Trump Calls Iran’s Strikes on Dubai and Oman Acts of War Against the World Economy

President Donald Trump characterized Iran’s attacks on Gulf state financial and industrial infrastructure as acts of war against the global economy on Friday, calling Iranian leaders “deranged scumbags” and promising devastating military reprisals. Iran’s strikes had targeted Dubai’s prestigious International Financial Centre, where debris from an intercepted projectile damaged a building housing major banks and wealth managers, and had killed two people in an industrial zone near Oman’s port city of Sohar. Trump warned that any further disruption to the Strait of Hormuz would result in immediate strikes on Iran’s oil infrastructure.
The Dubai International Financial Centre is one of the most important financial hubs in the Middle East and Asia, home to hundreds of international banks, investment firms, and capital trading operations. Iran had declared earlier in the week that it would target banks and financial institutions across the Gulf region in retaliation for an airstrike on a Tehran bank. Friday’s strike on the DIFC, even if technically intercepted, sent a clear message about Tehran’s targeting priorities. Saudi Arabia separately intercepted close to 50 Iranian drones in a single day of intensive defensive operations.
US and Israeli forces pressed on with their campaign against Iran. Combined strikes have exceeded 15,000 targets since the war began. Israel reported over 200 individual strikes in the most recent 24 hours. Trump announced that Kharg Island, Iran’s primary oil terminal, had been completely cleared of military installations in what he called the most powerful bombing raid in the history of the Middle East. Iran’s new supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei was described by US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth as wounded, disfigured, and hiding underground.
The conflict continued to devastate Lebanon, where more than 600 have been killed and 800,000 displaced. Israeli forces killed at least eight people in Sidon on Friday. The Zrarieh Bridge was struck in a separate operation. Hezbollah fired rockets at northern Israel, injuring close to 60 people. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards launched new coordinated strikes on Israel as part of al-Quds Day. Qatar issued Doha evacuation orders before a successful missile interception. Two died in Oman. The war has now touched virtually every country in the Middle East simultaneously.
Iran has reported over 1,300 deaths. The United States has lost 13 service members, including six in a tanker aircraft crash in Iraq. France lost one soldier in Iraq to a militia drone. Tehran residents described a city under constant bombardment, with one shopkeeper counting six explosions in an hour and a retired professor desperately pleading for international intervention. With roughly one-fifth of global oil and gas passing through the Strait of Hormuz, and Trump threatening to strike Kharg Island’s oil facilities, the economic consequences of the conflict extended far beyond the Middle East.