhul Ansari,
03:01because we hadn't heard any alert for the good part of the last two and a half to three days.
03:07And then he all of a sudden said that doesn't mean that there haven't been any attack.
03:11Shortly after, the Ministry of Defense has clarified that today alone, for example,
03:18nine ballistic missiles were intercepted here in Qatar.
03:22There seems to be maybe a shift that the attacks from Iran are now targeting specific areas away from the
03:30urban areas.
03:31You see that, for example, in Saudi Arabia, where most of the drone intercepted,
03:37and all of them, I would say, on this day, were towards the eastern region.
03:41That's home to most of the oil refineries and the most important oil installations in Saudi Arabia.
03:49And then you had another attack in Bahrain where a UAE contractor who is from Moroccan origin was killed
03:57and several others were hurt.
04:00That, again, being a military target.
04:05So people here are a bit confused.
04:09Many would tell you maybe there's space for diplomacy.
04:11Maybe something is happening behind the scenes.
04:15President Trump seems to say that.
04:18He just said it about 20 minutes ago or so while I was on standby to come on air.
04:23But there seems to be a little bit of a shift, and it's certainly not the same intensity that we
04:31had for the first three weeks of this war.
04:34I wouldn't draw conclusions yet.
04:36For sure, Iran is under a lot of pressure.
04:42It's being hit on a daily basis.
04:44And it's come under a lot of criticism because, according to some statistics I've seen,
04:50two-thirds of Iran's firepower was directed towards the Gulf countries rather than towards Israel.
04:57So that is something probably that the military commanders in Iran are also taking into consideration.
05:03Hoda Abdelhamid, thank you very much.
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