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TOP STORIES
A U.S. Navy ship took defensive action against a second
Iranian drone in the Strait of Hormuz last week, but did not see the
drone go into the water, the U.S. military said on Tuesday. The
United States said on Thursday that a Navy ship had
"destroyed" an Iranian drone in the Strait of Hormuz after
the aircraft threatened the vessel, but Iran said it had no
information about losing a drone. "This was a defensive
action by the USS Boxer in response to aggressive interactions by two
Iranian UAS platforms in international waters," Lieutenant
Colonel Earl Brown, a U.S. Central Command spokesman, said.
Plans for a European-led maritime security force in the
Gulf unveiled by the UK foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, hit
choppy waters as the plan was rejected by Iran and met resistance
from supporters of the incoming prime minister, Boris Johnson. It has
also been seen by British shipping industry experts as not providing
a short-term solution to the crisis facing UK-flagged shipping in the
Gulf.
The U.S. on Tuesday warned companies against dealing
with Iranian airlines, alleging that many of them support Iran in
regional violence by transporting fighters and weapons to
international locations. Entities that provide services for
designated Iranian airlines, including financing, reservations and
ticketing as well as procurement of aircraft parts, could be at risk
of enforcement actions or economic sanctions from the U.S., the
Treasury Department said in an advisory.
NUCLEAR DEAL & NUCLEAR PROGRAM
French authorities in a meeting Tuesday with an Iranian
envoy stressed the need for Tehran to quickly respect the 2015
nuclear accord it has breached and "make the needed
gestures" to deescalate mounting tensions in the Persian Gulf
region. A statement by the French Foreign Ministry said Seyed Abbas
Araghchi gave a message to President Emmanuel Macron from Iranian
leader Hassen Rouhani. Macron and Rouhani spoke last Thursday.
Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China will meet
Iran in Vienna on July 28 to discuss how to save the 2015 nuclear
deal, the EU's foreign policy service said in a statement on
Tuesday. "The meeting has been convened at the request of
France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Iran, and will examine
issues linked to the implementation of the JCPOA in all its aspects,"
the statement said.
SANCTIONS, BUSINESS RISKS, & OTHER ECONOMIC
NEWS
A Turkish banker convicted for plotting to help Iran
evade United States sanctions on Iranian oil proceeds has arrived in
Istanbul, according to state media in Turkey. Mehmet Hakan
Atilla on Wednesday landed in the Turkish city following his
departure from New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport
the day before, Anadolu Agency said.
Iran has threatened to cut its imports from Brazil
unless it allows the refueling of at least two Iranian ships stranded
off the Brazilian coast, in a sign of the global repercussions of
U.S. sanctions on the Islamic republic. Iran's ambassador in Brasilia,
Seyed Ali Saghaeyan, told Brazilian officials on Tuesday that his
country could easily find new suppliers of corn, soybeans and meat if
the South American country refuses to permit the refueling of the
vessels.
PROTESTS & HUMAN RIGHTS
An Iranian civic and labor activist jailed since January
has begun a hunger strike to protest her treatment and that of his
family at the hands of security organs. Sepideh Qolian (Gholian) who
was supporting last year's labor strikes in the oil-rich Khuzestan province
was arrested twice; once in November 2018 and again in January on
vague security-related charges and has been transferred from prison
to prison several times.
An Iranian model was forced to leave Tehran for breaking
the country's Islamic clothing law restrictions, according to a
feature news report by i24NEWS. "Neggzia" said that
modeling is both her dream and her passion. "When I am
working in the job I love, I feel alive again," she told
i24NEWS. She had been a model for years, starting her career in Iran.
At first, she followed Islam's strict clothing guidelines, but soon
she started wearing lighter and sexier clothes.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS & NEGOTIATIONS
A US military commander said a Navy ship may have downed
a second Iranian drone last week in the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran is ready for "just" negotiations but not
if they mean surrender, Iran's President Hassan Rouhani said on
Wednesday, without saying what talks he had in mind. Rouhani
seemed to be referring to possible negotiations with the United
States. U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from a landmark 2015
nuclear deal with Iran last year but has said he is willing to hold
talks with the Islamic Republic.
A group of American citizens and legal residents trying
to bring their Iranian spouses and other family to join them in the
United States has filed a federal lawsuit saying they are being
unfairly blocked by the Trump administration's travel ban. The
families sued late Monday in federal court in Santa Ana, California,
saying they have waited months for waivers to be able to be reunited,
but the U.S. government hasn't issued them.
Washington Times opinion editor Charles
Hurt said he feels Britain's next prime minister, Boris
Johnson, and President Trump can find the right way to deal
with Iran. "We remember all of the people in United States
saying the same thing about Donald Trump and these guys they're both
guys that they like to be discounted and they'd like to have people
say that they don't have a shot at something and then they love
proving everybody wrong," Hurt said on "The Story with
Martha MacCallum" Tuesday.
President Trump and his adversaries in Iran are inching
closer and closer to the brink. Both sides insist they don't want
war, but a series of escalations in the Persian Gulf and elsewhere
are shrinking their room to maneuver. The White House is sticking to
its "maximum pressure" campaign, intent on economically
strangling Tehran with sanctions that are choking off Iran's oil
exports.
Capt. Ronald Dowdell was on the starboard side
of the bridge, looking toward Iran, as his vessel passed through the
Strait of Hormuz on July 18. He had been monitored by Iranian
helicopters and speedboats, but now a drone was closing fast.
Dowdell ordered his crew to disable the drone because it "looked
like a potential threat," he said in an interview on that same
bridge Tuesday. The danger signs were the drone's proximity to the
Boxer, its closure rate and the profile detected by the ship's
sensors.
Many cynics have long contended that the real reason the
U.S. entered a slew of recent wars was only to protect American oil
interests. But now it's beginning to look like oil may be a major
reason why the U.S. isn't getting into a war with Iran. Believing
that flies in the face of a common sentiment that the need for oil
costs lives, especially when discussing the first and second Persian
Gulf Wars.
The
current crisis in the Gulf, ratcheted up by Iran's seizure of a
British oil tanker, is palpably explosive. But it began more than a
year ago when Donald Trump, behaving more like the leader of a rogue
power than the US, unilaterally withdrew from the Iranian nuclear
deal. That act of vandalism sabotaged a functioning international
diplomatic achievement. The Islamic Republic was always going to
reply with its own variety of pyromania - and it will continue to do
so.
MILITARY/INTELLIGENCE MATTERS & PROXY WARS
No Iranian drone has been brought down, the ISNA news
agency quoted Iran's Defence Minister Amir Hatami on Wednesday as
saying, after the U.S. military said it taken action against two
Iranian drones in the past week. The United States said last
Thursday that a Navy ship had "destroyed" an Iranian drone
in the Strait of Hormuz after the aircraft threatened the vessel, but
Iran said it had no information about losing a drone.
IRANIAN REGIONAL AGGRESSION
Iran will secure the Strait of Hormuz and not allow any
disturbance in shipping in the key oil transport waterway, Iranian
Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on Tuesday during a visit
to Paris, the state new agency IRNA reported. France, Italy,
the Netherlands and Denmark support a European-led naval mission to
ensure safe shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, three senior EU
diplomats said on Tuesday, after Britain proposed the idea following
Iran's seizure of a British-flagged oil tanker.
RUSSIA, SYRIA, ISRAEL, HEZBOLLAH, LEBANON & IRAN
A Hamas delegation went to Tehran this week
and met with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei July 22.
Ever since the deputy head of Hamas' diplomatic wing, Saleh
Al-Arouri, was elected to the position two years ago, his goal has
been to tighten contacts with Tehran in light of the disconnection
that has prevailed since the days of former Hamas chief Khaled
Meshaal, who is persona non grata in Iran. Al-Arouri
has visited Tehran before, but this time he was greeted as
an honored ally when he met with Iran's spiritual leader.
Israel's ambassador to the United Nations on Tuesday
accused Iran of exploiting civilian companies and maritime channels
to smuggle weapons manufacturing equipment to its Lebanese proxy
group, Hezbollah. In the quarterly meeting on the Middle East,
Ambassador Danny Danon told the Security Council that Israeli
intelligence has uncovered evidence showing Iran's Quds Force has
been using the port of Beirut to ship items to the terror group since
last year.
GULF STATES, YEMEN & IRAN
King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center's
(KSrelief) project for clearing mines (MASAM) announced that it had
removed 1,318 landmines planted by Houthi militias in the third week
of July. MASAM Program Manager Osama al-Gosaibi said that "the engineering
teams had removed 599 anti-tank and three antipersonnel mines. The
teams also removed 714 unexploded ordnance and 42 explosive
devices."
IRAQ & IRAN
Iran has reassured Iraq that there will be freedom of
international maritime navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, Iraq's oil
ministry said on Tuesday. Iran communicated this to Prime
Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi during a visit by him to Tehran on Monday,
the ministry said in a statement. "Iranian President
Hassan Rouhani (gave) reassurances to the Iraqi delegation ... around
guaranteeing freedom of navigation in the Gulf and Strait of Hormuz
and respect for international law guaranteeing that," the
statement said.
OTHER FOREIGN AFFAIRS
Britain has sent a mediator to Iran to discuss the
freeing of a British-flagged tanker seized by the Islamic Republic
last week, the head of the Supreme Leader's office said on Wednesday,
according to the semi-official Tasnim news site. Tensions have
spiked between Iran and Britain since the Islamic Republic last
Friday seized the tanker, Stena Impero, saying it had collided with a
fishing vessel.
A large British-flagged vessel transited the Strait of
Hormuz and arrived at a port in Qatar on Wednesday in the first such passage
made by a British ship of its size since Iran seized a U.K.-flagged
tanker last week, according to maritime tracking data. Maritime
publication Lloyd's List identified the vessel as the BW Elm and
reported that a British warship, likely the HMS Montrose, closely
shadowed the large liquefied petroleum gas carrier but that the Royal
Navy did not provide a direct escort.
Iran's foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, offered
his congratulations to Boris Johnson on Tuesday after he won a party
vote that cleared the way for him to become Britain's new prime
minister, but he also warned the leader-in-waiting that Tehran would
protect itself. The comments came four days after Iran seized a
British tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway linking
the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman. The episode has further ratcheted
up tensions between Tehran and the West and revealed the extent to
which Britain is directly involved in the conflict.
Iran suggested it would respond positively if the U.K.
reversed its decision to seize a tanker carrying Iranian oil near
Gibraltar, President Hassan Rouhani said. "If they renounce
their foul measure in Gibraltar, they will receive suitable response
from Iran," Rouhani said in a cabinet meeting, according to his
website. Iran "is making efforts to maintain security in the
Persian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz as well as other waterways in the
world including Bab-el-Mandeb and the Indian Ocean."
Ali Rabei, spokesman for the Hassan Rouhani
administration, said the crisis involving the oil
tankers belonging to the United Kingdom and Iran could
be solved diplomatically. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard
Corps (IRGC) recently seized the British oil tanker the Stena Impero
in the Persian Gulf. The IRGC not only released video of the seizure,
in which men dropped from a helicopter onto the
tanker, but it also released video of the Islamic call to prayer from
the loudspeaker of the British oil tanker.
To judge by the propaganda of the Iranian regime, the
brave warriors of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps had captured
a Royal Navy guided-missile destroyer. Video footage shows
the IRGC men rappelling down to a ship while other fearless comrades,
looking on from speedboats racing alongside the vessel, cheer them on
with shouts of "Allah Akbar!" Still images show
the men advancing cautiously down the deck, automatic weapons pointed
forward in preparation of a fierce gun battle.
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