NOURNEWS- The following headlines appeared in English-language newspapers in the Iranian capital on Wednesday, October 18, 2023.
IRAN DAILY:
-- Belarus-Iran trade triples in 2022
Trade between Belarus and Iran increased three-fold in 2022 year-on-year, the Belarusian prime minister said, adding that Minsk highly values friendly ties with Tehran.
Roman Golovchenko made the remarks during his meeting with the First Vice President of the Islamic Republic of Iran Mohammad Mokhber in Minsk, Belarus, on October 17, BelTA reported.
“This year, we have added another 25 percent to the high figures of the previous year,” the prime minister said.
Golovchenko stated that the Belarus president’s visit to Iran in March 2023 made an important mark in building the Belarus-Iran strategic partnership.
The prime minister stressed that the country is precisely fulfilling “the provisions of the roadmap of comprehensive cooperation between the two countries in 2023–2026,” which was signed during the visit of the Belarusian president to Iran in March 2023.
“This is a systematic document to let us work through a list of specific practical measures. Many measures of this roadmap are being successfully implemented,” Golovchenko said.
The Belarusian prime minister said that Minsk expects Mokhber’s visit “to add even greater dynamics to interaction on projects in trade and economy, manufacturing and investment cooperation, petrochemical industry, pharmaceuticals, agriculture, and transport.”
Mohammad Mokhber, for his part, highlighted, “Iran’s strategy is aimed at advancing economic and political relations with Belarus.”
On Tuesday, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko also met with the Iranian first vice president, stating the two countries should work “closely” together to counter attacks from the West.
The Belarusian president accused “unfriendly countries” — such as the US and other Western nations — of using never-ending Middle East tensions to poke Iran.
“The situation in the world is heating up,” Lukashenko underscored.
“The pressure exerted on our states is unprecedented,” Lukashenko told Mokhber. “But you have already learned to resist it to some extent, and your experience is valuable for us.”
“The most important thing for us is time, not sanctions and pressure. We should not lose time because of red tape,” the Belarusian leader said.
During Mokhber’s visit to Minsk, the Iranian official is set to meet several Belarusians for “high-level bilateral talks,” according to IRNA.
The one-day visit is expected to result in a new cooperation document to strengthen “ties between the two nations”.
-- Astana-Tehran cooperation developing comprehensively: Envoy
“Kazakhstan’s cooperation with Iran is developing comprehensively,” said the Kazakh ambassador to Tehran on Monday, “examples of which are the official visit of the president of Kazakhstan to Iran last year.”
Speaking at a ceremony held in Tehran to celebrate the National Day of Kazakhstan on Monday evening, Askhat Orazbay added that the Kazakh prime minister visited Iran this spring, and the official visit of Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi to his country is expected in the near future.
The ceremony was attended by ambassadors of other countries and international organizations to Iran as well as guests from Iran.
These will certainly give a new impetus to the further development of bilateral cooperation, the ambassador noted.
“During a short period by historical standards, our country has passed a long and hard way of establishing its statehood. At the beginning of independence, Kazakhstan started implementing reforms aimed at transforming from a Soviet type planned economy to a modern free market economy,” Orazbay said.
The envoy went on to say that modernization and economic growth were the main priorities.
“Facts convincingly speak about our success in state-building and conducting economic reforms. As a result, Kazakhstan has become a leading country in the Central Asian region,” said the ambassador.
Kazakhstan is a country with a rich historical and cultural heritage. It is located in the heart of Eurasia, at the crossroads of the world’s oldest civilizations, connecting the East with the West, where traditional Islamic values harmoniously coexist with Western values.
Despite being the world’s ninth largest country by territory and having the longest land borders, Kazakhstan at the outset of its independence has managed to fully complete the legal process of delimitation and demarcation of its borders with all neighboring countries including Russia and China, he stated.
“We do not have territorial disputes with any of our neighboring countries.”
Thanks to its multi-directional foreign policy, Kazakhstan does not have a single enemy country in the world, Orazbay said, adding that a significant achievement of Kazakhstan has been shutting down one of the largest nuclear test sites, known as Semipalatinsk. At that time, Kazakhstan possessed the fourth largest nuclear arsenal in the world.
Construction in a short time of a totally new and modern capital in the middle of the country, the city of Astana became a symbol of independence and sovereignty and a milestone in the country’s modern history.
Also speaking at the event, Houshang Mohammadi, a deputy agriculture minister of Iran said the two countries enjoy friendly relations.
Pointing to the current ascending trend of trade between Kazakhstan and Iran, Mohammadi said that considering the potentials of both sides, the level of bilateral trade could rise much further.
-- Iran’s six-month car production up 23%
Iran’s production of all types of cars increased by 23% in the first six months of the current Iranian year (March 21–September 22) compared to the same period last year.
According to a report released by Iran’s Ministry of Industry, Mine, and Trade on Tuesday, the country manufactured 642,930 automobiles during the six months to September 22, IRNA reported. Iranian automakers produced 524,256 cars during the first six months of the previous Iranian year, the report indicated.
Private and state-run automakers of Iran manufactured a total of 89,054 cars during the months to September 22, three percent more than the related figure of last year which was 86,451 sets. A sum of 545,180 sedans were produced in the country during H1 of the current Iranian year, indicating a 19 percent growth compared to the corresponding figure of last year
(456, 617 cars).
The report also revealed that a 46 percent rise was registered in pickup production in Iran as 76,032 pickup cars were produced during the six months to
September 22.
-- Leader: None can stop Resistance if Israeli crimes continue
Iran’s Leader warned Tuesday that "no one can stop" resistance forces if Israel's crimes continue, while a senior UN official denounced the "appalling reports" of the Zionist regime's attacks on civilians fleeing in the south of Gaza.
In a meeting with a group of Iranian elites on Tuesday, the Leader of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei said that Muslim nations are angry at the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip, adding that if Israeli crimes against Palestinians in Gaza continue, no one can stop Muslims and resistance forces.
The Leader emphasized that no matter what the Zionist regime does, it cannot compensate for the blatant defeat it suffered. He called for the trial of the Zionist regime and stated that what is before the whole world is the occupying regime’s genocidal crimes, which have been seen by everyone.
Ayatollah Khamenei also said that what is in front of the eyes of the whole world in Palestine is the Israeli regime’s crime of genocide.
Bombardments on refuge site
Israel on Tuesday bombed areas of southern Gaza where it had told Palestinians to flee to ahead of an expected ground invasion, killing dozens of people in the bombardments it says are targeted at Hamas resistance fighters that administrate the besieged territory, AP reported.
The UN human rights office decried “appalling reports” that civilians who were trying to flee to southern Gaza were killed by a military strike.
Spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani urged Israeli forces to avoid “aerial bombardments, indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks” and to “take precautions to avoid — and in any case, to minimize — loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, and damage to civilian objects.”
EU calls for Iran intervention
Meanwhile, European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called on Iran to use its influence to prevent the spillover of Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip into the entire West Asia region.
In a post on his X account, Borrell wrote, “It is in everyone’s interest to prevent a regional spillover. Urged Iran to use its influence to avoid regional escalation”.
2K US troops on
deployment alert
This is while the US military on Tuesday ordered 2,000 personnel to prepare for deployment to the Middle East as a show of force amid the escalating conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, AFP reported.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the deployment would allow the US “to respond more quickly” to the crisis, while the White House stressed it did not intend to put US combat forces on the ground.
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said preparing the troops for deployment “is really about sending a signal of deterrence”.
The move comes as President Joe Biden heads to Israel today to underscore Washington’s support for its close ally.
Biden will “hear from Israel what it needs to defend its people,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, and also hear how Israel “will conduct its operations in a way that minimizes civilian casualties and enables humanitarian assistance to flow to civilians in Gaza in a way that does not benefit Hamas”.
Israel has vowed to annihilate Hamas after the large-scale attack by the resistance movement that killed 1,400 people during a rampage through southern Israeli towns on October 7, the deadliest single day in Israel’s 75-year history.
3,000 Palestinians killed
In retaliation for the attack, Israel has bombarded the Gaza Strip with airstrikes that have killed around 3,000 Palestinians, according to Palestinian health ministry, and driven around half of the 2.3 million Gazans from their homes. Israel has imposed a total blockade on the enclave, halting food, fuel, and medical supplies, which are rapidly running out.
Scores of trucks carrying vital supplies for Gaza headed towards the Rafah crossing in Egypt on Tuesday, the only access point to the enclave outside Israel’s control, but there was no clear indication that they would be able to enter.
-- EU maintains arms embargo on Iran
EU member states decided on Tuesday to maintain restrictive measures against Iran under the non-proliferation sanctions regime after the JCPOA Transition Day, according to a statement.
The JCPOA, or the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, is a 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and major powers under which Tehran agreed to restrain its nuclear program in return for relief from US, EU, and UN sanctions.
“The [European] Council adopted legal acts to maintain the designations that had initially been imposed by the United Nations for individuals and entities involved in nuclear or ballistic missiles activities or affiliated to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC),” the statement said.
“The council also agreed to maintain sectoral and individual measures, existing under the EU’s sanctions regime, notably those related to Iran nuclear proliferation, as well as arms and missile embargoes.”
The council claimed that there are valid reasons to refrain from lifting the restrictions on October 18, 2023, as originally foreseen under the JCPOA. It also claimed that its decision is in line with the provisions of the UN Security Council Resolution 2231 and the JCPOA, in view of Iran not fulfilling its commitments under the JCPOA.
Back on September 14, Britain, France, and Germany also announced in a statement that they would retain their sanctions on Iran related to the country’s atomic program and its development of ballistic missiles in what they called a direct response to Iran’s consistent and severe noncompliance with the JCPOA.
The measures ban Iran from developing ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons and bar anyone from buying, selling, or transferring drones and missiles to and from Iran. They also include an asset freeze for several Iranian individuals and entities involved in the nuclear and ballistic missile program.
Throughout the years following the JCPOA, there has always been a clear difference in interpretation between Iran and Western parties regarding Iranian missile tests, satellite launches, and their connection to Resolution 2231. Western parties claim that this resolution prohibits any ballistic missile activity by Iran including the use of satellite launch vehicles for placing satellites into orbit. They claim that satellite launches help Tehran’s ballistic missile program.
However, the reality is quite different from the Western interpretation as per the texts of the JCPOA and Resolution 2231. Banning Iran’s ballistic missile activities was not mentioned in the 2015 JCPOA text at all. Even in Resolution 2231, the issue was not raised.
What the Western parties refer to is a non-mandatory and non-binding request in the third article of the second appendix of the resolution. This article calls on Iran not to have any activities related to the design and use of ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads.
-- Israel’s massacre of civilians rage on in Gaza
Lecturer in international relations
The Battle of Al-Aqsa is in its second week, and the scene continues to escalate in Palestinian territories, especially in the Gaza Strip. Hardly a minute goes by without hearing the sounds of shells targeting the homes of the innocent, leading to their destruction over the heads of women and children. This is in the context of Israel’s scorched earth policy, given its utter security failure in reaching the leadership and pillars of the resistance, leading to the complete destruction of entire neighborhoods like Al-Karama, Al-Shuja’iya, Jabaliya, and Sheikh Radwan. In addition, they have been using a policy of displacement, demanding that the residents of Gaza City and its northern areas head south towards the Rafah and Khan Younis governorates to be closer to Egypt, to carry out a citizen displacement plan.
The new dangerous development is the occupiers’ threat to central hospitals with bombardment and their demand for evacuation. These hospitals serve hundreds of thousands of citizens. They have been targeted with internationally banned incendiary phosphorus bombs, within the framework of the collective punishment policy used by the regime against the citizens of Gaza.
Since the first day of their aggression on the Gaza Strip, the occupiers have threatened a ground invasion. It is worth noting that the occupiers’ death toll has exceeded 1,400, while the number of Gaza Strip martyrs has reached over 2,700, with a significant number of martyrs and wounded still trapped under the rubble. Civil defense forces are unable to extract them due to the lack of equipment capable of doing so, especially since the Gaza Strip has suffered from a suffocating blockade that has prevented the entry of many devices and equipment of this kind for 16 years.
One of the scenes that deeply affected me occurred three days ago when the regime’s aircraft carried out continuous, brutal, and savage bombardments in the area where I reside. One of the strikes hit a residential apartment adjacent to mine, resulting in the tragic death of a ten-day-old infant along with her mother and two others. The force of the explosion and the shelling caused shrapnel and glass to scatter inside my home, leading to the injury of my three-year-old daughter as she fled from the sounds of the intense bombardment and explosions. She fell down the stairs during her escape, suffering injuries and a broken arm. Therefore, these are the targets that the leaders of the Israeli regime boast of targeting in Gaza. The Israeli military stated in a press release that on that night, 750 targets belonging to the resistance were hit. Does targeting children, killing them, and attempting to spread terror in their hearts represent the goals of the regime’s military? The Zionist Defense Minister explicitly stated that those in Gaza are subhuman and will be treated as such. That’s why the occupation does not hesitate to kill children and women in Gaza, cut off water and electricity, and prevent the delivery of food and medical aid to Gaza.
It can be said that we are still in the early stages of an aggression that appears to be intensifying over time to target both human lives and infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, in an attempt to eliminate any hope of living in Gaza and render it uninhabitable.
KAYHAN INTERNATIONAL:
-- Iran: EU’s Decision to Retain Sanctions ‘Illegal’
Iran on Tuesday condemned as “illegal” a decision by the European Union’s governing body to maintain ballistic missile- and nuclear-related sanctions against the Islamic Republic in violation of the 2015 nuclear agreement. “This action by the European Council is a blatant violation of the EU’s commitments and the three European countries under the JCPOA and UN Resolution 2231, and is an act of bad faith,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said. EU member states said on Tuesday they were retaining their restrictive measures against Iran under “the non-proliferation sanctions regime” beyond a JCPOA deadline.
-- PM: Armenia Ready for Peace Deal With Azerbaijan
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on Tuesday said Armenia was ready to sign a peace deal with Azerbaijan by the end of the year, and would guarantee the safety of all Azerbaijani citizens on its territory, Russia’s TASS news agency reported.
Russian President Vladimir Putin last week said he believed a peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan was achievable if both sides showed goodwill, playing down the difficulty of reaching an agreement on their shared border.
-- Israel Bombs Areas It Had Told Gazans to Flee
The occupying regime of Israel bombed areas of southern Gaza where it had told Palestinians to flee to ahead of a much- hyped ground invasion, killing dozens of people on Tuesday.
With no water, fuel or food being delivered to Gaza since last week, mediators struggled to break a deadlock over delivering supplies to increasingly desperate civilians, aid groups and hospitals.
U.S. President Joe Biden prepared to head to the region as he and other world leaders tried to prevent the war from sparking a broader regional conflict. Tensions flared Tuesday along Israel’s border with Lebanon, where Hezbollah fighters operate.
In Gaza, dozens of injured were rushed to hospitals after heavy attacks outside the southern cities of Rafah and Khan Younis, residents reported. Basem Naim, a senior Hamas official and former health minister, reported 27 people were martyred in Rafah and 30 in Khan Younis.
An Associated Press reporter saw around 50 bodies brought to Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis. Family members came to claim the bodies, wrapped in white bedsheets, some soaked in blood.
An airstrike in Deir al Balah reduced a house to rubble, martyring nine members of the family living there. Three members of another family that had evacuated from Gaza City were killed in a neighboring home. The dead included one man and 11 women and children. Witnesses said there was no warning before the strike.
The Zionist military claimed it was targeting Hamas hideouts, infrastructure and command centers.
The UN human rights office decried “appalling reports” that civilians who were trying to flee to southern Gaza were killed by a military strike. Spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani urged Israeli forces to avoid “aerial bombardments, indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks” and to “take precautions to avoid – and in any case, to minimize – loss of civilian life, injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects.”
The occupying regime of Israel has sealed off Gaza since the Hamas operation in southern Occupied Palestine on Oct. 7 killed over 1,400 Zionists, and resulted in some 200 captured and taken to Gaza. Israel’s army said Tuesday that 301 soldiers have been killed since October 7.
Hamas fighters in Gaza have launched rockets every day since, aiming at cities across the occupied territories.
Sirens sounded in Tel Aviv and surrounding cities Tuesday, with Israeli media reporting that rockets have been fired from Gaza.
Israeli strikes on Gaza have martyred at least 2,778 people and wounded 9,700, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. Nearly two-thirds of those martyred were children, a ministry official said.
Another 1,200 people across Gaza are believed to be buried under the rubble, alive or dead, health authorities said. Emergency teams struggled to rescue people while cut off from the internet and mobile networks, running out of fuel and exposed to unceasing airstrikes.
On Monday Israeli warplanes struck the headquarters of the Civil Defense in Gaza City, killing seven paramedics. Another 16 medics and doctors have been killed on the job, Gaza officials said.
Israel has massed troops at the Gaza fence for an expected ground offensive, but Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli military spokesman, said Tuesday no concrete decisions have been made despite the Zionist regime’s mass evacuation order for the north of the Gaza Strip.
More than 1 million Palestinians have fled their homes — roughly half of Gaza’s population — and 60% are now in the approximately 14-kilometer (8-mile) long area south of the evacuation zone, the UN said.
The UN agency for Palestinians said more than 400,000 displaced people are crowded into schools and other facilities in the south. The agency said it has only 1 liter of water a day for each of its staff members trapped in the territory.
At the Rafah crossing, Gaza’s only connection to Egypt, truckloads of aid were waiting to enter. The World Food Program said that it had more than 300 tons of food waiting to cross into Gaza.
An agreement to open the border appeared to have been reached Monday, but Israel denied reports of a ceasefire in Rafah, which would be a precondition. On Tuesday morning, gates were still closed.
Aid workers warned that the territory was near complete collapse. Hospitals were on the verge of losing electricity, threatening the lives of thousands of patients, and hundreds of thousands of people searched for bread and water.
Medicines Sans Frontiers, a humanitarian organization also known as Doctors without Borders, said that surgeons in Gaza’s Al-Shifa hospital have now been forced to “operate without painkillers.”
More than 2,000 artists and
celebrities accused western governments of “aiding and abetting” Israel’s “war crimes” in Gaza.
“We are witnessing a crime and a catastrophe,” they wrote in a letter calling for an “immediate ceasefire and the opening of Gaza’s crossings to allow humanitarian aid to enter unhindered”.
Raz Segal, a Holocaust and genocide studies expert, speaking to Democracy Now in a televised interview, said “what we are seeing now in Gaza is a case of genocide”.
UNRWA, the refugee agency, said at least six Palestinians sheltering in one of their schools located in the al-Maghazai refugee camp were killed Tuesday by Israeli bombing.
The Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) accused the UK government and arms industry of complicity in war crimes committed by the Israeli government.
In a statement issued Tuesday, CAAT said it is demanding the government revoke all licenses for arms exports, and are backing the calls from Palestinian trade unions for workers to refuse to build or export weapons to Israel.
Gen. Erik Kurilla, the head of U.S. Central Command, arrived in Tel Aviv for meetings with Israeli military authorities ahead of a Biden visit planned for Wednesday to signal White House support for the occupying regime. Biden will also travel to Jordan to meet with Arab leaders amid fears the fighting could spread in the region.
Israel evacuated towns near the Lebanese border, where the military has exchanged fire repeatedly with Hezbollah resistance fighters.
Israel fought a vicious monthlong war with Hezbollah in 2006 that ended in its humiliating defeat.
-- No One Can Stop Resistance Forces If Zionist Crimes Persist
Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei said here Tuesday that the Zionist regime’s actions in Palestine are an open genocide that is taking place in front of the world.
In a meeting with a group of Iranian elites and top scientific talents, the Leader said if Israeli crimes against Palestinians in Gaza continue, no one can stop Muslims and resistance forces.
“The officials of some countries have voiced their protest in their conversations with our officials as to why the Palestinians have been killing civilians. This statement is not true because the residents of the settlements are not civilians. They are armed, but even assuming that they are civilians, how many of them were killed compared to the number of Palestinian civilians that were martyred in recent days?” the Leader said.
“The usurping regime has killed a hundred times that number in these few days. They’ve killed several thousands of women, children, old and young civilians. By bombing populated centers and buildings that it knows are civilian residences, it is committing crimes before the entire world,” he added.
Ayatollah Khamenei said the usurping Zionist regime must certainly be prosecuted for the crimes, adding the U.S. government is responsible for the policies of the usurping regime.
“Based on various sources of information, the Americans are the policy makers and regulators of the current policies of the Zionist regime. The United States is responsible in this matter and must accept its responsibility.”
The Leader said the ruthless bombing of the Gaza Strip should be stopped immediately.
He touched on rallies held in Islamic countries and even non-Muslims in the U.S. and Europe, saying they are a sign of the serious fury of nations at the crimes taking place at the hands of the Zionist regime.
“If these crimes continue, Muslims and the Resistance forces will lose their patience and no one will be able to stop them. They should know this and they should not expect others to stop certain groups from doing certain things.”
The Leader said whatever crimes the Zionist regime commits will fail to compensate for the disgraceful defeat of the regime during Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.
The Leader said the several million young Iranian graduates and students are a great and valuable fortune, adding “many of these motivated, determined young people have valuable suggestions for solving problems.”
The Leader said scientific activities have grown in some countries in the region after observing Iran’s scientific progress.
“Our progress should not make us conceited and hold us back from the current scientific race in the world. Despite all our progress, we are still behind in terms of knowledge and science,” Ayatollah Khamenei said.
-- BBC Axes Six Reporters Over Pro-Palestine Posts
The BBC has taken six of its reporters off the air as an investigation has been launched into their pro-Palestinian posts on the social media website X.
The BBC News Arabic reporters were accused of breaking the so-called impartiality rules of the British broadcaster by making posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, that appeared to be in support of the Palestinian Hamas resistance movement or critical of Israel’s position in the ongoing war in the besieged Gaza Strip.
“We are urgently investigating this matter. We take allegations of breaches of our editorial and social media guidelines with the utmost seriousness, and if and when we find breaches we will act, including taking disciplinary action,” the BBC said in a statement on Monday.
One message is reported to have said: “Israel’s prestige is crying in the corner”, reported The Daily Telegraph.
According to media reports, all the posts have been taken down, although the reporters have not been formally suspended.
The reporters, including those based in Egypt and Lebanon, were also accused of liking posts that appeared to be in support of Hamas or critical of Israel.
In a separate statement, the BBC said that a member of its News Arabic team in Tel Aviv had been stopped and assaulted at the end of last week by Israeli police in a vehicle marked as media.
“Journalists must be able to report on the conflict in Israel-Gaza freely,” the British broadcaster said.
Last week, American broadcaster MSNBC quietly took three prominent Muslim journalists, including Mehdi Hassan, “out of the anchor’s chair” in the aftermath of the current war between Palestinians and Israel.
NBC claimed that the changes are ”coincidental” and denied that the hosts – three of the most high-profile Muslim on-air personalities on the network - are being sidelined, saying that the three Muslim journalists continue to appear on air to report and provide analysis.
The apparent dismissals came after the editorial board of the New York Post published a scathing attack on MSNBC for its “shameful” coverage of the Palestinian operation, accusing the news organization of having “run interference for Hamas.”
Hamas launched Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against Israel on October 7, in response to the regime’s violations at Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East al-Quds and growing settler violence.
The surprise raid shook the usurping entity’s security establishment, leaving about 1,300 Israelis dead.
In response, Israel launched deadly strikes on the Gaza Strip. More than 3,000 Palestinians, many of whom children and women, have been martyred and over 12,500 others injured in the coastal territory, according to Palestinian official news agency Wafa.
The military campaign has seen the Israel regime leveling entire districts and using banned white phosphorous munitions against densely populated neighborhoods.
-- Iranian FM: U.S. to Blame for Intensified Zionist Attacks on Gaza
The Foreign Minister of Iran Hussein Amir-Abdollahian pointed the finger at the U.S. or encouraging the Zionist regime to escalate its brutal military strikes on the people of Gaza.
In a telephone conversation with the European Union’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell, Amir-Abdollahian lashed out at the U.S. for its unconstructive policies and for encouraging the Zionist regime to intensify attacks against civilians in the Gaza Strip.
He denounced the American support for the Israeli regime as a main factor in the continuation and spread of war.
The foreign minister said the U.S. is backing the Zionist atrocities while people across the world have condemned the Israeli massacre of Palestinian women and children in Gaza.
Unfortunately, 300 to 700 civilians are getting killed in Gaza every day, Amir-Abdollahian deplored, noting that the siege of Gaza has prevented the delivery of food and medicine through a humanitarian corridor.
For his part, Borrell warned of the threat of spread of tensions in the region, calling on all parties to show self-restraint.
The European Union is making efforts to stop the war on Gaza, he noted, stressing the need to open a humanitarian corridor to send aid to the people of the Gaza Strip.
The EU foreign policy chief also highlighted the significant role of Iran in the de-escalation of regional tensions.
The Zionist regime has been pounding the Gaza Strip for 11 days. More than 2,800 Palestinians have been killed and around 10,000 wounded in the Israeli airstrikes.
The WHO has warned there are only “24 hours of water, electricity and fuel left” in the besieged Gaza Strip.
Earlier on Monday, The foreign ministers of Iran and Pakistan condemned the Zionist regime’s attempt at the forced displacement of people from the Gaza Strip as a war crime.
Amir-Abdollahian and his Pakistani counterpart Jalil Abbas Jilani talked about the latest developments in Palestine and the intensified Zionist attacks against civilians in Gaza in a telephone conversation.
Amir-Abdollahian thanked the Pakistani diplomat for his stance on the ongoing events in Palestine, including Gaza, saying the child-killing Zionist regime has turned to massacring children and civilians because it is unable to counter the resistance.
The Iranian foreign minister reiterated that the Zionist regime’s attempt to force the people in Gaza to relocate is another crime by Tel Aviv.
“Time is running out for political solutions and the unavoidable stage of possible expansion of the
war on other fronts is approaching,” he warned.
For his part, the Pakistani foreign minister expressed his readiness to participate in the Organization of Islamic Cooperation’s Executive Council meeting.
He said the OIC member states should make joint efforts in order to pave the way for an immediate ceasefire between the warring parties and open communication corridors to Gaza.
Jilani added that forcing Palestinians to move from the northern areas of Gaza to the south is an example of war crime and genocide against the Palestinian nation.
The defensive Palestinian action should never be compared to the occupational measures by the Zionist regime, the top Pakistani diplomat stated, saying the Palestinian people have the right to decide their own fate according to international law and the United Nations Security Council resolutions.
The Zionist regime has been pounding the Gaza Strip for ten days. More than 2,800 Palestinians have been killed and around 10,000 wounded in the Israeli airstrikes.
The WHO has warned there are only “24 hours of water, electricity and fuel left” in the besieged Gaza Strip.
TEHRAN TIMES:
-- Unprecedented revenge
The scenes we are witnessing across occupied Palestine today are the complete reverse of the 1967 war, when the Wrong State emerged victorious after its high morale soldiers defeated the large armies of Egypt, Syria and Jordan, despite being a new entity. Today, the Palestinian nation stands tall as it has humiliated the Wrong State and dealt a huge blow to its intelligence, military and field apparatus at every level, that is still unaware of the extent of the Palestinian’s military capabilities. The Wrong State has turned from the invincible army to the bewildered army, from a once confident state to a lost state. The image of superiority that the entity has been portraying has disappeared, and the social fragility of the entity has turned into a security and military fragility.
-- Gaza “running out of body bags”
In recent days, Gaza has continued to feel the effects of Israel’s tighter blockade and is already on the verge of running out of water, electricity and medication. Now, a UN official has said it is “even running out of body bags”. “Gaza is being strangled and it seems that the world right now has lost its humanity,” said United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) commissioner-general Philippe Lazzarini. “There is not one drop of water, not one grain of wheat, not a liter of fuel that has been allowed into the Gaza Strip for the last eight days.”
-- Why an attack on Iran will not happen
As hawkish Republicans in the United States exert all their efforts to persuade the Biden administration to attack Iran, it appears unlikely that such an attack will occur, at least in the foreseeable future. Various U.S. officials have been attempting to dismiss Iran’s involvement in Hamas’s October 7th attack on Israel. Contrary to popular belief, the Biden administration is not as naive and foolish as many portray it to be. The United States is currently preoccupied with the Ukraine conflict and has made significant miscalculations in provoking Russia’s attack on Ukraine. Washington credulously believed that heavy economic sanctions would bring Moscow to its knees.
-- Iran FM says resistance forces might take ‘preemptive measures’
Iran’s foreign minister has warned that the door will be open to every possibility, including preventative actions by the resistance front if the atrocities committed by the Israeli regime in the Gaza Strip persist and no political solution is found. Hossein Amir Abdollahian made the statements in a televised interview on Monday night, after returning from a regional trip that included stops in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Qatar. “During my regional trip and meetings that I had with leaders of the resistance front, they believed that political solutions should be taken into consideration in order to end Israel’s brutal strikes against the fully blockaded Gaza Strip,” he added. The foreign minister also noted, “However, in the event that the Israeli regime’s war crimes against civilians continue, any possibility is likely.” In reaction to Operation al-Aqsa Storm, the Israeli forces have called up 300,000 reservists and declared a long and devastating assault on Gaza. The Gaza-based Hamas resistance movement started the operation last Saturday in reaction to the Israeli regime’s decades-long campaign of genocide, land theft, and siege against Palestinians. The regime’s heinous attacks against the besieged Gaza strip have so far killed more than 2,800 Palestinians and injured at least 11,00 others.
-- Iran says Hamas is ready to release “civilian” hostages
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said on Monday that Hamas has signaled readiness to release the “civilian” hostages if Israel stops airstrikes on the Gaza Strip. The Hamas officials “said they were ready to take the necessary steps to free citizens and civilians held by the resistance groups, but their view was that such steps required preparations that were not possible in the face of the daily bombardment of various areas of Gaza by the Zionists,” Kanaani stated. According to Sky News, a Hamas official has also demanded 6,000 Palestinian men and women detained in Israel’s jails be released in exchange for hostages in Gaza. The Israeli military said on Monday that 199 captives were being held in the besieged territory - a higher figure than previously estimated. Khaled Meshaal, head of Hamas’ diaspora office, said the hostages include high-ranking officers from the Israeli Forces’ Gaza Division, which is responsible for patrolling around the Gaza Strip. Dr. Basem Naim, Hamas’s head of political and international relations, told Sky News: “I have no idea because it is impossible under this heavy bombardment - the communications are totally cut.”
NOURNEWS