Hezbollah Warns Of A Response If Israel Attacks Its Tents In Disputed Area

Nearly ten drones were identified and shot down, the municipal authorities wrote on Telegram.

Explosions were heard in different parts of the city, and debris from intercepted drones fell on five districts of the Ukrainian capital.

Some buildings were damaged, and two people hospitalized with shrapnel wounds.

Volodymyr Motus, a 22-year-old resident of an east Kyiv building hit by drone debris, carefully picked his way across the floor a destroyed apartment, his footsteps accompanied by the sound of shattered glass.

The mangled furniture was coated in a thick layer of dust.

“I was in my apartment and suddenly I heard a boom, that’s all. Then the alarm went off and I went down to the shelter.”

He said that some people were injured, but they were all alive.

Russia also launched 10 Iranian-made drones at other cities in the early morning, together with two Kalibr cruise missiles and one Iskander-M ballistic missiles.

Iran has supplied hundreds of Shahed drones to Russia since mid-2022, with NATO calling on Tehran to stop its military cooperation with Moscow.

Although Ukrainian forces have developed effective methods to shoot down most of the drones, Russia still uses them in swarms to overwhelm air defenses for its missiles to get through. The drones also force Ukraine to use precious anti-air missiles supplied by the West.

As Russia joined the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) members in support of the United Arab Emirates initiatives to look for “a peaceful settlement” over the ownership of Abu Musa, and the Greater and Lesser Tunb islands Tehran feels deeply annoyed, but it is too weak to show a serious response.

Britain, which maintained control of the three islands it had occupied in the 19th century, withdrew its forces from the Persian Gulf in 1971 and the United Arab Emirates was formed. However, Iran’s Imperial government at the time decided to reclaim what it believed were historical Iranian islands.

Mohammad Reza Shah sent the Iranian navy to secure all three in November of the same year. Iranian forces remain on the islands, with only Abu Musa having much of a civilian population of several thousand.

However, the UAE has maintained over the years that the islands belonged to littoral sheikdoms that joined to form the United Arab Emirates.

A former senior diplomat in Tehran, Qasem Mohebali says countries such as Russia and China believe that no matter what they say or do Tehran will continue to support them over Ukraine, Tibet and Taiwan.

In fact, Iran’s foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian tweeted Wednesday as an apparent response to Russia, reiterating Iran’s sovereignty on the islands, but shied away from mentioning Russia by name.

Mohebali, who was once the director general of Middle East Affairs at the Iranian Foreign Ministry, also said in an interview with moderate news website Entekhab that "Iran's friends apparently pay more attention to the wishes of its rivals."

He added that the odd stance by Russia is an outcome of Tehran's imbalanced foreign policy. This was a reference to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's ‘Looking East’ foreign policy which totally ignores the West and pins all hopes on Russia and China.

Many critics however have pointed out in recent years that Russia is not a trustworthy partner for Iran, neither on the nuclear issue nor in any other foreign policy or trade issue.

Russia joined the GCC on July 11 to support the UAE's demand to refer the case of the three islands to the International Court of Justice based on international laws and the UN charter.

Mohebali also drew attention to a similar move by China in December 2022, during President XI Jinping’s visit to Saudi Arabia. He argued that unlike the United States, Russia and China are not keen to call the waterway The Persian Gulf as Iran does, and they refer to it as "The Gulf" to appease the waterway's littoral Arab countries.

The former diplomat said European states also have supported the Arab states as they pay more attention to the other side's demands rather than to Iran's.

He said because of Iran's imbalanced foreign policy, China and Russia have far more extensive trade relations with the Persian Gulf Arab states than Iran does, and it is natural for them to look after their interests.

Asked how Tehran will respond to Russia's stance on the issue, Mohebali said: "Iran should tell Russia that it might change its position on the Ukraine war and Crimea."

IRGC-linked Tasnim news agency reported quoted Foreign Ministry Spokesman Naser Kanani as rejecting the issues raised in a joint statement of the GCC and Russia about the three Iranian islands in the Persian Gulf. “These islands belong to Iran eternally and issuing such statements run counter to the friendly relations between Iran and the neighbors,” the spokesman noted.

Tasnim added, "The islands of the Greater Tunb, the Lesser Tunb, and Abu Musa have historically been part of Iran, proof of which can be found and corroborated by countless historical, legal, and geographical documents in Iran and other parts of the world."

Following weeks of bold remarks by Saudi and Kuwaiti officials insisting on their "exclusive rights" in the offshore field, Iran has shown a subdued reaction.

Oil Minister Javad Owji simply said on Wednesday that the foreign ministry will follow up on the Arash/Durra gas field.

Called Arash in Iran and Durra or Dorra by Saudi Arabia and Kuwait -- the offshore field was discovered in 1967 and is estimated to have a total proven reserves of around 310 million barrels of oil and 20 trillion cubic feet of gas.

Owji's low-key reaction followed comments from Kuwait’s Oil Minister Saad Al Barrak on Sunday who reiterated that Iran has no right over the maritime field located in a divided area, and called on the regime to validate its claim to the field by demarcating its own maritime borders first.

"Until this moment, this is an exclusive right of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia in the Durra field, and whoever has a claim must start demarcating the borders. And if it has a right, it will take it according to the rules of international law," Al Barrak said, adding that "The other side (Iran) has claims that are not based on a clear demarcation of the maritime borders.”

The Islamic Republic, which usually is extremely vocal about claims over its territory, has been mysteriously reluctant to speak out about the renewed claims, with Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani only saying on Tuesday that talks about the country’s maritime demarcation are underway with Kuwait. According to him, the most recent legal and technical talks about maritime boundaries between Iran and Kuwait took place in March.

The reluctance to rebuff the claims follow the recent détente between Tehran and Riyadh, making the regime hesitate to react strongly in fear of ruining the recently resumed ties following a China-brokered deal.

Adding insult to the injury, Iran’s close ally Russia has also sided with Arab states of the Persian Gulf in another contentious issue: the sovereignty over the three Persian Gulf islands of Abu Musa, the Greater and Lesser Tunbs, which the United Arab Emirates claims sovereignty over.

The recent developments have become a double-edged sword as the regime is isolated in the international arena and losing face within the country.

Qasem Mohebbali, a former senior diplomat and head of the Middle East division of the foreign ministry, criticized the regime’s foreign policies as the reason why Iran’s allies are teaming up with its regional rivals.

Mohebbali told Entekhab new website in Tehran last week that in keeping with historic trends, China and Russia care more about their relations with Arab countries than with Iran. “Apparently, Iran's friends do not pay much attention to Iran's demands and pay more attention to the rivals’ [Arab] demands,” he said.

The former diplomat showed how hand-tied the regime is in its current international position by his veiled threats. “It is crucial that Russia knows if it pursues such a policy, Iran can likewise adjust its policies on issues such as Crimea and Ukraine,” he said.

The regime has reacted cautiously. In his tweet about this week’s support from Moscow for the UAE’s claims over the three islands, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Abdollahian only said that Iran will not tolerate threats against its “independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity”.

On Monday, Chinese Ambassador to Kuwait Zhang Jianwei said the issue of Arash/Durra gas field should be settled through diplomatic dialogue.

Regime loyalists have criticized the government’s inaction vis-a-vis the project. Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Association of Iranian Oil and Gas Drilling Companies, Hedayatollah Khademi, told ILNA news last month: “It seems that we have surrendered the joint fields to the neighbors.” 

Highlighting the fact that Riyadh has significantly developed and extracted from joint fields such as Arash/Durra, Farzad-A, Farzad-B, and Forouzan despite the fact that Iran dug the first exploratory wells in the fields, he said, “We have not done anything," accusing the Iranian government of sitting idle in the face of the encroachment.

In a statement issued on Wednesday, the Iranian foreign ministry said Tehran protested Russia's challenging of Iran’s ownership of Greater Tunb, Lesser Tunb, and Abu Musa islands in the Persian Gulf asking Russia to correct its position on the issue.

In a joint Russia-GCC statement at the sixth joint ministerial meeting of the strategic dialogue between the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and the Russian Federation, held in Moscow on Monday, ministers affirmed their support for the United Arab Emirates which, like Iran, claims sovereignty over the islands.

The statement called for "bilateral negotiations or the International Court of Justice, in accordance with the rules of international law and the United Nations Charter, to resolve this issue in accordance with international legitimacy".

Iran's foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani, on Tuesday rejected the claims, saying the islands “eternally belong to Iran and such statements are inconsistent with Iran’s friendly relations with its neighbors,” referring to the detente between Iran and its neighbors the UAE and Saudi Arabia.

The three Persian Gulf islands have historically been part of Iran, proof of which can be corroborated by historical and geographical documents. However, the United Arab Emirates has repeatedly laid claim to the islands, describing the situation as “the continued occupation by the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

Despite Iran’s denials, numerous reports show that the Russian army has used hundreds of Iranian-made drones to bomb Ukraine's infrastructure and civilians.

However, in his meeting with seminary students and religious missionaries on Wednesday, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said: "They [the US] are ready to victimize a nation like the poor homeless nation of Ukraine, so that the pockets of the American arms companies will be filled," he said.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Khamenei said "the interests of Western arms production and sales companies lie in the continuation of the war in Ukraine."

Last week, a new report by two Russian investigative media revealed the preparations for the production of Shahed kamikaze drones in the territory of Tatarstan in western Russia.

The foreign and defense ministers of NATO members, in their numerous meetings, especially in recent months in Bucharest, Madrid and also at the Ramstein Air Base in Germany, asked Iran to refrain from delivering more weapons and drones to Russia.