Israel Hits Damascus Airport, Iran-Related Targets

The newspaper on Friday quoted four people familiar with Khamenei’s health condition as saying that all his meetings are cancelled while there have been numerous rumors about his death on social media in recent days. 

Iran International had earlier reported about Khamenei absence from the public scene since the beginning of this month, while some pundits said separately that Khamenei has given Raisi authority to make decision over Iran’s nuclear talks with the West.

The octogenarian leader had surgery at a clinic set up at his home and office complex some time last week for bowel obstruction after suffering extreme stomach pains and high fever, one of the people said. 

One of the sources said he is currently being monitored around the clock by a team of doctors, claiming that his condition was critical last week, but has improved, and he is currently resting. 

The Iranian government has not denied social media reports circulating for more than a week about Khamenei's illness. Meanwhile, his office cancelled two scheduled meetings with the Assembly of Experts members and Basij militia during the past days.

In another development, a picture released by the official news agency IRNA last week about Khamenei's meeting with athletes, turned out to be at last three years old and the agency pulled the story.

The 22-year-old Mahsa Amini who was arrested on Tuesday by the morality police was taken to hospital two hours later from Vozara Detention Center after losing consciousness. She passed away Friday afternoon at Kasra Hospital in northern Tehran. Originally from Saqqez in Kurdistan province, Amini was arrested in her brother’s car on a visit to the capital to see their relatives.

“Mahsa Amini’s death after injuries sustained in custody for an “improper” hijab is appalling. Our thoughts are with her family. Iran must end its violence against women for exercising their fundamental rights. Those responsible for her death should be held accountable,” US Special Envoy for Iran Robert Malley tweeted Friday.

Amnesty International account for the organisation's work on Iran also said in a tweet that the circumstances leading to “the suspicious death in custody” of Mahsa Amini must be criminally investigated.

Iran’s exiled Prince Reza Pahlavi also issued a statement calling the Islamic Republic “misogynistic” and asking Iranians to “stand up against this monstrosity.”

Several videos posted on social media show dozens of people on sidewalks of streets close to the hospital where Amini died chanting slogans such as “We will kill the one who killed our sister”, “Down with Dictator’, and shouted “Scoundrels like Daish” while drivers of the vehicles on the street honked their horns.

Social media users said armed security forces who arrived on motorbikes at Argentine square and around the hospital in its vicinity beat people with batons with no discretion and blocked roads to prevent a protest rally from forming. Unconfirmed reports indicate that at least three people were arrested.

As seen in the videos uploaded on Twitter and Instagram, protesters also chanted against Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who has not seen been seen in public recently. Sources familiar with his health situation told New York Times Friday that the 83-year-old ruler fell gravely ill and is currently on bed rest under observation by a team of doctors.

In another social media video people are heard chanting “Death to Khamenei” on rooftops and from their windows in an unspecified neighborhood.

Hours after the announcement of Amini’s death at the hospital, the state television (IRIB) aired CCTV footage of the detention center where Amini had been taken by the morality police. The footage showed her collapsing while apparently arguing with one of the female officers as proof that she had not been subjected to violence at the time of her arrest, but the film is an edited segment, and it cannot be seen if something happened before she collapsed.

Amini’s family members say there was a scuffle at the time of Amini’s arrest. According to her uncle, Amini’s brother who was with her at the time of her arrest had tried to resist but the arresting officers used tear gas.

A photo of the 22-year-old Mahsa Amini on the hospital bed shows her unconscious with very clear signs of bleeding from her right ear. Several doctors including Mahdiar Saeedian, editor of a health magazine, have pointed out on social media that brain strokes do not cause otorrhagia (hemorrhage from ears) which proves that her coma was caused by trauma to the head, possibly at the time of her arrest.

Dr Alan Tofighi, a Paris-based physician and activist, also told Iran International TV that collapsing a few hours after head trauma with no apparent symptoms is very common.

Iran’s government which is now fully controlled by hardliners has adopted a harsher than usual approach amid economic crisis and hardship for tens of millions. Government and military officials have warned the population against disobeying hijab rules and hijab enforcement patrols have detained many women, sometimes violently, on the streets.

“The circumstances leading to the suspicious death in custody of 22-year-old young woman Mahsa Amini, which include allegations of torture and other ill-treatment in custody, must be criminally investigated,” Amnesty International said on Friday. 

Noting that all agents and officials responsible must face justice, it added that the so-called “morality police” in Tehran arbitrarily arrested her three days before her death while enforcing the country’s abusive, degrading and discriminatory forced veiling laws. 

Mahsa Amini was arrested Tuesday by a hijab patrol and during her detention she sustained severe trauma to her head and went into a coma in a hospital. She passed away on Friday.

While the interior ministry and Tehran's prosecutor launched probes into the circumstances surrounding her death following a demand by President Ebrahim Raisi, people in Tehran gathered outside Tehran's Kasra hospital, where she died. A video sent to Iran International shows security forces attacking a group of protesters chanting slogans there.

According to social media videos, there have been some other protests in other locations in Tehran, in which people are chanting slogans against the Islamic Republic’s authorities, such as “Death to Khamenei,” “Death to Oppressors,” and "We Will Kill Those Who Killed Our Sister".

Several Iranian celebrities including outspoken former national team soccer players Ali Karimi and Ali Daei, and Oscar-winning director Asghar Farhadi have posted about the young woman's tragic fate on social media.

A global trend away from using the dollar has been more pronounced in SCO states, with non-dollarized Russia-China trade rising about 50 percent in early 2020 after being 10 percent in 2015.

But the trend has accelerated between at least some SCO states with US and western European sanctions against Russia over the Ukraine crisis. Gazprom, the Russian gas major, last week said China would pay for gas in roubles and yuan rather than in dollars and euros.

An SCO declaration Friday said that “interested SCO member states” had agreed a “roadmap for the gradual increase in the share of national currencies in mutual settlements.” The SCO – comprising China, India, the Kyrgyz Republic, Kazakhstan, Pakistan, Russia Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan – is in the process of admitting Iran.

President Ebrahim Raisi has been more positive about SCO opportunities than predecessor Hassan Rouhani, whose efforts to increase trade with Europe – including bringing energy majors to Iran – were thwarted by the US. In 2018 Washington left the 2105 Iran nuclear deal and imposed ‘maximum pressure’ sanctions that threatened punitive action against any third parties dealing with Tehran.

Thwarting ‘draconian’ sanctions

Raisi’s made his first foreign trip as president to an SCO summit in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, October 2021, when he hailed “a new area” where “unilateralism and hegemony are failing.”

Raisi told the Samarkand SCO summit Thursday the organization needed to improve ways to thwart “draconian” US sanctions. On Thursday, meeting Putin, Raisi stressed the “strategic nature” of cooperation with Russia that could “be developed in the political, commercial and economic fields, as well as in space.” While US ‘maximum pressure’ restricted Iran-China trade after 2018 with Chinese companies wary of punitive US actions, China has remained Tehran’s largest trading partner and is easily its biggest market for crude oil.

In its economic and diplomatic isolation, Iranian officials emphasize the importance of ties with Russia and China, although Moscow has little to offer Iran as both countries face economic hardship and China is happy to buy discounted oil from both sanctioned energy exporters.

Global change

Putin and China’s President Xi Jinping both portrayed the SCO as part of a global change. “Fundamental transformations have been outlined in world politics and the economy, and they are irreversible,” Putin said. The Russian president presented the SCO as half the world’s population and responsible for a quarter of global gross domestic product.

But in fact, Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has led to NATO’s expansion, and more Western solidarity. This is what Beijing has on mind as Putin alluded to China’s concerns over the war in Ukraine during his meeting with Xi on Thursday.

Seven months after the Russians launched military operations in Ukraine, Putin acknowledged unease or reservations expressed by both India and China. “I know your position on the conflict in Ukraine, the concerns that you constantly express,” Putin told India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a televised meeting. “We will do everything to stop this as soon as possible.”

Turkey offers further mediation

Turkish President Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan told the SCO summit Friday that Ankara would continue its efforts to mediate an end to the war “as soon as possible.” He urged the holding of direct talks in Turkey between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has said he will never accept a peace allowing Russia to keep any Ukrainian land, including Crimea.

A senior Israel Defense Forces officer said on Thursday that the apparent withdrawal of these forces from some regions is “a result of the IDF strikes” in recent weeks. He did not say which parts of Syria he was referring to.

Israeli defense officials have made such claims before, most recently in 2020.

The withdrawal of the forces detected by the IDF comes after the Saudi-owned London-based newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat reported that Russian officials have asked the Iranians to leave several sites in Syria, including its military headquarters in the western Hama province, situated next to the Syrian army’s Regiment 49 base. The Regiment 49 site is one of the most important military sites in western Hama as it houses long-range S-200 missiles and other Russian-made military equipment.

According to the report, Russia’s call was meant to deprive Israelis of excuses or pretexts to continue the bombing of targets where Russian forces are present.

“The Russian officers also demanded that the Iranians evacuate a second military site in the Hamidiya area, south of Tartus governorate on the Syrian coast,” a source told the paper. 

Israel has intensified strikes on Syrian airports to disrupt Tehran's increasing use of aerial supply lines to deliver arms to allies in Syria and Lebanon including Hezbollah. 

Israel conducted several airstrikes against the Aleppo International Airport in northwestern Syria, hours before its missiles struck targets southeast of capital Damascus on August 31.