Gas prices rise after attack on Qatar’s Ras Laffan energy complex

By Nathan Morley

Four Palestinian women in the West Bank and a Thai worker in Israel were killed Wednesday night after Iran launched missiles toward Israel. The strike hit a caravan that had been converted into a hair salon in the town of Beit Awwa in the southern West Bank. 

​The Israeli military said the blast was caused by an Iranian missile. Palestinian officials said the damage came from an Israeli air‑defense interceptor that malfunctioned.

​In a separate development, gas prices in the U.K. and Europe rose sharply after an attack on Qatar’s Ras Laffan energy complex. ​

President Donald Trump issued a strongly worded warning to Iran, urging it to halt further attacks in Qatar and saying the United States “knew nothing” about Israel’s strike on Iran’s South Pars gas field on Wednesday. 

Israel has not commented. South Pars forms part of the world’s largest natural gas field, which is jointly exploited by Iran and Qatar. Arab states issued a joint statement condemning what they called Iran’s “deliberate attacks” on its neighbors.

Meanwhile, another vessel was struck by an “unknown projectile” in the Persian Gulf, the U.K. Maritime Trade Operations agency said. All crew members were reported safe. The incident occurred about four nautical miles east of Ras Laffan, the same area targeted overnight.​

Elsewhere, the Pentagon has asked the White House to approve more than $200 billion to fund the war in Iran, a senior administration official told The Washington Post.

 The report said the request would far exceed the cost of the Trump administration’s campaign to date and is intended to “urgently” increase production of weapons already expended.