Sudan Seeks Iranian Drones Amid Growing Regional Tensions

Titled "Qasem is Still Alive," the album features songs by Ali Reza Eftakhari, Sadeq Ahangaran, and Gholamreza Sanatgar. Published by the Center for the Arts Music Department, the album seeks to immortalize Soleimani, who was killed in a US drone strike near Baghdad International Airport in 2020.

The strike was ordered by then-President Donald Trump, who claimed Soleimani was actively planning attacks on American diplomats, service members, and members of the administration in the region.

Despite the Islamic Republic's efforts to portray Soleimani as a national hero, ordinary Iranians have expressed their discontent by setting fire to or destroying statues and banners depicting him as an icon of the Islamic autocracy.

Instances of such protests occurred during the anniversary of Soleimani's death, with people in various cities, including Tehran, Karaj, Zarinshahr, Rafsanjan, and his hometown Kerman, burning statues and posters in defiance.

Soleimani's legacy remains contentious, with many Iranians viewing him as responsible for spreading violence in the region through Iran's proxies, and contributing to violent repression at home.

Houthis have claimed drone and missile attacks on two ships they described as being linked to Israel but have not acknowledged targeting a US Navy vessel.

"We're aware of reports regarding attacks on the USS Carney and commercial vessels in the Red Sea and will provide information as it becomes available," the Pentagon said Sunday.

Earlier in the day, UK-based maritime security firm Ambrey said there had been a suspected drone attack and explosions in the Red Sea. "The affected vessel was issuing distress calls relating to piracy/missile attack," the UK-based company added, noting that "an international naval asset in the vicinity of the incident" was likely proceeding to the ship's location. Ambrey said a bulk carrier and a container ship had been hit by at least two drones.

Yemen's Houthi movement said its navy had attacked two Israeli ships, Unity Explorer and Number Nine, with an armed drone and a naval missile. A spokesperson for the Houthis’ military said the two ships were targeted after they rejected warnings, without elaborating. Houthis are believed to possess a variety of Iranian missiles and drones.

In a broadcast statement, the spokesperson said the attacks were in response to the demands of the Yemeni people and calls from Islamic nations to stand with the Palestinian people. Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree said the first vessel was hit by a missile and the second by a drone while in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait that links the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. “The Yemeni armed forces renew their warning to all Israeli ships or those associated with Israelis that they will become a legitimate target if they violate what is stated in this statement.”

Since Hamas’s deadly onslaught on Israel on October 7 and Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza, Yemen’s Houthis have launched several drone and missile attacks against US and Israeli targets in the region. The Biden administration, which took Houthis off of the US terrorist list has not retaliated to the maritime attacks.

Last month, the group – which controls most of Yemen's Red Sea coast -- also seized a British-owned and Japanese-operated cargo ship while their attempt to highjack another vessel was thwarted thanks to the US Navy as it responded to a distress call from an Israeli-managed commercial tanker in the Gulf of Aden after it had been seized by armed individuals.

The Houthi attack came after calls by Iran’s leader Ali Khamenei to ban shipment of oil and food to Israel. The group, which controls most of Yemen's Red Sea coast, had previously fired ballistic missiles and armed drones at Israel and vowed to target more Israeli vessels.

Though the Islamic Republic has avoided any direct involvement in the Israel-Hamas conflict, the regime has used its proxy groups in the region such as Houthis and Hezbollah to attack Israel and American targets.

ABC News, citing a US official, said the USS Carney had been involved in multiple engagements involving Houthi attacks on commercial vessels. "In at least two circumstances, the Carney successfully shot down (drones) headed in its direction," the official told ABC.

The Director General of Citizenship and Foreign Nationals Affairs of Kermanshah Province, Hamzeh Soleimani, confirmed on Sunday that settlement and employment of Afghan citizens are currently prohibited in provinces including Kermanshah, under a newly issued directive.

The directive, comprising eight stages for the identification, detention, and deportation of unauthorized nationals in Kermanshah, has been underway since the start of the year (March 21).

“Numerous housing construction projects, greenhouses, horse stables, and livestock farms underwent inspection under the plan, leading to the arrest and expulsion of Afghan workers from the province,” noted Soleimani.

The official also reported the detention of employers who had hired the individuals, emphasizing the severity of the measures taken.

Although specific provinces were not mentioned in the announcement, the Farda-e-Eghtesad website disclosed a list of 15 provinces where the residence of Afghan citizens is now prohibited. These include East Azarbaijan, West Azarbaijan, Ardabil, Zanjan, and others.

Simultaneously, Ahmad Vahidi, the Minister of Interior in Ebrahim Raisi's administration, revealed the expulsion of approximately 400,000 migrants living “illegally” in Iran. However, details regarding their nationality and the timeframe for their return to their home countries were not provided.

The development follows over 540 artists, lawyers, doctors, journalists, and activists demanding an end to harassment against Afghan migrants in Iran in October. Amnesty International has also warned of the serious risks, particularly for Afghan women and girls, exposed to harassment and abuse solely based on their gender.

Afghan refugees have been streaming through the border in recent years, with their total number now estimated to be between six to seven million, according to the Iranian Parliament’s Research Center expert.

The victim was believed to be a 23-year-old German-Filipino citizen according to France 24. A 66-year-old British citizen and a 60-year-old French national were also wounded and the suspect, only named as Armand R, is now being investigated "in connection with a terrorist plot".

Born in France to Iranian parents, Armand R, 26, was known for his radical Islamism and had psychiatric issues. The Paris prosecutor's office confirmed he was apprehended and tasered after fleeing the scene of the crime across the Seine.

Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin admitted that Armand R. had previously received a four-year prison sentence in 2016 for planning an attack that he did not execute.

Darmanin claimed that Armand R told the police that he could not tolerate the killing of Muslims in "Afghanistan and Palestine", blaming France for being an accomplice for the Israeli retaliatory attacks in Gaza following the Hamas invasion on October 7, which left 1,200 mostly civilians dead and 240 taken hostage. Israel's onslaught has since left more than 15,000 dead in Gaza and large swathes of the population displaced.

According to France 24, police and security sources claimed the attacker posted a video claiming responsibility to social media at the moment of the attack, speaking about "current events, the government, the murder of innocent Muslims".

In the nearly two-minute video, the attacker declared his support for Islamic State (IS) and pledged allegiance to its current leader Abu Hafs. The attacker claimed he acted “to avenge Muslims” and hailed the accomplishments of IS members. According to the report, he made no mention of Palestine or Gaza in the video.

Podro, a social commerce and logistics company that provides various services to small and medium-sized businesses, claims Instagram-based businesses’ sales went up by 38 percent in value on Black Friday with some small businesses selling up to 20 times more than in normal days. However, no actual sales numbers are available.

Podro’s claims are based on the results of an Instagram Black Friday campaign it launched in which around 2,000 small and medium-sized businesses took part.

Black Friday sales have become popular in Iran in the past few years. Fashion and beauty products made up most of the commodities on sale this year, but even homemade jam and condiments were on offer.

Iranians can only access Instagram and other major social media and instant messaging platforms such as X, Facebook, WhatsApp, and Telegram if they have installed anti-filtering software on their devices. They need to circumvent government filters that make these apps inaccessible in the country.

The ban on Instagram, the only social platform not blocked by authorities, was announced on September 21, 2022, a few days after anti-government protests sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in the custody of morality police engulfed the country.

Instagram is the second most popular social platform in Iran after Telegram with over forty million users. Both platforms are used by millions of small and home-based businesses for marketing.

The ban, and frequent internet blackouts, were meant to prevent protesters from sharing news and footage of the crackdowns. The use of VPNs to help access to banned social platforms and websites, however, surged by 30-fold in the following months.

According to Pashotan Pourpezeshk, the chief executive of Podro, small and medium-sized businesses that use social media as their main marketing tool have the largest share in the country’s online retail market.

A recent report by the e-commerce center of the ministry of industries showed Instagram to be the most used social platform in e-commerce with 55 percent of these businesses relying on it, followed by Telegram (41 percent) and WhatsApp (37 [percent).

Experts have repeatedly warned that filtering Instagram and other social and messaging platforms could be hugely detrimental to small businesses, particularly those run from homes by women or small farms in rural areas, which very heavily rely on Instagram for advertising and WhatsApp for communication with potential customers.

Instagram was instrumental in the exponential growth of small, often home-based businesses that sprang up during the COVID pandemic. Women in many rural areas began selling everything from herbs and vegetables they grew in their rural gardens to duck eggs, and handicrafts through Instagram.

Some of these tiny businesses grew to the extent that they provided work for others. In one fishing village in the southern Bushehr Province, for instance, a fisherman’s young wife started marketing their catch on Instagram a few years ago.

She would clean fish and shrimps caught in the Persian Gulf and send it to customers in nearby cities. The whole village’s catch is now being sold by the business, called Mahimarket (Fish Market).

The catch of the day is packed in ice in polystyrene boxes and sent by airplane to Tehran, over a thousand kilometers away, and other cities, where they are delivered to customers, often individual households, on the same day.

Villagers are also selling other products such as dates, dried herbs, and home-blended spices through the same platform.

Communications minister Issa Zare’pour said last month that forty million Iranians now use domestic social media platforms the number of users of some of which, he claimed, has increased by eight-fold in the past eighteen.

However, there is still a huge demand for anti-filtering software. Yekta Net, a major Iranian online marketing company, said in its latest annual report that 80 percent of Iranians use VPNs to circumvent filtering and access banned social media and messaging platforms. Many Iranians have several anti-filtering software and VPNs on their electronic devices to ensure easier access to banned platforms and websites if authorities manage to disable one or more.