{"id":549556,"date":"2026-03-19T01:49:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T01:49:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/549556\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T01:49:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T01:49:08","slug":"iranian-strikes-hit-near-australian-airbase-in-uae-albanese-confirms-australian-military","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/549556\/","title":{"rendered":"Iranian strikes hit near Australian airbase in UAE, Albanese confirms | Australian military"},"content":{"rendered":"

An Iranian projectile hit near Australia\u2019s headquarters at the Al Minhad airbase in the United Arab Emirates<\/a>, damaging an accommodation block and a medical facility.<\/p>\n

The prime minister, Anthony Albanese<\/a>, confirmed that no Australian personnel were injured in the strike at 9.15am AEDT on Wednesday morning.<\/p>\n

Albanese could not confirm if Iran<\/a> directly targeted the Al Minhad base while maintaining Australia was not at war.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Iranian regime is engaging in random attacks right across the region. We know that is the case,\u201d the prime minister said.<\/p>\n

The federal government last week announced<\/a> it would send a specialist surveillance aircraft and stocks of air-to-air missiles to the UAE to protect Australians in the Gulf state, which has been targeted by Tehran in retaliation for the US and Israel\u2019s bombings of Iran.<\/p>\n

Sign up for the Breaking News Australia email<\/a><\/p>\n

Australia has maintained a smaller force at Al Minhad airbase since the end of operations in Afghanistan. Defence last year said there were about 50 core ADF staff and a total of 70 to 80 Australians at the base at any time.<\/p>\n

The same base<\/a> was hit in a drone strike earlier in the conflict.<\/p>\n

Albanese said the projectile struck a road that leads to the base, sparking a fire that damaged the accommodation block and medical facility.<\/p>\n

Asked directly if Australia was now at war, Albanese said \u201cno\u201d and refused to elaborate.<\/p>\n

Albanese confirmed the latest strikes as he declined to criticise Donald Trump after the president claimed the US never needed help from allies \u2013 including Australia \u2013 to fight the war in Iran.<\/p>\n

In contrast, the Liberal frontbencher and former soldier, Andrew Hastie, said Trump\u2019s outburst was \u201cpetulant\u201d and \u201cnot how you treat allies\u201d in a rare direct rebuke of the president from a member of either of the major parties.<\/p>\n

The US president had been demanding US allies send warships to help unblock the strait of Hormuz, which Iran has effectively closed in retaliation against the US and Israel\u2019s strikes that triggered the latest Middle East conflict.<\/p>\n

The closure has caused the largest oil supply disruption in history<\/a>, sending commodity prices soaring around the world.<\/p>\n

RAAF aircraft at Al Minhad airbase in 2011. Australia has maintained a smaller force at the UAE airbase since the end of operations in Afghanistan. Defence last year said there were about 50 core ADF staff and a total of 70 to 80 Australians at the base at any time. Photograph: Leading Seaman Paul Berry\/Department of Defence<\/p>\n

In a post to social media, Trump said most Nato \u201callies\u201d had informed the US it would not provide direct assistance.<\/p>\n

The president went on to claim that because the US has had such \u201cmilitary success\u201d in Iran it would \u201cno longer \u2018need\u2019, or desire, the NATO countries\u2019 assistance \u2013 WE NEVER DID\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cLikewise, Japan, Australia, or South Korea,\u201d he posted to his Truth Social<\/a> social media platform.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn fact, speaking as President of the United States of America, by far the Most Powerful Country Anywhere in the World, WE DO NOT NEED THE HELP OF ANYONE!\u201d<\/p>\n

The Australian government on Tuesday confirmed it would not send warships to the strait of Hormuz and had not received a request to do so.<\/p>\n

Appearing on ABC\u2019s RN Breakfast on Wednesday morning, Hastie was asked for his reaction to Trump\u2019s post.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought it was a petulant post from a president under immense pressure,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the key parts of a relationship is reciprocity \u2013 we\u2019ve been a longstanding ally of the United States, we\u2019ve met our obligations with that alliance framework, we\u2019ve got a proud history \u2013 and I just don\u2019t think that\u2019s how you treat allies. I think it\u2019s a reflection on his character more than us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hastie supported the US and Israel\u2019s initial strikes on Iran and believes the federal government\u2019s decision to help defend the United Arab Emirates was in the national interest.<\/p>\n

But as a veteran of the Afghanistan conflict, the former Special Air Service soldier is sceptical about attempts to engineer regime change in other countries.<\/p>\n

It is the second time Hastie has publicly criticised Trump<\/a> after he strongly rejected the presidents claim that allied soldiers \u201cstayed a little back\u201d from the frontlines in Afghanistan. Trump later walked back the comments.<\/p>\n

Albanese declined to weigh into Trump or Hastie\u2019s comments when asked on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cAndrew Hastie can speak for himself. What I do is engage diplomatically with leaders right across the world,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Hastie noted the US had not consulted Australia before launching the attacks, although he was confident the alliance would withstand the shock of the Trump administration.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a president who is very unique in American history \u2013 in global history \u2013 and he\u2019s coming up to two years this November in the role. It\u2019s his second and final term, and I\u2019m sure the relationship will continue regardless of who sits in the Oval Office,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull, a longtime Trump critic, said the president\u2019s latest remarks showed he \u201cdoesn\u2019t respect\u201d his allies.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt really just underlines \u2026 the importance of Australia being more independent, exercising our own sovereignty and recognising that the course we have been undertaking, really since the Morrison government, of becoming more and more dependent on the United States, is absolutely the wrong course, because we are making ourselves more dependent on the US at a time when the US is less dependable,\u201d Turnbull said.<\/p>\n

In a separate interview on ABC\u2019s RN Breakfast, the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, brushed off Trump\u2019s comments as he reiterated that Australia had not received a formal request for naval assistance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An Iranian projectile hit near Australia\u2019s headquarters at the Al Minhad airbase in the United Arab Emirates, damaging…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":549557,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-549556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=549556"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549556\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/549557"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=549556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=549556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=549556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}