Tag: Iran

Iran Scientist Linked to Military Nuclear Program Killed

The Associated Press

An Iranian scientist named by the West as the leader of the Islamic Republic’s disbanded military nuclear program was killed Friday in an ambush on the outskirts of Tehran, authorities said.

Iran’s foreign minister alleged the killing of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh bore “serious indications” of an Israeli role, but did not elaborate. Israel, long suspected of killing several Iranian nuclear scientists a decade ago, declined to immediately comment. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu once told the public to “remember that name” when talking about Fakhrizadeh.

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Commentary: The Obama-Biden ‘Ostracize and Punish Israel’ Legacy Will Return if Democrats Win the White House in 2020

Virginia Star Staff

Joe Biden portrays himself as Israel’s ally and a friend of the Jewish people. Obama did the same when he was running for president and then he played bait and switch.  It’s time voters wizen up because Biden vows to repeat the Obama-Biden playbook on Israel and the Middle East.  It’s even worse: today’s Democrat party leadership has taken a major turn to the left. They are no friend of the Jewish people here or in Israel.  

A quick history lesson is instructive:  In 2008, Candidate Obama pledged Israel’s security was “sacrosanct” and “non-negotiable” with “secure recognized defensible borders,” where Jerusalem would “remain” Israel’s capital and “must remain undivided.”  Fast forward, months later in 2009, then President Obama wasted no time abandoning his empty words.  Embarking on their true agenda, Obama-Biden declared a “serious problem” existed precisely because there was no daylight between the United States and Israel.  Obama-Biden was determined to change that and, off to the races, they didn’t look back.   

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UN Watchdog: Iran to Allow Access to Two Suspected Nuke Sites

The Associated Press

Iran has agreed to allow inspectors in to two sites where the country is suspected of having stored or used undeclared nuclear material, the U.N. atomic watchdog agency said Wednesday.

The International Atomic Energy Agency said Iran was “voluntarily providing the IAEA with access to the two locations specified by the IAEA and facilitating the IAEA verification activities to resolve the issues.”

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US Says Iran Briefly Seizes Oil Tanker Near Strait of Hormuz

The Associated Press

The Iranian navy boarded and briefly seized a Liberian-flagged oil tanker near the strategic Strait of Hormuz amid heightened tensions between Tehran and the U.S., the American military said Thursday.

The U.S. military’s Central Command published a black-and-white video showing what appeared to be special forces fast-roping down from a helicopter onto the MT Wila, whose last position appeared to be off the eastern coast of the United Arab Emirates near the city of Khorfakkan.

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Iran Declines to Disclose Cause of Mysterious Nuke Site Fire

The Associated Press

An online video and messages purportedly claiming responsibility for a fire that analysts say damaged a centrifuge assembly plant at Iran’s underground Natanz nuclear site deepened the mystery Friday around the incident — even as Tehran insisted it knew the cause but would not make it public due to “security reasons.”

The multiple, different claims by a self-described group called the “Cheetahs of the Homeland” included language used by several exiled Iranian opposition organizations. They also focused almost entirely on Iran’s nuclear program, viewed by Israel as a danger to its very existence.

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US Tries to Seize Iranian Gas Heading Toward Venezuela

The Associated Press

U.S. federal prosecutors are seeking to seize four tankers sailing toward Venezuela with gasoline supplied by Iran, the latest attempt to disrupt ever-closer trade ties between the two heavily sanctioned anti-American allies.

The civil-forfeiture complaint filed late Wednesday in the District of Columbia federal court alleges that the sale was arranged by a businessman, Mahmoud Madanipour, with ties to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization.

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Commentary: The Establishment Media Is Ignoring What Just Happened In Iran, But We Won’t

Virginia Star Staff

While the establishment media have studiously ignored reporting the story, the social media accounts of Middle East and national security experts have been abuzz with questions and information on the huge explosion or explosions that recently rocked a site believed to house one of Iran’s nuclear weapons facilities – the facilities that Obama and the Iranians claimed do not exist.

Rick Moran writing for our friends at PJ Media reported the explosion happened in the Alborz mountains, just east of Tehran. Satellite photos show the massive extent of the blast. The area of the blast near Iran’s Khojir missile base was identified in 2017 as a nuclear research facility despite Iran’s pledge to reveal all its nuclear infrastructure in the nuclear deal with the West.

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Amid US Tension, Iran Builds Fake Aircraft Carrier to Attack

The Associated Press

As tensions remain high between Iran and the U.S., the Islamic Republic appears to have constructed a new mock-up of an aircraft carrier off its southern coast for potential live-fire drills.

The faux foe, seen in satellite photographs obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press, resembles the Nimitz-class carriers that the U.S. Navy routinely sails into the Persian Gulf from the Strait of Hormuz, its narrow mouth where 20% of all the world’s oil passes through.

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Pompeo Terminates Iran Treaty After UN Court Hands Tehran a Victory in Sanctions Lawsuit Against Washington

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by Will Racke   Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced Wednesday the U.S. will terminate a 63-year-old treaty with Iran, hours after a top United Nations court ruled in favor of Tehran in a lawsuit challenging U.S. sanctions. Pompeo said the abrogation of the 1955 Treaty of Amity was “39 years overdue,”…

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Promoting Religious Liberty Affirms ‘Human Dignity,’ Pompeo Tells Values Voter Summit

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by Fred Lucas   Secretary of State Mike Pompeo reaffirmed Friday that the Trump administration is committed to religious liberty, both at home and abroad. Speaking at the conservative Values Voter Summit in Washington, Pompeo said that more than 80 percent of the world’s population lives in countries that place…

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Mattis Backs Up Trump’s Strong Words On Iran

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by Evie Fordham   Secretary of Defense James Mattis backed up President Donald Trump’s fiery message about Iran at the Hoover Institution in Stanford, California, on Tuesday. “[Iran] cannot continue to show irresponsibility as some revolutionary organization that is intent on exporting terrorism, exporting disruption across the region,” Mattis said, reported The…

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In Another Blow to Iran’s Faltering Economy, Shipping Giant CMA CGM Announces Exit, Citing US Sanctions

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CMA CGM Shipping

Reuters   One of the world’s biggest cargo shippers announced Saturday that it was pulling out of Iran for fear of becoming entangled in U.S. sanctions, and President Hassan Rouhani demanded that European countries to do more to offset the U.S. measures. The announcement by France’s CMA CGM that it was…

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President Trump Withdraws from Iran Deal; Marsha Blackburn and Diane Black Praise Decision

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President Trump

Ahead of the May 12th deadline and against the many requests from European allies,  President Trump announced Tuesday afternoon the United States will withdraw from the Obama-era “Iran Deal.” The president announced his decision in a speech at the White House in the Diplomatic Room as Trump’s National Security Adviser…

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