CIA Director Lifts Lid On What Iran Was Quietly Building At Blistering Pace
Source: The Daily Wire - Breaking News, Videos & Podcasts · Bias: Right
Summary
CIA Director John Ratcliffe said during a Wednesday hearing that the United States had moved on the Iranian regime in part because of the “alarming” rate at which Iran was building and stockpiling weapons that could have eventually been fired at Americans or American allies. Ratcliffe took questions from members of the Senate Intelligence Committee ...
CIA Director Lifts Lid On What Iran Was Quietly Building At Blistering Pace
Right
CIA Director John Ratcliffe said during a Wednesday hearing that the United States had moved on the Iranian regime in part because of the “alarming” rate at which Iran was building and stockpiling weapons that could have eventually been fired at Americans or American allies. Ratcliffe took questions from members of the Senate Intelligence Committee ...
Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf has warned of an Iranian response if the U.S. and Israel breach the interim peace deal, as Tehran prepares to bury its former supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. “We strongly demand full implementation of the agreements, and if the U.S. and the Zionist regime fail to fulfill their commitments, Iran…
Iran's entire regime made a red carpet entrance to the first of three funeral ceremonies for late Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei — except the dead ayatollah's own son and successor.
Trump administration officials reportedly believed that the Israeli government intended to assassinate Iran’s top negotiators—including the country’s foreign minister—during peace talks with the US in an effort to sabotage diplomatic progress.The New York Times reported Thursday that “American concerns about the targeting of two particular Iranian officials—Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s foreign minister, and Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the speaker of the Parliament—spiked during delicate ceasefire negotiations that began in April.” In response, the US “went so far as to ask other countries in the region to warn Iran about the possibility Israel could target the two officials,” according to the Times, which cited unnamed current and former American officials.The US and Israel have killed dozens of top Iranian officials since launching their illegal joint war in late February. But the allied countries reportedly removed Araghchi and Ghalibaf from their target list in late March, opening the possibility of high-level negotiations to end the war.But Israel remained bent on targeting the negotiators, according to the Times, whose reporting was later corroborated by The Washington Post.The Times detailed one dramatic incident in April, when Ghalibaf was planning to travel to Pakistan’s capital to meet with US Vice President JD Vance:Pakistani fighter jets escorted the Iranian airplanes carrying a delegation of more than 70 Iranians from the border of Iran to Islamabad and back again when the session was over.But on the way back to Tehran, an Israeli security threat emerged.Iran’s security forces notified the plane carrying Mr. Ghalibaf back to Tehran that they had picked up intelligence that Israel planned to attack the plane and that two Israeli fighter jets had entered Iran’s airspace from its western border near Iraq, the two officials said.Mahdi Mohammadi, a senior adviser for Mr. Ghalibaf, who accompanied him to Islamabad, confirmed this account on his social media page. The plane made an emergency landing in the city of Mashhad, Iran’s closest airport to the Pakistani border, and the Iranian delegation traveled some eight hours by land back to Tehran, Mr. Mohammadi and the two officials said.The Post reported that “cracks emerged” between the US and Israeli approaches to the war following Israel’s assassination of top Iranian national security official Ali Larijani in March.“They’ve wiped out everybody,” Trump told reporters in late March, suggesting Israel’s assassination campaign was making it difficult to find potential negotiating partners.Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, wrote in response to the new reporting that “Israel is a state that, on paper, is a US partner, but in reality is so extreme in its obsession to undermine US diplomacy that it even tries to assassinate those the US engages with in crucial negotiations.”“I can’t recall a government as terrified of peace as the one running Israel,” Parsi added.At present, the Israeli government—led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—is endangering tenuous US-Iran peace talks with its continued occupation of and assault on Lebanon, which Iran has highlighted as a key factor in the negotiations.Visiting occupied southern Lebanon earlier this week, Netanyahu declared to Israeli troops that “our insistence is that we will not leave... until the threat is removed.”Parsi wrote earlier this week that “beyond his long-standing desire to use American force to subjugate Iran to Israeli domination and achieve a regional balance favorable to Israel,” Netanyahu “now also has stark political and personal reasons to restart the war” with Iran.“The [US and Iran’s memorandum of understanding] has come at a steep political cost for Netanyahu,” wrote Parsi. “His prospects for reelection in October are weaker than they have been in months. Once seen as the Israeli leader uniquely capable of delivering President Trump, he now confronts the prospect that both the war and the ensuing diplomacy will leave Israel in a strategically weaker position—undermining the very case he has made for his leadership.”“And of course,” Parsi added, “if he loses the elections, he will likely spend the next few years in jail, as he will lose his immunity as prime minister and face trial over corruption charges.”The story was published in partnership with Common Dreams, read the original here.
A stream of foreign dignitaries, officials and mourners gathered in Tehran on Friday to pay their respects to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed by U.S.-Israeli airstrikes on Feb. 28 that triggered the war. Pakistani Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif, a key mediator in the U.S.-Iran talks to end the war, joined mourners…
The country's theocracy hopes to see millions flood the streets of the capital beginning Saturday in scenes reminiscent to the burial of the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989.
This column grimly spent a spring predicting a dark summer of possible chaos and violence, an administration on the move, power grabs at every turn, one preparing for an unpredictable but authoritarian fall season. We would endure a lot of hot weather, late nights, some dangerous dynamics, and Kalshi had odds at 40% that Portland would be ashes by June 15th. This worry followed protests in Minnesota, the fear of troops coming to Chicago, and everything else you surely remember. Well, the heat came to the East Coast. But nothing else, not yet.Indeed, so far, if one had to pick a theme or feel for what's happening, it would be a catchy viral meme about what's not happening. "The summer that wasn't."We are passing through the nation's 250th birthday, the biggest annual summer holiday, made infinitely bigger by the incredible number, and yet it looks like it'll go by largely unnoticed, except for skipping work on Friday, maybe hearing some booms late at night Saturday. One would have expected baited anticipation, pride, and massive celebrations planned everywhere, or at least that would have been the expectation back 10 years ago, "normal America."I went to a big gathering in my city's central park to watch the U.S. play in the World Cup on big screens with a big crowd — nice weather. Yes, people supported the American team, but not with the passion, anticipation, or hypertension otherwise expected. Everyone's support seemed a bit muted, as if we weren't sure "which" America this team represented. They wore white, not red or blue. If one said, "It's actually the whole country's team," most would reply, "Right. But, again, which country?"Everyone knows the cause.Instead of a celebration of the good that this country has done in its years (while acknowledging the horrific), as per usual, the President of the United States made the entire thing, everything official, at least, not about America but about him. Yes, of course, your city park will still have the earnest city band or orchestra playing in the evening and then fireworks. But the tone is set by the institutions functioning as the nation's cerebellum: the White House, Capitol Hill, the Supreme Court, the Mall. Trump took it all over and made it a MAGA rally. About him.Well that will blow a tire for the 60% of the nation that is exhausted by this man, consumed with disdain and fury. Interestingly, though, there's some evidence that even Trump supporters don't like having the Fourth of July a personal celebration of Donald Trump, as if they, too, have actually found a line in the sand upon which even they won't cross. He cannot take over everything. Kinda like if he named every NFL team "Trump," like the Buffalo Trump, the Dallas Trump, Seattle Trump, all of them. That would be too far, guaranteed. Perhaps this is, too.No, no one is fooled. He damn sure can try to take over elections, has taken over the Department of Justice, the military, and planted his face on banners in a Stalinesque way throughout Washington. He can take over most things, and most of those things are the really important ones, as opposed to the "Great National State Fair" that invisibly passed us by and the big celebration planned for the actual Fourth of July — a rally, about him, always, his greatness, a nation relegated to nothing but a stage.Is it possible that even MAGAs never wanted at least this part?There are other factors. Yes, there is the heat. Yes, you better believe gas prices play a role. Lots more. And yet the number of artists who checked out after hearing the agenda, the lagging ticket requests before the weather report, the bizarre claw of the UFC fight on the White House lawn, a "Fair" no one asked for, and the fact that Washington is empty, all point to something deeper. Kind of like the U.S. soccer team, it's possible everyone agreed we'd have official "Safe Spots," areas relied on to rest from politics — a "timeout." Is it possible that people from the furthest left, to the most extreme 15% of MAGA muckers, all just want to eat a cheeseburger in a backyard, enjoy a day off, maybe even read in the AC? Sick of it all? Not sure which America we're celebrating, only knowing it's not Donald Trump personally?Well, something is happening because nothing is happening!It appears that our kids are out of school, mine seems to be home a lot — which normally indicates something "summery." That weirdly fascinating soccer stuff is on television, and we get to see some kinda cool costumes and customs from around the world. Hollywood released a handful of massive budget movies. Most people have Friday off. There is some evidence that it's summer's big holiday and a lot saying it's not supposed to be like this.All of this might be an important development; it is possible it is an important element, and it's certainly better than an extreme alternative. But there's also the chance that we're seeing a delay of the dangers to which this column previously pointed.
