Regional Developments

Ali Haydar Onatça Özel Bülten

WAR BETWEEN USA-ISRAEL VS IRAN

On 28 February, the US and Israel launched a series ofaerial attacks across Iran, killing the Islamic Republic’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and several senior regime officials.

US-Israeli bombing raids and missile strikes have targeted cities and military installations across Iran, killing more than 750 people – including 175, most of them children, sheltering in a school in the south of the country.

In response, Iran has launched missiles and drones at US allies across the Gulf, hitting US military locations, oil and gas installations, and civilian areas in Saudi

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Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, Jordan, Cyprus and Iraq.

Hostilities have quickly spread throughout the region, with dozens killed in Lebanon by Israeli raids following rocket fire from the Iran-aligned Hezbollah militia.

Why did the US and Israel attack Iran?

The conflict comes after months of US military build-upin the region and repeated failed negotiations betweenthe US and Iran over Tehran’s nuclear programme.

President Donald Trump said the “massive and ongoing military operation” was launched now because Iran had “rejected every opportunity to renounce their nuclear ambitions.”

Israel has long viewed the Islamic Republic, established during the Iranian Revolution of 1979, as an existential threat, and fought a punishing 12-day war against Iran with US support in June.

Both Israel and the US claim that Iran still seeks to own nuclear weapons, despite the 2015 US-Iran nuclear dealand Trump’s claim following last year’s conflict that Iranian nuclear facilities had been “obliterated.”

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Omani mediators reported on the night before the US-Israel attack that the latest round of US-Iranian nuclear talks were close to a breakthrough, meaning “Iran will never ever have nuclear material that will create a bomb.”

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, three days after the initial strikes, said the US attack pre-empted one by Israel on Iran, and was launched to minimise retaliation on US assets in the region.

Iranians themselves have endured years of economic turmoil, made worse by US and EU sanctions on Iran’s oil sector over its alleged nuclear ambitions, financial links to international terrorism, and human rights abuses.

Over the New Year, authorities launched a deadlycrackdown on protesters following the sharp collapse ofthe country’s currency. While reporting restrictions make the exact death toll impossible to know, reports from inside Iran suggest as many as 30,000 people were killed by their own security forces.

Trump repeatedly threatened to attack Iran if authorities did not end the bloodshed and return to nuclear talks.

Although it is ruled as a theocracy with only limited power delegated to its elected parliament, Iran is culturally and ethnically diverse. Under the Islamic Republic, reformist movements have been repeatedlythrottled, and while there are a number of opposition

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parties with widespread support, their leaders are either in exile or under heavy state surveillance.

How will the attack on Iran affect oil prices?

Oil has not been the stated justification for the US and Israel’s attack on Iran. But their attack, and Iran’s response, is already causing major disruptions to oil and gas supplies – disruptions that may affect people around the world for a long time.

Iran is one of the world’s largest producers of oil and gas. Despite US sanctions, in 2025 the country pumped out more fossil fuels than any other country save the US, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Canada, according to the energy data firm Rystad. Much of this has gone to China, with Iranian oil making up over 13% of its seaborne imports.

Surrounding Iran, and well within range of the country’s missiles and drones, are some of the world’s other largest oil and gas producers, including Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and the UAE.

Together with Iran, these countries produce over 20% of the world’s fossil fuels, according to Rystad. And Iran has said it will prevent tankers from travelling through

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the only shipping lane through which most of these fuels pass – the Strait of Hormuz.

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