Iran Says Its Naval Forces Foil Pirate Attack On Merchant Vessel In Red Sea

“We have told all those who are working inside Iran that film screening in Israel is a redline for the Islamic Republic and we will certainly punish those who screen their films there,” Mohammad-Mehdi Esmaili said. 

“We have no tolerance” regarding this issue, he said, warning all producers and filmmakers to be careful that such screenings do not happen.

He also thanked producers and filmmakers who stopped the screening of their films “in the occupied territories” as soon as they found out that their sponsors plan to release their movies there. 

Esmaili did not elaborate on how the filmmakers are going to stop international distribution companies – who are actually responsible for marketing a film – from screening the movies in Israel. 

In the latest case -- at the Jerusalem Film Festival that was held in July -- several films by Iranian directors such as Asghar Farhadi, Paris-based Mitra Farahani and Ali Abbasi, whose movie Holy Spider won the best actress award at 2022 Cannes Film Festival -- were screened, but the film "Tomorrow" by Ali Asgari was withdrawn from the festival after pressure from the Islamic Republic’s authorities.

The Islamic Republic does not recognize Israel and even forbids its athletes from facing Israeli competitors in international sports, making numerous Iranian champions leave the country or defect to other national teams.

Mehrzad Zarei, the father of Arad Zarei, will embark on his symbolic 400-kilometer march on Wednesday noon local time after a press conference at his son's grave in Richmond Hill, Ontario, and will go to Ottawa to personally deliver his protest letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Criticizing a lack of justice for the victims of the incident, he intends to ask Trudeau why the government does not blacklist Iran’s Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization, as was stipulated by a Canadian parliament's resolution in 2018.

In May 2021, in a case -- titled Zarei et al vs Islamic Republic of Iran et al – some family members filed a civil lawsuit against Iran and senior officials they believe were to blame for the incident. The Ontario Court ruled that the downing of the plane was an intentional act of terrorism and on December 31, 2021, awarded compensation to be shared by the estates of the six victims.

Earlier this year in June, Canada's international human rights parliamentary subcommittee criticized the government's “passive” approach toward Iran’s widespread human rights abuses in a House of Commons subcommittee meeting attended by several political and human rights activists – including the spokesman of the Association of Victims' Families, Hamed Esmaeilion.

The airliner was shot down by two air-defense missiles fired by the IRGC on January 8, 2020, as it took off from Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport. Only hours earlier, the IRGC had fired more than a dozen missiles at Iraqi bases hosting US and coalition troops in retaliation for the killing of the IRGC Qods Force Commander Ghasem Soleimani who was killed in Baghdad by a US drone strike just five days earlier.

Anonymous sources told Hebrew media on Tuesday that Israel is convinced Tehran will not accept the latest text Western negotiators have agreed upon as diplomats returned home from Vienna following the most recent round of talks. 

According to Haaretz, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei will block the move as Europe’s recent confidence in renewed confidence in the talks is just ‘manufactured optimism’ designed to pressure Tehran. 

“There was momentary optimism, but very quickly it turned out to be contrived optimism meant to pressure the Iranians into making a decision, hopefully accepting the text as it was presented,” the officials said.

“There wasn’t any strategic shift in terms of the Iranians. They don’t want to accept this agreement, and they will struggle to accept anything that isn’t a significant improvement of the original nuclear deal,” one Israeli official argued. 

The new text includes guarantees that foreign companies will be able to invest in Iran or operate there once sanctions are lifted, without fearing the repercussions of any party withdrawing from the deal, as the United States did in 2018 under President Donald Trump, but Tehran demanded more drastic concessions outside the scope of the original agreement, including over an International Atomic Energy Agency probe into undeclared nuclear material found in the country.

Since the announcement of the impending satellite launch, Iranian officials were trumpeting it as their satellite, symbolizing their scientific achievement, but after it was sent into orbit the Russian embassy put out a statement on Instagram saying its companies had built and launched it.

The Islamic Republic, which has openly supported Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, has also been trumpeting the importance of strategic and military ties with Moscow. US officials have been warning since mid-July that Russia is preparing to buy military drones from Iran to use in the war. Iranian officials never clearly denied the accusation.

CNN reported on Wednesday that US officials believe Russians are training in Iran to familiarize themselves with the Iranian drones. This is the second time US officials speak to the media about Russian personnel being in Iran either to review or train on the drones. US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said in mid-July that Russian officers visited a drone base in Iran’s Kashan, hinting at possible training for operating the drones.

The director of US Central Intelligence Agency, William Burns also said in July, “It’s true that the Russians are reaching out to the Iranians to try to acquire armed drones,” Bloomberg reported.

An adviser to the Ukrainian president told Iran International on July 25 that it won’t be a surprise is Tehran provides military drones to Moscow.

“We have to view it in that perspective that Iran and Russia are allies in this conflict. In Ukraine, we obviously have no illusions about this. So, we are obviously very aware of what's going on, and we're going to be very careful about our relationship with Iran and what we hear from Iranian authorities when it comes to Ukraine,” Alexander Rodnyansky told Iran International.

An unconfirmed report quoting a Kyiv official last week said that Russia was already using Iranian drones in Ukraine.

US–based think tank Institute for the Study of War quoted an advisor to the Ukrainian President’s Office, Oleksiy Arestovych, as saying on Friday that Iran handed 46 drones over to Russia and that the Ukrainian government has already noted the use of these drones in combat in Ukraine.

Another embarrassing aspect of the satellite deal were media reports last week that Russia will control the Iranian satellite for a while and possibly use it for the war in Ukraine. Iranian officials responded to this on August 7, categorically stating that they will be in full control from Iran.

Many politicians and former officials who are loyal to the Islamic Republic have repeatedly warned in recent months not to tilt the country’s foreign policy toward Russia and China and try to resolve Iran’s nuclear dispute with the West. But the hardliners in Tehran have so far rejected this advice, refusing to accept a compromise deal worked out with European Union mediation in Vienna after 16 months of negotiations.

In a number of tweets on Monday, the FBI said Iran and its proxy groups “don't just endanger the Middle East -- they also put Americans, US national security, and our country's critical infrastructure at risk.”

Sharing a link to a page on its website about how it is fighting back against the Iranian threat, the bureau added that the risk by the Islamic Republic is not theoretical. “Through intel and law enforcement partnerships, the FBI has countered an array of threats from Iran's government -- such as attempted terrorist attacks and kidnappings, espionage and foreign influence ops, and cyberattacks.”

Reiterating its commitment to identifying and disrupting all Iranian intelligence and military operations that threaten the Americans, the FBI said, “We'll use every tool and authority at our disposal to investigate crimes that Iran’s government and terrorist partners direct.”

“The Iranian regime has used repressive tactics in its wrongful detention of Americans in Iran on unsubstantiated criminal charges. The Iranian regime has also exported its repression through its harassment and lethal targeting of Iranian dissidents worldwide, including Americans living in the United States.”

Earlier in August, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan expressed concerns over the safety of Iranian women’s rights activist Masih Alinejad following the arrest of a man with an assault rifle outside her New York home.

Alinejad, who was also the target of an international kidnapping plot orchestrated by Iran’s intelligence network last year, has promoted videos of women protesting Iran's compulsory Islamic dress code to her millions of social media followers.