The Latest: Israel hits Lebanon and Tehran oil depot as desalination plants become targets

Israel on Sunday struck southern Lebanon, Beirut and an oil storage facility in Tehran as the war in the Middle East keeps escalating, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised “many surprises” for the next phase of the conflict.

Iran also hit a desalination plant in Bahrain. Earlier Sunday, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said a U.S. airstrike damaged an Iranian desalination plant on Qeshm Island, warning that in doing so “the U.S. set this precedent, not Iran.” Such infrastructure is critical for drinking water supplies in the parched deserts of the Gulf.

An Israeli attack on an oil storage facility in Tehran sent up pillars of fire that could be seen in Associated Press video as a glow against the Saturday night sky. It appeared to be the first time a civil industrial facility has been targeted in the war.

The war, which erupted on Feb. 28 after joint U.S.-Israeli strikes hit Iran, has so far killed at least 1,230 people in the Islamic Republic, more than 300 in Lebanon and around a dozen in Israel, according to officials.

Here is the latest:

Iran’s president has threatened to step up attacks on American targets throughout the Middle East as the U.S. and Israel press ahead with their air campaign.

“When we are attacked, we have no choice but to respond. The more pressure they impose on us, the stronger our response will naturally be,” President Masoud Pezeshkian said in video comments Sunday. “Our Iran, our country, will not bow easily in the face of bullying, oppression or aggression — and it never has.”

Pezeshkian appeared to be backtracking from conciliatory comments toward his Gulf neighbors on Saturday. Those comments, in which he appeared to apologize for attacks on their soil, were quickly contradicted by Iranian hard-liners.

Pezeshkian said Iran is not looking for a battle against neighboring Arab countries, many of which host American military bases. “They are our brothers,” he said, accusing the U.S. of trying to pit the region’s countries against one another. Many Iranian attacks have gone beyond U.S. bases in the region, striking energy facilities, hotels and cities.

The sky over Iran’s capital was blanketed with smoke Sunday morning, hours after Israeli strikes hit oil facilities in Tehran, Associated Press footage showed.

Fars news agency reported that Saturday’s strikes hit four oil storage facilities and an oil production transfer center in Tehran and Alborz. Four tanker drivers in the center were killed, it reported.

The strikes sent up pillars of fire that could be seen in AP video as a glow against the Saturday night sky.

It appeared to be the first time a civil industrial facility has been targeted in the war.

A missile alert sounded Sunday morning in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

It is the first time an Arab country says Iran has targeted a desalination plant during the nine-day war.

Hundreds of desalination plants sit along the Persian Gulf coast, and the Arab countries in the region rely heavily on the facilities for their drinking water

Israel’s military said on Sunday that it had struck a series of fighter jets that pre-revolutionary Iran purchased from the United States.

The fleet of F-14s parked at Isfahan Airport, south of Tehran, was a pillar of the Iranian air force and historically used to defend its airspace.

The Israeli military did not say whether the jets were destroyed. It also said it had struck detection and air defense systems.

Bahrain’s Interior Ministry provided the information.

The shrapnel fell over a university building in Muharraq city in Bahrain Sunday morning, authorities said.

The Interior Ministry said fragments of a missile also caused material damage.