RSS
Iran Warns Planned Attack on Israel Unrelated to Gaza Ceasefire Talks, Intent on ‘Punishing the Aggressor’
Iranians attend the funeral procession of assassinated Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, Iran, Aug. 1, 2024. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
Iran’s plan to attack Israel in retaliation for the recent killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran will not be affected by ongoing discussions to reach a ceasefire in Gaza, the Iranian foreign ministry said on Monday.
“Iran’s support for the necessity of an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and stopping the Zionist regime’s [Israel’s] onslaught against the Palestinian people has no direct connection with Iran’s legitimate right and punishing the aggressor and responding to the aggression,” ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani told reporters during a press conference. “These two issues are two separate matters and are not directly related to each other.”
Haniyeh, the exiled political chief of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, was killed in an explosion in Iran’s capital city on July 31. Iran has accused Israel of carrying out the assassination and vowed revenge, which, according to experts and Western officials, will likely take the form of a direct strike on the Jewish state. The Israeli government has neither confirmed nor denied responsibility for Haniyeh’s death.
Iran is the chief international sponsor of Hamas, providing the terrorist group with weapons, funding, and training.
It is unclear when Iran will take action against Israel. On Tuesday, the spokesperson for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), an Iranian military force and internationally designated terrorist organization, revealed there could be a long wait.
“Time is in our favor, and the waiting period for this response could be long,” Alimohammad Naini said, according to Reuters, which cited Iranian state media. Naini added that “the enemy” should wait for a calculated response.
Reuters reported last week, citing three anonymous “senior Iranian officials,” that only a ceasefire deal in Hamas-ruled Gaza, where Israel has been waging a military campaign for the past 10 months against Palestinian terrorists, would hold Iran back from direct retaliation against Israel.
However, Iran has signaled it will attack Israel in the coming days regardless of the outcome of the ceasefire talks.
“As the Islamic Republic of Iran, we insist on our legal and indisputable right to punish the aggressor,” Kanaani said on Monday. “We have also told our friends that we do not seek to escalate tensions in the region, and we support efforts with good faith. On the other hand, we emphasize Iran’s inherent right to assert its rights and punish the aggressor, and we will use it at the appropriate time.”
Negotiations brokered by the US, Egypt, and Qatar to reach a ceasefire deal to halt fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza continued this week.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken pushed for progress toward a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal as he visited Egypt on Tuesday. He flew to Egypt from Tel Aviv, where he said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had accepted a US “bridging proposal” aimed at narrowing the gaps between the two sides. He urged Hamas also to accept the proposal as the basis for more talks.
Hamas has not explicitly rejected the current proposal but indicated it likely won’t accept it. The terrorist group rejected US comments that it was backing away from a deal, saying it was still committed to terms it agreed with mediators last month based on a US proposal from May and blaming Netanyahu for obstructing an agreement with new demands.
Netanyahu has said any hostage-truce deal must include measures to ensure Israel’s security needs, such as mechanisms to prevent a return of armed Hamas gunmen to northern Gaza, which borders southern Israel.
Hamas launched the war with its invasion of southern Israel on Oct. 7. During the onslaught, Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists murdered 1,200 people and kidnapped some 250 hostages while committing mass atrocities, including widespread sexual violence.
Israel repelled the surprise invasion and responded with weeks of airstrikes before launching a ground offensive in neighboring Gaza on Oct. 27. According to Israeli leaders, the main goals of the ongoing military campaign in the enclave are to free the hostages and dismantle Hamas’ military and governing capabilities.
Hamas leaders have vowed to carry out attacks on Israel similar to the Oct. 7 massacre “again and again.”
The conflict has raised fears around the world that the fighting could spread and engulf the Middle East in a regional war.
Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed terrorist group in Lebanon, has pummeled northern Israeli communities almost daily with barrages of drones, rockets, and missiles since the start of the Gaza conflict in October.
About 80,000 Israelis have been forced to evacuate Israel’s north during that time due to the unrelenting attacks. Most of them have spent the past 10 months living in hotels in other areas of Israel.
Hezbollah has also said it will attack Israel in retaliation for the killing of Fuad Shukr, a senior Hezbollah commander, in an airstrike in Beirut, Lebanon late last month. Israel claimed responsibility for Shukr’s death.
According to reports, the expected Iranian and Hezbollah response will likely be larger than Iran’s unprecedented direct attack on Israeli soil in April. In that attack, Iran fired some 300 missiles and drones at Israel, nearly all of which were downed by the Jewish state and its allies.
Despite the failure of the April strike, Brig. Gen. Aziz Nasirzadeh, the nominee to serve as Iran’s next defense minister, hailed it as a success while addressing the Iranian parliament on Monday.
“After [Iran’s] proud operation of True Promise, the US has begun to strengthen the weakened deterrence of the infamous Zionist regime [Israel],” Nasirzadeh said, stressing the need of the Islamist regime to ramp up weapons production to boost its own deterrence.
Nasirzadeh also claimed that the world has rejected a US-led world order and is seeking to form a new system with new powers emerging, according to Iranian media.
The post Iran Warns Planned Attack on Israel Unrelated to Gaza Ceasefire Talks, Intent on ‘Punishing the Aggressor’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Top US General Makes Unannounced Middle East Trip as Iran Threat Looms
US Air Force General C.Q. Brown, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, speaks at a conference of African chiefs of defense in Gaborone, Botswana on June 25, 2024, the first time a chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the top U.S. military officer, has visited sub-Saharan Africa in 30 years, according to the Pentagon. Photo: REUTERS/Phil Stewart/File Photo
The top US general began an unannounced visit to the Middle East on Saturday to discuss ways to avoid any new escalation in tensions that could spiral into a broader conflict, as the region braces for a threatened Iranian attack against Israel.
Air Force General C.Q. Brown, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, began his trip in Jordan and said he will also travel to Egypt and Israel in the coming days to hear the perspectives of military leaders.
His visit comes as the United States is trying to clinch an elusive Gaza ceasefire-for-hostages deal between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas, which Brown said would “help bring down the temperature,” if achieved.
“At the same time, as I talk to my counterparts, what are the things we can do to deter any type of broader escalation and ensure we’re taking all the appropriate steps to (avoid) … a broader conflict,” Brown told Reuters before landing in Jordan.
US President Joe Biden’s administration has been seeking to limit the fallout from the war in Gaza between Hamas and Israel, now in its 11th month. The conflict has leveled huge swathes of Gaza, triggered border clashes between Israel and Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Hezbollah movement and sparked attacks by Yemen’s Houthis on Red Sea shipping.
Meanwhile, US troops have been attacked by Iran-aligned militia in Syria, Iraq and Jordan. In recent weeks, the U.S. military has been bolstering its forces in the Middle East to guard against major new attacks by Iran or its allies, sending the Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group into the region to replace the Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group.
The United States has also sent an Air Force F-22 Raptor squadron into the region and deployed a cruise missile submarine.
“We brought in additional capability to send a strong message to deter a broader conflict … but also to protect our forces should they be attacked,” Brown said, saying safeguarding American forces was “paramount.”
IRANIAN RESPONSE
Iran has vowed a severe response to the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, which took place as he visited Tehran late last month and which it blamed on Israel. Israel has neither confirmed or denied its involvement.
Hezbollah has also threatened a response after Israel killed a senior Hezbollah commander in Beirut last month.
Iran has not publicly indicated what would be the target of an eventual response to the Haniyeh assassination but U.S. officials say they are closely monitoring for any signs that Iran will make good on its threats.
“We stay postured, watching the (intelligence) and force movements,” Brown said. On Friday, Iran’s new Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi told his French and British counterparts in telephone conversations that it was his country’s right to retaliate, according to the official IRNA news agency.
On April 13, two weeks after two Iranian generals were killed in a strike on Tehran’s embassy in Syria, Iran unleashed a barrage of hundreds of drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles towards Israel, damaging two air bases. Israel, the United States and other allies managed to destroy almost all of the weapons before they reached their targets.
Brown did not speculate about what Iran and its allies might do but said he hoped to discuss different scenarios with his Israeli counterpart.
“Particularly, as I engage with my Israeli counterpart, how they might respond, depending on the response that comes from Hezbollah or from Iran,” Brown said.
The current war in the Gaza Strip began on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas terrorists stormed into Israeli communities, killing around 1,200 people and abducting about 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
The post Top US General Makes Unannounced Middle East Trip as Iran Threat Looms first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Gaza Talks Resume in Cairo
Illustrative. Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian meets with Qatari Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, in Tehran, Iran July 6, 2022. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS.
Gaza ceasefire and hostage negotiators discussed new compromise proposals in Cairo on Saturday, seeking to bridge gaps between Israel and Hamas as the UN reported worsening humanitarian conditions, with malnutrition soaring and polio discovered in the Palestinian enclave.
A Hamas delegation arrived on Saturday to be nearer at hand to review any proposals that emerge in the main talks between Israel and the mediating countries Egypt, Qatar and the United States, two Egyptian security sources said.
Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani was expected to attend.
A US official said negotiators from the United States met with Egypt then bilaterally with Egypt and Qatar on Saturday, and believed that representatives from Egypt and Qatar were meeting with Hamas.
Months of on-off talks have failed to produce a breakthrough to end Israel’s military campaign in Gaza or free the remaining hostages seized by Hamas in the terrorist group’s Oct. 7 attack that triggered the war.
The Egyptian sources said the new proposals include compromises on outstanding points such as how to secure key areas and the return of people to north Gaza.
However there was no sign of any breakthrough on key sticking points, including Israel’s insistence that it must retain control of the so-called Philadelphi Corridor, on the border between Gaza and Egypt.
Hamas has accused Israel of going back on things it had previously agreed to in the talks, which Israel denies. The group says the United States is not mediating in good faith.
In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has locked horns with Israeli ceasefire negotiators over whether Israeli troops must remain all along the border between Gaza and Egypt, a person with knowledge of the talks said.
A Palestinian official familiar with mediation efforts said it was too soon to predict the outcome of talks.
“Hamas is there to discuss the outcome of the mediators’ talks with the Israeli officials and whether there is enough to suggest a change in the Netanyahu stance about reaching a deal,” the official said.
The post Gaza Talks Resume in Cairo first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Soldier Killed in Central Gaza, Bringing IDF Death Toll to 696
Sgt. First Class (res.) Evyatar Atuar was killed in action in Gaza City, Aug. 23, 2024. Photo: IDF.
JNS.org – An Israel Defense Forces soldier was killed and several others were wounded on Friday morning when Hamas terrorists detonated an explosive device in Gaza City.
The slain soldier was named as Sgt. First Class (res.) Evyatar Atuar, 24, of the 16th “Jerusalem” Infantry Brigade’s 6310th Battalion, from Rosh Haayin.
The brigade, part of the 252nd “Sinai” Division, was involved in expanding the IDF’s Netzarim Corridor, which separates Gaza’s north and south.
According to an initial probe, terrorists remote-detonated a bomb planted on a building’s outer wall after soldiers had entered to search it in the Zeitoun neighborhood.
At least four soldiers outside the structure were seriously wounded and three others were moderately hurt, the IDF said.
On Thursday, Sgt. Ori Ashkenazi Nechemya, 19, a member of the 401st Armored Brigade’s 46th Battalion, was killed battling Hamas terrorists in the southern Gaza Strip.
A preliminary probe found that he was killed by anti-tank missile fire in Rafah.
Earlier this week, Lt. Shahar Ben Nun, 21, from the Paratrooper Brigade’s Reconnaissance Battalion, was killed by an IAF missile that malfunctioned during a strike in southern Gaza.
The death toll among Israeli troops since the start of the Gaza ground incursion on Oct. 27 now stands at 333, and at 696 on all fronts since the Hamas-led Oct. 7 massacre, according to official military data.
Additionally, Ch. Insp. Arnon Zamora, a member of the Border Police’s Yamam National Counter-Terrorism Unit, was fatally wounded during a hostage-rescue mission in Gaza in June, and civilian defense contractor Liron Yitzhak was mortally wounded in May.
The post Soldier Killed in Central Gaza, Bringing IDF Death Toll to 696 first appeared on Algemeiner.com.