GoKawiilAWS urges customers to migrate off damaged Abu Dhabi, Bahrain data centers
Amazon Web Services has told customers to relocate their data away from its Abu Dhabi and Bahrain facilities, more than six months after drone and missile strikes damaged both sites during regional conflict involving Iran, the US and Israel. AWS gave no timeline for repairs, and Bahraini state media reported that site was destroyed by cruise missiles.
GoKawiil's interpretation of the reporting above, not reported fact.
The setback undercuts the UAE's multi-year push to become a global data-center hub, already strained by stalled negotiations over OpenAI's planned 5-gigawatt facility. It also highlights how vulnerable cloud infrastructure in conflict-prone regions has become, pushing officials to consider costly countermeasures like underground data centers or anti-drone defenses.
- AWS has advised customers to migrate away from its Abu Dhabi and Bahrain data centers indefinitely.
- Both facilities were damaged by drone and missile strikes linked to regional conflict involving Iran.
- The UAE's data-center ambitions, including a major OpenAI deal, face delays as security concerns mount.
Source: tomshardware.com — Oliver Haslam, 2026-09-16
Published there as: “AWS tells clients to abandon Middle East data centers six months after Iranian drone strikes — Amazon offers no recovery timeline as UAE mulls underground data centers”
Read the original report → The summary and analysis above are GoKawiil's own, written from reporting by the source above. Facts and quotes belong to the original publisher.