Gen Saleh Jokar also says Iran’s missiles could easily reach US warships in Gulf
Iranian missiles could easily hit US ships in the Gulf, and any conflict would threaten global energy supplies, a senior Iranian military official has said.
As tensions simmered on Friday, Tehran blamed the US for an escalating regional crisis that western intelligence officials fear could lead to open conflict.
Continue reading...Donald Trump’s national security adviser is stoking tensions with North Korea, Iran and Venezuela, in line with decades of taking the most hawkish position on any given issue
The US is now engaged in three major confrontations around the world that have the potential to degrade into war. And in the driving seat on all three fronts is John Bolton, one of the most fervent believers in American military power ever to work in the White House.
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Continue reading...Israeli academics criticise motion, saying it is wrong to conflate BDS and antisemitism
Germany’s Bundestag has become the first parliament in Europe to pass a motion labelling the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel as antisemitic.
The non-binding motion, passed on Friday afternoon, said the campaign to boycott Israeli artists and goods was “reminiscent of the most terrible chapter in Germany history” and triggered memories of the Nazis’ slogan “Don’t buy from Jews”.
Continue reading...Risk to oil market of three simultaneous disruptions becomes lobbying point for Iran and Libya
In November 2018, Donald Trump tweeted: “Oil prices getting lower … a tax cut for America and the world! Enjoy! $54 … Thank you to Saudi Arabia.”
Five months on, with oil prices more than $70, Trump will be in a less celebratory mood as Opec’s oil ministers and their allies gather in Jeddah on Friday, without Iran. The main agenda item will be the implications for oil of three interconnected American foreign policy crises – in Venezuela, Iran, and Libya. Together these crises, being played out simultaneously, have the potential to scrub as much as 3.5m barrels of oil per day from the markets.
Continue reading...Hatice Cengiz criticises lack of action and calls for sanctions on Saudi Arabia
Hatice Cengiz, the fiancee of Jamal Khashoggi, the journalist killed at a Saudi Arabian consulate in Turkey last year, has said she could not believe that no one had yet faced serious consequences for the crime.
“I cannot understand that the world still has not done anything about this,” she said in emotional testimony to a US Congress hearing on press freedom and the dangers of reporting on human rights. “I still cannot make human sense of it. I still cannot understand. I still feel that I’ll wake up.”
Continue reading...Exclusive: Top military leader delivers message at Baghdad meeting as tensions rise
Iran’s most prominent military leader has recently met Iraqi militias in Baghdad and told them to “prepare for proxy war”, the Guardian has learned.
Two senior intelligence sources said that Qassem Suleimani, leader of Iran’s powerful Quds force, summoned the militias under Tehran’s influence three weeks ago, amid a heightened state of tension in the region. The move to mobilise Iran’s regional allies is understood to have triggered fears in the US that Washington’s interests in the Middle East are facing a pressing threat. The UK raised its threat levels for British troops in Iraq on Thursday.
Continue reading...The US is closer to war with Iran than it has been since the Bush years, or perhaps ever. And Bolton is largely to blame
Donald Trump’s national security adviser John Bolton wants the United States to go to war with Iran.
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Continue reading...UN envoy issues warning as renewed clashes reported following Houthis’ withdrawal
Renewed clashes broke out between Houthi rebel fighters and Saudi-backed pro-government forces in the Yemeni port city of Hodeidah on Wednesday, breaching a ceasefire and potentially threatening a withdrawal agreement intended to pave the way for wider peace talks.
The fighting prompted the UN’s special envoy to Yemen, Martin Griffiths, to warn that peace could yet be a way off, despite earlier signs the pullout by Houthi forces was going to plan. Their withdrawal from Hodeidah and two other Red Sea ports, which began on Saturday, was the most significant advance yet in efforts to end the four-year-old war.
Continue reading...Thousands turn out to commemorate mass displacement of people in 1948
Israeli soldiers have shot 16 people at the Gaza frontier on a day of rallies commemorating the mass displacement of Palestinians during the war that led to Israel’s creation in 1948.
Each year, typically on 15 May, Palestinians mark the nakba, or catastrophe, when more than 700,000 people fled or were expelled from towns and villages seven decades ago.
Continue reading...Deputy commander of anti-Isis coalition rebuts White House justification for sending troops
The top British general in the US-led coalition against Isis has said there is no increased threat from Iranian-backed forces in Iraq or Syria, directly contradicting US assertions used to justify a military buildup in the region.
Hours later however, his assessment was disowned by US Central Command in an extraordinary rebuke of an allied senior officer. A spokesman insisted that the troops in Iraq and Syria were on a high level of alert due to the alleged Iranian threat. The conflicting versions of the reality on the ground added to the confusion and mixed signals in a tense part of the Middle East.
Continue reading...Secretary of state’s visit will be first high-level meeting since redacted Mueller report release
Mike Pompeo is to meet Vladimir Putin in Russia at a time of heightened fears of a clash between the US and Iran, a Moscow ally.
A Kremlin spokesman, before the meeting on Tuesday, accused the US of applying a “maximum pressure policy” against Iran, a reference to a harsh US sanctions regime and military deployments to the Middle East.
Continue reading...Calling themselves the Gaza skate team, a group of young Palestinians get together to skate and rollerblade amid deprivation and high security
Continue reading...At least four dead in protests in Khartoum after ousted president charged and transition deal moves closer
Violence has flared in Sudan’s capital Khartoum after the military council and opposition groups said they had agreed to a power structure for the country’s transition following the removal of President Omar al-Bashir last month.
Heavy gunfire was heard late into the evening, and the council said a military police officer and a protester had been killed and many protesters wounded. A doctors’ committee linked to protest movement later said three more protesters had been shot dead. State TV put the death toll at one police officer and three protesters.
Continue reading...Jeremy Hunt warns of conflict erupting in the Gulf by accident after Saudi ships sabotaged
The US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, has been urged by European leaders to show maximum restraint towards Iran after Saudi Arabia confirmed that two of its vessels had been mysteriously sabotaged on Sunday in the waters off Oman by an unidentified assailant.
Federica Mogherini, the EU’s foreign affairs chief, warned Pompeo in a hastily arranged meeting in Brussels: “We are living in crucial delicate moments where the most responsible attitude to take and should be is maximum restraint and avoiding any escalation on the military side.”
Continue reading...Long-term standoff threatens to turn into crisis after alleged sabotage of two Saudi tankers
A festering four-year war, crippling sanctions, threats to maritime oil trade and a US naval battlegroup steaming for the Persian Gulf. Such developments were troubling enough, before two Saudi tankers were reportedly sabotaged off the UAE coast on Sunday – a development set to ratchet tensions between Tehran and Washington to new and combustible highs.
With Riyadh claiming significant hull damage to its ships and the UAE claiming the damage was done inside its territorial waters, what last week was a looming standoff is now a real-time crisis with potent implications for both global energy security and regional stability.
Continue reading...One vessel was bound for the US and comes after warnings that Iran or its proxies could target shipping in region
Two Saudi oil tankers have suffered “significant damage” in an apparent sabotage attack off the coast of Fujairah, part of the United Arab Emirates, the Saudi energy minister has said.
The reported incident – which could threaten the security of global oil supplies – comes after the US warned ships that “Iran or its proxies” could be targeting maritime traffic in the region, prompting the US to send an aircraft carrier strike group and B-52 bombers to the Persian Gulf.
Continue reading...President calls for united front in face of ‘unprecedented’ US pressure
Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani, has called for unity among political factions to overcome conditions that he said may be harder than those during the 1980s war with Iraq, state media reported, as the country faces tightening US sanctions.
Donald Trump on Thursday urged Iran’s leaders to talk with him about giving up their nuclear programme and said he could not rule out a military confrontation.
Continue reading...Suggestions that the war in Syria is winding down must sound like a sick joke to the people of Ras al-Ain. Their village, in north-western Idlib province, was targeted in an air raid last week. Five residents were killed, including three children, and at least 20 others were injured.
A local man, Hussein al-Sheikh, described to Al Jazeera reporter Farah Najjar how a building collapsed as the children ran for cover: “I was standing near the front door watching the kids play. Suddenly we heard another explosion... It was a difficult scene to watch. I can’t express what I saw.”
Continue reading...UN supervisor welcomes long-delayed implementation of Stockholm ceasefire deal
Yemen’s Houthi movement has begun unilaterally moving its forces out of key ports, the first practical progress under a ceasefire deal agreed last year.
The retreat from areas in and around western Hodeidah was agreed at talks in Sweden in December but stalled over a lack of trust between two sides in the war.
Continue reading...Survivors report fishing vessel coming to their rescue 40 miles of coast of Tunisia
As many as 70 people trying to reach Europe from Libya have drowned after their vessel capsized in the deadliest such incident in the Mediterranean since January.
According to survivors, at least 16 of whom were rescued, the boat left Zuwara in Libya, where renewed warfare between rival factions has gripped the capital, Tripoli, in the past five weeks. The vessel capsized 40 miles off the coast of Sfax, south of Tunis, as it headed towards Italy.
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