Bahrain issues first threat alerts since September as Iran says it attacked U.S. base

Bahrain issued two alerts of potential threats Sunday, its first such warnings since September, as Iran said it had attacked a U.S. base in the Gulf country amid uncertainty over a U.S.-Iran deal aimed at ending the nearly 9-month-old war.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it had attacked a U.S. military base in Bahrain in retaliation for “hostile U.S. actions,” Iran’s Fars news agency reported.

Explosions could be heard around 4 a.m. local time, with residents reporting a second series of blasts around 6:30 a.m.

The Revolutionary Guard said they had launched six drones targeting a U.S. air-defense radar at the Al-Rifaa helicopter base in Bahrain, Iranian state-run Press TV reported. There was no immediate confirmation from U.S. or Bahraini authorities.

Bahrain, home to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet, urged citizens and residents to remain calm and proceed to the nearest safe location, the interior ministry said. It did not provide further details on the threats.

Two days earlier the Revolutionary Guard said they had attacked a U.S. early-warning radar in Bahrain. The U.S. military denied this, saying it had intercepted two Iranian drones without any damage.

Diplomatic efforts to end the conflict have yet to produce a breakthrough, though Washington and Tehran have held off on direct attacks in the war that began with U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran on Feb. 28 and then spread across the region, with Tehran launching missile and drone attacks on U.S. bases in Gulf countries.

President Donald Trump has said in recent days that he might hold off on attacking Iran if the U.S. faces no new provocations from Tehran or the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen, but that he would maintain a U.S. naval blockade.

On another front, however, the Houthis and the Saudi-led coalition fighting them have continued to exchange attacks, with the coalition saying on Sunday it had intercepted two Houthi ballistic missiles launched toward the Saudi capital Riyadh and three drones in the kingdom’s oil-rich Eastern Province.