Iran Arrests Nature Tourists For Flouting Hijab, Partying In Forest

Speaking to the Israeli parliament’s defense and foreign affairs committee, Gantz referred both to a shared vision and a “program” that was “already operative.” Gantz said the visit to Israel and Saudi Arabia in mid-July of US President Joe Biden would “support this process.”

“I have been leading for the past year together with my colleagues at the Pentagon and the [Biden] administration an extensive program to strengthen cooperation between Israel and the countries of the region, under American leadership and Centcom [US Central Command, covering the Middle East],” Gantz said.

“Part of that vision is what I call MEAD, Middle East Air Defense, which we are building amid Iran’s attempts to hit the region’s countries with rockets, cruise missiles and UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones].”

Possibilities for coordinating air defense were reportedly discussed at the March meeting in Negev of foreign ministers from Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco, Egypt, and the US.

Israel has been working to improve relations with the Persian Gulf monarchies especially since the 2020 ‘normalization’ agreements with Bahrain and the UAE, arguing they face a common threat in Iran. The Israelis link Syria, where Iranian presence in support of President Bashar al-Assad and Hezbollah, and Yemen, where Iran backs Ansar Allah, known as the Houthis, fighting a Saudi coalition that intervened in the civil war seven years ago. Saudi Arabia has faced intermittent Houthi missile and drone attacks since 2019. Iran has been accused of supplying the weapons to the Houthis.

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Rather than following Bahrain and the UAE in ‘normalizing’ relations with Israel, Saudi Arabia has stuck to Arab League policy of insisting Israel first accepts a viable Palestinian state.

‘Powerful responses’

Gantz addressed a sense among many Israeli politicians that tensions with Iran are worsening, especially after the alleged killings of Iranian scientists and officers by Israel. He said he had ordered “powerful responses” prepared after reports Iran would kidnap Israelis in Turkey. His remarks came hours after Israeli authorities suspected an Iranian cyberattack had triggered rocket sirens in Jerusalem and Eilat Sunday.

Gantz said the Israeli government has been successful in “enlisting international support in our struggle against Iran in recent months," which he said included “our efforts to keep the designation of a terror organization, for the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, and in the condemnation of Iran by the IAEA.”

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Year-long talks in Vienna aimed at reviving the 2015 international agreement limiting Iran’s nuclear program have been paused since March, reportedly because the US has refused Tehran’s request to remove its Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), around half its defense forces, from Washington’s list of ‘foreign terrorist organizations.’ Israel opposed the 2015 deal, the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action), which the US left in 2018.

Europe Backs Restoring JCPOA

Addressing Gantz’s remarks on air defense, an Israeli official said “partner countries” were synchronising efforts through electronic communication rather than using the same physical facilities. Some US-based analysts have suggested Washington is fostering closer cooperation between Israel and Arab Gulf States in order to help fill a gap left by the withdrawal of US hardware.

The Council of the European Union Monday agreed a document, ‘Council conclusions on a strategic partnership with the Gulf’, that welcomed “recent positive steps, including…the normalization agreements with Israel…and the recent agreement on a truce and on confidence building measures in Yemen as a major development, offer opportunities for improved wider regional security and stability.”

But the EU also reiterated support for the “restoration and full re-implementation” of the JCPOA, which it said had “the potential to contribute positively to regional prosperity and security.”

In a letter to the chief justice Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei released to the media Sunday, Fazel called the practice "worrying and horrifying" and said it would create “a wave of hatred and disgust in the world.”

Earlier in June, four fingers of a prisoner were cut off in Tehran’s Evin prison with a guillotine reportedly installed at the infirmary a month earlier to carry out such sentences. According to some readings of Islamic law, just punishment for theft can be amputation of fingers or hands.

Eight men convicted of theft are at imminent risk of having their fingers cut off, according to the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran (ABC) and Amnesty International.

Three of them, who have waited five years for their sentence to be implemented, have been transferred from Orumiyeh prison in the north-western province of West Azarbaijan to Tehran for the amputation to take place.

"The international community can and should react urgently to stop the implementation of these amputations," Roya Boroumand, ABC executive director, said earlier in June. Amnesty condemned the move to “deliberately mutilate and traumatize prisoners through unspeakably cruel judicial corporal punishments.”

An informed source from the judiciary reacted to the letter, denying reports about the imminent amputations.

Imam Hossein University’s Chancellor Mohammad-Reza Hassani Ahangar, who is an IRGC commander, said in a speech published on Monday that the “industrial sabotage” targeted one of the production lines of the base. 

"We have witnessed industrial sabotage at the level of the Armed Forces laboratories, and efforts have been made to destroy our advanced laboratory equipment," he said, noting that the officer who was killed not the target. "We must prevent threats with artificial intelligence methods," he added. 

Following the blast late in May, the Defense Ministry had said that “in an accident that took place in one of the research units of the Defense Ministry in the Parchin area, engineer Ehsan Ghadbeigi was martyred and one of his colleagues injured.”

Iran’s missile and space programs have suffered a series of mysterious explosions in recent years. In 2020, a giant explosion occurred in the area of Parchin at a gas storage facility, rattling the capital and sending a massive fireball into the sky near Tehran.

Iran has accused Israel of carrying out several attacks on facilities linked to its nuclear program and of killing its nuclear scientists since mid-2020. 

A series of killings and deaths among IRGC ranks in Iran in recent weeks has led to suspicion that they might have been targets of a secret series of operations, purportedly by Mossad.

Gantz, who warned Iran the previous day on what Israeli officials say are threats of Tehran-organized attacks on their citizens in Turkey and in the Persian Gulf Arab countries, said the offensive plans are being prepared in case they are needed.

“We aren’t able to personally protect every Israeli anywhere in the world,” Gantz said, perhaps emphasizing the deterrent aspect of his threat directed at Iran.

“We are in contact with the relevant Turkish authorities, and we are of course mainly preparing offensive capabilities, if and when they are needed,” he said. “I suggest that the Iranians not test these capabilities.”

Earlier on Sunday, Prime Minister Naftali Bennet also warned Iran against any threats to Israeli citizens in regional countries.

“We are currently witnessing Iranian attempts to attack Israelis in various overseas locations,” Bennett said in remarks at the opening of the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem.

“Our new rule: Whoever sends, pays,” Bennett warned according to an English-language statement of his remarks provided by his office quoted by Times of Israel. “We will continue to strike those who send the terrorists, and those who send those who send them.”

Parallel with the prime minister’s and defense minister’s warnings on Sunday, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid’s office announced that he will visit Turkey this week.

Israeli sources have been warning about possible attacks on tourists visiting Turkey for three weeks but calls for travelers to be extremely cautious increased last week, with fresh concerns over possible attacks on Israelis in the United Arab Emirates.

Tehran has vowed to take revenge after a top Quds Force commander was gunned down in broad daylight in in Iran on May 22. Other deaths of people connected with the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) followed, although Tehran tried to portray their deaths for reasons other than any foreign plot. But the perception that Israeli secret agencies are operating freely in Iran and have been inflicting damage since mid-2020 is widespread among the people.

This could be potentially costly for the IRGC and the regime in political terms as it loses the aura of omnipotence it has been trying to portray within the country.

Alleged Israeli operations in Iran started when Tehran ratcheted up its nuclear program in 2019, once the US withdrew from the 2015 nuclear agreement and imposed sanctions on Iran in 2018.

Specially since the Biden administration started talks with Iran last year to reach a new nuclear deal, Israel has repeatedly said that it will not tolerate a nuclear Iran and has clearly indicated military preparation. The issue of threats to Israeli tourists in Turkey is the manifestation of the long-existing tensions as Israel has been preparing for a possible confrontation with Iran.

Iran International reported on June 18 that some political analysts in Iran also believe that the clerical regime is moving toward a confrontation in the region, with not agreeing to a nuclear deal after more than a year of indirect talks with the United States.

Lapid office announced the snap visit on Sunday after months of warming ties between Israel and Turkey, adding that he would meet with Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu, who last month visited Israel.

Israeli officials and media began issuing the warnings in the end of May, citing suspected assassination or abduction plots by Iran, which has vowed to avenge the May 22 assassination of a Revolutionary Guards colonel in Tehran that it blamed on Israeli agents.

Earlier in the day, Israeli President Isaac Herzog thanked Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan for “efforts to thwart (Iran’s) terrorist attacks against Israelis,” adding that “the threat has not yet passed and that the counterterror efforts must continue.”

On Saturday, Defense Minister Benny Gantz issued a statement reiterating that there is a serious risk of attacks on Israelis in Turkey by Iranian networks. 

Despite repeated statements from Israeli officials warning of impending Iranian attacks, Tehran has generally remained silent, but on Saturday, the Iranian and Turkish foreign ministers had their first phone call since the warnings.

Iranian state media said Cavusoglu has invited his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amir-Abdollahian to visit Turkey, without providing any time for the visit.

Ankara has reportedly warned the Islamic Republic against attacking Israelis in Turkey, saying it is not prepared to allow Iran to use its territory to carry out acts of terrorism against other nations.