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Iran’s Acting FM Meets Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad Leaders in Syria, Calls for Gaza Ceasefire
Iran’s acting foreign minister Ali Bagheri Kani attends a press conference with Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad in Damascus, Syria, June 4, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Yamam al Shaar
Iran’s acting foreign minister Ali Bagheri Kani on Tuesday met with leaders of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) in Syria, further underscoring the Iranian regime’s support for the terrorist groups as they fight Israeli forces in Gaza.
Bagheri Kani held meetings with key figures from the Palestinian terrorist factions at the Iranian embassy in Damascus, the Syrian capital.
Hamas, which rules Gaza, and PIJ have both long received extensive support from Iran, including funding, weapons, and training.
During his trip, Bagheri Kani also discussed Israel’s ongoing war against Hamas in Gaza with his Syrian counterpart, Faisal Mekdad.
Bagheri Kani said at a joint press conference that he and Mekdad had discussed the need for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and the delivery of humanitarian aid without conditions.
The Iranian diplomat then met Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. According to Assad’s office, they discussed bilateral ties between the two allies and “developments in the occupied Palestinian territories.”
The meeting came one day after a general in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a powerful Iranian military force and a US-designated terrorist organization, was killed in an alleged Israeli airstrike near the Syrian city of Aleppo. In recent years, Israel has allegedly launched several strikes against Iranian targets in Syria in order to prevent Tehran from building another terrorist front against the Jewish state.
Tuesday’s meeting also came after Assad met Iran’s so-called “supreme leader,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in Tehran last week to offer condolences for the death of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi. The late Iranian president died in a helicopter crash in northwestern Iran last month along with Bagheri Kani’s predecessor, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian.
The strong ties between Iran’s Islamist regime and Hamas were evident last month, when Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh delivered a eulogy for Raisi at a funeral in Iran. During his speech, Haniyeh thanked Raisi and Iran for their continued support of the “resistance factions in Gaza” and for creating, financing, and directing a “resistance axis” of Islamist, anti-Western militant organizations across the Middle East.
Before coming to Syria, Bagheri Kani traveled to Lebanon in his first trip abroad since becoming Iran’s acting top diplomat. In his day-long visit to Beirut, Bagheri Kani met top Lebanese officials as well as Hassan Nasrallah, the head Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed terrorist group based in Lebanon.
While Israel has been fighting Hamas to the south in Gaza, Hezbollah terrorists have been firing rockets daily at northern Israel, displacing tens of thousands of Israeli civilians.
Hamas’ Oct. 7 invasion of and massacre across southern Israel launched the war in Gaza. PIJ is a separate but allied terrorist organization in the Palestinian enclave that has also held Israeli hostages kidnapped during the Oct. 7 onslaught.
Khamenei claimed on Monday that the massacre occurred “just when the region needed it.” He added that there was a plan by “the Americans, the Zionists, of their supporters and of some of the countries in the region to change the equation in the region” — an apparent reference to ongoing, US-brokered efforts to foster a normalization agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia.
Many observers have claimed the Oct. 7 atrocities were meant to force Israel into a war and undermine the push for a historic Israel-Saudi normalization agreement.
The post Iran’s Acting FM Meets Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad Leaders in Syria, Calls for Gaza Ceasefire first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Lebanon Must Disarm Hezbollah to Have a Shot at Better Days, Says US Envoy
Thomas Barrack at the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse in Brooklyn, New York, U.S., November 4, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
i24 News – Lebanon’s daunting social, economic and political issues would not get resolved unless the state persists in the efforts to disarm Hezbollah, the Iranian proxy behind so much of the unrest and destruction, special US envoy Tom Barrack told The National.
“You have Israel on one side, you have Iran on the other, and now you have Syria manifesting itself so quickly that if Lebanon doesn’t move, it’s going to be Bilad Al Sham again,” he said, using the historical Arabic name for the region sometimes known as “larger Syria.”
The official stressed the need to follow through on promises to disarm the Iranian proxy, which suffered severe blows from Israel in the past year, including the elimination of its entire leadership, and is considered a weakened though still dangerous jihadist outfit.
“There are issues that we have to arm wrestle with each other over to come to a final conclusion. Remember, we have an agreement, it was a great agreement. The problem is, nobody followed it,” he told The National.
Barrack spoke on the heels of a trip to Beirut, where he proposed a diplomatic plan for the region involving the full disarmament of Hezbollah by the Lebanese state.
The post Lebanon Must Disarm Hezbollah to Have a Shot at Better Days, Says US Envoy first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Report: Putin Urges Iran to Accept ‘Zero Enrichment’ Nuclear Deal With US
Russian President Vladimir Putin meets Iranian counterpart Masoud Pezeshkian on the sidelines of a cultural forum dedicated to the 300th anniversary of the birth of the Turkmen poet and philosopher Magtymguly Fragi, in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, Oct. 11, 2024. Photo: Sputnik/Alexander Scherbak/Pool via REUTERS
i24 News – Russian President Vladimir Putin has told Iranian leadership that he supports the idea of a nuclear deal in which Iran is unable to enrich uranium, the Axios website reported on Saturday. The Russian strongman also relayed the message to his American counterpart, President Donald Trump, the report said.
Iranian news agency Tasnim issued a denial, citing an “informed source” as saying Putin had not sent any message to Iran in this regard.
Also on Saturday, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi stated that “Any negotiated solution must respect Iran’s right to enrichment. No agreement without recognizing our right to enrichment. If negotiations occur, the only topic will be the nuclear program. No other issues, especially defense or military matters, will be on the agenda.”
The post Report: Putin Urges Iran to Accept ‘Zero Enrichment’ Nuclear Deal With US first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Syria’s Al-Sharaa Attending At Least One Meeting With Israeli Officials in Azerbaijan
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa speaks during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron after a meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, May 7, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Stephanie Lecocq/Pool
i24 News – Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa is attending at least one meeting with Israeli officials in Azerbaijan today, despite sources in Damascus claiming he wasn’t attending, a Syrian source close to President Al-Sharaa tells i24NEWS.
The Syrian source stated that this is a series of two or three meetings between the sides, with Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani also in attendance, along with Ahmed Al-Dalati, the Syrian government’s liaison for security meetings with Israel.
The high-level Israeli delegation includes a special envoy of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, as well as security and military figures.
The purpose of the meetings is to discuss further details of the security agreement to be signed between Israel and Syria, the Iranian threat in Syria and Lebanon, Hezbollah’s weapons, the weapons of Palestinian militias, the Palestinians camps in Lebanon, and the future of Palestinian refugees from Gaza in the region.
The possibility of opening an Israeli coordination office in Damascus, without diplomatic status, might also be discussed.
The source stated that the decision to hold the meetings in Azerbaijan, made by Israel and the US, is intended to send a message to Iran.
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