Around a dozen US soldiers have reportedly been wounded and multiple planes damaged following an Iranian missile strike at a base in Saudi Arabia. 

The service members were on Prince Sultan Air Base when it was struck by at least one missile and several unmanned aerial vehicles on Friday, according to multiple US and Arab officials.

Twelve American soldiers were wounded in the attack, according to the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. 

Two service members are ‘very seriously injured’ while eight others are ‘seriously injured’, both a separate category under the military’s classification system, according to CBS News. The condition of others is unknown.

At least two KC-135 refueling planes suffered ‘significant damage’ in the combined missile and drone attack, according to the NYT. Satellite photos appeared to reveal the full extent of damage to the aircraft.

Friday’s strike represents one of the most serious breaches of US air defenses since the monthlong war with Iran began, as well as at least the second hit on Prince Sultan Air Base. 

An earlier March 1 strike on the base damaged five US refueling aircraft and claimed the life of 26-year-old Army Sgt. Benjamin N Pennington just days after he was wounded. 

Over 300 US troops have been wounded and at least 13 killed in the ongoing conflict, including about 225 with traumatic brain injuries from missile blasts, the US Central Command announced on Friday.

Saudi Arabia and other Gulf powers are now signaling a tougher stance against Iran’s attacks, hinting that continued strikes may draw them deeper into the war.

Meanwhile, the US and its allied forces are continuing to see their supply of air defense interceptors shrink after just four weeks.    

President Donald Trump, speaking at a Miami event backed by the Saudi sovereign wealth fund, declared today that the war is coming to a close very soon, according to the WSJ. 

‘It’s sort of finished, but it’s not finished,’ he said. ‘It’s got to be finished.’

He also said that he expected the war to deliver an even bigger and more destructive blow to the stock markets. 

‘I thought we were going to go down more,’ he said. ‘And I thought oil prices were going to go up higher.’

But the S&P 500 sunk for a fifth consecutive week to its lowest point since last August, with US gasoline prices climbing toward $4 a gallon. 

Trump also lashed out at NATO allies for their reluctance to provide military support, saying it has made him ‘rethink’ how much the US spends on the alliance. 

He called it a ‘tremendous mistake’ for allied countries to stay out of the conflict, adding that it will make ‘a lot of money’ for the US since ‘we spend hundreds of billions of dollars a year on NATO.’ 

The president declared that Saudi Arabia and Israel should move to normalize relations after the Iran conflict wraps up. 

‘It’s now time,’ Trump said. ‘We’ve now taken them out, and they are out bigly,’ he added. ‘We got to get into the Abraham Accords.’

Trump has been urging Israel and Saudi Arabia, the two biggest powers in the Middle East, to normalize ties for years as part of his Abraham Accords initiative. 

However challenges remain, including Saudi Arabia’s insistence on a credible path to a Palestinian state before establishing commercial and diplomatic ties with Israel. 

Meanwhile, the Iranian ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva Ali Bahreini said Tehran has agreed to ‘facilitate and expedite’ humanitarian aid through the Strait of Hormuz, even as its nuclear sites are being struck. 

He said Tehran has agreed to a UN request to allow both humanitarian aid and agricultural shipments through the critical waterway that carries a fifth of the world’s oil and nearly a third of global fertilizer trade. 

The aid plan would be the first breakthrough at the shipping chokepoint after a month of war. 

Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization said the Shahid Khondab Heavy Water Complex in Arak and the Ardakan yellowcake plant in Yazd Province were hit, according to IRNA.

Officials, however, reported no casualties and no risk of contamination. The Arak facility has been offline since Israel attacked it last June. 

Yellowcake – concentrated uranium stripped of impurities – and heavy water, used as a reactor moderator, are key parts in nuclear reactors. 

Israel’s military later said the strike targeted materials processed for enrichment at the Yazd plant, calling it a major blow to Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. 

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps warned Iran would retaliate, with its Aerospace Force commander writing on X that employees of companies tied to US and Israel should abandon their workplaces.

‘This time, the equation will no longer be “an eye for an eye,” just wait,’ the commander said.

Tel Aviv was also hit hard late Friday: Israel’s Fire and Rescue Service said it was responding to 11 different impact sites across the metro, leaving a man in his 60s dead, according to AP.

The strikes hit Iran just hours after Trump boasted that cease‑fire talks were progressing ‘very well,’ a claim Tehran has flatly denied, saying it isn’t engaged in any such deal‑making. 

With stock markets tumbling and the economic fallout spreading far beyond the Middle East, Trump continues to face mounting pressure to break Iran’s chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz. 

Steve Witkoff, Trump’s envoy, said Washington passed a 15‑point ceasefire plan to Iran through Pakistan, aiming to restrict Tehran’s nuclear program and reopen the critical waterway.

Tehran shot down the president’s ceasefire package and fired back with its own five‑point deal that included reparations and official control of the vital strait.

Trump warned that if Iran doesn’t fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz by April 6, he will order strikes on the country’s energy plants. 

The Daily Mail has reached out to the White House and Pentagon for comment.