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The US justice department has issued a warrant to seize a detained Iranian oil tanker, a day after a judge in Gibraltar ordered it to be released. The Grace 1 supertanker, which is carrying 2.1m barrels of oil, was detained on 4 July on suspicion of illegally transporting oil to Syria. A last-minute legal attempt by the US to keep the tanker detained was rejected by Gibraltar on Thursday. Iran previously called the detention of Grace 1 an "illegal interception".

In listening to an interview given by Malcolm Hoenlein, the Executive Vice Chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, I was surprised to hear him casually say (at 5:10): "Israel flew F-35s to Tehran and made it sort of public.  The leadership of Iran know they did, and (the F-35s) made it back to Israel (Ed: Rough transcript made from podcast)." This was news to me, so I did a Bing search that returned mixed results.  CNBC put out a piece last week that treated the issue as "old news" or maybe even "fake news":...

Washington prods longtime adversaries on intelligence sharing, military cooperation against a common threat Israel and the United Arab Emirates held secret meetings arranged by the U.S. in recent months to share information and coordinate efforts to counter what they see as the increasing threat posed by Iran, according to U.S. officials familiar with the clandestine diplomacy.

Gibraltar has released an Iranian oil tanker detained last month despite a last-minute US bid to have the ship seized. The US made an emergency appeal to Gibraltar to keep the Grace 1 in custody but authorities in the British territory announced on Thursday that they were releasing it. The ship’s release after more than a month will raise hopes that Iran may now release the Stena Impero, a British-flagged tanker seized in retaliation by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard. It was not immediately clear when the Grace 1 would actually set sail from Gibraltar or if the US would try to...

Saudi Arabia has essentially been booted from Yemen after four years of bankrolling mercenaries at the cost of $200 million a day to crush impoverished desert tribesmen. As of mid-June, the Yemen Civil War that began in 2015 had seemingly settled into a stalemate after about 39,700 battles and the loss of about 91,600 lives, according to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED). But even with much less military movement, there were 4,900 armed incidents and 11,900 dead in 2019. Located in the southwest and comprising about 12 percent of the Arabian Peninsula, Yemen has a population...

The US Department of Justice has made a last-minute application to block the release of the Iranian oil tanker Grace 1, which was seized by authorities in Gibraltar last month, a spokesman for the Gibraltar attorney general told CNN. Gibraltar attorney general Joseph Triay revealed the application had been made at a short hearing at the Supreme Court on Thursday morning. A decision by the court on whether the tanker could be released was expected on Thursday morning, but has now been delayed until later in the day because of the US request, the spokesman added. The Gibraltar Chronicle reported...

Regarding “Land for Peace” (August 11), in December 2016, the lame duck Obama administration allowed UNSC 2334 to pass, claiming that all of Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem (including the Old City, the Jewish Quarter, Temple Mount and Western Wall) are “occupied Palestinian territories.” Yet the Palestinian National Charter of 1964 defined Palestine as the pre-1967 territory of the State of Israel – specifically excluding the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem, claiming they belonged to Jordan. When the area was part of Jordan, the Palestinians affirmed they did not want that land. In 1967, Israel ended the Jordanian occupation of...

“Building peaceful societies” is a major goal of this year’s theme, and one which we wholeheartedly condone. This past summer we traveled all across the country as interns of the Ambassadors’ Club of Israel, and met a diverse group of people. In many of our conversations, we noticed one recurring issue when discussing any hope for peace between Israelis and Palestinians: youth education. As International Youth Day is being celebrated today with “Transforming Education” as its theme, and a new school year is rapidly approaching, we find it appropriate to call for a reform of the Palestinian educational system. “Building...

Infighting kills 40, wounds 260 in Yemen's Aden: UN Iran Press TV Sun Aug 11, 2019 01:28PM The United Nations (UN) says at least 40 people have been killed and 260 others wounded in Yemen's southern port city of Aden during infighting between groups of militia receiving support from either Saudi Arabia or the United Arab Emirates (UAE). "Scores of civilians have been killed and wounded since August 8 when fighting broke out in the city of Aden. Preliminary reports indicate that as many as 40 people have been killed and 260 injured," UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Yemen Lise Grande...

"Land speculators close to IRGC attacked IranAirForce base in Mahmudabad, Mazandaran province & tried to take over its lands & its residential town in North of Iran. They had brought bulldozers to destroy fence & runway of the base. Three of them were killed." "The base commander ordered the soldiers to open fire at the intruders who had thrown stones at the IRIAF soldiers & had beaten them with sticks." "Iran Air Force uses the Mahmudabad base for training of its CH-47C Chinook helicopter pilots & also for the Search & Rescue training in CaspianSea.

Yemeni separatists have taken control of the strategic city of Aden after days of fighting with forces backing the internationally recognized government. A spokesperson for the Southern Transitional Council (STC) told CNN the group took over the city including its presidential palace, port and airport. Aden has been the seat of the Saudi-backed government since Houthi fighters took over Sanaa in 2014. "We are not inside the presidential compound, which is on an island, but we have secured its entrances and exits," Nizar Haytham, the STC spokesperson, told CNN. CNN wasn't able to verify the claims. However, the interior minister...

Cameroon: Muslims cut off the ears of women in Christian village AUG 10, 2019 11:00 AM BY ROBERT SPENCER Will the Islamophobia never end? “Militants cut off the ears of women in horrific attack on Christian village,” Christian Today, August 8, 2019: The barbarism of Boko Haram, an Islamist militant group, has reached new heights after reports of women having their ears chopped off during an attack on a Christian village. Local media reports that Boko Haram fighters stormed the Christian village of Kalagari in northern Cameroon on July 29, taking eight women hostage and cutting off their ears before...

Reza Aslan calls for genocide, says Trump supporters must be “eradicated” AUG 10, 2019 5:00 PM BY ROBERT SPENCER The cannibal Aslan has somewhat faded from the public eye since he was fired by CNN and exhorted readers in his last book to take the advice of the oldest and most celebrated self-improvement coach, Satan: “take a lesson from Adam and Eve and eat the forbidden fruit. Do not fear God. You are God.” Last January, however, in the midst of the media savaging of a group of Kentucky high school students were accosted by a Native American activist, Aslan...

July 25, 2019 Special Dispatch No.8195 Article On Muslim Brotherhood Party Website: Al-Sisi Destroying Egypt In Accordance With Jewish Bible The Freedom and Justice Party, the political branch of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood (MB), recently posted on its website an antisemitic article by journalist Sayyed Tawakkul, formerly a commentator on the Qatari Al-Jazeera channel and currently on the MB-affiliated Mekameleen TV. In the article, titled "Whoever Thinks Al-Sisi Is Failing Should Peruse the Bible of the Jews," Tawakkul accuses Egyptian President 'Abd Al-Fattah Al-Sisi of destroying Egypt in accordance with a plan "that has been set out in the Jewish...

The U.S. Navy officer was eager to talk. He’d seen his ship, one of the Navy’s fleet of 11 minesweepers, sidelined by repairs and maintenance for more than 20 months. Once the ship, based in Japan, returned to action, its crew was only able to conduct its most essential training — how to identify and defuse underwater mines — for fewer than 10 days the entire next year. During those training missions, the officer said, the crew found it hard to trust the ship’s faulty navigation system: It ran on Windows 2000. The officer, hoping that by speaking out he...

Report Slams US Troop Pullout from Syria By Jeff Seldin August 6, 2019 U.S. plans to keep just a residual force in Syria to ensure the enduring defeat of the Islamic State may be on the verge of backfiring, with some military officials warning the strategy is giving the terror group new life. The doubts, raised in a Defense Department Inspector General report released Tuesday, come as Washington has struggled to secure additional on-the-ground help in Syria from allies and amid renewed warnings that while IS may have lost control of its self-declared caliphate, the group's fighters are far from...

Ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf have reported unusual GPS interference, among other problems, and the US believes Iran is to blame. The Department of Transportation's Maritime Administration issued a warning on Wednesday highlighting threats to commercial vessels posed by Iran. The warning revealed that ships have had a variety of issues when operating in the region, including "spoofed bridge-to-bridge communications from unknown entities falsely claiming to be US or coalition warships." (excerpt) US defense official told CNN that Iran has GPS jammers operating on Abu Musa Island, an island in the Persian Gulf located...

Intrusions come as tensions between Iran and its Gulf neighbors ratchet up over sanctions, nuclear program and shipping Suspected Iranian hackers infiltrated critical infrastructure and government computers in the Persian Gulf nation of Bahrain within the last month, raising fears among leaders in the region that Tehran is stepping up its cyberattacks amid growing tensions. “Bahrain au­thor­i­ties iden­ti­fied in­tru­sions into its Elec­tric­ity and Wa­ter Au­thor­ity. The hack­ers shut down sev­eral sys­tems in what the au­thor­i­ties be­lieved was a test run of Iran’s ca­pa­bil­ity to dis­rupt the coun­try.”

eace with Iran is the mother of all peace and war with Iran is the mother of all wars, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani declared on Iranian TV on Tuesday, according to Reuters. He said that if the United States wants to have negotiations with Iran then it must lift all sanctions. On Monday, Iran threatened to take further steps to reduce compliance with the 2015 deal in about a months time if Europe still failed to protect Iran from US sanctions. “With the continuation of the inaction of the Europeans in carrying out their commitments (to the nuclear deal) ......

What do the Iranian regime, the New York Times and Sen. Rand Paul have in common? “I believe Mr. Trump does not seek war. But Mr. Bolton and Netanyahu have always sought war.” Thus spoke Iran’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, at a Monday press conference in Tehran. It’s not the first time Mr. Zarif has tried to drive a wedge between President Trump and his national security adviser, John Bolton—or between the president and his most steadfast international ally, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. But for Mr. Bolton, Mr. Zarif implies, we could have peace in the Middle East tomorrow....