Thanks for the Warning—Iran Reportedly Gave Qatar the Heads-Up Before Attack

By Bob Hoge | 2:35 PM on June 23, 2025

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*Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader via AP*

Entrepreneur Dr. Eli David, who has an X account with almost 800,000 followers, is looking pretty smart Monday. He made this prediction:

Prediction:
Iran will fire missiles on an empty US base in Qatar, after pre-approving the exact time and location of the attack with the US, to prevent any American injury.

It will then declare victory for its "strong response".
— Dr. Eli David (@DrEliDavid) June 23, 2025

A New York Times report claims that he’s not far off the mark, and Iran did indeed telegraph its intentions in advance of today’s missile attacks against Qatar and our large air base there—Al Udeid.

Reporter Farnaz Fassihi said she was in contact with Iranian officials:

Iran told US and Qatar that attack was coming per @nytimes report. Wants to dial down conflict after we smoked them Saturday night. No word from NYT yet on gender identity of who fired missiles from Iran. pic.twitter.com/Bvb4d2XhRe
— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) June 23, 2025

The report said that Iran wanted to limit the damage:

Iran coordinated the attacks on the American air base in Qatar with Qatari officials and gave advanced notice that attacks were coming to minimize casualties, according to three Iranian officials familiar with the plans.

One could certainly come to the conclusion that Iran was terrified of the U.S. response if they had actually killed our servicemembers or blown up our fighter jets (both of which had been largely removed in anticipation of an attack anyway). I’m not saying that Iran doesn’t want to inflict damage on the United States, which it calls “the Great Satan,” but this doesn’t seem like the great revenge they’ve been spouting off about.

More likely, if they do attempt to seriously harm us, it will be through proxies and terrorism, where they can deny accountability and hope to avoid retaliatory U.S. airstrikes (although that plan didn't work out so well for Qasem Soleimani).

UPDATED: Explosions Heard Over Qatar As Iran Retaliates for US Bombing—Large American Base in Area

This certainly doesn’t seem very effective:

6 Iranian missiles were fired at US bases in Qatar. All 6 were intercepted.
pic.twitter.com/HitcI10ROp
— Buzz Patterson (@BuzzPatterson) June 23, 2025

Author Aviva Klompas has an excellent point: Qatar must be thinking, This is how you show gratitude, Iran?

And after all that time Qatar spent shielding Iran’s proxy terrorists—this is the thanks they get.
— Aviva Klompas (@AvivaKlompas) June 23, 2025

Air sirens are reportedly being heard at U.S. bases in Kuwait, Iraq, and Bahrain, so this thing is not over, and Iran could still inflict major damage. However, if they did give advance notice, knowing that Qatar would likely pass along the information and give us plenty of time to clear out, it hardly seems like a winning strategy to cause maximum casualties.

After all, we didn’t exactly send the mullahs a telegram letting them know we were about to bomb their Fordow nuclear facility to smithereens.

Editor's note: The headline of this story has been updated to clarify that Iran did not warn the U.S. directly, according to the New York Times story, but gave Qatar the heads-up.

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