DOHA - US President Donald Trump threatened to "massively blow up" a vast Iranian gas field unless Tehran stops striking Qatari energy facilities, which sustained extensive damage on Thursday.
Crude oil prices surged five percent as the latest strikes fed fears that the nearly three-week-old Middle East war could inflict lasting damage on global energy supplies.
Tehran has carried out a series of attacks on Gulf energy sites, including on Qatar's huge Ras Laffan LNG facility, in retaliation for an Israeli strike on Iran's South Pars gas field -- part of the world's largest natural gas reservoir.
Trump called in a social media post for strikes on both Iranian and Qatari energy sites to halt.
Washington "knew nothing" of Israel's earlier attack on Iran's South Pars gas field, he said, vowing that "NO MORE ATTACKS WILL BE MADE BY ISRAEL" on the site if Tehran stops attacking Qatar.
But if Iran did not comply, the United States would "massively blow up the entirety of the South Pars Gas Field", Trump warned.
Statement from President Trump on South Pars Gas Field: pic.twitter.com/YrjhDdGTxP
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) March 19, 2026
Energy prices have already spiralled since tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, which normally carries a fifth of the world's oil, was brought to a near standstill by the threat of Iranian attacks.
Qatar's state energy company said firefighters managed to contain several blazes caused by Iranian missile attacks on its Ras Laffan liquefied natural gas facility.
Saudi Arabia said it reserved the "right to take military actions" after intercepting drones targeting energy infrastructure in the east, while debris from a ballistic missile landed near a refinery south of Riyadh.
The killing of Iran's intelligence chief, Khatib, followed the assassination of security chief Ali Larijani, as Israel pressed a campaign to eliminate senior Iranian officials.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian condemned Khatib's killing as a "cowardly assassination", while the country's new supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei vowed retaliation.
"Every drop of spilled blood comes at a price," he said in a written message.
Khamenei has not appeared in public since taking power after the death of his father, Ali Khamenei, in the opening strikes of the war.
In Washington, US intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard told Congress the Iranian government remained "intact but largely degraded", while also acknowledging Tehran had not resumed nuclear enrichment.
Lebanon has been drawn into the conflict since the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah launched rockets at Israel over Ali Khamenei's death.
Israeli strikes hit central Beirut multiple times on Wednesday, with casualties reported, as fighting with Hezbollah intensified.