Recently, desalination facilities have been targeted in Iran and Bahrain.
On the island of Qeshm, Iranian authorities accused the United States of disrupting the water supply of thirty villages after a strike on a desalination facility – an accusation denied by the U.S. Central Command. The following day, Bahrain confirmed that material damage had been caused to a desalination installation by a drone attack attributed to Iran.
These incidents have received relatively little global attention. Yet they highlight a strategic reality: in some parts of the world, drinking water has become a critical infrastructure.
Why desalination is vital in the Gulf
In Gulf countries, water supply relies heavily on seawater desalination. According to an analysis by the French Institute of International Relations (Ifri), approximately 90% of drinking water in Kuwait, 86% in Oman, and 70% in Saudi Arabia comes from this technology. In the United Arab Emirates, the share reaches around 42%.
The region also concentrates a significant portion of global desalination capacity : more than 40% of the world’s desalinated water production is located in the Middle East, according to several analyses reported by AFP and The Wall Street Journal.
In these desert territories, water is therefore no longer simply a natural resource. It has become an industrial product : seawater is captured, treated, and transformed before being distributed to millions of residents.
Without these facilities, some Gulf metropolises – built in the heart of arid environments -could operate for only a few days. Strategic water reserves are often limited, and infrastructure is concentrated on a small number of coastal sites.
Water, a new critical infrastructure
This reality is now described by a central concept : water security.
Used by the United Nations and the World Bank, this term refers to a society’s ability to guarantee sustainable access to water for its population, its economy, and its ecosystems.
In Gulf economies, water security depends on heavy industrial infrastructure : desalination plants, power grids, port facilities, and pipelines.
This technical architecture has enabled the spectacular development of cities built in the desert. But it also creates a strategic vulnerability.
During the 1991 Gulf War, energy and water facilities were already sabotaged during the withdrawal of Iraqi forces from Kuwait. In an analysis published in 2010, the CIA warned that disruptions to desalination plants in several Gulf countries could have consequences more severe than the loss of other industrial infrastructure.
Recent attacks are a reminder of how easily these facilities can become sensitive targets in modern conflicts.
A global challenge beyond the Middle East
The issue extends far beyond regional geopolitics.
According to UNESCO and UN-Water, nearly half of the world’s population already experiences severe water scarcity at least part of the year.
Driven by climate change, population growth, and urbanization, global demand for water continues to rise.
In this context, desalination is increasingly seen by many states as an essential solution for securing access to freshwater.
The dominant technology today is reverse osmosis, which forces seawater through membranes to remove salt. This process has enabled significant progress in terms of cost and energy efficiency.
However, it remains associated with energy-intensive infrastructure and the production of concentrated brine, whose management is a major challenge for protecting marine ecosystems.
Producing water without damaging the sea
The expansion of desalination therefore raises a fundamental question: how can freshwater production be increased without placing additional pressure on the oceans?
Among the emerging approaches is cryo-separation, a process based on the crystallization of water. This method involves producing ice from seawater and naturally separating salt during the freezing process.
The challenge is not only technological.
It requires rethinking how societies produce freshwater at large scale, in a world where access to water is becoming simultaneously an ecological, industrial, and geopolitical challenge.
Recent events remind us of an often-overlooked reality : water is not just a resource.
It is one of the invisible infrastructures upon which the stability of human societies depends.
The 20th century was shaped by the geopolitics of oil.
The 21st century may well be shaped by the geopolitics of water.
Ultimately, the question is not only how to produce more freshwater.
The real challenge is how to guarantee access to water without weakening the seas from which it comes.
