We Will Not Let Iran and Its Proxies Win, US Vows

Iran's Defense Minister Mohammad Reza Ashtiani and Brigadier General Esmail Qaani, the Commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force are among those sanctioned.

The ministry's statement denounced the IRGC as a "malignant actor" threatening both international security and Iranian citizens.

The sanctions also target additional Iranian officials, businesspeople, and companies involved in advancing Iran’s missile and Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) programs.

According to the ministry, these technologies have long contributed to regional instability by empowering Iranian proxies.

The IRGC Navy, which seized a civilian vessel linked to Israel under a Portuguese flag in international waters on April 13, 2024, is among the targeted entities, with Australia reiterating its calls for the immediate release of the ship and its crew.

Overall, Australia says it has sanctioned 90 people and 100 entities linked to Iran, saying it is committed to "deliberately and strategically apply pressure" on Iran to halt its disruptive actions and comply with international law.

The new sanctions align with measures taken by other nations following Iran's drone and missile strikes on Israel last month.

Australia has not designated the IRGC as a terrorist organization, despite imposing wide-reaching sanctions against the IRGC and its affiliates. This stance differs from the United States' decision in 2019 to label the IRGC as a foreign terrorist group.

Other nations, including the UK, Canada, and France, have also refrained from labeling the IRGC as a terrorist organization in its entirety, though they have imposed substantial sanctions.

“[We were] sending a message, saying we can completely destroy their air defense on this site, and we can freely attack whenever we want,” said Brigadier General (ret.) Amir Avivi, the founder and chairman of the Israeli Defense and Security Forum (IDSF). His organization is a powerful political and cultural force in Israel – which is made up of more than 30,000 former IDF soldiers and officers.

Avivi, a close friend and Caesarea neighbor of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, is regularly consulted by key government ministers.

This is the first time an Israeli insider so closely connected to the government details the country's attacks on the Russian-made S-300 air defense system near Iran's Natanz nuclear enrichment facility, and explains the motivations behind the strikes.

On April 19, in the early hours of the morning, Israel’s arm reached far into Iranian territory into the province of Isfahan, just a few days after the Tehran launched more than 300 drone and missile attacks on Israel.

It seemed years of a shadow war between the two nations had ended - and what appeared to be the impossible - a direct conflict between the two nations - suddenly became a reality.

Iranian officials sought to downplay the attack - with Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir- Abdollahian claiming in an interview with NBC news in April that what happened “was not a strike.”

On May 5, weeks after the retaliation, a member of Israel’s security cabinet and Minister of Transportation, Miri Regev, officially confirmed the strike on an Iranian air base in Isfahan on Israeli TV Channel 14. That marked the first time the attack had ever been even publicly acknowledged by Israel.

Israel’s response, for many, seemed rather limited, but according to Brigadier General Avivi, it was anything but.

Avivi said in an interview with Iran International in Tel Aviv that the attack destroyed the defense system in Isfahan in a “minute” - which he argues tells the Islamic Republic of Iran “you are nothing.”

“In any moment we want to deal with you, in 10 minutes we are going to destroy all your air defense, and then we are going to attack you and that’s it,” Avivi said.

During his service, Avivi held a number of senior roles in the Israeli Defense Force (IDF). He was the deputy division commander of the Gaza Strip, Deputy Comptroller of the Security Forces, Director of the Office of the Chief of Staff, Commander of the Sagi Division, Commander of Battalion 605 and Commander of the School of Combat.

He said he realized two years ago that Iran was “on the way to war.” He wrote a 300-page Israeli national security assessment - sending it to the Israeli government, Mossad and military, claiming “there will be war in the coming years.”

What’s next for Iran and Israel?

Avivi said Israel was currently prioritizing the war against Hamas and bringing the hostages home with the nation fighting on 7 fronts. Iran, Avivi said, was an issue that he believes Israel will deal with - but later.

“We can deal with this. What can they do? Shoot another 400 missiles?”

As a General - Avivi has for years been discussing what an attack from Iran would look like. Now that it’s happened, he said Israel was more likely to go in later and attack Iranian nuclear sites.

He suggested that Netanyahu’s government would likely go to war with Iran in November if there is a change in US administration after the election.

“Our top priority is winning in Gaza. The dealing with Iran will happen in a month or two when we deal with Hezbollah. If we have to go to a full-scale war with Hezbollah, then it would be worthwhile attacking Iran. But this is a difficult decision to make when America is not on board. I think Netanyahu is thinking maybe it’s worthwhile to wait till November, maybe there will be a change in administration. Maybe with the next administration we will attack Iran together and not alone,” says Avivi.

While Iran and Israel continue to engage in proxy fighting and a potential direct war looms - Avivi said Israel has not yet shown even 1 percent of its capabilities.

He said April’s attack in Iran showed two things: “One, we can deal with your capabilities. Two, you cannot deal with ours.”

Mehrabi, arrested last year, was charged with “corruption on earth”—a vague term that Iran employs to describe various offenses, including blasphemy and actions against Islamic morals, all stemming from his online activism focused on justice and corruption.

The UN team of experts, led by Javaid Rehman, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, said that "the expression of critical views online and offline cannot meet the threshold under international law for the imposition of the death penalty.” They added that the accusations against Mehrabi do not constitute "the most serious crimes."

In September, the situation escalated as Mehrabi was slapped with additional charges including “propaganda against the state”, “inciting disobedience among police and military forces”, “inciting to war”, “crimes against national security”, and “insulting Iran's founding and current supreme leaders”. Subsequently, Iran’s Revolutionary Court sentenced him to death.

The UN’s experts said “the arrest, detention and sentencing to death of Mr. Mehrabi sends a chilling message to all those who wish to express themselves freely in Iran.”

The team urged Iranian authorities to amend the constitution and the penal code to abolish the death penalty and commute all existing death sentences.

Rights group Amnesty International reported earlier this year that 853 people were executed in Iran in 2023, a record number in the last eight years. The execution wave continues with dissidents and their families being targeted across the country.

Ali Khamenei’s selection of the book by Lebanon’s Somayah Ali Hashem comes amidst renewed military tensions between Israel and Iran which peaked with Iran’s first ever direct attack on Israel last month.

Speaking to Iran International, Masoud Mafan, manager of Baran Publishing in Sweden, described Khamenei's book selection as "beating the drum of war."

On April 13, in what was reported as a response to an Israeli strike on its consulate in Damascus, Iran carried out its first direct assault on Israel, firing over 350 cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, and drones. Most of these were intercepted by Israeli defenses and a US-led coalition. In retaliation, Israel targeted and destroyed a crucial part of the S-300 air defense system at the Isfahan base.

This year's Tehran book fair has also been marked by its inclusion of the Yemeni Houthis as special guests. The Iran-backed militia, known for its recent attacks against Israeli and commercial targets in the Red Sea, was invited following the absence of Indian publishers, who were unable to attend due to travel restrictions imposed by the government.

The Tehran International Book Fair, a cultural event since its inception in 1987 under then-minister Mohammad Khatami, initially attracted 196 foreign and 200 domestic publishers.

Notable initial participants included major international publishers like Oxford, Penguin, and UNESCO but amid Iran’s ongoing policy of hostage diplomacy, human rights abuses and visa issues of the sanctioned nation, less and less participants now attend.

“[President] Biden and [US Secretary of State Antony] Blinken will not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon,” State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel said in a press briefing.

He made the remarks in reaction to Sunday comments by Kamal Kharrazi, a senior advisor to Iran’s ruler Ali Khamenei, that the Islamic Republic would be left with no option but to alter its nuclear doctrine if Israel threatened its nuclear facilities or its existence.

“We continue to assess, though, that Iran is not taking any key activities that would be necessary to produce a testable nuclear device,” Patel told Iran International correspondent Samira Gharaei.

Kharazi said on Sunday that Iran does "not possess nuclear weapons, and there is a fatwa from the leader regarding this matter. But what should you do if the enemy threatens you? You will inevitably have to make changes to your doctrine."

Asked if these comments were a concern for the United States, Patel said, “We don't believe that the Supreme Leader has yet made a decision to resume the (nuclear) weaponization program that we judge Iran suspended or stopped at the end of 2003.”

When asked about the Biden administration's strategy toward a "nuclear threshold state" like Iran in the absence of ongoing negotiations, Patel told Iran International, "We have ways of communicating with Iran when it's in our interest, I'm not going to comment on that."

In a Monday press conference in Tehran, Iran's foreign ministry spokesman suggested that Kharrazi's remarks were not the official position of the Islamic Republic, and that Tehran's nuclear doctrine has not changed.

"Iran's official position on Weapons of Mass Destruction has been repeatedly declared by high-ranking Iranian officials, and there has been no change in Iran's nuclear doctrine," Nasser Kanaani told reporters in a briefing held on the sidelines of Tehran International Book Fair, citing a fatwa by Ali Khamenei on the prohibition of the production and use of nuclear weapons as the basis for Iran's position.

However, the fatwa Iranian officials refer to is not an irrevocable principle. Islamic fatwas can change or be reversed at a moment’s notice, experts have pointed out. Also, the alleged Khamenei fatwa is not actually a religious order, it is part of a statement he submitted to an international conference more than a decade ago.

Khamenei may invoke the principle of expediency to overrule his “anti-Nuclear” fatwa. The principle of expediency, as decreed by the founder of the Islamic Republic Ayatollah Khomeini in January 1988, stipulates that the Supreme Leader may even violate the fundamental tenets of the Islamic faith in order to preserve “the Islamic Regime” as the preservation of the Islamic Regime supersedes all else.

Kharrazi on Sunday also raised the issue of Israel’s alleged nuclear arsenal and called for the Jewish state’s nuclear disarmament. “If Israel threatens other counties, they cannot remain silent,” he retorted.

Last week, Kharrazi had stated, “If they dare to strike Iran's nuclear facilities, our level of deterrence will change. We have experienced deterrence at the conventional level so far. If they intend to strike Iran's nuclear capabilities, naturally, it could lead to a change in Iran's nuclear doctrine.”

In recent weeks, Iran has evoked the option of using the nuclear option as a deterrent against the possibility of an Israeli strike against its atomic facilities, amid a new reality in the Middle East after the October 7 Hamas attack.

On Friday, Iranian lawmaker Ahmad Bakhshayesh Ardestani claimed Iran might already possess a nuclear weapon.

He conveyed to the Rouydad 24 website his belief that Iran's decision to risk attacking Israel in April stemmed from its possession of nuclear weapons.

Ali-Akbar Salehi, who was foreign minister more than a decade ago and is still a key foreign policy voice in the Iranian government, also said last month that Iran has everything it needed to build a nuclear bomb, as tensions rose with Israel amid the Gaza war.

In a televised interview in April, Salehi, was asked if Iran has achieved the capability of developing a nuclear bomb. Avoiding a direct answer he stated, "We have [crossed] all the thresholds of nuclear science and technology.”

Salehi’s statement was preceded by a declaration from a Revolutionary Guard general. In the midst of tensions between the Islamic Republic and Israel, Ahmad Haghtalab, the IRGC commander of the Guard for the Protection and Security of Nuclear Facilities, announced on April 19 that if Israel intends to "use the threat of attacking our nuclear facilities as a tool to pressure Iran, a revision of the nuclear doctrine and policies of the Islamic Republic of Iran and a shift from previously stated considerations is conceivable and likely."

Since early 2021, when the Biden administration opted for negotiations to restore the Obama-era JCPOA agreement, Iran has vastly expanded its uranium enrichment efforts and is now believed to have amassed enough fissile material for 3-5 nuclear warheads.