Iran threatens attacks on ‘Stargate’ AI data centers

Iran has warned of possible attacks on data centers across the Middle East in response to ongoing threats and airstrikes from the United States. Iran's military stated that if the U.S. proceeds with its threats to strike the country's civilian infrastructure, Iran would retaliate with its own strikes against U.S. energy and tech infrastructure in the region, according to a video released late last week and widely shared on Sunday. The video, featuring Iranian military spokesperson Ebrahim Zolfaghari, shows an image of a globe zooming in on the Stargate data center in the United Arab Emirates with the message, 'nothing stays hidden to our sight, though hidden by Google.'

Stargate is a $500 billion joint venture between OpenAI, SoftBank, and Oracle to build AI data centers, announced in January 2025. The initiative initially struggled with funding issues and tariff-related costs and sought to expand with new data centers internationally. This latest threat comes after U.S. President Trump threatened to strike Iran's civilian infrastructure, such as power plants and water desalination facilities, if Iran does not reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a critical global shipping channel that has choked global supply chain traffic since the war began in February.

Several data centers in the region have already been hit by missiles as a result of the war. Iranian missiles struck Amazon Web Services (AWS) data centers in Bahrain and an Oracle data center in Dubai. Iran also threatened tech companies, including Nvidia and Apple, by name last week.