Iran

Spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI), Behrouz Kamalvandi, said Wednesday that preparations for the fourth stage of a reduction in Iran’s commitments to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), also known as Iran nuclear deal, have begun.

The spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) says with the new centrifuges installed following the third step that Iran took to reduce its commitments under the 2015 nuclear deal, the country’s enrichment capacity is to reach the level it was before signing the agreement.

Remarks by Brian Hook come amid growing concern in Israel over potential attack by Tehran in retaliation for efforts to thwart arming of Iranian proxies.

The seven-member Terrorist Financing Targeting Centre in Riyadh on Wednesday designated 25 targets affiliated with Iran and Hezbollah, in the largest single designation to date.

The day after anti-government protests erupted in Iraq, Iranian Gen. Qassim Soleimani flew into Baghdad late at night and took a helicopter to the heavily fortified Green Zone, where he surprised a group of top security officials by chairing a meeting in place of the prime minister.

Israel, which regards Sunni Muslim Gulf states as natural allies against Shi’ite Muslim Iran, has formal diplomatic relations with only two Arab states, neighboring Egypt and Jordan, established in 1979 and 1994 respectively.

Iran and the United States are as close to direct conflict as they have been for three decades, since Operation Praying Mantis in 1988 which was, at the time, the largest surface naval engagement since World War II.

Security forces have arrested nine people connected to a whistleblower page on social media platform Telegram, the chief of Police in the province of Kurdistan, western Iran, says.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani called the United States the “supporter of terrorism” in the Middle East and downplayed Tehran’s role in the recent Saudi oil facility attacks in a Tuesday interview with Fox News.

Key point: The IRGC is a fanatical and elite unit. No other branch of the Iranian military can claim the notoriety that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has earned for itself over the last several decades.