When Israeli jets struck the South Pars gas complex near Asaluyeh, they hit more than pipes and compressors. They struck the single piece of infrastructure most essential to Iran's ability to function -- a field that provides 75 percent of Iran's domestic gas supply and powers roughly 80 percent of the country's electricity generation.
The strike halted output at two refineries with a combined daily capacity of around 100 million cubic meters, sending prices soaring and triggering Iranian retaliatory strikes on energy infrastructure in Gulf Arab states, including Qatar's Ras Laffan liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal.
A Target Long in Decline
South Pars was already struggling before the first bomb fell. Straddling the maritime border with Qatar in the Persian Gulf -- where the same reservoir is known as North Dome and supplies roughly 20 percent of global LNG -- Iran's side of the field has suffered years of chronic underinvestment.
Since Washington withdrew from a nuclear deal in 2018 and imposed harsh sanctions on Tehran, international companies including France's Total have departed, and the field's aging infrastructure has gone largely unrenewed.
Shahram Kholdi, a professor of international relations in Canada, says the field was already on borrowed time.
"The Islamic republic has invested very little in the oil and gas sector since Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal," he told RFE/RL's Radio Farda. "Many of these facilities were already in need of renovation. Qatar is extracting a far greater share of gas from the shared reservoir because our infrastructure has become outdated and deteriorated."
Even in peacetime, Iranians had experienced rolling gas shortages as the regime diverted supplies to petrochemical exports while running power plants on mazut -- a heavy fuel oil that blanketed Iranian cities in smog.
Strategic Logic, Human Cost
Israeli officials say the strike was coordinated with the United States and aimed at degrading the Islamic republic's capacity to sustain its military. But analysts warn the damage is impossible to contain to the military sphere.
Umud Shokri, an energy security analyst and professor at George Mason University, argues the choice of South Pars as a target is about as consequential as it gets.
"Targeting South Pars is worst-case because it underpins most of Iran's gas supply, feeding power generation, heating, industry, and petrochemicals," he said. "Disruption doesn't just hit exports, it hits daily life. Expect outages, shortages, and inflation almost immediately, meaning ordinary Iranians absorb the shock first."
Since the launch of the military operation, Trump has said there can be "no deal with Iran except UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!" And while endorsing regime change as the "best thing that could happen," Trump has also noted that it may not occur "immediately."
On the political intent behind hitting civilian-adjacent infrastructure, Kholdi puts it bluntly: "I believe the intended or unintended goal is to bring the population to a point where they demand the overthrow of this regime. I see no other logic to it."
But both analysts are skeptical that such logic holds.
Shokri argued the strikes "don't neatly destabilize" the clerical establishment. "They weaken it, yes, but also give it justification to tighten control and externalize blame," he said.
The Day After
But he is skeptical that civilian pressure will translate into political change mid-conflict. "No, never," he said when asked whether people under active bombardment would take to the streets. The more lasting danger, in his view, is what happens after the war ends.
"Once a cease-fire is reached, the Islamic republic will not be able to immediately restore [gas facilities at] Asaluyeh," Kholdi warned. "The country will face severe shortages, even if the Islamic republic collapses and is gone."
Iran, he argues, would be forced to import gas from neighbors like Turkmenistan during any transition period, while reconstruction -- requiring advanced Japanese or South Korean technology and financing from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund -- could take years.
It is a challenge, he notes, that Iran's opposition movements have not planned for. Their transition frameworks were written before South Pars was a target.
"I think everyone's calculations included the hope that the leaders of the Islamic republic would show some degree of rationality and simply let go and leave," he said. "Allow me to hold everyone responsible -- myself included."
