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Regime supporters also point fingers at Israel, Azerbaijan, accusing the countries of conspiring against Iran. Since the official announcement of the death of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, numerous spontaneous instances of celebration and sarcasm have been expressed by Persian and Arabic-speaking users and outlets in the Middle East and abroad. However, in the meantime, outlets loyal or belonging to the Islamic Republic regime have been notedly attempting to endow Raisi's death with a mystical dimension and grant religious meaning to his passing. The death of Raisi was announced this morning at the Imam Reza Holy Shrine in Mashhad, where crowds...

I haven't cross checked this but...

BREAKING:'No sign of life' detected at crash site of helicopter carrying President Ebrahim Raisi, others, Iran state TV says

Islam Times - President Ebrahim Raisi voiced concern over the increased number of illegal abortion cases in Iran, calling for tighter control over the growing trend to boost the birth rate and larger population in accordance with Islam. President Raisi made the comments while addressing a national conference to discuss ways to increase the population in Tehran on Saturday. According to Raisi, family is a key part of any society, which needs to be empowered partly through giving birth to children, adding that families should be helped to reduce their concerns including economic-related ones, of which the most important is...

By bne Tehran bureau May 19, 2024 Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian are reportedly missing after a helicopter he was travelling in was forced to make a “hard landing” on the border of Azerbaijan, local media reported. The massive search for the Bell 412 helicopter involving Red Crescent rescue teams, military personnel, and police is ongoing but is being hampered due to heavy fog in the region. Teams of men are currently on foot looking for the helicopter at the latest reports. Iran's television networks have no changed their line from "hard landing" to "accident"...

Iranians have been asked to pray for the safety of President Ebrahim Raisi after his helicopter went missing on the way back from a meeting Sunday with President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan. The helicopter was also carrying Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian, among other officials. It went missing in heavy fog in the mountainous region of northwestern Iran.

News broke a few hours ago that the helicopter carrying Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi and his foreign minister, Hossein Amirabdollahian, has crashed in the mountainous, wooded terrain of Eastern Azerbaijan, with a search ongoing for the crash site. Sometimes bad things happen, but when the President of Iran’s helicopter crashes, and his foreign minister was on the copter, too, one wonders if its more than coincidence. People are already wondering whether this was an accident or something more. It’s no secret that Iran is a worldwide state funder of terrorism. Along with Qatar, it’s the money behind both Hezbollah and...

Senior officials from the Biden administration held indirect talks last week with the Iranian regime in the Gulf state of Oman to avoid “escalation” in the region — even as Iran’s proxies continue to attack Israel and global shipping. The effort is one of few diplomatic meetings between the U.S. and Iran, and recalls the secret meetings between President Barack Obama’s envoys and the Iranian regime in Oman in 2013 that set the stage for the Iran nuclear deal.

Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi has been involved in a helicopter crash hours after posing for pictures with Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev and rescuers are frantically trying to reach the site. The aircraft was traveling in Iran's East Azerbaijan province near Jolfa, around 375 miles northwest of Tehran, when it suffered a 'hard landing', according to Iranian state television. Rescuers were attempting to reach the site, but had been hampered by the poor weather conditions in the area. There had been heavy rain and fog reported with some wind. The helicopter was one of a convoy of three and foreign minister...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi suffered a “hard landing” on Sunday, Iranian state television reported, without immediately elaborating. Raisi was traveling in Iran’s East Azerbaijan province. State TV said the incident happened near Jolfa, a city on the border with with the nation of Azerbaijan, some 600 kilometers (375 miles) northwest of the Iranian capital, Tehran.

Iranian authorities have sentenced a Jewish man to die — and they plan to carry out the execution as soon as Monday, sources told The Post. The case has sent a shockwave through the tiny Jewish community in the Islamic Republic, and Iranian Jewish expats and others in the Jewish community in New York and Israel are sounding the alarm that it is a clear miscarriage of justice. Arvin Ghahremani, 20, was working out at the gym in the Iranian city of Kermanshah, about 500 miles outside of Tehran, in November 2022 when he was ambushed by seven men, one...

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan claimed on Wednesday that Israel would "set its sights" on Turkey if it succeeded in defeating Hamas in the Gaza Strip, AFP reported. "Do not think that Israel will stop in Gaza," Erdogan told his party lawmakers in the parliament in the capital Ankara. "Unless it's stopped... this rogue and terrorist state will set its sights on Anatolia sooner or later," he added, referring to the large Turkish peninsula also called Asia Minor that comprises more than half of Turkey's territory. "We will continue to stand by Hamas, which fights for the independence of its...

The Biden administration is urging Arab states to join a "peacekeeping" force which would control Gaza once the war ends, the Financial Times reported. The initiative aims to fill the vacuum which would be created in Gaza once Hamas is toppled and until a "credible Palestinian security apparatus" could be established. Among the countries the US has been discussing its plans with are Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, and Morocco, all of which are "considering" the initiative. The US has also spoken to Saudi Arabia about the plan, but the Saudis are unwilling to deploy their own forces to the...

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said Tuesday that it had killed 15 terrorists, at least 10 of whom were from Hamas, in a strike on a “war room” that they had set up at a United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) school. In a joint statement, the IDF and the Israel Security Agency (ISA, or “Shabak,” or “Shin Bet”) said: Based on IDF and ISA intelligence, the IAF carried out a precise strike on a central Hamas war room commanders embedded inside an UNRWA school in the area of Nuseirat. The war room was used by terrorist operatives in...

Iranian member of Parliament Ahmad Bakhshayesh Ardestani said in an interview this weekend that he believed his country had successfully developed a nuclear weapon, contrary to international law, but would not admit to it. Ardestani claimed that Iran would still claim to be abiding by the “Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action” (JCPOA), the 2015 agreement brokered by American President Barack Obama that dramatically reduced sanctions on Tehran in exchange for promises not to expand its nuclear development. Iran has consistently violated the nuclear deal for years; President Donald Trump withdrew from the deal in 2018 but the other four countries...

After the head of the United Nation’s atomic watchdog agency warned that Iran has enough uranium to produce "several" nuclear bombs, a firebrand Iranian lawmaker declared on Friday that the Islamic Republic of Iran possesses atomic weapons. "In my opinion, we have achieved nuclear weapons, but we do not announce it. It means our policy is to possess nuclear bombs, but our declared policy is currently within the framework of the JCPOA," Ahmad Bakhshayesh Ardestani told the Iran-based outlet Rouydad 24 on Friday, according to an article published by the independent news organization Iran International in London.

Biden administration officials are said to be offering Israel exact locations of Hamas leaders in a bid to stop the IDF invading the Gazan city of Rafah. The president has reportedly offered highly-classified information that also includes the locations of Hamas' secret tunnels to try and stave-off what he fears could be a humanitarian catastrophe. The detailed and sensitive talks serve to illustrate the stakes facing Israel and the U.S. Rafah is the last city in Gaza that has not been bombed by Israel. According to the Washington Post, the U.S. is also proposing to assist in the construction of...

As a consequence of October 7, Israel is a traumatized but still resilient country. Until the joint American-Israeli anti-missile response to the Iranian assault on April 14, Israel felt isolated, as its primary ally in the world appeared to be turning its back because of its actions in Gaza as it fought an existential battle against Hamas, Hezbollah, and their patron, Iran. Will the alliance remain strong after Israel responded to the Iranian attack? President Joe Biden told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to “take the win” and not counterattack the Islamic Republic of Iran. Or will the relationship return to...

Terror group said to tell mediators it doesn’t have 33 living people who meet ‘humanitarian’ criteria of initial phase — after Israel agreed to lower previous demand of 40 people Hamas has said some of the 33 hostages it would release under the first phase of a prospective hostage deal with Israel would not necessarily be alive. In an announcement detailing the clauses to which it had agreed Monday in the latest proposal for a deal, the terror group said, “During the first phase, Hamas releases 33 Israeli detainees (alive or corpses).” The New York Times reported Tuesday that the...

The president of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) of Iraq, Nechirvan Barzani, traveled to Tehran on Monday to meet with Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, who warned him to prevent “anti-revolutionary elements” from getting too friendly with the autonomous Kurdish region. The warning appeared to be a threat intended to dissuade Kurdish cooperation with the United States and any potential cordial ties with neighboring Israel. The KRG maintains friendly relations with the United States and cooperates militarily with Washington, particularly against the Islamic State (Isis) jihadist organization. The KRG’s Peshmerga forces were pivotal in the ouster of the ISIS “caliphate” from...