Saudi Delgations Planning Visit To Washington As Ties Improve

During the meeting with Grossi on Friday, Bennett reiterated that Israel has the right to halt the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program if the international community fails to do so.

The Israeli premier expressed mounting concerns about the danger of Iran’s progress in acquiring nuclear weapons, while “misleading the international community.” He urged the world to take action against Iran to prevent it from becoming a nuclear state.

The quick visit comes amid stalled Iran nuclear talks days and after Bennett published documents this week that he said can prove “Iran stole classified documents from the UN’s Atomic Agency and used that information to systematically evade nuclear probes.”

Earlier in the week, Israel's National Security Council chairman Eyal Hulata met his US counterpart Jake Sullivan in Washington, and announced their agreement to coordinate on efforts to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and destabilizing the region.

The Vienna talks to restore the 2015 nuclear deal have stalled mainly because of Iran’s demand for the US to remove the Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) from its terrorism list (FTO) and the recent missile attacks have shed more doubts whether Washington would take such a step.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh on Thursday rejected remarks in a statement issued at the end of the 152nd session of GCC's Ministerial Council in Saudi Arabia's capital Riyadh on Wednesday. 

In their statement, the GCC described Iran’s nuclear and missile programs and regional strategies as the main “challenge” facing the member states, criticizing the Islamic Republic’s support for “terrorism” as well as its “destabilizing behavior” across the region.

Khatibzadeh said such a "threadbare and destructive” statement indicates a “completely wrong approach” adopted by some member states and their “strategic confusion” vis-à-vis the Islamic Republic.

Iran and Saudi Arabia have held several rounds of talks since 2021 to improve their ties, severed since 2016, with no major results so far.

Commenting on the request by some GCC member states to be part of the Vienna talks to revive the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, JCPOA, Khatibzadeh said raising such issues demonstrates the depth of the council’s failure to see the realities as the JCPOA and the UN Resolution 2231 have made it clear which countries are the signatories to the international treaty and can take part in the negotiations.

The independent monitoring service, which tracks and reports shipments and storage of crude oil, said in a Twitter post on Thursday that they have a visual confirmation the hijacked Greek Suezmax tanker Prudent Warrior is in the anchorage of Bandar Abbas in the southern Hormozgan province and the other Suezmax vessel, the Delta Poseidon is being held north of Larak island near the Strait of Hormuz.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guards' navy seized the two vessels during helicopter-launched raids on May 27 in the Persian Gulf, a week after the confiscation of Iranian oil from a tanker held off the Greek coast and its transfer to the US. 

Criticized by many former and current officials as well US congresspeople for a lenient Tehran diplomacy that has led to the increase of the Islamic Republic’s oil revenues, President Joe Biden’s administration has apparently stepped up its effort to put pressure on Iran’s crude exports, which have been sanctioned since the former President Donald Trump abandoned the nuclear deal in 2018.

The Vienna talks to restore the 2015 nuclear deal have stalled mainly because of Iran’s demand for the US to remove the Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) from its terrorism list (FTO) and the recent missile attacks have shed more doubts whether Washington would take such a step.

According to a statement by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), dozens of fighter jets conducted a drill that included "long-range flight, aerial refueling, and striking distant targets" over the Mediterranean Sea on Tuesday night. 

In May, The Times of Israel reported that the drill would simulate a large-scale strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities. The exercise is part of the military’s major Chariots of Fire drills, which involves nearly all branches of the IDF, and has been focusing on training for fighting on Israel’s northern borders, including against the Iran-backed group Hezbollah in Lebanon.

IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi announced last year that he the army had “greatly accelerated” preparations for action against Tehran’s nuclear program, that would include finding ways to strike facilities that are buried deep underground and preparing for an expected retaliation against Israel by Iran and its allies throughout the region

Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid said Monday Iran must understand that it will pay the price for its terrorist activities and threatening Israelis around the globe, in reference to Iranian threats of revenge for the assassination last week of Revolutionary Guard colonel Hassan Sayyad-Khodaei in Tehran.

He was a commander in Iran’s extra-territorial Qods (Quds) Force reportedly in charge of organizing attacks against Israel.

A coalition source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said on Tuesday that the projectiles landed on the vicinity of the airbase, located about 160 kilometers (100 miles) west of the capital Baghdad, adding that the rocket attack caused no casualties. 

Sabereen News, a Telegram channel associated with Iraqi Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), claimed that six 122mm BM-21 Grad rockets had targeted Ayn al-Asad. An Iran-backed militia group that calls itself ‘The International Resistance’ has claimed responsibility for the attack. 

The base is the frequent target of Iran-backed proxy groups in the region. Late in April, it was targeted by three Grad missiles, which fell outside the base, without causing significant losses, and earlier in the month, two combat drones hit targets inside the air base, again without any casualties.

The base was also targeted by Iranian ballistic missiles in January 8 2020 in retaliation for the killing of Ghasem (Qassem) Soleimani the commander of Qods (Quds) force, a branch of the Revolutionary Guard (IRGC), who was killed in Baghdad by a targeted US drone attack on January 3, 2020.

The attacks came as nuclear talks in Vienna to revive the 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers have paused, mainly over Iran’s demand to remove the IRGC from the US list of foreign terrorist organizations.