Amazon’s data centers in Bahrain and the UAE have been hit multiple times by drone and missile strikes from Iran since the U.S. started bombing the country in February 2026. This left the company’s ME-CENTRAL-1 and ME-SOUTH-1 disrupted, with the AWS Health Dashboard indicating that it will take months before they can go back online.
“The Middle East (UAE) Region (ME-CENTRAL-1) has suffered damage as a result of the conflict in the Middle East and is currently unable to reliably support customer applications,” Amazon said in its latest update. “While some workloads continue to function normally, we strongly recommend customers migrate all accessible resources to other Regions and restore inaccessible resources from remote backups as soon as possible. Relevant billing operations are currently suspended while we restore normal operations in this AWS Region. This process is expected to take several months.”
These sites were first hit in early March, a few days after the U.S. started its bombing campaign on Iran. A few weeks after that, AWS Bahrain was hit once more, this time by drone strikes, further disrupting operations. The last reported strike happened in early April, putting several zones into a “hard down” status. Although both sites remain partially operational, it seems that Amazon has refrained from billing customers who used these servers and continues to encourage them to move to other regions and avoid further disruption due to the conflict.
Even if the missile and drone strikes haven’t completely leveled the two data centers, Amazon is still on the hook for months of repairs. Aside from these direct hits, the shockwave and post-explosion fires they caused have compounded the damage to the sensitive equipment used in these sites. The company also reported that fire suppression systems have caused flooding and water damage to various equipment, while cooling systems have suffered from mechanical failures.
There’s currently an uneasy truce in the area, as the two parties are at the negotiating table trying to end the war. However, hostilities could resume at any time, especially as the U.S. and Iran cannot agree on several points, making it risky for Amazon to start repairs right now. But even then, the ongoing chip shortages could make it harder for the company to get the components it needs to get these services up and running again, unless they have backup servers in their inventory ready to be deployed if peace in the region has been achieved.
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