Iran Strikes Bahrain Airport's Fuel Tanks — Four IRGC Spies Arrested as the Gulf War Enters Its Darkest Day

Operation Epic Fury entered its twelfth and most geographically expansive day in the early hours of Thursday March 12 — with Iran striking fuel storage tanks on Muharraq Island in Bahrain, igniting a blaze visible across Manama, and simultaneously targeting energy infrastructure in Oman, the UAE, and continuing strikes against every Gulf Cooperation Council member state that has supported the US-Israeli campaign. The Bahrain Interior Ministry confirmed in an official statement that Iranian aggression targeted fuel storage tanks at a facility in Muharraq Governorate — the island home to Bahrain International Airport, the US Navy's 5th Fleet headquarters, and a dense network of jet fuel storage and oil industry infrastructure that makes it one of the most strategically sensitive pieces of real estate in the Arabian Gulf. Civil defence teams were immediately deployed to battle the blaze. Riya Road was closed in both directions as a precautionary measure. Citizens and residents in the districts of Hidd, Arad, Qalali, and Samaheej were instructed to remain in their homes with windows and ventilation openings sealed against smoke inhalation. The Ministry of Interior did not minimise what had happened — it used the phrase "blatant Iranian aggression" in its official statement, confirming the strike was not an accident, not a misfire, and not ambiguous in its attribution. Four IRGC Spies Arrested: Coordinates of Vital Locations Sent via Encrypted Software Simultaneous with the Muharraq strike, Bahrain's General Directorate of Criminal Investigation and Forensic Science announced the arrest of four Bahraini citizens for spying for the IRGC — and the active search for a fifth suspect who has fled the country. The four detained are Murtadha Hussain Awal, 25; Ahmed Isa Al Haiki, 34; Sarah Abdulnabi Marhoon, 36; and Elias Salman Mirza, 22. A fifth suspect, Ali Mohammed Hassan Al Shaikh, 25, remains at large abroad. Investigators confirmed the four suspects had taken photographs of vital locations across Bahrain — strategic infrastructure, military facilities, and government installations — and transmitted the images and precise GPS coordinates to the IRGC via encrypted software. As digital8hub.com reported earlier this week, Israel confirmed that Iran had been hacking 66,000+ civilian security cameras to locate missile impact sites and identify targeting coordinates — a parallel intelligence methodology that the Bahraini arrests now confirm was supplemented by human intelligence assets embedded within the civilian population of a country hosting the US Navy's regional headquarters. The arrests carry enormous strategic significance: they confirm that the IRGC had human intelligence assets on the ground inside Bahrain before the strikes began — assets capable of providing targeting data precise enough to hit specific fuel storage infrastructure on a specific island. The Regional Picture: Oman, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait & Qatar All Struck The Muharraq strike was not the only energy infrastructure attack across the Gulf on the night of March 11-12. Oman's Port of Salalah — the sultanate's primary commercial port and a critical logistics hub for regional trade — battled blazes at fuel storage tanks following Iranian drone strikes, bringing Oman into the direct line of fire for the first time since Operation Epic Fury began. In Dubai, two Iranian drones struck near Dubai International Airport — wounding four people though flights continued — and a fire broke out at a luxury apartment tower in Dubai Creek Harbour following a separate drone hit, which was extinguished by Thursday morning. Saudi forces downed two drones over the kingdom's eastern region. Kuwaiti National Guard units intercepted six drones. Qatar's armed forces blocked a missile attack. As digital8hub.com has reported across our continuous Day 1-12 coverage, Bahrain's military has now intercepted over 170 drones and more than 100 missiles since Operation Epic Fury began on February 28 — a combined total that represents one of the most sustained aerial bombardment campaigns against a single small nation in modern military history, directed at an island state of fewer than 1.5 million people. The Wider War: US Strike Near Iranian School, 165 Dead, Pentagon's $11.3B First Week Bill Day 12 also brought some of the most morally confronting news of the entire conflict. Louisiana Senator John Kennedy — a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee — confirmed that all available indications point to the United States being responsible for a strike near a school in Iran that killed more than 165 people. "This was a terrible thing that happened," Kennedy said. "And it looks like it's our missiles. And I'm really sorry. But we will learn from it." The strike's precise circumstances — whether it was a targeting error, a consequence of proximity to a military objective, or a failure of intelligence — had not been formally confirmed by the Pentagon at time of publication. Separately, the Pentagon informed Congress that the first week of Operation Epic Fury alone cost the United States more than $11.3 billion — a figure that encompasses munitions expenditure, fuel, personnel, equipment, and the replacement cost of assets lost in combat. President Trump, speaking to reporters in Cincinnati during a tour of Thermo Fisher Scientific's facility, said the US had "knocked out twice their leadership" in Iran — a reference to the eliminations of Supreme Leader Khamenei, his successor Mojtaba Khamenei, and multiple senior IRGC commanders. "Now they have a new group coming up," Trump said. "Let's see what happens to them." The UN Security Council voted on Wednesday to approve a resolution demanding a halt to what it described as Iran's attacks on its Gulf neighbours — a resolution that carries moral weight but no enforcement mechanism capable of stopping what is happening on Muharraq Island tonight. For the latest coverage of Operation Epic Fury Day 12 and beyond, follow digital8hub.com.