The strike against the world’s largest gas field in Iran Wednesday was coordinated by the United States and Israel, Israeli officials said. The joint attack signaled a warning to Iran over its threat to the Strait of Hormuz.

The two countries reportedly struck the South Pars gas field Wednesday, the world’s largest gas field. Iran obtains 70% of its gas from South Pars and shares the massive field with Qatar, which condemned the strike. The field, located in the Bushehr Province in southern Iran, houses a facility that processes natural gas. Other facilities associated with the South Pars Offshore Gas Field and Asaluyeh Oil Industry were also struck, with several phases at South Pars now offline.

The attack destroyed only part of the field, so officials estimate that this has decreased the natural gas available to the people of Iran by about 20 percent. This will have enough of an impact, according to one official, to increase internal pressure on the regime.

“The regime will likely reduce gas supply to consumers, increasing internal pressure,” he said. “Shutting off gas to citizens could accelerate unrest.”

The official said that this attack represents the first stage of a strategy meant to force Iran to back off from its chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20 percent of the world’s oil is shipped. The fear of attack has prevented ships from sailing through, throwing the global economy into a tailspin. Iran’s continued intransigence regarding the vital waterway will trigger the next stage of the plan.

“The gas facility is the first stage,” the official said. “Fuel infrastructure could follow. In such a scenario, Iran risks losing its primary source of revenue.”

An Israeli official said the joint attack was meant to send a united message to Iran that it would not be able to export its own oil through the strait while disrupting the oil exports of Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The authoritarian regime vowed to retaliate by attacking oil and gas production facilities in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, singling out Saudi Arabia’s SAMREF Refinery and the Jubail petrochemical complex, the UAE’s Al-Hasan Gas Field, and some of Qatar’s petrochemical plants, as well as a refinery there.