DHS docs: Govt bracing for nationwide anti-AI riots, preparing to crack down on dissent
By Alan MACLEOD | MintPress News | June 11, 2026
New documents from government agencies such as the FBI and Department of Homeland Security show that Washington is preparing for widespread anti-A.I. riots, as the technology destroys communities and industries across the country. Ironically, the Trump administration is already using invasive A.I. technology to identify and suppress what it calls anti-A.I. “extremists,” in the process, sweeping the entire nation into its massive surveillance dragnet.
More than 1,000 pages of leaked documents reviewed by WIRED Magazine show that government agencies are anticipating a huge wave of domestic unrest in the coming years, as artificial intelligence upends American society. Automation-related job losses could shatter entire industries, while the building of gigantic data centers will remove water and electricity from public use, ramping up the price of what little remains.
As one report from the New York Intelligence and Counterterrorism Bureau notes:
“The chaotic atmosphere that may result from emergent A.I. technology in the next five years may fuel large-scale protests that devolve into civil unrest and anti-tech violent extremist activity, especially in large urban areas such as New York City.”
An Environmental and Health Catastrophe
Last year, the tech industry collectively spent around half a trillion dollars on the construction of new data centers. These buildings consume near insatiable amounts of energy and water. By 2030, they are expected to represent around 12% of total U.S. electricity consumption. One large data center consumes up to five million gallons of water per day – as much as a small city. It has been calculated that a single 100-word A.I. prompt to a chatbot like Claude or ChatGPT uses over half a liter of water, equivalent to one bottle.
When a data center moves into town, utility prices skyrocket. In this situation, wholesale electricity, for example, jumps by up to 267%. Ordinary Americans cannot compete with the likes of Amazon or Microsoft, and can be priced out of even the most basic necessities of life, causing widespread resentment.
Living near a data center can also be hazardous to human health. Thanks to the low-frequency noises they produce, residents often report chronic symptoms such as insomnia, vertigo, and nausea. Worse still, to meet their enormous energy demands, data centers often rely on gas or diesel generators, which emit high levels of nitrogen oxides, fine particular matter, and so-called “forever chemicals” into the air, further complicating the situation.
A.I. will also have a profound effect on employment. Goldman Sachs predicts that, over the next decade, 300 million jobs could be lost to A.I.-based automation. Sam Altman, CEO of ChatGPT’s parent company, OpenAI, has suggested that whole industries may be replaced by his product. “Entire classes of jobs will go away and not come back,” he confidently stated in 2019. Facing growing public anger, last month, he walked those statements back, assuring the public that there would be no “jobs apocalypse.”
But if these predictions are anything close to correct, it will cause massive economic disruption across America, and send towns and entire cities dependent on certain types of work into potentially permanent depressions. The latest news that Washington is preparing to treat this unrest as akin to terrorism should be of great concern to all Americans.
The Dark Side of A.I.
The public, as a whole, is highly skeptical of artificial intelligence. A recent poll found that only 5% trust A.I. a great deal, while 77% think it could pose a fundamental threat to humanity.
The U.S. national security state, however, has fully committed to A.I., and is using it to mass surveil the public and to identify those not sufficiently supportive of the new technology. In March, FBI director Kash Patel confirmed that the bureau is buying Americans’ personal online user data from brokers in order to track the public. The Department of Homeland Security has spent millions purchasing A.I. software that detects the sentiment and emotions of Americans’ online posts, and is using it to identify activists and other potential “threats.” It has also sent subpoenas to Google, Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, Discord, and other large social media apps demanding they share the personal information and identities of anonymous users who have criticized the actions of the Trump administration. Government officials confirmed to The New York Times that platforms have often complied with their requests.
A.I. giant Anthropic publicly pulled out of a deal with the U.S. Department of War to develop A.I. systems in “classified environments,” stating that they feared the technology would immediately be used to carry out mass domestic surveillance in the United States. “We cannot in good conscience accede to their request,” they said, explaining their decision. The company was immediately labeled a national security “supply chain risk” by the Trump administration, and the contract was fulfilled by OpenAI.
OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman is one of Trump’s most generous donors, having channeled $25 million to the president’s super PAC, MAGA Inc. He has also poured $50 million into Leading the Future, a bipartisan super PAC aimed at promoting pro-A.I. legislation in Washington, D.C., and defeating and silencing lawmakers who wish to curb the influence and power of the new industry.
It remains to be seen to what extent A.I. will actually become a revolutionary technology, but what is clear is that the U.S. government is preparing for major economic and social disruption in its wake. Instead of creating economic bailout plans and social welfare programs to help those negatively affected, however, it is preparing an authoritarian response, looking to crush dissent. What makes this future even more ironically dystopian is that, to do so, it is using the very A.I. that is triggering the problem in the first place.
India signals rethink over West Asia
By M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | Indian Punchline | June 13, 2026
Make no mistake, Modi Government is squarely blaming the US for the attack on ships in Strait of Hormuz killing seven Indian sailors. Protests have been lodged with the US charge d’affaires twice in 3 days, the second demarche being in notably harsher tone despite the news trickling from the Persian Gulf region, Pakistan and US that an MOU has been all but negotiated for signature lifting the American naval blockade of Iranian ports.
The salience of the Indian demarche lies in the following directions:
1. The US was provoking Delhi, which has resolutely pushed back — Washington’s silence in rebutting the Indian accusation is deafening.
2. There is no interest whatsoever in Delhi to adopt a median line apportioning blame between DC and Tehran (contrary to what some Indian newspapers have prioritised).
3. Stemming from the above, it sands to reason that Delhi has begun a comprehensive review of its tilt toward the US-Israeli axis and the earlier short-sighted delusional thinking that Abraham Accords would be the gateway to peace in West Asia.
4. Conceivably, the door opens — now that it is a matter of time before sanctions against Iran are lifted — for a full-throttle engagement of Iran which is going to be a towering presence in the geopolitics of our region, that would, hopefully, correct the distortions that crept into India’s foreign policy strategies in West Asia during the past decade.
5. No doubt, this is a major diplomatic shift on India’s part. World media has taken note. The foreign policy establishment is adjusting with alacrity in real time — an extraordinary spectacle in itself, to put it mildly, considering the manifest reluctance to indulge in public diplomacy critical of American moves — to the new imperatives of conducting a ‘transactional relationship’ with the US that take into account not only the domestic sentiments but also the global situation as well as the humiliating defeat — arguably, the most far-reaching defeat in the modern history— of the Americans in West Asia.
6. Finally, most important, Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi’s stance on West Asian developments seeking a course correction to the illogical pro-US tilt in India’s foreign policies stands vindicated, which in turn would necessitate a jettisoning of unilateralism in foreign policy moves and a return to the process of consensus-making, which had served India’s interests historically and used to be integral to the country’s political culture and civilisational traits.
The strategic arsenal US lost in war against Iran – and why replenishment will take years
By Mohammad Molaei | Press TV | June 13, 2026
The sheer scale of munitions consumed during the Third Imposed War is without modern precedent in American warfare. As reported by The New York Times, within just the first two days of the military aggression that began on February 28, an estimated $5.6 billion worth of precision-guided munitions were expended, a sum that exceeds the annual military budgets of most countries in the world.
Over the full 40-day war leading up to the fragile ceasefire in early April, US forces struck more than 13,000 targets, many of which required multiple munitions each. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the cost of the air campaign alone reached between $11.3 billion in its first six days and $16.5 billion by day twelve.
The total cost over 40 days of full-scale military aggression, followed by subsequent hostilities in the Persian Gulf region, amounts to a far greater sum. While the Pentagon has estimated the figure at around $25 billion, independent assessments place the cost closer to $100 billion.
These figures do not reflect a campaign defined by restraint or resource discipline. Rather, they reveal a military establishment that bet its most advanced precision arsenal on a war it expected to win quickly – only to find itself mired in a quagmire of its own making.
JASSM-ER: Draining the Pacific’s first line of strike
No single weapons system reveals the strategic recklessness of so-called “Operation Epic Fury” more precisely than the AGM-158B Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile Extended Range, known in Pentagon parlance as the JASSM-ER.
This is not a conventional cruise missile. It is a stealthy, air-launched precision strike weapon with a range exceeding 600 miles, purpose-built to penetrate the most sophisticated integrated air defense systems in the world.
Its operational logic is explicitly tied to high-end war scenarios – specifically, a potential confrontation with China in the Western Pacific, where the People’s Liberation Army has constructed the most elaborate anti-access/area-denial architecture in history. The JASSM-ER is the weapon Washington designed for its most serious adversary. And it is largely gone.
At the outset of the war of aggression launched on February 28, the United States held a JASSM-ER inventory of approximately 2,300 missiles. According to Bloomberg, citing a source with direct knowledge of the matter, US forces consumed more than 1,000 JASSM-ERs in the first four weeks of the campaign alone.
The New York Times, drawing on Department of War sources, placed total JASSM-ER expenditure over the full campaign at approximately 1,100 missiles. An additional 47 were fired in a separate operation to abduct Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
The order to drain Pacific stockpiles for the Iran campaign, stripping missiles from US facilities across the continental US and repositioning them to CENTCOM bases and RAF Fairford in the United Kingdom, was issued at the end of March, according to Bloomberg.
The arithmetic is unambiguous and brutal. Of a prewar JASSM-ER inventory of 2,300, approximately 425 remain available for the rest of the world, roughly 18 percent of the prewar total. In the shorter-range baseline JASSM variant, approximately two-thirds of total stocks across both versions were committed to the Iran campaign, according to Bloomberg.
CSIS calculates that around 25 percent of the total combined JASSM inventory was expended in just 40 days of combat.
The unit cost of the JASSM-ER is $1.1 million per missile. The JASSM baseline variant costs $2.6 million per unit at current procurement figures. The roughly 1,100 JASSM-ERs fired in the recent war, therefore, represent approximately $1.2 billion in precision strike munitions, consumed in a campaign that failed to destroy Iran’s ballistic missile infrastructure, did not fracture its command structure, and did not alter the strategic balance in West Asia.
Replenishment will not be swift, as per experts. The US Air Force has procured JASSM variants at an average rate of nearly 500 per year over the past decade, and existing orders in the pipeline mean that JASSM inventories will recover more quickly than other systems; CSIS estimates “several months to a year” for baseline replacement.
However, this timeline assumes no new wars, no additional campaign consumption, and full US Congressional funding of the FY 2027 military procurement request, which has not yet been appropriated.
Tomahawk: A thousand missiles in the 40-day war
The BGM-109 Tomahawk Land Attack Missile (TLAM) is the oldest and most combat-proven precision strike weapon in the US Navy’s inventory, having been used in every major American military operation since Operation Desert Storm in 1991.
Its versatility, fired from surface ships and submarines, capable of loitering and retargeting in flight, with a range of approximately 1,000 miles, makes it the Navy’s primary instrument of long-range power projection.
The war against Iran consumed it on a historically unprecedented scale.
The Washington Post reported that US naval assets fired more than 850 Tomahawks in the first month of the third imposed war. The Wall Street Journal subsequently updated that figure to more than 1,000 over the full pre-ceasefire campaign period.
CSIS’s analysis of the first six days alone identified 319 TLAMs expended, representing approximately 10 percent of the prewar inventory in less than a week.
The prewar Tomahawk inventory stood at approximately 3,200 missiles. The expenditure of over 1,000, therefore, represents roughly 31 percent of the prewar total consumed in 40 days, more than ten times the annual procurement rate.
The Pentagon ordered just 190 new Tomahawks in 2026, a figure barely more than half the number fired in the first six days of the war. The US Navy has requested 785 Tomahawks in the FY 2027 budget, a substantial increase from prior years, but CSIS projects these will not begin arriving in US inventories until March 2030, after 34 months of production lead time.
US Tomahawk inventories will not return to prewar levels until late 2030 at the earliest.
The cost consequences compound the strategic ones. Each Tomahawk Block V costs approximately $1.87 million. The 1,000-plus Tomahawks fired in the recent war, therefore, represent approximately $1.9 billion in naval strike capability, consumed against a country that, at the ceasefire, retained its ballistic missile launch capacity, its underground missile production infrastructure, and its ability to control shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
The allied dimension of the Tomahawk shortage adds a further layer of strategic damage. Japan, which recently completed modifications on a destroyer to fire TLAMs and had purchased 400 missiles as part of its historic shift toward a more robust conventional deterrent posture against Chinese pressure, has reportedly been told that its deliveries may be delayed indefinitely because the United States must prioritize refilling its own depleted stockpiles.
Australia has also purchased more than 200 Tomahawks, and the Netherlands has purchased 175. All of these allied orders now sit in a queue behind American replenishment needs, weakening the combined deterrent posture of the US alliance network in the Western Pacific at precisely the moment that network is under the greatest pressure.
The defensive arsenal: Patriot, THAAD, and interceptor crisis
While the consumption of offensive strike missiles has drawn significant analytical attention, the depletion of America’s missile defense interceptor inventory may carry even more severe long-term strategic consequences.
These systems, including the much-hyped Patriot PAC-3 MSE, the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD), and the Standard Missiles SM-3 and SM-6, are not interchangeable with cheaper alternatives. They are the irreplaceable components of layered missile defense architecture, designed to defeat the ballistic and cruise missile threats posed by peer and near-peer adversaries.
In the Pacific scenario, they are the systems that would need to protect US forward bases, carrier strike groups, and allied territory from Chinese ballistic missile salvos in the opening hours of any war. Instead, they are being consumed in the Persian Gulf.
The Patriot PAC-3 MSE interceptor, at approximately $4 million per unit, was among the most heavily used anti-missile systems in the recent war imposed on Iran.
The New York Times reported that over 1,200 Patriot interceptors were fired during the aggression. CSIS estimates that Patriot usage, combined with the ongoing supply of interceptors to Ukraine, has left prewar PAC-3 inventory at critically reduced levels.
The Army’s FY 2027 budget requests 3,203 Patriot missiles, a procurement figure that reflects the scale of the shortfall, but CSIS projects these will not begin delivery until May 2029, with full replenishment of prewar levels taking three or more years from the present.
Current Patriot production stands at approximately 650 interceptors per year, with roughly half going to allied orders. Lockheed Martin intends to surge production to 2,000 per year, but achieving this capacity requires years of facility and tooling expansion.
In the interim, the United States faces a set of allocation decisions with no good options: prioritize replenishment of its own depleted stocks, continue supplying Ukraine, or fulfill the orders of the 17 other countries that operate the Patriot system and are now watching their own deliveries pushed back indefinitely.
Swiss authorities have already threatened to cancel their Patriot purchase and seek an alternative supplier after being informed of delivery delays. The bilateral friction this production shortfall is generating with allied governments has been explicitly acknowledged by CSIS and represents a tangible erosion of alliance cohesion at a moment of acute strategic uncertainty.
The THAAD situation is, by CSIS’s assessment, the most critical of all. THAAD is the upper-tier component of the US missile defense architecture, designed to intercept ballistic missiles at higher altitudes and longer ranges than Patriot.
Its interceptors are expensive, scarce, and – as of the ongoing fragile ceasefire – severely depleted. CSIS estimates that between 52 and 81 percent of the prewar THAAD interceptor inventory was expended in the recent war and related offensives, building on roughly 150 THAAD interceptors already consumed during the 12-day war in June 2025.
There have been no new deliveries of THAAD interceptors since August 2023. Deliveries are not scheduled to resume until April 2027 at the earliest. The US Army’s FY 2027 budget requests 857 THAAD interceptors, which CSIS projects will not complete the replacement of the usage during the recent war against Iran until the end of calendar year 2029.
Compounding the interceptor shortage is the damage or possible destruction of multiple AN/TPY-2 radar systems – the targeting backbone of THAAD batteries – during Iranian retaliatory strikes on US facilities in the region.
Only 13 AN/TPY-2 radars have been delivered to the United States in total. The loss or degradation of even two or three of these systems represents a qualitative capability gap that cannot be papered over by procurement requests. The US has also maintained only eight THAAD batteries in total, a number that was considered inadequate for simultaneous deployment in multiple theaters even before the war on Iran consumed the interceptors from those batteries at a rate far exceeding production capacity to replace them.
The ship-launched Standard Missiles present a somewhat less acute but still serious picture. CSIS estimates that SM-3 expenditure in the recent war ranged from 31 to 60 percent of prewar inventory, while SM-6 consumption ran between 16 and 32 percent.
Both missiles carry production lead times of 36 to 39 months from contract award to first delivery. Inventories will not return to prewar levels until early 2029 – despite their relatively lower usage in the 40-day war of aggression – reflecting the cumulative effect of years of inadequate procurement before the war began.
The cost ledger: What was spent and what was not gained
The aggregate financial cost of the munitions consumed in the recent war against Iran, calculated from unit costs and reported expenditure figures, represents one of the most expensive failed military campaigns in the history of modern warfare.
The principal expenditures, based on CSIS data and DOD reporting, break down as follows. Over 1,100 JASSM-ER missiles at $1.1 million each account for approximately $1.21 billion. More than 1,000 Tomahawk missiles at $1.87 million each represent approximately $1.87 billion. Over 1,200 Patriot PAC-3 MSE interceptors at $4 million each amount to approximately $4.8 billion. More than 1,000 Precision Strike Missiles and ATACMS, at between $500,000 and $1.5 million each, add a further $500 million to $1.5 billion.
THAAD interceptors, along with SM-3 and SM-6 expenditures, contribute several hundred million more at their respective unit costs. The aggregate munitions cost of the war runs to well in excess of $10 billion, and that figure covers only the missiles, not the operational costs of the platforms that delivered them, the intelligence infrastructure that supported targeting, or the diplomatic capital expended in securing basing and overflight rights.
War Secretary Pete Hegseth himself, in testimony before the US Senate Armed Services Committee, acknowledged that replenishment will take “months and years, depending on the weapon system.” CSIS’s assessment supports that timeline in its conservative form and exceeds it in the more pessimistic analysis.
The combined picture across all seven critical munitions categories is that the US will not return to prewar inventory levels for any of its most critical systems before 2028 at the earliest, with Tomahawk, THAAD, and Patriot taking three or more years from the present.
Building inventories to the levels that war planners have identified as necessary for a high-intensity peer war, levels that were already considered insufficient even before the Iran war, will take additional years beyond that.
The China variable: A window of vulnerability measured in years
The strategic meaning of these numbers transcends the war against Iran in itself. The JASSM-ER was not designed to strike Iranian nuclear facilities but to defeat Chinese integrated air defense systems protecting military targets in the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea.
The Tomahawk was not stockpiled to prosecute a campaign in the Persian Gulf but maintained as the Navy’s primary instrument of long-range strike in a Western Pacific contingency. The THAAD interceptors depleted over Iranian skies were the same interceptors positioned in South Korea and Guam to defend against North Korean and Chinese ballistic missile threats. They have been moved and their replacements are years away.
Even before the war against Iran, as assessments suggest, US munitions stockpiles were deemed insufficient for a peer competitor fight in the Western Pacific, based on the classified war-gaming conclusions of the House Select Committee on China.
That shortfall is now dramatically more acute. The think tank’s characterization that depleted inventories have created a “window of vulnerability” for a potential Western Pacific war is not alarmist rhetoric but a straightforward arithmetic conclusion drawn from the procurement timelines and inventory figures its researchers have calculated from publicly available budget documents.
The implications for Chinese strategic calculations are substantial and not easily dismissed. Beijing’s military planners have observed, in real time, that the US consumed its primary long-range strike inventory – the very capabilities designed to hold Chinese assets at risk in a Taiwan contingency – in a 40-day war that did not achieve its strategic objectives.
They have observed that the combined JASSM and Tomahawk inventories available for Pacific contingencies are now a fraction of their prewar levels. They have observed that THAAD batteries have been stripped from South Korea – degrading the missile defense coverage of a key US ally on China’s periphery – and that their replacement is years away.
And they have observed that American production capacity, constrained by decades of procurement at peacetime rates and manufacturing lead times measured in years rather than months, cannot rapidly reverse any of these deficits, regardless of how much money US Congress appropriates.
This is not the profile of a deterrent in robust health, but the profile of a military establishment that has consumed its premium, China-specific capabilities in a secondary theater without achieving the decisive outcome that would have justified the expenditure, and that now faces a multi-year period of structural vulnerability during which its ability to credibly threaten the use of force in the Taiwan Strait is materially diminished.
The CSIS report notes with the cautious observation that China is deeply aware it has no recent combat experience, while the US military has been engaged in wars on multiple fronts, and that this experiential differential may preserve deterrence until inventories are restored. This is a thin reed on which to hang the credibility of American extended deterrence across Indo-Pacific.
The deterrent value of operational skill is real, but it is not a substitute for the physical missiles that a deterrent posture requires, and Beijing’s strategic calculus is driven more by inventory mathematics than by assessments of American tactical proficiency.
The production constraint: Why money cannot buy time
The Trump administration has responded to the munitions crisis with a series of framework agreements with major contractors – Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Boeing – committing to expand production capacity across the full range of critical munitions.
Lockheed Martin has agreed to quadruple THAAD interceptor production capacity from 96 to 400 per year. Raytheon has committed to increasing Tomahawk production to more than 1,000 per year and Patriot MSE output to 2,000 per year.
These are significant capacity targets that, if achieved, would substantially accelerate inventory recovery relative to current baselines.
But capacity is not production, and production agreements are not delivered missiles, according to military experts. The fundamental constraint is not financial but temporal. Manufacturing lead time for advanced missile systems – the period between contract award and first delivery – runs between 34 and 39 months for the most critical systems. Building new production facilities, qualifying new supply chains, training additional skilled labor, and resolving bottlenecks in specialized components such as guidance systems and rocket motors are processes measured in years, not quarters.
The FY 2027 defense budget, even if fully and promptly appropriated by a Congress that has not yet voted on it, will not produce a single additional THAAD interceptor or Tomahawk before 2030. The window of vulnerability is already wide open.
Hegseth’s own assessment before the Senate Armed Services Committee, that replenishment will take “months and years, depending on the weapon system,” represents, in the carefully hedged language of executive branch testimony, an acknowledgment that the US has accepted a period of strategic risk in exchange for a military campaign that did not deliver the outcome its architects promised.
The question that American strategic planners cannot answer to Beijing’s satisfaction is how long that window remains open – and what Beijing’s strategic interests, combined with this window of opportunity, might produce.
No return to pre-war status for Strait of Hormuz – Iran’s top diplomat
RT | June 13, 2026
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has said that control over the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz will not return to its pre-war status.
The minister made the remarks as the US and Iran are finalizing a deal to end the conflict, which began on February 28 with joint US-Israeli bombardments of Iranian territory and the assassination of senior officials, including the country’s longtime supreme leader, Ali Khamenei.
The waterway, which normally handles around a quarter of the world’s seaborne oil and LNG trade, has largely remained closed throughout the war, although President Donald Trump said the US military had helped guide more than 200 ships through the strait.
“The Strait of Hormuz lies under the sovereignty of Iran and Oman. The administration of the waterway will not return to its pre-war arrangement. Iran and Oman will soon issue a joint statement outlining a new framework for the administration of the Strait of Hormuz,” Araghchi said on Friday, according to Iranian media.
The diplomat said Iran would charge passing ships service fees. Tehran had previously insisted that it maintained full sovereignty over the strait and would collect tolls.
Araghchi said that, under the memorandum of understanding awaiting final approval, the US would, “for the first time in 47 years,” commit to respecting Iran’s sovereignty and non-interference in its domestic affairs. The agreement would also declare an end to the conflict on all fronts, including in Lebanon, he said.
Iran most recently declared the strait closed to all ships in response to US strikes on Tuesday and Wednesday. Trump later said he had called off the attack in an effort to advance peace talks, expressing confidence that an agreement could be signed as early as this weekend.
US publishes docs on ‘dangerous’ Ukrainian biolabs
RT | June 12, 2026
US Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard has released new evidence that US-funded biological laboratories in Ukraine were researching dangerous pathogens. Washington previously denied any role in running these labs.
Published on Friday, the declassified documents reveal that the US “built and supported” 40 biolabs in Ukraine, which worked with “especially dangerous pathogens” including anthrax, avian flu, Ebola, plague, and tuberculosis. At least 12 of these laboratories were carrying out human research.
Some of the laboratories were engaged in so-called ‘gain of function’ research, a controversial practice whereby animal viruses are modified to increase their virulence and transmissibility to study their effects on humans.
The partially-redacted documents state that the US paid for the construction and equipping of at least four laboratories, at a total cost of more than $9 million. They also reveal that these laboratories carried out research on behalf of and in collaboration with the US Department of Food and Agriculture, the US Army, the World Health Organization, the UN, and multiple US universities. Metabiota, a biotech company part-owned by Hunter Biden’s investment firm, is also listed as a partner.
What did Russia say about the biolabs?
As Russian troops entered Ukraine in February 2022, the Russian Defense Ministry claimed that Vladimir Zelensky’s government in Kiev ordered the “emergency destruction” of pathogens at multiple US-funded laboratories in Ukraine. The ministry accused Kiev of ordering the destruction in an attempt to hide its role in an American biological weapons program.
Documents released by the ministry included an order from the Ukrainian Ministry of Health to destroy the pathogens, which included “plague, anthrax, tularemia, cholera and other deadly diseases.”
After reviewing thousands of pages of documents seized from labs in Donetsk, Lugansk and Kherson, Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov of the Russian Radiological, Chemical, and Biological Defense Forces concluded in 2023 that “the US, under the guise of ensuring global biosecurity, conducted dual-use research, including the creation of biological weapons components, in close proximity to Russian borders.” Kirillov led Russia’s investigation into the labs until he was assassinated in 2024, allegedly by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).
Among the facilities mentioned by the ministry was the Institute of Veterinary Medicine in Kharkov. The Russian military accused Ukraine of researching potential biological weapons in the institute’s basement. According to Gabbard’s documents, the facility did have a basement level, where anthrax and brucella bacteria were stored. Both are considered bioweapons due to their extreme infectivity and capacity to cause debilitating illness.
Did the US deny that the biolabs existed?
Back in March 2022, then-US Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland admitted under oath that “Ukraine has biological research facilities.” However, Nuland denied that these facilities worked on biological weapons, and insisted that “the United States does not own or operate any chemical or biological laboratories in Ukraine.”
The US State Department claimed that “the Kremlin is intentionally spreading outright lies that the United States and Ukraine are conducting chemical and biological weapons activities in Ukraine,” while the then-US ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, stated that “there are no Ukrainian biological weapons laboratories supported by the United States.”
What is Tulsi Gabbard doing about the biolabs?
“Despite the obvious potential for catastrophic global impact research on dangerous pathogens in biolabs can have, politicians, so-called health professionals like Dr. Fauci, and entities within the Biden administration’s national security team lied to the American people about the existence of US-funded and supported biolabs, and threatened those who attempted to expose the truth,” Gabbard said in a statement on Friday.
Gabbard said that she has issued new guidance to US intelligence agencies on collection of data from the laboratories in Ukraine, and from the broader network of US-linked biolabs around the world. At present, her office is collecting “new details on clinical trials that are underway at these facilities, raising significant ethical, financial, and security concerns,” her statement read.
However, Gabbard will not be in a position to act on this intelligence for much longer. Following her husband’s diagnosis with a rare form of bone cancer last month, Gabbard announced that she would retire at the end of June. President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that he would nominate US attorney for the Southern District of New York, Jay Clayton, to replace Gabbard as DNI. Clayton has never commented publicly on the biolabs issue.
Trump’s ERAM cruise missiles for Ukraine blow up his peace overtures to Russia
By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | June 12, 2026
At the Anchorage summit last summer between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, there was some optimism that the conflict in Ukraine might be resolved through diplomacy.
There appeared to be an atmosphere of bonhomie between the two leaders, and in particular, an openness on the American side to listen to Russia’s historic grievances about NATO’s enlargement, presenting a national security threat.
Only days later, however, Trump’s administration quietly approved the supply of new cruise missiles to Ukraine. After months of delay, those new types of weapons are now on their way to Ukraine. This firepower will give a deeper reach into Russia, which is already being assailed by long-range NATO drones.
The summit in the Alaskan capital in August 2025 was dubbed the “spirit of Anchorage.” The meeting was supposed to signal Trump’s commitment to finding a diplomatic settlement of the conflict, taking into account Russia’s historic territorial claims. There appeared to be a recognition on the American side of addressing Moscow’s concerns about the “root causes of conflict” from decades of NATO encroachment on its borders.
But nearly a year on, the diplomatic track has failed to gain any traction, as Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov acknowledged this week.
Trump has, of course, become embroiled in a disastrous war against Iran, one that is endangering the whole Middle East and the global economy.
So much for the “peace presidency” that he had promised. Still, one might expect him to at least pay some token attention to pushing diplomacy in Ukraine. No. Like a kid bored with a new toy, Trump has backed away, which makes all his past angst to stop the slaughter in Ukraine something of a superficial theater.
What is still going ahead, though, is the supply of over 3,300 U.S.-made cruise weapons, manufactured under a program called the Extended Range Attack Missiles (ERAM). The ERAM program began production in April 2025 of two new cruise missile designs.
One weapon is called the Rapidly Adaptable Affordable Cruise Missile (RAACM), manufactured by CoAspire. It has a range of 450 kilometers.
The other design, known as Rusty Dagger, has a much longer range of over 900 km, and is produced by Zone Five Technologies. Both companies are based in the U.S.
The ERAMs are much smaller than Tomahawk cruise missiles in terms of overall size, weight, and explosive warhead. But they were engineered to give Ukraine a cheaper option for deep strikes in Russian territory. They also do not have the iconic image of the Tomahawk and, therefore, can be supplied without arousing the same provocation.
They are designed to be deployed as air-launched weapons using F-16 fighter jets or MiG-29s, both of which are flown by the Ukrainian armed forces.
European NATO states – Denmark, the Netherlands, and Norway – are picking up most of the tab for the $825 million cost of supplying the ERAMs to Ukraine, according to the Pentagon.
It is being reported, although not officially confirmed, that the Rusty Dagger ERAM, the longer-range version, has already begun operations in striking Russia. The claims are based on the alleged recovery of missile debris, showing navigation equipment belonging to Five Zone Technologies.
Since the Anchorage summit last year, President Trump has sought to cast the Kiev regime and the European NATO leaders as unhelpful to his efforts to make a peace deal with Russia. There has also been a belief on that Russian side that Trump is genuine in his expressions of wanting to find a diplomatic resolution to the more than four-year war in Ukraine – the biggest in Europe since World War II.
Moscow has tended to rebuke the Zelensky regime and its European patrons for being intransigent and acting to undermine Trump’s peace diplomacy. There is no doubt that this criticism of European Russophobia blocking diplomatic engagement has some merit.
Nevertheless, a reality check is due on what Washington’s abiding agenda is.
Washington has led the long-term strategic policy of confrontation with Russia using the NATO alliance and Ukraine as a proxy. This has been Washington’s systematic policy under successive U.S. administrations, from Clinton in the 1990s to Bush, Obama, Biden, and Trump.
It was under Trump during his first administration in 2018 that the U.S. broke the taboo of supplying lethal weapons to Ukraine. Those munitions included $47 million worth of Javelin anti-tank missiles. Russia warned at the time that such arming of Ukraine would lead to open conflict. That prediction duly culminated in February 2022 during the Biden administration when Russia invaded Ukraine to defend Russian-speaking people who were being attacked and killed by the NATO-backed NeoNazi Kiev regime.
Indeed, Trump has boasted at various times about how he was the first president to send lethal weapons to Ukraine, while at the same time trying to blame the Biden administration for starting the war.
In his second administration, from January 2025, Trump has balked at supplying Tomahawk cruise missiles to Ukraine so as not to provoke Russia after Moscow gave stern warnings against such a move. And he has talked up his supposed desire to end the slaughter, at one point claiming he could achieve that in 24 hours.
Trump has also scaled back sending U.S. tax dollars as military aid to Ukraine, which might suggest that he is serious about winding down the conflict.
A more nuanced view is that what transactional Trump seems more concerned about is not so much reducing the supply of U.S. weapons to Ukraine but rather getting the Europeans to pay for it.
This is evident from the expected supply of over 3,300 ERAM cruise missiles to Ukraine, which Europe is financing. Trump has approved that delivery.
Unmistakably, this represents a grave escalation in the war against Russia, whereby the U.S. and its European NATO partners are making a concerted effort to weaponize the Kiev regime to strike deeper. The new cruise missile arsenal dovetails with the ramping up of European-supplied and financed long-range drone capability.
Thus, the inescapable conclusion is that Washington’s agenda of hostility towards Russia has not changed fundamentally. It has merely become nuanced with duplicity about seeking diplomacy, a charade in which Washington is supposedly thwarted by a recalcitrant Kiev regime and European Russophobes.
This same duplicitous charade is played with regard to Iran. Trump makes out that he wants to find a peace deal with Tehran, but that his efforts are continually sabotaged by Israel and its “crazy” prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, whom he gets on the phone to shout at, we are told. This, from a U.S. president who started a war of aggression against Iran 100 days ago on February 28 by murdering Iran’s supreme leader while he was saying prayers in his Tehran home, and on the same day killing 168 schoolgirls in a multiple air strike on a college in Minab.
The reality is that the United States could bring the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East to a rapid end by stopping the supply of weapons.
Trump’s so-called peace diplomacy is a con to cover up for the fact that U.S. warmongering is the root cause of conflicts, and this warmongering is not going to stop until it is defeated.
French watchdog reveals Israeli propaganda firm meddled in New York, Scottish, African elections
The Cradle | June 12, 2026
On 11 June, French disinformation and digital interference watchdog Viginum linked Israeli firm BlackCore to digital influence and propaganda campaigns across Europe, Africa, and the US.
Viginum Chief Marc-Antoine Brillant and French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu identified global operations in France, Scotland, Angola, Togo, and New York City.
“Our investigations did not make it possible to identify the sponsor or sponsors, if indeed they exist, behind this foreign digital interference,” Brillant told Reuters.
The report identified BlackCore-linked accounts targeting Scottish First Minister John Swinney, who has described Gaza as a “man-made humanitarian catastrophe.”
Earlier investigations by Viginum revealed that BlackCore had targeted hard-left France Unbowed party candidates in Marseille, Toulouse, and Roubaix using automated accounts and data leaks, as well as fabricated sexual violence allegations against some candidates.
The latest investigations suggest that in the US, the firm allegedly meddled in New York City municipal elections, which were won by Zohran Mamdani, with Brillant confirming the same “modus operandi” from the French campaigns was utilized, though it remains unclear who the specific targets were or who sponsored the operation.
While Mamdani’s victory was received positively by younger progressive members of the Jewish community in New York, traditional pro-Israel backers were unsettled by his outspoken support for Palestine.
Lecornu sought a formal diplomatic explanation from Israel, stating, “I do not doubt for a single instant that if a French private group, from French soil moreover, had engaged in foreign digital interference in Israel, they would have done the same to its ambassador on site.”
Reuters reported that BlackCore removed its entire online presence following inquiries from the news agency. The Israeli firm describes itself as “an elite influence, cyber, and technology company built for the modern era of information warfare.”
In early May, Israel had authorized an unprecedented $730 million propaganda budget for 2026, marking a fourfold increase with the aim of reversing the global decline in public perception following its genocide in Gaza, and the many aggressions towards its surrounding countries that followed.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had designated this narrative offensive as the “Eighth Front” of the Israel’s various wars.
The operation functions as what analysts call a “Digital Iron Dome” designed to suppress dissenting online content through AI-driven surveillance and mass reporting while simultaneously flooding social media platforms with state-sponsored narratives.
Researchers have identified expanding state-backed efforts to shape global discourse through AI, paid influence, and covert campaigns.
In the US, millions of dollars were channeled through entities linked to US President Donald Trump to automate state-engineered narratives on social media and AI platforms like ChatGPT and Claude.
Trump State Department Moves to Deport Trita Parsi
By Kurt Nimmo | Another Day in the Empire | June 12, 2026
President Trump’s State Department has reportedly opened an investigation into Trita Parsi, an Iranian-Swedish international relations writer, political analyst, vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, and critic of the administration’s war against Iran.
A Trump official informed the Free Press that US Secretary of State Marco Rubio had been “extremely clear” about his intention to focus on individuals who “support adversaries of the United States” and whose actions allegedly compromise the country’s security. “Anyone who seeks to undermine the US, we’re taking a hard look at,” the official said, while not explaining how Parsi’s analysis of foreign policy constitutes a threat. News reports suggest that US officials are initiating deportation proceedings against several US green-card holders who they believe have expressed sympathy for Iran.
Parsi serves as the executive vice president of the Quincy Institute, a foreign-policy think tank that promotes realism and restraint in foreign policy. “As a research institution we expose the dangerous consequences of an overly militarized American foreign policy,” states an overview of the organization. Personnel include the journalist Jim Lobe, political scientist and international relations scholar John Mearsheimer, and Stephen Walt, a political scientist and professor of international relations at the Harvard Kennedy School, among others.
“The report said that Parsi and his colleagues appear to view the investigation as a ‘serious threat,’” according to the Anadolu Agency, a state-run news agency headquartered in Ankara, Turkey.
In April, Quincy Institute CEO Lora Lumpe informed staff and donors that the organization’s chairman had agreed to fund legal preparations to defend Trita Parsi in the event of a deportation effort, according to a memo. The memo also noted that the institute was in the process of hiring an immigration attorney who had “advised that we immediately prepare a writ of habeas corpus to have at the ready” if Parsi were unexpectedly taken into custody by immigration authorities.
Zionist-centric Free Press Broke Parsi Story
The Trita Parsi investigation was first reported by the Free Press, a media company founded by the iconoclastic Zionist Bari Weiss, a former book review editor at The Wall Street Journal and and an op-ed staff editor and writer on culture and politics at The New York Times. In 2025, Paramount Skydance acquired The Free Press. David Ellison, the CEO of CBS News, installed Weiss as as editor-in-chief of the broadcast news network. Weiss has never managed a television newsroom, never operated foreign bureaus, and is not known to have produced broadcast news content. Paramount has broadcast a number of documentaries and series covering the October 7, 2023 al-Aqsa Flood Gaza breakout.
Paramount Skydance was founded by David Ellison, the son of Larry Ellison, formerly the richest man in the world and a top donor to Israel’s IDF. The elder Ellison is a confidant of Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu. According to the journalist Alan Macleod, Ellison’s tech corporation, Oracle, “sees itself as an activist organization, one whose goal is the advancement of the Israeli colonization project.” Oracle began as project of the CIA, “named after Project Oracle, a 1970s CIA operation on which Ellison worked.”
Iranians Targeted for Deportation
Beginning with the illegal and unconstitutional sneak attack on Iran, the Trump administration has increasingly targeted figures of Iranian descent in the US. Hamideh Soleimani Afshar was abducted along with her daughter by masked ICE agents in April. Afshar is the niece of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Major General Qasem Soleimani, who was murdered by Trump prior to a meeting with Iraqi prime minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi in 2020. ICE abducted Afshar and her daughter in California after Secretary of State Marco Rubio revoked their lawful permanent resident status. The State Department said Afshar supported the Iranian government and what it described as its propaganda. It also said Afshar’s husband was barred from entering the United States, according to Reuters.
Rubio and the State Department also terminated the legal status of Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani, the daughter of Iranian politician Ali Larijani, and her husband Seyed Kalantar Motamedi. Ali Larijani, the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in March along with his son Morteza and the head of his office, Alireza Bayat, in Tehran. Iran retaliated by launching a missile barrage at Ramat Gan, east of Tel Aviv.
In January, the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) warned that the Trump administration planned to deport Iranians on a flight from the United States to Iran, the third of such flights. “These deportations come amid mounting evidence of systemic ICE abuses, including wrongful deaths in custody, deplorable conditions in ICE facilities, shootings and arrests of citizens, and the forcible removal of vulnerable individuals with credible fears of reprisal from Iranian authorities,” NIAC said in a press release.
Parsi was the first president and founder of NIAC. The organization has engaged in lobbying efforts in opposition to military conflicts by the United States and has advocated for the cessation of sanctions imposed on Iran. NIAC supported the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) agreement between Iran and the United States in 2015. Critics argue the organization is a front for the Iranian government.
The Hoover Institution, a neocon think tank at Stanford University, contends NIAC is a lobby “in all but name” for the Iranian government. “NIAC is alleged to have been created, directly or indirectly, by the Iranian regime’s foreign minister Javad Zarif,” argues Kaveh Shahrooz. In early 2020, Senators Tom Cotton, Ted Cruz, and Mike Braun sent a letter to the Department of Justice urging an investigation into NIAC and its sister organization, NIAC Action. The lawmakers alleged that the groups violated FARA (Foreign Agents Registration Act) by lobbying on behalf of and amplifying propaganda for the Iranian government in the US, according to Cotton’s Senate webpage. Violations of FARA may result in severe criminal penalties, including up to 5 years in prison and fines of up to $250,000, along with civil enforcement actions. Failing to register with FARA, making false statements, or omitting material facts is a felony.
FARA requirements, however, do not apply to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Prior to losing the primary in Kentucky, Rep. Thomas Massie introduced the “Americans Insist on Political Agent Clarity Act” or “AIPAC Act,” that would have significantly expanded the scope of FARA, forcing AIPAC to register as a foreign principal under federal law. The Israel lobby spent more than $15.8 million to defeat Massie.
McCarthyism and the Trump Administration
It remains to be seen if Trita Parsi will be abducted by ICE and deported. However, news of Rubio and the Trump State Department’s interest in the vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, and a related story put out by a Zionist-controlled propaganda outlet, should serve as a warning to others in opposition to Trump’s Iran quagmire.
Beginning in June of 2025, ICE arrested hundreds of Iranian nationals and has deported dozens. In addition to the Iranians previously mentioned, government data reveals that ICE “conducted a major surge of arrests of Iranians” during the June 2025 war on Iran, with 220 arrests in June, and 80 in July of 2025. 577 Iranians were imprisoned in ICE detention facilities across the United Sates as of May. The oldest of the Iranians in detention as of December was 77 years old, and the youngest was 5 years old, imprisoned in South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas.
The crackdown on opposition to Trump’s war, especially in regard to Iranians, many who are permanent residents, is reminiscent of the McCarthy Era, or the Red Scare, in the late 1940s and 1950s. Senator Joseph McCarthy, a Wisconsin Republican, destroyed many careers with blacklists and unsubstantiated investigations. Being accused of leftist sympathies or questioning the political status quo was frequently enough to result in termination. Federal employees, teachers, and university professors were subjected to interrogations, compelled to take loyalty oaths, and subsequently blacklisted. The government used the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 (McCarran-Walter Act) and previous ideological exclusion laws to target and deport left-wing individuals, labor organizers, and suspected Communists.
President Trump, due to his narcissism and desire for revenge against political adversaries, may further increase the targeting of Iranians, abducting them while violating their constitutionally guaranteed right to due process. “The administration has sidestepped the courts and the ability of people to defend their rights wherever it can,” notes the Vera Institute of Justice. “The right to due process and fair treatment under the law is guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution to all people in the United States, regardless of where they were born.”
Report: US military building new base near Gaza border to support post-war plan
MEMO | June 12, 2026
The US military has begun constructing a large base near the Gaza border that is expected to serve as a headquarters for military and civilian personnel involved in implementing President Donald Trump’s Gaza plan, according to a report by the Israeli newspaper Israel Hayom.
The newspaper reported on Wednesday that construction is underway near the Israeli community of Re’im, close to the Gaza Strip.
According to the report, the facility is intended to function as a central command and coordination hub for international organizations, civilian personnel and military forces expected to participate in the implementation of the next phases of Trump’s plan for Gaza.
“We have learned that the US Army has begun constructing a massive base on the Gaza border, not far from Re’im,” the newspaper reported.
Israel Hayom said the new installation is expected to replace the multinational headquarters currently operating from Kiryat Gat in southern Israel.
According to the report, the Kiryat Gat facility previously hosted representatives from more than 24 countries, including several Arab states, who participated in international coordination efforts related to Gaza.
The newspaper said many of those representatives left following the outbreak of the conflict involving Iran earlier this year.
Iran is not the one using Lebanon as its bargaining chip
By Robert Inlakesh | Al Mayadeen | June 12, 2026
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun has claimed that Iran is “using Lebanon as its bargaining chip.” Not only is this blatantly false, but it also implies that Tehran has something material to gain from including Lebanon in its ceasefire agreement.
Several inflammatory statements have recently been issued by the Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, blaming Iran for “Israel’s” mass murder of Lebanese civilians and its illegal invasion of southern Lebanese lands.
These allegations against Iran are not new. For decades, they have been fabricated by Israeli politicians and Zionist think-tanks such as the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP). There is, however, a significant difference when such claims are echoed by a Lebanese president and whose government has been instructed to engage in direct talks with an enemy that, within a matter of months, has killed around 3,600 of his country’s citizens and continues to occupy Lebanese territory.
The mere concept of Lebanon’s “bargaining chip” is factually incorrect in Iran’s case. A “bargaining chip” means that Tehran would use Lebanon to its own benefit, which is patently false. If anything, Iran’s demands that “Israel” withdraw from Lebanese territory and cease its bombing campaign are making the prospect of reaching any deal more difficult.
If we focus solely on what would materially benefit Iran, the other demands it has listed – namely guarantees against future aggression, the withdrawal of US forces from the region, the lifting of sanctions, recognition of its control over the Strait of Hormuz, the unfreezing of assets, and compensation – are tangible gains. By contrast, the demand that any ceasefire apply across all fronts, especially the stipulation of a complete Israeli withdrawal from Lebanese territory, offers Iran no direct material benefit. This is a matter of principle rather than self-interest.
One could argue that by insisting on Lebanon’s inclusion in the ceasefire agreement, Iran was seeking to strengthen its standing while demonstrating loyalty to its allies. Yet if this were primarily a strategic or symbolic demand, Tehran could simply have accepted a return to the status quo that “Israel” had imposed on southern Lebanon prior to March 2.
Instead, the demand is that “Israel” no longer be permitted to do what it did following the announcement of the November 27, 2024 ceasefire agreement, which, according to UNIFIL, it violated at least 15,400 times. Iran has been clear that it is not interested in a merely symbolic agreement; it wants credible assurances that “Israel” will cease its bombing and retreat from Lebanese territory.
In reality, there are two reasons these kinds of statements are made – The first being that in the event of an Iranian comprehensive deal that forces the Zionist regime to retreat fully, the Lebanese leadership will lose all its remaining legitimacy. The second reason is that this argument closely mirrors a talking point promoted by US officials.
In 2021, Hezbollah facilitated the transfer of Iranian fuel shipments to Lebanon at a time when the country was experiencing a severe energy crisis. The following year, Tehran also offered additional fuel supplies to Lebanon on a free-of-charge basis. More broadly, Iran has historically provided financial support for a range of Lebanese social initiatives, including welfare programs, assistance to low-income communities, and reconstruction efforts.
Despite the Lebanese leadership that took power in February 2025 adopting a generally adversarial stance toward Hezbollah and Iran, Tehran did not seek to obstruct the formation of the government. In fact, Nawaf Salam and Joseph Aoun came to power in a political context in which Hezbollah and the Amal Movement ultimately chose not to block the process, reportedly in the interest of preserving domestic stability.
Allegations that Iran is responsible for the war are simply outlandish. Iran’s ambassador was declared “persona non-grata”, yet the Lebanese government is now sitting down for direct negotiations with the Israelis. All of the accusations made against Iran are simply nonsensical.
If Joseph Aoun and Nawaf Salam truly believed in Lebanese sovereignty, then they would also expel the US ambassador who represents a government that quite literally greenlights Israeli airstrikes against Lebanon. In this sense, the argument against Iran is not new; it draws on longstanding narratives that have circulated for decades and often lack substantive grounding.
It is often argued that a basic requirement of any ceasefire should be the cessation of hostilities and the withdrawal of forces from occupied territory. In this context, Iranian warnings that further Israeli strikes on Beirut would trigger retaliation came amid heightened tensions ahead of the third round of direct Lebanon–”Israel” negotiations, during which a planned Israeli escalation did not proceed.
For 15 months, diplomacy was given a chance. The result: Israelis are still occupying southern Lebanon, and they continue bombing Lebanese territory, while the US has developed a plan for disarming the Resistance instead.
Iranian media reveal details of potential Iran-US draft MoU
Al Mayadeen | June 12, 2026
Iran has firmly refused to capitulate to recent American military and diplomatic pressure aimed at forcing changes to its 14-article proposal, Tasnim News Agency reported, citing informed sources.
Despite direct US military actions and leverage applied through Qatari mediation by President Donald Trump, Tehran rejected newly proposed amendments from Washington, according to Tasnim’s sources.
The United States has, in fact, communicated through the Qatari mediator that it is withdrawing its latest amendments as they were no longer necessary.
However, the sources emphasized that the draft text must still undergo formal review and receive final approval from Iran’s relevant governing institutions. Until that process is complete, the sources added, all media speculations regarding a finalized deal remain entirely inaccurate.
Talks to exclude Iranian missile program: Mehr
According to a separate report from Iran’s Mehr News Agency, the proposed memorandum of understanding with Washington outlines a comprehensive framework in which final-stage negotiations will focus strictly on nuclear and economic issues. Notably, the draft explicitly excludes any discussions regarding Iran’s ballistic missile program.
The draft details a series of mutual commitments. Under the terms, the United States would be required to lift secondary sanctions, withdraw its military forces from areas surrounding Iran, end the naval blockade on Iranian ports, and facilitate the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz to restore global trade.
Furthermore, the memorandum includes provisions for the total abolition of oil sanctions and the release of $24 billion in frozen Iranian assets held abroad during the negotiation period, provided that half of this amount, i.e., $12 billion, is made available to Iran before the start of negotiations.
These developments come amid emerging Western media reports of a potential US-Iran deal, with some outlets suggesting the agreement might be signed in Geneva. Iranian sources, however, continue to caution that no final deal has been reached until formal approval is granted.
IRNA delves into potential agreement
Meanwhile, IRNA has published a detailed account of the potential agreement between Iran and the United States, emphasizing that the text has been drafted with extreme precision to prevent arbitrary interpretation or evasion of obligations by either side.
According to IRNA, no agreement will be reached on the nuclear file under the current memorandum of understanding. Iran will not offer any new commitments, and nuclear talks will be held within 60 days of signing.
According to IRNA, Iran is making no commitments regarding the administration of the Strait of Hormuz; it will instead be resolved within a regional framework through joint dialogue and decision-making between Tehran and Oman.
The primary objective of the memorandum, the agency said, is to end the war on all fronts in the region. According to IRNA, the United States is obligated to compel “Israel” to end the war on Lebanon, emphasizing that the phrase “extension of the ceasefire” has no place in the text.
Regarding frozen assets, some will be released immediately upon signing, with the remainder released gradually during negotiations. Tehran has obtained clear guarantees based on the mechanisms it requires, according to the report.
The implementation mechanism for receiving compensation will be agreed upon during the 60-day negotiations following the signing. The lifting of all US sanctions and international resolutions will also be reviewed during that same 60-day period of nuclear negotiations.
IRNA confirmed that the 60-day negotiations will address only three issues: the continuation of Iran’s peaceful nuclear program, the lifting of unilateral US sanctions, and the compensation mechanism. The agency explicitly stated that no other issue, including Iran’s missile capabilities, will be on the table.
Featured Video
Macgregor: We Haven’t Seen the Worst of the Iran War Yet
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
From the Archives
15 Saudi ‘hijackers’ were CIA agents working for US: Scholar
Press TV – April 13, 2016
Fifteen of the 9/11 “hijackers” from Saudi Arabia were CIA agents working for the United States government, which was seeking to destroy the Middle East for Israel and to double the American military budget, says Dr. Kevin Barrett, an American academic who has been studying the events of 9/11 since late 2003…. continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Iran’s Plan to Shut Down AI in the Persian Gulf
- Israel seeks ‘compensation’ from Washington over Saudi F-35 sale
- Saudi crown prince seeks dialogue with Ansarullah after Yemeni blows: Report
- Damascus rejects Saudi request for Syrian fighters to counter Yemen: Report
- South Korea says will not send troops to join terrorist US war on Iran
- Russia Just Struck the Eyes of NATO’s War Machine in Ukraine
- Russia summons UK charge d’affaires over Kiev drone support
- NATO member warns bloc seeking pretext for war with Russia
- Macgregor: We Haven’t Seen the Worst of the Iran War Yet
- ‘We are not like everyone else’ laws that bind other nations do not apply to Israel, says Likud lawmaker
- If Americans Knew
- Debunking The Claim That Macklemore Has A “History Of Antisemitism”
- CPJ demands release of arrested Palestinian-US journalist near Bethlehem
- Robert Kraft: The Billionaire Friend of Netanyahu Pulling The Strings Behind the Macklemore/Ed Sheeran Blow Up
- Columbia Administered Fund Gives Big Money to Pro-Israel Groups
- Deportation Case of Palestinian Activist Salah Sarsour Tests First Amendment
- ‘We Will Not Forget’: Palestinians Mark 44 Years since Sabra and Shatila
- Why do we let Zionists decide what we can and can’t say?
- US welcomes Israeli, Iranian delegations to UN, but not Palestinians – Daily Update
- Biden’s Genocide Accomplices Targeted by New Accountability Campaign
- AIPAC’s Network Has Already Spent $67.2 Million to Shape the Midterm Elections
- No Tricks Zone
- New Study: ‘Global Drought Shows No Detectable Recent Acceleration Under Climate Warming’
- Economic Masterminds: German Socialists Suggest Taxing Productivity Gains Stemming From Using AI
- The South China Sea Has Not Been Cooperating With The Climate Change Narrative
- Energy Crisis: Germany Enters Heating Season With Historically Low Gas Reserve Fill Levels
- New Study: The Antarctic Ice Sheet Gained Mass From 2020-2024 Due To Staggering Snow And Ice Accumulation
- Study: Ocean Heating Rates From Thousands Of Years Ago ‘Dwarf’ Modern Ocean Heating Rates
- Climate Extremists Target, Attack Large-Scale Power Grid Infrastructure In Germany!
- New Study: Antarctic Ice Melt Has Contributed Less Than 1 Centimeter To Sea Level Rise In The Last 30 Years
- Fear Of Debate: Alarmist German Climate Scientist Calls On Mainstream Media To Discredit Skeptic Voices
- End-Of-August Arctic Sea Ice Extent Hasn’t Fallen In 20 Years, Official Data Show!
Aletho News 