Mideast Crisis

Dozens of Israeli actors were targeted in a phishing attack believed to have originated from Iran, Israel's National Cyber Directorate said on Friday.

An Iranian lawmaker suggested on Thursday that Qatar expel US forces and allow Iran’s Revolutionary Guards to deploy missiles on its territory to counter Israel.

Israel’s comptroller published a report on Wednesday outlining a series of government shortcomings in responding to civilian needs during the 12-day war with Iran and called for fixing gaps in emergency response.

The threat from Iran and its regional allies has sharply increased in recent year, senior officials in Jordan told Iran International, in a setback to decades of stability in the Western-allied kingdom.

Elizabeth Tsurkov, an Israeli-Russian academic abducted in Baghdad in March 2023, was freed this week in what Iran’s Revolutionary Guards-affiliated Tasnim described as a prisoner exchange.

Israel’s strike in Doha targeting senior Hamas leaders has given Tehran a chance to present itself as the true defender of Arab sovereignty and Palestinian resistance.

Iran’s military on Wednesday accused the United States of involvement in an Israeli attack on Hamas in Qatar the previous day despite public denials by its two foes.

The head of the UN nuclear watchdog said on Wednesday that its new deal with Iran covers inspections at all of the country’s declared nuclear sites, including those hit by Israeli and US strikes in June, in what he called a step in the right direction toward restoring safeguards.

Tuesday’s strike on the leadership of the Iran-backed Palestinian group Hamas in Doha aims to intimidate Tehran but also sows unease among Arab states, Israeli and American experts told Iran International.

Ali Larijani, Iran’s top security official, reacted to Israel’s strike on Qatar with a pointed message in Arabic on social media, casting the attack as a signal of Israel’s future ambitions for regional dominance.

An Israeli-Russian academic abducted and held hostage by an Iran-backed militia in Iraq has been released, US President Donald Trump said in a social media post on Tuesday.

Facing a grinding crisis and mounting calls at home to change course before disaster strikes, Iran’s rulers still speak in a language that suggests they prefer the risks of war to the uncertainties of reform.

Iran on Tuesday condemned an Israeli attack on Hamas leaders in the Qatari capital Doha, calling the bombing of the Tehran-backed group's negotiating team a dangerous escalation to simmering Middle East tensions.

Iran’s government said on Tuesday it does not currently have access to its stockpiles of enriched uranium following June’s 12-day war that devastated the country’s nuclear facilities, as its foreign minister traveled to Egypt for talks with the UN nuclear watchdog.

Nearly 22,000 Iranian gas centrifuges at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan were knocked out in June strikes, leaving “no identifiable route” to weapon-grade output at those plants, the Institute for Science and International Security said citing the UN nuclear watchdog’s latest reports.

Hamzeh Safavi, son of Yahya Rahim-Safavi, a senior military adviser to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, said Iran must be prepared for the possibility that Israel could attempt to assassinate the country’s top leader.

Amir Mousawi, a former Iranian diplomat and defense ministry adviser whose abduction in Egypt had earlier been confirmed by Tehran, wrote on X that he has returned to Iraq.

Departures from Iran are on the rise since a 12-day war with Israel in June as heightened surveillance and moribund prospects at home push some households to liquidate assets and leave.