Iran condemns ‘illegal and unjustified’ US sanctions on oil industry: ministry

File photo of Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi speaks to the press (AFP)
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Updated 13 October 2024
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Iran condemns ‘illegal and unjustified’ US sanctions on oil industry: ministry

  • US on Friday slapped Iran with a spate of new sanctions on the country’s oil and petrochemical industry in response to Tehran’s October 1 attack against Israel.

Tehran: Iran condemned Sunday what it called an “illegal and unjustified” expansion of US sanctions targeting its oil industry following Tehran’s missile attack on Israel earlier this month.
In a statement, foreign ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei defended Iran’s attack on Israel and “strongly condemned” the sanctions, saying they were “illegal and unjustified.”
The United States on Friday slapped Iran with a spate of new sanctions on the country’s oil and petrochemical industry in response to Tehran’s October 1 attack against Israel.
Baghaei defended Iran’s attack on Israel as being legal and insisted on Iran’s right to respond to the new sanctions.
The US Treasury Department said it targeted Iran’s so-called shadow fleet of ships involved in selling Iranian oil in circumvention of existing sanctions.
It said it had designated at least 10 companies and 17 vessels as “blocked property” over their involvement in shipments of Iranian petroleum and petrochemical products.
The State Department also announced it was placing sanctions on six further firms and six ships for “knowingly engaging in a significant transaction for the purchase, acquisition, sale, transport, or marketing of petroleum or petroleum products from Iran.”
Baghaei said “the policy of threats and maximum pressure” had no impact on “Iran’s will to defend its sovereignty, territorial integrity, national interests and citizens against any violation and foreign aggressions.”
He said the sanctions would enable Israel “to continue killing innocents and pose a threat to the peace and unity of the region and the world.”
The new wave of sanctions comes as the world awaits Israel’s promised response to Tehran’s missile attack, with oil prices hitting their highest levels since August.
Earlier this month, US President Joe Biden advised Israel against targeting oil infrastructure in Iran, one of the world’s 10 largest producers.
Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi last Tuesday warned that “any attack against infrastructure in Iran will provoke an even stronger response.”


Hezbollah chief says tens of thousands of ‘trained’ combatants ready to fight Israel

Updated 3 sec ago
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Hezbollah chief says tens of thousands of ‘trained’ combatants ready to fight Israel

“We have tens of thousands of trained resistance combatants” ready to fight, he said

BEIRUT: Hezbollah chief Naim Qasem said Wednesday his group had tens of thousands of combatants ready to fight Israel, in a speech marking 40 days since his predecessor was killed in a strike.
“We have tens of thousands of trained resistance combatants” ready to fight, he said, adding that nowhere in Israel was “off-limits” to the group’s attacks.

Iran plays down importance of US election, voices readiness for confrontation

Updated 1 min 57 sec ago
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Iran plays down importance of US election, voices readiness for confrontation

  • Arab and Western officials tell Reuters Trump may reimpose “maximum pressure policy” through more sanctions on Iran
  • They fear Trump may also empower Israel to strike Iranian nuclear sites and conduct assassinations

DUBAI: Iranians’ livelihoods will not be affected by the US elections, government spokesperson Fatemeh MoHajjerani was reported as saying on Wednesday after Donald Trump claimed victory in the presidential vote.
Arab and Western officials have told Reuters Trump may reimpose his “maximum pressure policy” through heightened sanctions on Iran’s oil industry and empower Israel to strike its nuclear sites and conduct assassinations.
“The US elections are not really our business. Our policies are steady and don’t change based on individuals. We made the necessary predictions before and there will not be change in people’s livelihoods,” MoHajjerani said, according to the semi-official Tasnim news agency.
The Revolutionary Guards did not directly react to Trump’s claimed electoral victory but said Tehran and its allied armed groups in the region are ready for confrontation with Israel.
“The Zionists do not have the power to confront us and they must wait for our response... our depots have enough weapons for that,” the Guards’ deputy chief Ali Fadavi said on Wednesday, as Tehran is expected to respond to Israel’s Oct. 25 strikes on its territory which killed four soldiers.
He added Tehran does not rule out a potential US-Israel pre-emptive strike to prevent it from retaliating against Israel.
In his first term, Trump re-applied sanctions on Iran after he withdrew from a 2015 nuclear pact between Iran and world powers that had curtailed Tehran’s nuclear program in exchange for economic benefits.
The reinstatement of US sanctions in 2018 hit Iran’s oil exports, slashing government revenues and forcing it to take unpopular steps, such as increasing taxes and running big budget deficits, policies that have kept annual inflation close to 40 percent.
Iran’s national currency has weakened at the prospect of a Trump presidency, reaching an all-time low of 700,000 rials to the US dollar on the free market, according to Iranian currency tracking website Bonbast.com.


Iranian Revolutionary Court sentences four individuals to death over charges of spying for Israel

Updated 23 min 16 sec ago
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Iranian Revolutionary Court sentences four individuals to death over charges of spying for Israel

DUBAI: Four people were sentenced to death by a revolutionary court in northwestern Iran over charges of spying for Israel, the semi-official Fars news agency reported on Wednesday.
Fars said three of the defendants — whose nationalities it did not give — were accused of helping Israel’s spy agency Mossad move equipment used in the 2020 assassination of Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.
Fakhrizadeh was viewed by Western intelligence services as the mastermind of a covert Iranian program to develop nuclear weapons capability. The Islamic Republic has long denied any such ambition.
The Jewish Chronicle newspaper reported in February 2021, citing intelligence sources, that Fakhrizadeh was killed by a one-ton gun smuggled into Iran in pieces by Mossad agents, both Israeli and Iranian nationals.
Israel declined to comment at the time of his killing and on Wednesday an Israeli government spokesman said in response to the Fars report: “We never comment on such matters. There has been no change in our position.”
Fars said the fourth defendant sentenced to death was linked to another unspecified espionage case.


Rescuers pull 30 bodies from a building in central Lebanon hit in an Israeli strike

Updated 06 November 2024
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Rescuers pull 30 bodies from a building in central Lebanon hit in an Israeli strike

  • The airstrike hit the building in the town just north of the port city of Sidon, an area that has not been regularly targeted by Israeli military operations

BARJA: Lebanese rescuers pulled 30 bodies out of the rubble after a late night Israeli strike on an apartment building in the town of Barja, Lebanon’s Civil Defense service said Wednesday as the Mideast wars press on with no signs of abating.
It remained unclear if there were any survivors or bodies still trapped under the rubble following the Tuesday night airstrike, which came without warning. There was no statement from the Israeli military and the strike’s intended target also was unknown.
Barja, a town just north of the port city of Sidon in central Lebanon, has not been regularly targeted so far in the conflict.
“Something pulled me hard, and then the explosion happened,” said Moussa Zahran, who was at home with his wife and son when the building was hit. He said he couldn’t see but started digging through the rubble until he found his wife and son — alive but injured — and pulled them out. Both are still in the hospital, he said.
Another building resident, Muhyiddin Al- Qalaaji, said he was at work when the strike happened and heard the news from his wife who called him frantically.
“There are many dead and injured,” he said as he carried out what he could salvage of the family’s belongings on Wednesday morning.
Civil defense official Mostafa Danaj said some of the neighbors have reported there are still people missing.
Israeli forces and the Hezbollah militant group have been clashing for more than a year, since Hezbollah started firing rockets across the border soon after the deadly Hamas-led attack on southern Israel sparked the ongoing war in Gaza in October last year.
The war on the Lebanese front has substantially escalated since mid-September, with Israel launching a massive aerial bombardment and ground invasion.
On Wednesday, sirens blared across northern and central Israel, including in the populous metropolitan area of Tel Aviv, as Hezbollah launched 10 rockets toward Israel. Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue services said there were no reports of injuries.
A large portion of a rocket slammed into a parked car in the central Israeli city of Raanana. Rockets also struck an open area near Israel’s main airport, Israeli media reported, though the airport said flights were operating as normally.
Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue services said there were no injuries. Israeli police said they arrested 40 people during protests on Tuesday night when the demonstrators blocked Israel’s main highway in Tel Aviv.
On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in a surprise announcement that sparked protests across the country. Gallant’s replacement is Foreign Minister Israel Katz, a longtime Netanyahu loyalist and veteran Cabinet minister.
While Netanyahu has called for continued military pressure on Hamas, Gallant said military force created the necessary conditions for at least a temporary diplomatic deal that could bring home hostages held by the militant group.
The Israel-Hamas war began after Palestinian militants stormed into Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people — mostly civilians — and abducting 250 others, taking them back to Gaza as hostages.
Israel’s military response in Gaza has killed more than 43,000 people, Palestinian health officials say. They do not distinguish between civilians and combatants, but say more than half of those killed were women and children.
Since the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah erupted in 2023, at least 3,000 people have been killed and some 13,500 have been wounded in Lebanon, about a quarter of them women and children, the Health Ministry reported.
Hezbollah continues to send dozens of rockets and drones toward Israel. The projectiles have killed 72 people in Israel so far, including 30 soldiers, according to Netanyahu’s office.
A report by Lebanon’s crisis response unit said that 361,300 Syrians and over 177,800 Lebanese have crossed into Syria between Sept. 23 and Nov. 1, to escape the fighting.
Another night of protests was planned across Israel on Wednesday evening, over Gallant’s firing.
Netanyahu and Gallant have repeatedly been at odds over the war in Gaza but the prime minister had avoided letting go of his rival before the US presidential election on Tuesday.
By midday Wednesday in the Middle East, Donald Trump was elected the 47th president of the United States in a remarkable political comeback.


Hezbollah says it fired missiles at military base near Ben Gurion Airport

Updated 06 November 2024
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Hezbollah says it fired missiles at military base near Ben Gurion Airport

BEIRUT: Hezbollah said on Wednesday that it fired missiles at a military base near Ben Gurion Airport, Israel’s main international gateway.
Israeli media reported on Wednesday that a rocket had landed near the airport. The airports authority said the airport was continuing to operate as usual.