Departure flights for military families in Bahrain paused following attacks on US naval base

Update, 2 p.m. Saturday, Manama time: Departure flights are on hold pending further notice, U.S. officials said. Navy officials are directing personnel to continue to shelter.

The Department of Defense has authorized the departure of military dependents in Bahrain after the U.S. and Israel began an attack on Iran Saturday morning.

The authorized departures, which are not mandatory, come as President Donald Trump declared that the U.S. has launched a major combat operation in Iran. For weeks, the U.S. has been amassing naval and air power in the region as bilateral negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program languished.

The alert, seen by Stars and Stripes, went out to military families living on the island just an hour after explosions were reported in Tehran. The emergency message noted that service members and dependents could book flights on a first-come, first-serve basis.

Details on how the departure would work remained unclear Saturday. Last summer, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth authorized a departure that allowed military dependents to fly anywhere in the U.S. at government expense for up to six months. By the beginning of the school year, many of those families had returned.

In-person classes at the Defense Department school on base in Bahrain also have been canceled for the rest of the week. Preparations are being made for remote learning, school officials said.

Iranian missile and drone attacks struck the Navy base in Bahrain and several off-base residential buildings beginning around noon and stretching well into the night.

U.S. Central Command did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the departure plans. Bahrain is home to U.S. Naval Forces Central Command and the 5th Fleet, and is one of the only accompanied billets in the theater.

In an eight-minute long video posted to Truth Social, the president on Saturday described the Iranian regime as a group of “very hard, terrible people” that have threatened the United States, its troops overseas and its allies around the world.

The strikes, Trump said, are with the goal of ensuring Iran can never obtain a nuclear weapon.

The president also acknowledged that the strikes could mean the loss of American lives.

“I do not make this statement lightly: the Iranian regime seeks to kill,” the president said in the video. “The lives of courageous American heroes may be lost and we may have casualties. That often happens in war. But we’re doing this, not for now, we’re doing this for the future, and it is a noble mission.”

U.S. embassies in Qatar, Israel and Bahrain also issued emergency notices to Americans on Saturday, advising them to shelter in place with food, water and medicine.

Trump, in an appeal to the Iraninan people, advised them to stay in their homes amid the strikes, saying that “bombs will be dropping everywhere.”

He also encouraged them to overthrow the regime once the attacks cease.

“When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will probably be your only chance for generations,” he said in his video message.