- Iran targets Stargate UAE AI data center
- IRGC hints at ‘complete and total annihilation’
- 1 GW of capacity is planned for the Middle East site
As the conflict in the Middle East continues, Iran has threatened to target the $30 billion Stargate AI data center located in the United Arab Emirates – a data center relied on by tech giants like OpenAI, Nvidia, Cisco, Oracle and SoftBank.
The Times of India reports the threat, which was clearly and specifically made in a video speech by Ebrahim Zolfaghari, spokesperson for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
“If the United States carries out its threats regarding Iranian power plants, the following retaliatory measures will be quickly adopted,” Zolfaghari said, identifying “all power plants, energy infrastructure and information and communications technologies of the Zionist regime” as targets.
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These targets would face “complete and total annihilation,” Zolfaghari continues, before the video cuts to a Google Maps photo of the Stargate UAE base in the desert – hidden in the standard map view but visible via night vision.
“Computing capacity across borders”
Iran takes it to the next level They released a video threatening to strike a 1 GW Stargate AI data center in the United Arab Emirates. The data center is hidden on Google Maps, they even showed that pic.twitter.com/LuOGIp3BVjApril 3, 2026
The Stargate UAE project was announced last year, with OpenAI describing it as representative of “our long-term vision to build global-scale computing capacity in service of safe, secure and broadly beneficial AGI”.
Also having close ties to the US government, the data center is now in the crosshairs of the IRGC and its arms. The site is expected to offer 1 GW (gigawatt) of power and computing capacity, with the first phase of 200 MW (megawatts) expected to integrate some 10,000 Nvidia chips.
It is unclear how much of the data center is currently operational, but this first 200 MW phase was expected to come online this year, before the start of the war in Iran. This would represent a major blow to AI technology infrastructure.
The IRGC continues to target targets linked to the United States and American companies in the Middle East region, including Microsoft, Apple, Google and Meta. As the war stretches into a second month, Stargate UAE and other critical sites remain under threat.
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