Browsing: Region
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian met Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei around the start of the president’s third year in office in late July, state media said on Sunday, and a paramilitary leader promised footage of Khamenei in the future. Pezeshkian has given differing accounts in recent weeks about his access to Khamenei, who has not been seen in public since he succeeded his father in the role in March. On July 21, the president said interactions with the supreme leader were “increasing day by day”, but in early August he said communicating with Khamenei was “very difficult”. The late July meeting covered military affairs and the economy, including securing resources, managing foreign exchange and energy use, as well as economic ties with foreign partners, according to state media. In May, Iranian state media also reported that Pezeshkian had a meeting with Khamenei for several hours, in what was then the first publicly reported meeting between the two since Khamenei became supreme leader. Khamenei was reportedly seriously injured in the February 28 strike that killed his father and predecessor, Ali Khamenei on the first day of the US-Israeli war on Iran. He had also generally kept a low public profile before becoming supreme leader. Basij Organisation deputy Qasem Qoraishi said Sunday that footage and other documentation showing Khamenei among the public and out in the streets, as well as in meetings with armed forces commanders, would be released in the future. Qoraishi said the footage would “once again bring disgrace upon the enemies and detractors of the Iranian people.” The comments appeared aimed at countering speculation about Khamenei’s health and public appearances. Source link
Iran said yesterday that a deal with Oman on control of the Strait of Hormuz was close but would not be enough to free up the waterway. Agreement between Iran and Oman over the strait is seen as vital to a wider deal to end the war that began with US and Israeli attacks on Iran on February 28 and led to Tehran establishing a chokehold over the major energy export route. A US official, who declined to be identified, had said on Friday that Washington anticipated an agreement soon between Iran and Oman, which sit on either side of the strait, so that normal oil traffic could resume. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran and Oman were “very close” to agreement on a new shipping route through the strait but that reopening it depended on other conditions, including US compensation to Iran. The secretary of Iran’s top national security body, Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, listed other demands including ending US threats against Iran, stopping aggression against Iran and its Lebanese, Palestinian, Yemeni and Iraqi allies, lifting a blockade and sanctions on Iran and freeing Iranian assets. Source link
A mound of dirt put into place by the Israeli military blocks the eastern entrance of the southern Lebanese village of Zawtar al-Gharbiyah. – AFP Israeli troops infiltrated a Lebanese village placed under the control of Lebanon’s army as part of a June agreement, building an earthen barrier there overnight, state media and the local mayor said yesterday.An AFP correspondent saw the barrier at the village’s eastern entrance, blocking the road.The local authorities said that it is unclear if any Israeli forces remained in the area. …
TOPSHOT – Israeli security forces patrol along a street during a military raid in the Qalandia refugee camp, south of Ramallah in the Israeli-occupied West Bank,…
The US must pressure Israel to accept the next phase of the Gaza plan, a Hamas official told AFP on Sunday, after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said he rejected the US-backed agreement.”We expect the mediators and the American guarantor to pressure Netanyahu and his government to adhere to the roadmap and not obstruct the process for internal political and electoral reasons,” Hamas political bureau member Bassem Naim told AFP Source link
Israel has rejected US President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace 15-point plan for Gaza, and will not withdraw until Hamas fully disarms, Prime Minister Netanyahu said on Sunday.Trump announced last month that there had been a breakthrough in his plan to end the war, which both Israel and Hamas agreed to last year and which started with the ceasefire.Israel has continued to carry out strikes on Gaza since agreeing to the ceasefire last October.Trump said that Hamas had agreed to lay down its weapons. Source link
The Israeli occupation forces (IOF) murdered at least 73,386 Palestinian civilians and injured at least 174,250 others since the beginning of the genocide that the Israeli occupation has been committing against the Gaza Strip in October 2023.Palestinian medical sources reported on Sunday that hospitals across the Strip received two Palestinian martyrs and eight injured others over the past 24 hours.The sources indicated that many of the victims remain under the rubble and scattered on the streets, as ambulance and civil defense crews are still unable to reach them.Since the “ceasefire” agreement went into effect in October 2025, the IOF murdered at least 1,258 Palestinians, and injured at least 4,139 others, while 807 bodies were pulled out from under the rubble Source link
The Saudi Ministry of Energy announced that Saudi Aramco’s industrial security firefighting teams extinguished a fire that broke out today at one of the facilities belonging to the Saudi Aramco refinery in Jazan. No injuries were reported.The Ministry of Energy stated in a post on its “X” platform that the relevant authorities are completing the necessary procedures to address the incident. Source link
What happened in Makkah on Friday was more than the signing of a defence agreement. It could mark the emergence of a new strategic equation in the Middle East, with Saudi Arabia, Turkiye and Pakistan signalling a stronger determination to shape their own security architecture. At Al-Safa Palace, following Tawaf around the Kaaba, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif signed a pact carrying a clear message: an attack on one partner would be treated as a threat to all. Formally, the agreement is a defence pact. Strategically, however, it could signal a significant shift in the region’s balance of power.The timing is particularly important. Saudi Arabia’s confidence in Washington as its ultimate security guarantor has increasingly been tested. Since February, Iran has targeted Saudi Arabia with missiles and through allied groups, including the Houthis in Yemen and militias in Iraq. Attacks on oil facilities and disruption around the Strait of Hormuz, through which around 20% of the world’s oil passes, have further intensified concerns over Gulf security. Against this backdrop, Riyadh has increasingly looked beyond its traditional security arrangements. Pakistan brings decades of military co-operation with Saudi Arabia and, crucially, is the only Muslim-majority nuclear-armed state. Turkiye, meanwhile, possesses the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato)’s second-largest military and has emerged as an important defence partner for Riyadh. The agreement therefore carries three important strategic messages. First is deterrence. By bringing Islamabad and Ankara closer to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia is signalling that any future attack could have consequences extending well beyond its borders. Second is strategic autonomy. The pact demonstrates that Saudi Arabia is increasingly prepared to strengthen its own defence capabilities and diversify its security partnerships rather than relying exclusively on Washington. Third is symbolism. The decision to sign the agreement in Makkah gives it a significance that extends beyond conventional military co-operation, linking the alliance to the protection of Islam’s holiest sites and reinforcing its political and religious symbolism.The development could have repercussions well beyond the three signatories. A stronger Saudi-Turkish-Pakistani alignment may push Iran to deepen its strategic and military ties with China and Russia. Beijing and Moscow, in turn, could justify a greater role in the Gulf to preserve regional balance and prevent any single power from controlling vital energy routes. The result could be increased military co-operation, advanced weapons transfers, satellite capabilities and naval exercises, gradually turning the Gulf into a new arena of global strategic competition between competing power blocs. From the perspective of Henry Kissinger’s realpolitik, such a development would represent a delicate challenge for Washington. His emphasis on balance-of-power politics suggests that the United States would have an interest in neither fully embracing nor directly confronting the emerging alliance, but rather in using it as leverage for diplomacy while preventing its military dimension from escalating into a wider confrontation. Ultimately, the Makkah Agreement may not resolve the Gulf’s longstanding security dilemma. Instead, it could transform it, from a predominantly regional confrontation between Iran and Saudi Arabia into a broader strategic contest involving the US and its allies on one side, and China, Russia and Iran on the other. What appears today to be a defence agreement could therefore become an early indicator of a new strategic order taking shape in the Gulf. Source link
ADNOC, the state-owned oil company of Abu Dhabi, confirmed that one of its vessels was targeted by a missile while transiting the Strait of Hormuz in the early hours of Saturday, August 8.The incident resulted in no injuries, and the situation has been brought under control, the company said. Source link