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TOP STORIES
Millions of Iranians joined long queues to vote on
Friday, an early sign of strong turnout in an unexpectedly tight
presidential election that could determine the future of the
country's nascent emergence from international isolation. The
presidential vote pits incumbent Hassan Rouhani, who wants to
normalize ties with the West, against a hardline judge who says
Rouhani has gone too far and sold out the values of Iran's Islamic
revolution to its enemies. Rouhani, who struck a deal with world
powers two years ago to curb Iran's nuclear program in return for the
lifting of most economic sanctions, said the election was important
"for Iran's future role in the region and the world".
"Whoever wins the election, we should help him to fulfill this
important and serious duty," state news agency IRNA quoted him
as saying after voting.
Millions of voters will head to the polls across Iran
Friday to elect the country's next president after a tightly fought
race is likely to see internationalist incumbent Hassan Rouhani
retain his position. Rouhani staked his political future on opening
up Iran to the outside world and overcoming hard liners' opposition
to secure a historic nuclear deal in exchange for relief from
crippling sanctions. He'll soon find out if voters think it's enough
to keep him in the job. The 68-year-old religious scholar, a moderate
within Iran's political system, has history on his side given that no
incumbent President has failed to win re-election since 1981.
Iranians began voting Friday in a high-stakes
presidential election that pits a moderate incumbent who has sought
closer ties with the West against a hard-liner suspicious of that
agenda. The incumbent, Hassan Rouhani, is seeking a second four-year
term. His main challenger is Ebrahim Raisi, a cleric who emerged only
recently as a serious contender and is close to Supreme Leader
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has final say over most matters of state.
The differences in the two campaigns highlight the divide between
Iranians' visions for their future. Mr. Rouhani is a technocrat who
wants to solve economic problems, including double-digit
unemployment, through private-sector growth and stronger global trade
links. Mr. Raisi, meanwhile, favors measures including more
government handouts to the poor.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS
US jets have attacked a convoy of Iranian-backed
militiamen in south-eastern Syria in the first clash between the
American military and forces loyal to Tehran since the US military
returned to the region almost three years ago. The airstrikes
occurred near the Syrian town of al-Tanf, where Syrian opposition
forces backed by the US have been under recent attack by Syrian and
Russian jets near the main road linking Damascus to Baghdad. The
militias, made up mainly of Iraqi Shia fighters, had been advancing
towards the base throughout the week. The US military said the
strikes were aimed at stopping the militia advance and protect
fighters it has sponsored throughout the civil war and in the fight
against the Islamic State terror group.
The Iranian regime is believed to be operating polling
stations across the United States ahead of the country's election on
Friday, an effort that appears to violate U.S. laws barring Iranian
agents from operating on American soil in this manner, according to
sources apprised of the situation. There are nearly 50 such polling
stations across the United States, including in major American cities
such as New York City and Washington, D.C., according to a list of
polling stations published online. Iranian polling stations have
already been shut down in Canada and calls are mounting for the Trump
administration to take similar action, according to a White House
petition created by Iranian dissident groups that call on President
Donald Trump to "shut down illegal Iranian regime election sites
in the U.S."
SANCTIONS ENFORCEMENT
Iran said on Thursday that new U.S sanctions targeting
its ballistic missile programme show Washington's "ill
will" and could undermine the 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran
and world powers, state television reported. The U.S. Treasury on
Wednesday sanctioned two senior Iranian defence officials, an Iranian
company, a Chinese man and three Chinese firms for backing ballistic
missile development in Iran. Separately, however, Washington also
extended wider sanctions relief for Iran called for under the nuclear
accord. "Iran condemns America's unacceptable ill will in its
effort to undermine the positive outcome of Tehran's commitment to
implement the nuclear deal by adding individuals to its list of
unilateral and illegal sanctions," state TV quoted Foreign
Ministry spokesman Bahram Qasemi as saying.
SYRIA CONFLICT
U.S.-led coalition jets hit a convoy of Syrian and
Iranian-backed militias that were heading toward the Tanf base in
southern Syria where U.S. special forces are based, a rebel official
with a Pentagon-backed rebel group said on Thursday Muzahem al
Saloum, from the Maghawir al Thwra group, told Reuters that the jets
struck after rebel forces clashed with advancing Syrian and Iranian
militias that were about 27 kms away from the base. "We notified
the coalition that we were being attacked by the Syrian army and
Iranians in this point and the coalition came and destroyed the
advancing convoy," Saloum said.
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to
persuade President Donald Trump to impose tough new sanctions on Iran
for threatening Israel with ballistic missiles and bankrolling
terrorism, a close adviser said. The restrictions would aim to
inflict damage in the same way that blocking money transfers did
before Iran signed the 2015 agreement to curtail its nuclear program,
said Michael Oren, a deputy cabinet minister to Netanyahu and his
former ambassador to the U.S. The Israeli leader was among the most
outspoken opponents of the deal and relishes the prospect of renewed
confrontation if Iran violates its terms, he said
DOMESTIC POLITICS
Iranians began voting on Friday in a closely-fought
presidential contest between pragmatist President Hassan Rouhani and
hardline challenger Ebrahim Raisi that could determine the pace of
social and economic reform and Iran's re-engagement with the world. State
television showed long queues outside polling stations in several
cities and said 56 million Iranians out of the more than 80 million
population were eligible to vote "Everyone should vote in this
important election ... vote at early hours," Supreme Leader
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said after casting his vote in the capital
Tehran. "The country's fate is determined by the people."
Iranians were headed to the polls Friday to cast their
ballots for president in a vote that could either boost ties with the
West or return the country to diplomatic isolation. The race pits
President Hassan Rouhani, a moderate, against conservative cleric
Ebrahim Raisi, who is backed by Iran's powerful security
establishment. Iran's Guidance Council, a clerical body chaired by
the supreme leader, closely vets all candidates. At stake is
Rouhani's legacy as the leader who negotiated an end to international
sanctions as part of a nuclear deal with world powers. If elected,
Raisi has promised to uphold the agreement, but he has criticized
Rouhani for the deal's failure to bring major economic gains.
Iranians began voting Friday in a presidential election
that will either hand Hassan Rouhani a second term to pursue his
engagement with the world economy, or see control of the nation's top
elected office lurch back to conservatives whose antagonism to the
West left Iran isolated. Polling for 55 million voters started at 8
a.m. after a campaign that became increasingly bitter the longer it
went on. Echoing recent elections around the world, it centered on
populist claims that ordinary people were being left behind. The race
was transformed by the April entry of Ebrahim Raisi, until then an
obscure hardline cleric whose background spurred speculation he was
being groomed as an eventual successor to Iran's ultimate arbiter,
77-year-old Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The authority in charge of counting ballots in Iran's
presidential election has backed down from its initial decision to
announce the winner after all votes have been counted. "The
Interior Ministry actually agrees that it is more practical to report
the vote count gradually," said Assistant Interior Minister
Mohammad Hossein Moghimi on May 17, two days before Iranians vote for
their next president and local councils. Moghimi explained that
according to Article 31 of the Presidential Election Law, the
Interior Ministry must announce the "result" of the
election and not the "results." "We will confer with
the Guardian Council, and after resolving the legal issues, the vote
count will be gradually announced to the honorable people of
Iran," he added.
OPINION & ANALYSIS
IRAN'S PRESIDENTIAL election on Friday is a familiar
contest between a relative moderate, the incumbent Hassan Rouhani,
and a hard-line conservative backed by the Revolutionary Guard and,
it seems, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It's not correct to
say the difference between them is insignificant: Mr. Rouhani,
embraced by Iran's educated middle class, favors more relaxed
enforcement of Islamic rule at home and engagement with Western
investors abroad, while opponent Ebrahim Raisi is a populist who
rails against foreign influence and predicts the "Zionist regime
of Israel will be "wiped from Jerusalem." From the U.S.
point of view, however, it's not clear that there's a side to root
for in what will be the 12th presidential election since the 1979
revolution. Both candidates have promised to stick with the 2015 deal
that froze Iran's production of enriched uranium and other nuclear
activities for about a decade. And both appear committed to Iran's
aggressive bid for hegemony in the Middle East by other means,
including military interventions in Iraq and Syria, support for
rebels in Yemen and harassment of U.S. ships in the Persian Gulf.
On Friday, Iran will elect its next president. More than
1,600 people registered as candidates, but only six were approved by
the 12-member Guardian Council, the appointed religious authorities.
The front-runners are Ebrahim Raisi, Iran's hard-line former attorney
general who now runs the country's holiest site, and Hassan Rouhani,
the popular moderate incumbent. Just like in the United States, these
quadrennial contests often pit conservatives against progressives, or
their theological equivalents. But no matter who wins, one thing is
almost certainly true: The president will have a grueling experience working
with the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The election is only
the first, fleeting battle. The next one unfolds slowly, often in
secret, and cannot really be won. In every case, it has ended with
bitterness, resentment and mutual distrust between the country's two
most powerful men.
Iran's presidential vote is now a two-man race. Tehran
Mayor Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf's 11th-hour withdrawal means that
incumbent Hassan Rouhani will face the 56-year-old Ebrahim Raisi, a
close associate of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and a man
who was at the heart of the decision to mass execute political
dissidents in the late 1980s. Qalibaf not only withdrew from the
race; he endorsed Raisi and is now campaigning on his behalf. The
great unknown is how much Qalibaf's populism (he was widely believed
to have modeled his campaign on Donald Trump's) will benefit Raisi, a
drab figure who has emerged from the darkest corners of the regime to
become the consensus candidate of the establishment's hard-line camp
despite very limited popular appeal. One possibility is that much of
the populist vote behind Qalibaf - which, if his past campaigns are
any indication, could be around 15 percent - could move toward
Rouhani.
A few months ago, I heard a wise diplomat say that the
"Iranian political spectrum is much wider than the reformist or
hard-line clergy." His subtle rebuke to the gullible Western
media comes to mind now as Iran prepares to stage another Potemkin presidential
election on Friday, when voters get to choose between slightly
different flavors of hard-line Islam. If he were still alive,
Ayatollah Khomeini would have delighted in his regime's ability to
disorient foreign observers. By allowing for a few toothless popular
branches that would be checked by numerous unelected bodies, Khomeini
created an illusion of quasidemocratic legitimacy in what is
otherwise a theocratic dictatorship.
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