Latest news with #Lorestan
Forbes
18-06-2025
- Politics
- Forbes
Iran, Israel and the Lost Legacy of Natural Resource Cooperation
Drip Irrigation System in Lorestan, Iran. Photo by Saeed Yeganeh The current war between Iran and Israel should not prevent us from reimagining a future of peace between these current foes. Indeed, within living memory, there was a time when Iran and Israel cooperated extensively on a range of issues, most notably on natural resources and environmental technologies. Before the Islamic revolution in 1979, Iran and Israel had relatively close relations that came out of collective suspicion of neighboring Arab states. After Türkiye, Iran was the second Muslim-majority country to recognize Israel's sovereignty. Reza Shah Pahlavi, the ruler of Iran before the revolution saw the value of cooperating with Israel for economic and technical reasons. The nationalization of the Suez Canal in 1956 by Egypt and the ensuing conflict led to Israel and Iran cooperating on the Eilat-Ashkelon pipeline which would negate the need for using the canal for oil transport from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean. The company was set up as a 50/50 joint venture between the two governments and started flowing oil in 1968. Iran helped Israel with oil supply during subsequent constraints on credit and is still asking through tribunals for the debt payments of over a billion dollars from that era of cooperation. In 2015, a Swiss court ordered Israel to pay back Iran which it has refused to do given provisions of the 'Trading with the Enemy Act' of the United States. Israel's support for Iran during natural disasters was particularly noteworthy after the devastating Buin-Zahra earthquake in the Qazvin region which killed more than 12,000 people. Moshe Dayan was the Agricultural Minister of Israel at the time and was planning to visit Iran just before the earthquake struck. Although his visit as postponed, Dayan offered a comprehensive plan for use of relief funds towards more sustainable urban revitalization of the region. He dispatched urban planner Micha Talmon and architect Yehuda Drexler to develop a comprehensive plan with transfer of technology and expertise. This episode has been documented in detail by researchers Rachel Kallus and Neta Feniger in an open-source article with copies of original manuscripts and interviews. Even after the Iranian revolution, Iran and Israel had opportunistic cooperation albeit largely around the military industrial complex that is well-researched by Trita Parsi in his notable book Treacherous Alliance: The Secret Dealings of Iran, Israel and the United States. As far as agricultural technologies are concerned, there has been no direct cooperation after the revolution but many of the drip irrigation systems which were set up during the 1960s and 1970s remain active to this day. The name of Netafim, the Israeli drip irrigation firm, which was established by the pioneering engineer Simcha Bass, is still used in agricultural equipment sales in Iran. Having visited both Iran and Israel, I see much in common between the ancient cultures of both lands. They have ecological commonalities as well that could be a source of enduring ties along with their Arab neighbors. The Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington issued a report in 2023 on the 'Unique Promise of Environmental Cooperation in the Gulf,' which in a future peace scenario could include Israel as well. At the Expo 2020, following the Abraham Accords, Israel had a prominent pavilion in Dubai which had a focus on environmental technologies. While the current conflict may lead us to think such cooperation is fanciful, who could have thought that the U.S. and Japan would be G7 allies after a nuclear bombing within a generation? Peace can come swiftly -- and when there is already a legacy of natural resource cooperation to build upon, we should hold out hope for both Israel and Iran finding a better future together.
News24
18-06-2025
- Politics
- News24
Iran claims the arrest of 5 Israel Mossad agents, warns public to delete WhatsApp
Iran detained people it claimed were agents of Mossad. There are restrictions on internet access in Iran during the war with Israel. Chinese evacuees from Iran have shared their experiences. Iran said on Wednesday it had detained five suspected agents of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency on charges of tarnishing the country's image online, Iranian news agencies reported. 'These mercenaries sought to sow fear among the public and tarnish the image of the sacred system of the Islamic Republic of Iran through their calculated activities online,' the Tasnim and ISNA news agencies quoted a statement from the Revolutionary Guards as saying. They added that the arrests had been made in the western province of Lorestan. The arrests came as Iran traded fire with Israel for a sixth day following the aerial assault on Iranian military and nuclear facilities, as well as residential areas, which it launched last week. Iran announced on Friday that it was placing temporary restrictions on the internet for the duration of the conflict. Numerous sites and apps have since been at least partially inaccessible. The authorities appealed to the public on Tuesday to 'minimise their use of equipment connected to the internet and to take appropriate precautions' online. For their own safety, civil servants and their security teams have been banned from using any connected devices, including smartphones, watches and laptops during the Israeli air offensive. State television appealed to Iranians on Tuesday to delete WhatsApp from their phones, charging that the messaging app gathers users' location and personal data and 'communicates them to the Zionist enemy'. According to Reuters, Iran will respond to Israeli strikes 'strongly' and 'without restraint,' its ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva said on Wednesday. 'We will not show any reluctance in defending our people, security and land. We will respond seriously and strongly, without restraint,' Ali Bahreini, the ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations in Geneva, told reporters. Peter Kollanyi/Bloomberg via Getty Images The first Chinese evacuees from Iran have started sharing on social media their desperate efforts to reach the Islamic Republic's borders and the safety of Turkmenistan, Armenia and Azerbaijan, as the Israel-Iran air war entered a sixth day. Several thousand Chinese nationals are thought to reside in oil-rich Iran, according to state media reports highlighting Beijing's efforts to deepen strategic and commercial ties with the theocratic regime over the past two decades. 'My heart was pounding but amid the haze of war, everything became clear: I packed my bags and tried to evacuate to the embassy,' wrote a Chinese travel blogger under the alias Shuishui Crusoe, a nod to Daniel Defoe's fictional castaway, Robinson Crusoe. The travel blogger had decided to leave after sitting through Israel's overnight bombings last Friday when the conflict began, even as the embassy told advised her to stay put. Atta Kenare/AFP Emboldened by news of fellow citizens who made it across to Armenia, 750km from the Iranian capital Tehran, she chose the same route, arriving by bus in the Armenian capital Yerevan on Monday, a day before China's embassy officially urged citizens to leave Iran. China started evacuating its citizens from Tehran to Turkmenistan by overland bus on Tuesday, a distance of 1 150km, state-run China News Service reported on Wednesday. More than 700 Chinese nationals have been transferred to places of safety and more than 1 000 more are in the process of being transferred, China's Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday. While the embassy emphasised evacuation, some other Chinese netizens still in Iran shared video compilations showing an orderly scenario of well-stocked grocery shops and fruit stalls, with only a couple of clips of large purchases of bottled water. Most Chinese in Iran are engineers who moved there to work for Chinese firms that have invested just under $5 billion in the country since 2007 - primarily in its oil sector - according to data from the American Enterprise Institute think tank. If the regime in Tehran is severely weakened or replaced, Beijing loses a key diplomatic foothold in a region long dominated by the US but vital to President Xi Jinping's flagship Belt and Road initiative and its aim to link the world's second-largest economy with Europe and the Gulf.
Al Bawaba
16-06-2025
- Politics
- Al Bawaba
Sources reveal the location of Iran's Khamenei
Published June 16th, 2025 - 08:33 GMT ALBAWABA - Amid rising tensions between Iran and Israel due to ongoing airstrikes from both parties, two sources recently confirmed that Ali Khamenei and his family were reportedly transferred to an underground shelter in Tehran on Sunday. Also Read Video: Iranian secret agents catch Mossad van filled with drones According to Iran International, two sources inside the country revealed that the Iranian Supreme Leader was transferred alongside his family, including his son Mojtaba, to a bunker in Lavizan neighborhood. The information surfaced after Mohsen Rezaee, a Member of the Expediency Discernment Council of Iran, revealed that Iran will take the necessary measures towards Israel's attacks. Additionally, Rezaee accused Israel of plotting more assassination attempts in Iran. Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and his family are reportedly hiding in a secret bunker as Israeli strikes rock Iran's nuclear ambitions under scrutiny and leadership in hiding, the world watches closely. Read here: #DNAUpdates |… — DNA (@dna) June 16, 2025 Recently, a clip circulating on social media showcased the Iranian undercover intelligence reportedly capturing a Mossad van that was carrying drones in Kakareza, Lorestan. The two suspects were arrested on June 15 after the Iranian police linked them to the Mossad. Israel's ongoing attacks on Iran have resulted in the assassination of prominent figures in the IRGC, including Commander-in-Chief Hossein Salami, Chief of Staff Mohammad Bagheri, Commanders Gholamali Rashid and Amir Ali Hajizadeh. In response, Iran launched a barrage of missiles towards several cities in Israel, damaging several parts of Tel Aviv after the country's Iron Dome failed to intercept some of them, leaving several dead and many wounded. © 2000 - 2025 Al Bawaba (
Al Bawaba
16-06-2025
- Politics
- Al Bawaba
Iran's Khamenei transferred to underground shelter, sources confirm
Published June 16th, 2025 - 08:33 GMT ALBAWABA - Amid rising tensions between Iran and Israel due to ongoing airstrikes from both parties, two sources recently confirmed that Ali Khamenei and his family were reportedly transferred to an underground shelter in Tehran on Sunday. Also Read Video: Iranian secret agents catch Mossad van filled with drones According to Iran International, two sources inside the country revealed that the Iranian Supreme Leader was transferred alongside his family, including his son Mojtaba, to a bunker in Lavizan neighborhood. The information surfaced after Mohsen Rezaee, a Member of the Expediency Discernment Council of Iran, revealed that Iran will take the necessary measures towards Israel's attacks. Additionally, Rezaee accused Israel of plotting more assassination attempts in Iran. Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and his family are reportedly hiding in a secret bunker as Israeli strikes rock Iran's nuclear ambitions under scrutiny and leadership in hiding, the world watches closely. Read here: |… — DNA (@dna) June 16, 2025 Recently, a clip circulating on social media showcased the Iranian undercover intelligence reportedly capturing a Mossad van that was carrying drones in Kakareza, Lorestan. The two suspects were arrested on June 15 after the Iranian police linked them to the Mossad. Israel's ongoing attacks on Iran have resulted in the assassination of prominent figures in the IRGC, including Commander-in-Chief Hossein Salami, Chief of Staff Mohammad Bagheri, Commanders Gholamali Rashid and Amir Ali Hajizadeh. In response, Iran launched a barrage of missiles towards several cities in Israel, damaging several parts of Tel Aviv after the country's Iron Dome failed to intercept some of them, leaving several dead and many wounded. © 2000 - 2025 Al Bawaba (
Al Bawaba
16-06-2025
- Politics
- Al Bawaba
Video: Iranian secret agents catch Mossad van filled with drones
Published June 16th, 2025 - 07:33 GMT ALBAWABA - A video was shared online, reportedly caught the moment secret Iranian intelligence members caught a van that is likely linked to the Israeli intelligence (Mossad). Also Read Video: hundreds of Iranians flee Tehran The clip allegedly showed Iranian undercover intelligence capturing another Mossad van that was carrying drones in Kakareza, Lorestan, in the western part of the country. On June 15, local newspapers revealed that the Iranian police in Alborz province, west of Tehran, caught two people who were suspected of links to Mossad. ⛓️🇮🇷Agentes del Mossad capturados infraganti en #Iran 🔺Dos camiones cargados con drones y explosivos, vinculados con el Mossad israelí, fueron capturados en la provincia occidental iraní de Lorestan, tras informes públicos a los servicios de inteligencia del país persa. — HispanTV (@Nexo_Latino) June 16, 2025 In addition to arresting Mossad agents, Iran's security forces found over 200 kilograms of explosives in a three-story building that was used by "Israeli agents to assemble and store UAVs," Tasnim news agency reported. It is worth noting that before Israel's Friday attack on Iran that targeted nuclear facilities and killed several key-ranking military leaders, Mossad spies were already inside Iran and helped send sensitive data and disable Tehran's air defense system. Israeli security officials said that the country's intelligence agency had smuggled weapons into Iran ahead of the airstrikes. Nonetheless, Iran's judiciary announced hanging a man who was convicted of being a spy for the Israeli intelligence, noting that the man, named Esmaeil Fekri, was arrested back in 2023. "Esmaeil Fekri, a Mossad agent convicted of the capital offences of 'corruption on Earth' and 'moharebeh' (waging war against God) was hanged after going through the full process of criminal procedure," the judiciary's Mizan Online news website mentioned. © 2000 - 2025 Al Bawaba (
