Press TV – June 25, 2025
Shipping giant Maersk has announced that it will sever business ties with companies linked to the Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, citing concerns over complicity in Israel’s genocidal crimes against the Palestinians.
The Danish firm said in a statement on its official website Wednesday that it has tightened its vetting process “in relation to Israeli settlements.”
“Following a recent review of transports related to the West Bank, we further strengthened our screening procedures in relation to Israeli settlements,” read the statement.
It said the company’s decision “addresses only shipments to/from settlements” and is “not about cutting ties with the companies on the OHCHR (the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights) list in general but only related to transport to/from Israeli settlements.”
Maersk has not specified the exact businesses or contracts affected, but the OHCHR database includes businesses involved in various activities related to the settlements, such as providing services, equipment, or financial operations.
The firm’s decision follows a months-long campaign led by the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM), which accused it of playing a role in Israel’s military supply chain — including the shipment of weapons components.
Weeks earlier, Maersk shareholders voted at the company’s annual general meeting to review the firm’s involvement in arms shipments to the occupied Palestinian territories.
The Palestinian group welcomed the decision, which it said is a “step toward dismantling complicity in occupation and apartheid.”
“This sends a clear message to the global shipping industry: compliance with international law and basic human rights is not optional. Doing business with Israel’s illegal settlements is no longer viable, and the world is watching to see who follows next,” said PYM’s spokeswoman Aisha Nizar.
She called for further action though, arguing that Maersk still transports goods for the Israeli military, including components of its F-35 warplanes.
“Maersk continues to profit from the genocide of our people – regularly shipping F-35 components used to bomb and massacre Palestinians.”
Nizar said the campaign “will continue to build pressure and mobilize people power until Maersk cuts all ties to genocide and ends the transport of weapons and weapons components to Israel.”
In 2024, Spain banned Maersk ships transporting military goods to Israel from using its ports.
The PYM revealed earlier in June how the Danish firm was using the port of Rotterdam as an essential link in, as it said, a “supply chain of death.”
In response to those findings, Maersk has previously said it upholds a strict policy of not shipping weapons or ammunition to active conflict zones.
The PYM urged other logistics and shipping firms to follow suit and cut ties with companies complicit is Israel’s war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territories.
MEMO | June 25, 2025
A new study has found that at least 75,200 Palestinians were killed in Gaza between October 2023 and January 2025 as a direct result of Israel’s military campaign. This figure is almost 40 per cent higher than the death toll reported by the Gaza Ministry of Health (GMoH) for the same period, which stood at approximately 45,650.
The study, Violent and Nonviolent Death Tolls for the Gaza War: New Primary Evidence, present the results from a large-scale household survey the Gaza Mortality Survey (GMS). It is the most comprehensive and scientifically grounded estimate of war-related deaths in the enclave to date. It also estimates 8,540 excess nonviolent deaths, due to starvation, disease, and the collapse of healthcare systems, bringing the combined toll of the war to nearly 84,000 lives lost.
The research was conducted by an international team of scholars: Michael Spagat (Royal Holloway, University of London), Jon Pedersen (independent), Khalil Shikaki (Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research), Michael Robbins (Princeton University), Eran Bendavid (Stanford University), Håvard Hegre (Peace Research Institute Oslo), and Debarati Guha-Sapir (Université Catholique de Louvain).
Based on face-to-face interviews, the study randomly selected 2,000 households across Gaza, representing a population sample of 9,729 individuals. Data were gathered between 30 December 2024 and 5 January 2025, under conditions of extreme violence, displacement, and siege. The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research led the fieldwork.
The survey found that 56.2 per cent of violent deaths were among women, children and the elderly, figures that align closely with GMoH reports and counter claims that the ministry has inflated civilian casualties.
By contrast, the study found the GMoH likely undercounted total fatalities, with the official figure falling below even the lower bound of the study’s 95 per cent confidence interval. In absolute terms, the bottom estimate of 63,600 is still more than 17,000 above the GMoH total.
The researchers took additional steps to mitigate bias and account for the massive displacement of Gaza’s population, including statistical raking to match expected demographic distributions and using mobile tracking and live data uploads for verification. The survey also corrected for under-sampled areas like Northern Gaza and Rafah.
Nonviolent deaths, largely from disease, hunger, and denial of medical care, are often overlooked in conflict tolls, but the GMS sets a precedent by offering a grounded estimate. The study calculated that 8,540 of these were “excess” deaths—deaths that would not have occurred under peacetime conditions. Infants were particularly affected: among 357 children born after the war began, four died, indicating extreme neonatal vulnerability.
The authors say their results contradict narratives that cast doubt on Palestinian casualty reports. They found no evidence to support allegations that GMoH has exaggerated figures, and instead concluded that the ministry’s records are conservative. Furthermore, the demographic profile of the dead—mostly civilians—supports broader human rights findings that Israel’s war in Gaza has disproportionately targeted non-combatants.
This study comes as Israel faces a genocide investigation at the International Court of Justice and mounting scrutiny over its conduct in Gaza. The authors say their work lays the foundation for accurate historical reckoning and accountability.
MEMO | June 25, 2025
Advisor to the director of the Moral Guidance Department at the Yemeni Ministry of Defence, Brigadier General Abed Thawr stressed Tuesday that the maritime blockade imposed by the Houthis on Israeli and Israel-bound ships will continue, adding that the recent conflict between Iran and Israel and the subsequent ceasefire, will not affect the group’s support for the Palestinian cause.
“Gaza will remain our cause and our common destiny” he told Al-Resalah Net.
“From 7 October 2023, until now, Yemen has not stopped supporting Gaza politically, militarily, and popularly, because Palestine lives in our hearts, and the battle of Gaza is the battle of all free people,” he added. Thawr stressed that Yemen, under the leadership of its armed forces and revolutionary leadership, will continue to impose a naval and air blockade on the “Zionist entity” and will not allow any ship to pass into the occupied ports, regardless of its nationality or destination.
“The enemy has ignored humanitarian demands for the entry of food and medicine and the opening of the crossings, and therefore the Yemeni response will continue with our missiles and drones”.
Thawr explained that the weekly mass demonstrations in Yemen since the start of the aggression on Gaza in October 2023, are a clear manifestation of the depth of popular affiliation with the Palestinian cause.
“The people of Gaza are our people, their honour is our honour, and we will harness all our military and economic capabilities to support them until their suffering is alleviated and what the occupation has destroyed is rebuilt”.
He also criticised “shameful and humiliating” official Arab positions, stressing that the Yemeni people will not wait for action from subservient governments but will continue to stand with Gaza until its liberation.
“As long as Yemen exists, rest assured that Israel and America will remain besieged in the Red Sea, and that Gaza will never be left alone. Victory is near, God willing, and we will remain faithful to the covenant until the end,” he concluded.
By Tarik Cyril Amar | RT | June 24, 2025
Forget the fog of war. Even in war, and sometimes especially in war, some things are exceedingly clear. Regarding the so-called ‘Hamas-Israel War’, for instance, it is obvious that in reality it is not a war at all but a genocide, namely the Gaza Genocide, carried out by Israel against the Palestinians whose unbroken resistance will be the stuff of legends, and of history too.
Likewise, in the case of Israel’s current assault on Iran – really, of course, a combined US-Israeli attack from the get-go – there is no room for doubt that it is criminal and a “blatant act of aggression,” as multiple experts in international law agree. That’s because in essence, Israel is not acting with a UN mandate – which it would not have received – or in self-defense.
The legal basis for this compelling assessment is not complex and there is no room for good-faith debate: Israel’s attack violates Article 2 (4) of the foundational UN Charter, which is recognized universally as jus cogens, that is, a binding norm: no pick and choose.
The few generally accepted, narrowly defined potential exceptions to this article’s comprehensive prohibition on the use of force, such as an erroneous incursion, certain operations at sea, or a rescue of nationals, clearly do not apply. The Israeli onslaught also does not have the blessing of the UN Security Council, and it cannot possibly count as lawful self-defense under Article 51.
So far, so simple. If anyone tries to make this look complicated by flagrantly misapplying and abusing the notion of a ‘preemptive strike’, you are dealing with Israeli or Israel-Lobby disinformation and propaganda. That too is anything but surprising.
Yet what is more puzzling than the above is the response of the governments, and often the mainstream media of the West, to this clearly criminal Israeli attack. After years of invoking international law to go after Russia, it turns out that the same leaders and talking heads will tie themselves into 5-D pretzels to let Israel get away with whatever Israel feels like doing on any given day.
This is not really news either, of course: Western ‘elites’, with Washington always in the lead, have behaved no better when serving as accomplices in Israel’s Gaza Genocide. But there is something peculiar and noteworthy about how exactly some important Western politicians and their media and ‘think tank’ experts spin the attack on Iran.
Take, for instance, Germany. Its chancellor Friedrich Merz has gone out of his way to loudly endorse the assault on Iran. He has even exposed himself to ridicule and some – if far too little – criticism by employing revoltingly indecent language. Calling Israel’s actions “dirty work” (it sounds even worse in the original German: “Drecksarbeit”) that must be done and for which we all should be grateful, Merz has revealed his double racism: As a German and a historian, I can only say that a German leader praising Jews for doing “our” dirty work is, to put it very mildly, extremely boorish. Defining the criminal killing of Iranians as that “dirty work” adds a very nasty “colonial” flavor reminiscent of say, Kaiser Wilhelm II gloating over massacring Chinese during the so-called Boxer Rebellion.
While Merz has been clumsy enough to couch his obnoxious ideas in equally obnoxious language, he has by no means been alone. All too many prestigious German publications, such as the staid Frankfurter Zeitung or the also important Merkur newspaper, have hurried to either simply agree with Merz or at least to excuse and relativize his vile statement. In addition, rather overworked all-purpose ‘experts’, such as the reliably conformist and rarara-russophobic Christian Mölling, have used their perma-perk in Germany’s streamlined talk shows to cynically diminish international law and help dress up Israel’s newest crime as so necessary that it trumps all law anyhow.
Mölling was self-unaware enough to openly argue that some countries (read: Israel) can’t afford the “luxury” of accepting “normative limits” and that international law, anyhow, might be “protecting the wrong ones” (read: Iran). It’s breathtakingly brazen and intellectually primitive, and also historically speaking, very German in the worst sense: If we or our friends (read: Israel) feel constrained by international law, then that’s a problem not for us or our friends but for international law.
And now, let’s take a step back and think for a moment like a German who was not a conformist intellectual mediocrity: Enlightenment giant Immanuel Kant. For those with ears to hear and brains to process, Kant has taught us that reason and ethics demand that the justifications for our actions ought to be generalizable in good conscience. In short, when we act, we should be able to show that we are acting according to a fair and reasonable rule.
Let’s generalize into such a rule, then, what German leader Friedrich Merz has just said and what all too many German mainstream representatives agree with: A country (here: Israel) that feels sufficiently afraid (as judged by that country) of another country (here: Iran) has a right (that trumps international law) to attack that other country without provocation and even during ongoing negotiations.
Interesting. Consider that German elites have been fanning war hysteria relentlessly. Not a day seems to go by without some German general, spy, or politician warning their fellow Germans that Russia is at least likely, really almost certain, to attack within the next five years or so. Evidence: zero.
Indeed? So, if we are all supposed to be so afraid of Russia in Germany, does that now mean that according to Merzian logic we may as well one day launch a preemptive strike on Moscow? After all, we could then say we felt threatened and our military and the intelligence services were telling us that the Russians were coming. And moreover, we’d probably claim that we, the Germans, were proudly doing the ‘Drecksarbeit’ for all of NATO (minus, most likely, the US). And isn’t doing the ‘Drecksarbeit’ now officially a good thing in Germany, again?
Absurd, you say? Yes, absolutely. Exactly as absurd as Israel’s pretexts for attacking Iran. And yet those have been officially endorsed by a German chancellor, including self-revealing dirty language. Let’s hope that Moscow does not take seriously what Merz says. Because if Moscow did take it seriously, then by Merzian logic, it should feel very threatened indeed by Berlin – and again by Merzian logic, who knows where that might lead.
Tarik Cyril Amar is a historian from Germany working at Koç University, Istanbul, on Russia, Ukraine, and Eastern Europe, the history of World War II, the cultural Cold War, and the politics of memory.
By Sonja van den Ende | Strategic Culture Foundation | June 24, 2025
Lately, it has become increasingly evident that European citizens are growing weary of their political elites and the entrenched system of rotating figureheads who perpetuate the same policies year after year. The political establishment exhibits a rigid adherence to outdated approaches, and their arrogance – manifest in a belief that they operate above democratic accountability – is glaringly apparent in their mainstream media channels, which are themselves staffed by the same elite journalists who have dominated the airwaves for decades.
Whether it is their reckless plans to fund military escalations through EU citizens’ taxes – such as the proposed five percent increase in NATO spending, justified by the unfounded fear of a Russian invasion – or the diversion of public funds to arm Israel, a state which commits genocide against the citizens of Gaza and which has now escalated to bombing nuclear facilities in Iran alongside its perpetual war partner, the United States, the disconnect between rulers and ruled has never been clearer.
Recently, widespread outrage erupted among citizens (and even some alternative politicians) over statements by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who declared that Israel and Ukraine were performing the Drecksarbeit (“dirty work”) for Germany and Europe. The remark was so brazen that even Germany’s state broadcaster, ZDF – part of the mainstream media apparatus – reacted with shock. Beyond confirming what many already suspected, this episode laid bare Germany’s geopolitical stance 80 years after the end of World War II.
“It would be good if this mullah regime came to an end,” Chancellor Merz asserted in an ARD interview, emphatically defending Israel’s military actions while insisting Iran must never acquire nuclear weapons. “Germany is also affected by the mullah regime.”
This rhetoric is emblematic of the German elite’s worldview. Merz is no outlier; his stance reflects the consensus within his party, the CDU – a so-called Altpartei with roots stretching back to the Nazi era. Many of its former members held high-ranking positions in the Third Reich, only to seamlessly reintegrate into postwar governance as if history had never happened. Merz’s own grandfather, the mayor of Brilon, was a card-carrying member of the NSDAP.
The Netherlands fares no better, currently mired in political chaos. Governments collapse with alarming frequency, yet power merely circulates among the same old parties, all aligned on fundamental policies – particularly in foreign affairs. Take the CDA, a party that dominated Dutch politics for decades. Its most famous figure, Joseph Luns, served as Foreign Minister across multiple cabinets from 1952 to 1971. Less known is his membership in the NSB – the Dutch Nazi party – in 1934. He was, like Mark Rutte, Secretary General of NATO, and incidentally the longest-serving Secretary General of NATO! But actually he was complicit in colonial crimes, including endorsing the 300-year exploitation of Indonesia, which only gained sovereignty in 1948.
Many Dutch citizens hoped for change when Geert Wilders’ far-right PVV ascended to power in 2024. Yet they were deceived once more: the PVV has proven to be little more than an extension of the neoliberal VVD, augmented by ultra-Zionist fanaticism and overt anti-Arab, anti-Islam vitriol. Historically, such a platform would have been labeled an apartheid party – akin to South Africa’s Dutch-derived Nasionale Party. The parallels are undeniable, though the targets have shifted: where Afrikaner nationalism oppressed Black South Africans, today’s Zionists, backed by Europe and the U.S., are exterminating Palestinians.
In their hatred of Islam, the PVV and its ilk fail to grasp that they are fueling the very refugee crises they claim to oppose. War breeds displacement, as Europe witnessed in 2015. Meanwhile, ostensibly left-wing parties like the Dutch PvdA-GL rely on Muslim migrants as a voting bloc, knowing they will never support the right. Thus, the cycle perpetuates itself – a self-reinforcing loop that must be broken.
The situation is equally dire elsewhere in Europe. In France, the ruling elite has resorted to banning opposition figures, even imprisoning them. Marine Le Pen, convicted of embezzling EU funds, received a four-year sentence (two suspended) and a five-year electoral ban. Though she avoids jail via ankle monitoring, the precedent is chillingly reminiscent of NSDAP tactics – a softer fascism, but fascism nonetheless.
Belgium mirrors this decay. After two years without a government, it banned the Flemish nationalist Vlaams Blok in 2004 for racism, only for the party to rebrand as Vlaams Belang. Now, its leader, Dries Van Langenhove, faces imprisonment. Meanwhile, the Baltics embrace open fascism: demolishing Soviet monuments, persecuting Russian speakers, and hosting marches glorifying locals who joined the Wehrmacht and SS.
These snapshots – from Western Europe to the Baltics – paint a disturbing portrait. The nations that founded NATO and the EU remain fascist at their core, cloaked in modernist rhetoric. What passes for left-wing politics in Europe today is, in reality, fascist leftism: a push for a genderless, LGBTQIA+-dominated society that paradoxically depends on Muslim immigration to marginalize the right. At its heart lies a new state atheism, with traditional Christianity supplanted by woke dogma and Russia cast as the arch-enemy precisely because it upholds the values Europe has abandoned.
The so-called right-wing and centrist parties, meanwhile, champion family and Judeo-Christian identity (never Islam), though many are merely Zionist proxies serving U.S.-Israeli interests. While they oppose the Ukraine war and advocate diplomacy with Russia, they misunderstand Moscow’s pluralism – its 25-million-strong Muslim community defies their binary worldview.
This is the vicious cycle dooming Europe: both political flanks, beholden to elites who rotate between corporate boardrooms and ministerial offices, are destroying the continent. Obsessed with maintaining a unipolar colonial order, they trail behind the U.S. into endless wars, oblivious that China, India, and Russia have already eclipsed them.
Europe, still occupied by U.S. bases, risks becoming another Ukraine – a vassal state. Its leaders, like Ursula von der Leyen, conflate democracy with fascism, having never fully reckoned with their Nazi past. But dissent is growing. Citizens are awakening to the totalitarian reality of an EU where they have no voice.
The time for change is overdue. Whether through a European Spring or a new Renaissance, the process has begun. Ironically, Russia’s Special Military Operation – however unintended – has accelerated this reckoning on both sides of the Atlantic.
By Wyatt Reed | The Grayzone | June 23, 2025
On June 18, former Fox host Tucker Carlson published a video which, though marketed as an interview, was more of a snuff film. Over the course of two hours, Carlson can be seen rhetorically disemboweling his debate opponent, US Senator Ted Cruz, on the politician’s determination to see the US attack Iran on Israel’s behalf.
While Cruz presents himself as a Christian Zionist moved by his own zealotry to support Israel, the politician’s Tel Aviv-driven policy line can also be traced back to his Senior Advisor for Policy and Communications, an Israeli-born Zionist lobbyist named Omri Ceren.
Before overseeing Cruz’s public relations, Ceren managed his foreign policy docket as his national security advisor. Prior to joining the Senator’s staff, Ceren served as the press director for The Israel Project, a Zionist pressure group which was forced to close down after being exposed as a de facto Israeli government front by Al Jazeera’s groundbreaking undercover investigation, The Lobby. Before that, Ceren cut his teeth lobbying for Ivory Coast dictator Laurent Gbagbo, who relied on Ceren as a registered foreign agent lending his marketing expertise to the embattled regime.
Ceren has consistently opposed a nuclear deal with Iran since at least 2015, when he declared that any agreement would simply ensure Tehran was “able to cheat with impunity.” At a talk hosted by the neocon Hudson Institute think tank in 2018, he suggested Washington should continue preaching about “freedom” and encouraging Iranian protesters to pursue regime change while simultaneously maintaining Trump’s ban on Iranians entering the US.
Omri’s sister, Merav Ceren, previously worked under the supervision of the Israeli Defense Ministry, as well as another Israeli government cutout in Washington, the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. The pair were born in Haifa, Israel, with Merav embarking on her career of Israel lobbying as a college student.
Upon Merav Ceren’s appointment to head the Israel and Iran desks of Trump’s National Security Council in April 2025, one Israeli publication declared her “One of Our Own.” The authors went on to boast that Ceren’s “presence… in the discussion rooms gives significant space to voice Israeli interests.” Just a month later, however, she was fired as tensions between the Republican Party’s America First and Israel First wings came to a head.
While his sister looked for a new gig, Omri Ceren continued to represent his home country as the national security advisor to a senator who has pantomimed “America First” conservatism while zealously advancing Israel’s objectives. Cruz’s messaging since the US bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities on June 21 clearly bears his Israeli advisor’s imprimatur.
Since the attack, Cruz has posted 14 comments on Twitter/X. 12 of them consisted of breathless statements cheering the bombing or attacks on opponents of the war, whom he branded as “the death to America crowd.” The remaining two posts expressed affection for the senator’s hometown NBA team, the Houston Rockets.
By Douglas Macgregor | June 23, 2025
On the 21st of June, a day that will live in infamy, President Trump led the American People to War with Iran. Trump’s message to Americans? Striking Iran’s three nuclear facilities is all that U.S. Forces will do. Unless, of course, the Iranians have the temerity to strike back. In that case Trump promises to destroy Iran. Ridiculous.
Washington has launched its own Pearl Harbor operation. U.S. Air and Naval Power executed rehearsed strikes against a few “critical” Iranian targets. Then, American Forces pulled back, ostensibly waiting for Tehran to capitulate much like the Japanese in December 1941. Trump’s mindset echoes Israel’s thinking when it attacked Iran last week, but Iran did not collapse after Israel’s surprise attack.
And Tehran won’t capitulate to Washington’s opening moves. Initial assessments of the strikes’ effectiveness suggest nothing of consequence was destroyed. The facilities? Devoid of people. Empty of centrifuges and enriched uranium. But the lack of damage? That’s not yet relevant. It’s a question no one in Washington cares to answer.
The world now waits for Iran’s response. Tehran’s leaders aren’t reckless or impetuous. Their counter-strike will be deliberate and likely decisive. And make no mistake, Iran will strike back. It will do so in ways Washington doesn’t expect.
Why? Tehran controls the political and moral high ground. Israel violated international law. A program of mass murder in Gaza. Backing the murderous ISIS-led regime in Syria. Killing Christians. Killing other minorities. Israel’s unprovoked attack on Iran. These are incontrovertible facts.
Escalation is inevitable, but Iran, not Washington, will control it. Remember the Houthis from Yemen and their war with Saudi Arabia? They struck Saudi oil fields. Repeatedly. Now, Iran has far greater reach. Far more ballistic missiles. Desalination plants. Across the Arabian Gulf are within striking distance of the Houthis. They are also within striking range of Iranian missiles. Millions depend on them for water.
Iran’s parliament just voted to close the Strait of Hormuz. Markets won’t react until Monday morning. But they will panic. Inevitably, oil prices will soar. The financial consequences for Americans? Eventually, devastating. Everyday, one out of every five barrels of oil flows through the Straits of Hormuz.
Washington spent six months bombing the Houthis. Then, Washington threw in the towel. Walking away from war with Iran won’t be so easy.
Russian Prime Minister Medvedev warned that many countries are now willing to transfer nuclear technology to Iran. Simple rule. Countries with nuclear weapons don’t get bombed. Look at North Korea. Countries without them? They get bombed. Iraq. Libya and, now, Iran prove it. This is the universal lesson for the world beyond America’s borders.
Iran’s parliament voted to close the Straits of Hormuz, but Tehran doesn’t need to formally close the Strait of Hormuz. Shipping companies will do it. If the risk of losing tankers is too great, the insurance companies will insist. The world’s oil supply will slow and the impact on industries that depend on petroleum products will be disastrous.
This is the real “battle damage assessment.” The consequences will be felt for decades. Trump just invited war to America. Now, Americans must prepare for it. Tens of millions of foreigners crossed our borders illegally between 2020 and 2025. Washington is foolish to ignore the high probability that Islamist terror sleeper cells are here. No doubt, the Drug Cartels will be happy to cooperate with them against American Law Enforcement.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Pastor who resisted Hitler’s regime and was eventually executed by the Nazis, said evil carries the germ of its own subversion. But against stupidity, Bonhoeffer warned the well-intentioned are always defenseless.
Bonhoeffer explained why: “Against stupidity we are defenseless. Neither protests nor the use of force accomplishes anything here; reasons fall on deaf ears; facts that contradict one’s prejudgment simply need not be believed – in such moments the stupid person even becomes critical – and when facts are irrefutable, they are just pushed aside as inconsequential, as incidental. In all this the stupid person, in contrast to the malicious one, is utterly self-satisfied and, being easily irritated, becomes dangerous by going on the attack.”
Washington’s ruling political class, not just President Trump, decided to unconditionally support Israel in its war against Iran. Going to war when and where Israel dictates and for reasons Israel decrees is stupid. It’s worse than stupid. It’s stupidity on stilts. Israel’s war for Jewish Supremacy in the Middle East will fail and Washington will now fail with it. The war against Iran will fail because the war is unjust and the world will ensure that it fails.
Press TV – June 22, 2025
Iran announced the first-ever launch of its multi-warhead Kheibar Shekan ballistic missile during the twentieth wave of Operation True Promise III in the early hours of Sunday.
In a statement, the public relations department of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) said that this phase of the retaliatory operation marked the debut of the third-generation Kheibar Shekan ballistic missile, successfully striking its intended targets.
The twentieth wave came just hours after the United States claimed to have struck three Iranian nuclear facilities in Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan.
According to the IRGC, a total of 40 solid- and liquid-fueled missiles were launched at strategic targets across the occupied Palestinian territories on Sunday.
“In this operation, for the first time, the IRGC Aerospace Force deployed the third-generation Kheibar Shekan multi-warhead ballistic missile, employing new and surprising tactics to achieve greater precision, destructive power, and effectiveness,” the statement said.
Main targets included Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv, the regime’s biological research center, and alternative command-and-control sites.
The missiles employed maneuverable warheads capable of adjusting their trajectory during descent, maintaining guidance until impact, and delivering multiple high-explosive, highly destructive payloads.
Sirens reportedly went off only after the missiles scored direct hits, plunging the occupied territories into chaos, as witnessed in several previous waves of Operation True Promise III.
“We declare that the core capabilities of the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran have yet to be activated in this sacred defense,” the IRGC statement concluded.
Iranian armed forces have carried out 20 phases of True Promise III so far, targeting strategic and sensitive military and intelligence sites in the occupied territories.
These operations are in response to the continued Israeli aggression that has claimed the lives of more than 400 Iranians since June 13, including military commanders, scientists, university professors, athletes, school students etc.
Al Mayadeen | June 22, 2025
Following the United States’ airstrikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, senior Iranian lawmakers have raised the possibility of withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and closing the strategic Strait of Hormuz in retaliation.
The warnings come after US President Donald Trump announced, in a post in Truth Social, on Sunday at dawn, that the United States carried out what he described as a “very successful attack” on three Iranian nuclear facilities: Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan.
Esmail Kowsari, a prominent member of Iran’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee in Parliament, affirmed that the country had already implemented protective measures to safeguard its nuclear infrastructure. He dismissed allegations of severe damage to Iran’s nuclear program, calling them “baseless claims,” and insisted that “Tehran has accurate intelligence disproving such assertions.”
Kowsari revealed that authorities are actively weighing a possible exit from the NPT. “We are reviewing the option of withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty,” he said, noting that the parliamentary committee would soon hold an emergency session to assess the American attack and formulate Iran’s official response.
Reiterating Iran’s commitment to Resistance, Kowsari warned that “our armed forces will certainly continue striking the Zionist entity,” adding, “US military bases across the region will not remain secure. Hitting them will be far easier than targeting the Israeli regime.”
He further cautioned that Iran is prepared to escalate militarily if necessary, stating, “The closure of the Strait of Hormuz is on the table. We will definitely implement it if the situation requires.”
‘Iran will respond decisively’
In a related comment, Sara Fallahi, another member of the parliamentary committee, told Tasnim News that a forceful response is inevitable. “Iran will respond decisively,” she said, adding that retaliation could involve “a full withdrawal from the NPT and closure of the Strait of Hormuz.”
Parliament’s Foreign Policy Committee head, Abbas Golroo, reinforced that position in a statement posted on X, asserting that “Iran has the legal right to withdraw from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) based on its Article 10, following US strikes on three Iranian nuclear facilities.”
Article 10 of the NPT provides that any member state has “the right to withdraw from the Treaty if it decides that extraordinary events have jeopardized the supreme interests of its country.”
IAEA announces emergency meeting following US strikes
In response to the escalating crisis, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi announced an emergency session of the agency’s Board of Governors scheduled for Monday in Vienna.
“In light of the urgent situation in Iran, I am convening an emergency meeting of the @IAEAorg Board of Governors for tomorrow,” Grossi posted on X on Sunday.
Separately, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization sent a formal letter to the IAEA, demanding an independent investigation into the US aggression. Iranian officials have insisted that the targeted facilities were operating under full IAEA supervision and posed no nuclear threat.
Sputnik – 22.06.2025
MOSCOW – The Russian Foreign Ministry condemned the US bombing of Iranian nuclear sites as a reckless move that violates the Islamic Republic’s sovereignty, international law and the UN Charter.
“The reckless decision to bomb the territory of a sovereign state, whatever the arguments, runs counter to international law, the UN Charter, the UN Security Council Resolution,” the ministry said.
It is of particular concern that the attack was carried out by a permanent member of the UN Security Council, the ministry said, adding that the UN’s core body had to interfere.
“The UN Security Council should naturally take action. Confrontational behavior of the US and Israel has to be rejected collectively,” the statement read.
“We call for an end of aggression and urge efforts that will create conditions for a return to a political and diplomatic path,” the statement said.
The ministry also called on Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, to report impartially on the Iran attacks at the UN atomic agency’s board of governors’ meeting on Monday.
Myth-making as strategy
By Shivan Mahendrarajah | The Cradle | June 21, 2025
Since 13 June, “Operation Rising Lion” has dominated headlines, framed by a deluge of western media portraying Iran as days from building a nuclear bomb. In response, Israel unleashed waves of airstrikes on Iranian territory, targeting military, nuclear, and civilian infrastructure. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu likened it to the 1981 bombing of Iraq’s Osirak reactor – a strike of necessity to prevent annihilation.
But beneath the familiar tropes of “pre-emptive defense” lies an unmistakable imperial calculus. Over 200 Israeli aircraft participated in the opening barrage, with deep-penetration strikes and cyber warfare. Iranian air defense and radar installations were among the first to be hit. Mossad and allied forces used proxy agents to ignite internal sabotage, including drone and car bomb attacks in major cities.
This was not a “surgical strike” to stop a bomb. It was a declaration of war – a bid to decapitate the Islamic Republic.
Iran: Weak ‘regime’ or resilient state?
Western assessments insist Iran is tottering: its economy hollowed out by sanctions, its population seething, its leadership fractured. But these are fantasies. What has emerged since Israel’s 13 June assault is not a ‘regime’ in collapse, but a state adapting under fire – around which the majority of Iranians, irrespective of political affiliations, have united.
Contrary to the western narrative, the strikes that eliminated senior Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commanders and nuclear scientists barely dented Iran’s strategic posture. Within hours, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reaffirmed Artesh (conventional military) control over national defense, elevating new commanders and activating pre-planned strike protocols. This signaled a transfer of initiative from cautious IRGC veterans – many shaped by the traumas of the 1980–1988 war with Iraq – to a more hawkish generation, willing to directly strike Israel.
Iran’s retaliatory attacks on 13, 14, and 15 June – the third instalment of Operation True Promise – struck Tel Aviv, Haifa, and three Israeli military bases. Online observers admired how quickly the Iranian military pivoted to war footing despite the assassination of high-ranking officers. One noted:
“I don’t think the American or Israeli military could have taken the losses of so many senior commanders and still struck back.”
Did Israel achieve air superiority?
Initial reports claimed Israeli dominance of Iranian airspace, based largely on footage of Israeli jets evading response and striking decoy targets. Yet after a 12-hour “silence,” Iranian air defense (AD) systems re-engaged with full force. The delay has been interpreted as either the effect of cyber warfare or a deliberate “rope-a-dope” strategy: feign weakness, draw in the enemy, make him over-confident, counterstrike.
Iran lost facilities it expected to lose, such as the outdated IR-1 centrifuges at Natanz. Underground sites with IR-6 [SM1] centrifuges at Fordow were unaffected. Mobile and fixed AD units resumed operations by nightfall, and there are unconfirmed reports of Israeli aircraft downed in later attempts to breach Iranian skies.
Israeli media touted “air superiority,” but most confirmed strikes targeted decoys. As military analyst Mike Mihajlovic explained, “more than three-quarters of the videos circulating are actually hits on the decoys.”
The illusion of dominance, broadcast by Tel Aviv, is cracking.
War by terror
Unable to sustain large-scale aerial assaults, Israel shifted tactics. Standoff missile strikes from Iraqi airspace waned. Instead, Mossad and its internal assets launched FPV drone attacks, car bombings, and anti-tank guided missile strikes. Five car bombs exploded in Tehran on 15 June alone. Civilian sites – hospitals, dormitories, and residential buildings – were hit.
These are not military operations. They are acts of terror. Still, the west echoes Tel Aviv’s narrative. The BBC and others describe these incidents as “strikes,” implying aerial precision, rather than the car bombings they are. This deliberate linguistic obfuscation dehumanizes Iranians while sanitizing Israeli aggression. Yet, this has galvanized Iranians and united them.
National unity reforged
Much like the late Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s 1980 invasion, Tel Aviv misread Iran’s internal contradictions as signs of collapse. Yet from 13 June onward, Iranians from across the political spectrum – including long-time dissidents – have rallied behind the state.
Political analyst Sadegh Zibakalam questioned:
“Which opposition figure has spoken and written as much as I have against this regime? But how can I join the enemy in this situation? Was it right for the MEK to join Saddam?”
Former political prisoner Ali Gholizadeh added, “Despite all my criticisms of the government, I stand fully behind the commander-in-chief of the Iranian Defense Forces and [Armed] Forces in defending the homeland.”
Even reformist voices, once critical of Iran’s nuclear policy, now demand a bomb. Journalist and editor Ali Nazary says, “Iran must acquire a nuclear bomb as soon as possible. Conducting a nuclear test is the biggest deterrent.”
On Iranian social media, images of civilians killed in Israeli attacks have gone viral. As of 15 June, 224 Iranians – 90 percent civilians – were reported killed, with over 1,200 injured.
Crumbling illusions
The occupation state claims it destroyed 120 missile launchers and 200 AD units. But Iranian units continue to fire in visible clusters – indicating low attrition and high confidence. Independent analysts mock Israeli claims as propaganda. Patarames, a known military observer, posted:
“IRGC missile crews still feel so confident and safe that their launchers are firing in clusters. So much for Israeli air superiority.”
In truth, Israeli AD systems are being degraded. Iranian missiles increasingly strike with little interception. The myth of omnipotent Israeli defense is unraveling.
Meanwhile, Tehran may be preparing its exit from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) – according to a statement made by Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei – and expelling International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) monitors. Parliament is fast-tracking bills. Crowds chant for a nuclear test. The west’s double standards on Israel’s arsenal and Tehran’s right to self-defense are fueling a shift in national strategy.
Global reactions: Hypocrisy laid bare
Washington’s rhetoric mirrors past duplicity. US President Donald Trump – who unilaterally withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) during his first term – posted on X triumphantly:
“I gave Iran 60 days to make a deal. Israel attacked on day 61.”
G7 governments mumble about de-escalation, but offer no condemnation of Israeli aggression. The so-called “rules-based order” is silent as civilians die.
Iranians are not surprised. In 2001, they condemned the 11 September attacks and supported the US so-called War on Terror. Today, they watch the same west excuse terrorism against them. Trust is gone. Nationalism is surging.
Israel’s strategic gamble is backfiring. Hamas remains entrenched in Gaza and is targeting occupation soldiers in greater numbers. Hezbollah watches closely. Yemen’s Ansarallah-aligned armed forces are coordinating with Tehran. If Iraq’s resistance factions activate, US forces could be drawn in.
Meanwhile, Tel Aviv’s own population is rattled. Social media posts from Israelis hiding in bunkers – “they’re turning us into Gaza” – reflect growing fear. The psychological war, waged by Iran, is winning.
Across the Global South, sympathy lies with Tehran. As Australian journalist Caitlin Johnstone put it:
“Imagine being so evil and reviled that people love watching you get hit.”
A war of narratives and attrition
“Operation Rising Lion” was meant to decapitate Iran, destroy its nuclear program, and shatter its morale. Instead, it has united a fragmented polity, discredited western media, and exposed the hollowness of Israeli deterrence.
Iran’s leadership has hardened. Its people are defiant. Its enemies are scrambling to control the story.
This is not just a war of missiles. It is a war of narratives, sovereignty, and historical memory. The Axis of Resistance understands this. Tel Aviv, it seems, does not.
The Persian lion is not in a good mood.
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
By Lisa Pease | Consortium News | September 16, 2013
More than a half century ago, just after midnight on Sept. 18, 1961, the plane carrying UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld and 15 others went down in a plane crash over Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia). All 16 died, but the facts of the crash were provocatively mysterious. … continue
Aletho News If Americans Knew No Tricks Zone
Aletho News 