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Reports that two Iranian frigates may be steaming into the Atlantic toward Venezuela ought to concentrate minds in the Biden Administration. So much for Iranian goodwill amid President Bidens determination to rejoin the 2015 nuclear deal.

The vessels destination isnt clear, and they could still turn back. But when asked by reporters on Monday about U.S. monitoring of the frigates, an Iranian foreign ministry spokesman said Iran has constant presence in international waters, is entitled to this right on the basis of international law, and can be present in international waters. He added: I warn that nobody should make a miscalculation. Those who live in glass houses must be cautious.

Irans navy isnt the U.S. Sixth Fleet, but the entry of warships into Caribbean waters would be a notable provocation. If it sails into these waters without resistance, a precedent will be set for adversarial navies operating in the region. Dont be surprised if Russia and China decide to join the party in the future.

Iran is a long-time Cuban ally, and since Hugo Chvez turned Venezuela into a dictatorship 20 years ago, Tehran has nurtured an ever-closer relationship with Caracas. The two regimes have engaged in joint defense ventures in the Venezuelan state of Aragua, and Venezuela is known to supply fake identities to Iranian operatives to move around the region.

Venezuelas point man for Iran is Tareck El Aissami, now oil minister. Iran is an essential energy supplier for the South American basket case, where domestic gasoline production has collapsed amid a shortage of resources, maintenance failures and corruption.

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Irans Navy Heads to the Americas - The Wall Street Journal

The two countries both of them facing severe U.S. sanctions have developed closer ties over the last few years, with cooperation ranging from gasoline shipments to joint car and cement factory projects.

Senior officials in President Nicols Maduros government in Caracas have been advised that welcoming the Iranian warships would be a mistake, according to a person familiar with the discussions. But its not clear whether Maduro has heeded that warning: At one point on Thursday, U.S. military officials understood the ships had turned around, but as of Friday morning they were still steaming south, one of the people said.

Lawmakers privy to the most sensitive intelligence information were informed over the past few days that the U.S. believed the Iranian ships may be heading toward Venezuela, but cautioned that the destination could change, according to a person briefed on the matter.

The mere presence of Iranian warships in Americas backyard would represent a challenge to U.S. authority in the region and would likely inflame the debate in Washington over President Joe Bidens decision to re-open negotiations with Tehran.

Iranian media has claimed the 755-foot long Makran, which was commissioned this year, can serve as a platform for electronic warfare and special operations missions, and Iranian officials have boasted of the ships missile and weapons capabilities. It is able to carry six to seven helicopters, as well as drones, they have said.

A spokesperson for the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry declined to comment. A spokesperson at the Iranian Mission to the U.N. declined to comment. And White House and Pentagon spokespersons declined to comment.

The timing of Irans apparent westward foray is especially inopportune for those hoping for a lowering of tensions with Tehran.

Since entering office, Biden has explored rejoining the 2015 agreement to curb Irans nuclear program, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which his predecessor Donald Trump abandoned in 2018. Those talks are ongoing in Vienna. The recent fighting between Israel and the militant group Hamas, long backed by Iran, also has fueled criticism from Republican lawmakers about the wisdom of re-entering the JCPOA.

Successive governments in Tehran and Caracas have made a habit of defying the United States, with whom each country has a complex history. The Venezuelan government was one of the first to recognize the Islamic Republic after the 1979 overthrow of the shah, a U.S. ally in the Middle East.

Tehran regularly objects to the presence of U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf region, and it has previously threatened to make a similar show of force in Americas backyard but never followed through.

Maduros authoritarian regime has been shunned by many countries, including its Latin American neighbors. The United States has imposed successively harsher rounds of sanctions that have punished an economy already wracked by mismanagement, corruption and Covid. Iran is one of Venezuelas few close allies.

As Venezuelas oil refining sector has collapsed in recent years, the Islamic Republic has sent multiple fuel tankers to the country to help with crippling gas shortages. In exchange, Venezuelas government has supplied Tehran with much-needed cash and helped it build relationships in Latin America.

U.S. officials have watched those ties blossom with varying levels of concern.

In December, the top commander of U.S. troops in Central and South America described Irans growing military presence in Venezuela as alarming. In comments reported by The Wall Street Journal, Adm. Craig Faller, the commander of U.S. Southern Command, said the presence of personnel from Irans elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force is particularly concerning.

The Trump administration designated the Revolutionary Guards a terrorist organization in 2019, and killed its Quds Force commander, Gen. Qasem Soleimani, last year in an airstrike in Iraq.

Last summer, U.S. authorities seized four ships carrying cargo from Iran to Venezuela, as the Journal reported. At one point on their journey, those ships and five others were traveling with an Iranian naval intelligence ship, U.S. officials told the paper. The ships did not reach Venezuela.

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U.S. monitoring Iranian warships that may be headed to Venezuela - POLITICO

Iran will put a French citizen that it detained last year on trial on charges including espionage, his lawyer said on Sunday, a crime that can carry the death penalty.

The French citizen, Benjamin Brire, who is in his mid-30s, was arrested in Iran in May 2020 on suspicion of flying a drone and taking photographs in a prohibited area. Saeid Dehghan, a human rights lawyer who represents him, said on Twitter on Sunday that Iranian prosecutors had confirmed his client would be tried on two counts of espionage and propaganda against the system.

The prosecutor is preparing the indictment and sending it to the revolutionary court, Mr. Dehghan told the French news agency Agence France-Presse.

In the years since President Donald J. Trump withdrew the United States from a nuclear deal with the country and reimposed sanctions, Iran has detained several foreigners and dual citizens.

Iran frequently uses such cases as diplomatic bargaining chips or to press for the release of Iranian prisoners abroad. In March last year, the French government secured the release of an academic who had been held on national security charges, Roland Marchal, as part of a prisoner swap.

Mr. Brires lawyer said in March that his client was facing a propaganda charge because he asked in a social media post why head scarves were required for women in Iran but optional in some other predominantly Muslim countries.

A conviction for propaganda can carry a jail term of three months to one year. Espionage can be punishable by death in Iran; Mr. Dehghan, the lawyer, told the BBC in March that Mr. Brire was at risk of a long prison sentence if convicted.

His sister, Blandine Brire, described the charges against her brother as groundless and said he was just a French tourist in Iran.

To mark the anniversary of Mr. Brires detention on May 26, the French weekly Le Point published an open letter from Ms. Brire to President Emmanuel Macron of France, making a desperate appeal for his help.

Mr. President, its after a long year of waiting, of worrying and of incomprehension that I write to you, to call on you to help free Benjamin who is today cut off from his own life, from those who love him, and from the rest of the world, Ms. Brire wrote on Facebook, echoing the letter.

One year that Benjamin, and we, his loved ones, have gone through hell, Ms. Brire said, describing the Iranian authorities as deliberately obfuscating the case. We are powerless, facing a scenario as unreal as it is incomprehensible, she added.

The French foreign ministry said in March that Mr. Brire, who is being held in the Vakilabad prison in the city of Mashhad in northeastern Iran, was entitled to consular protection and that its embassy in Tehran was in regular contact with him.

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Iran Will Try French Citizen on Spying Charges - The New York Times

The leadership of Iran, engaged in a long shadow war with Israel on land, air and sea, did not try to conceal the pleasure it took in the most recent Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Over the 11 days of fighting this month, Tehran praised the damage being done to its enemy, and the state news media and conservative commentators highlighted Irans role in providing weaponry and military training to Palestinian militants in Gaza to hammer Israeli communities.

Iran has for decades supported Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that controls Gaza and whose own interests in battling Israel align with Irans. Experts say that over the years, Iran has provided Hamas with financial and political support, weapons and technology and training to build its own arsenal of advanced rockets that can reach deep into Israeli territory.

But in the assessment of Israeli intelligence, Hamas made its decisions independently of Iran in the latest conflict.

In the past year, Israel orchestrated a string of covert attacks on Iran, including the sabotaging of Irans nuclear facilities. While Irans leaders have made no secret of their desire to punish Israel for the wave of attacks, they have struggled to find an effective way to retaliate without risking an all-out war or derailing any chance for a revised nuclear accord with the United States and other world powers.

So the conservative factions in Iran that had been urging payback for the Israeli strikes seized on a chance to portray the thousands of rockets fired by the Gaza militants as revenge.

The Gaza war woke up Israel to the fact that war with Iran means Israel getting plowed, Gheis Ghoreishi, a political analyst who has advised Irans foreign ministry on Arab affairs, wrote on Twitter.

One analyst in Israel suggested that Irans leadership believes that the new military capabilities displayed by the militants in Gaza during the conflict, in both quantity and range of rockets, might make Israel think twice before launching its next covert strike.

Iran viewed the rocket attacks as re-establishing deterrence for further Israeli attacks on its soil, said Meir Javedanfar, a political analyst in Tel Aviv who teaches Iranian security studies at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, Israel.

But Israels foreign ministry spokesman, Lior Haiat, said this month that he had no intelligence connecting Iran to a role in the recent crisis.

Iran does not reveal the details of how it arms Palestinian militants. But Mr. Ghoreishi said Tehran had provided Hamas and another smaller Palestinian militant group in Gaza, the Islamic Jihad, with blueprint technology and training for how to domestically build an arsenal of advanced rockets with a range to target all of Israels territory.

Fabian Hinz, an independent expert on Irans military, said Iran had in the past sent to Gaza key components of the rockets that were fired at Israel and taught Palestinians to become resourceful in securing raw material locally. Militants have learned from Iranian experts how to use water pipes and how to repurpose unexploded shells to build up their artillery, he said.

But analysts said smuggling Iranian-made weapons and rockets into Gaza was extremely difficult because of a strict land and sea blockade enforced by Israel. Iran was able to transfer military hardware and components for building rockets through underground tunnels connecting Gaza to Egypt for a brief time after the Arab Spring of 2011. But analysts said that the current Egyptian government had cracked down on the route.

While Irans hard-liners may have been eager for retribution, public opinion within the country is far from monolithic when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Many do not see the Palestinian struggle as their fight and oppose the governments funneling millions of dollars to an array of proxy militant groups in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen that could be used to address urgent economic problems at home.

No to Gaza, no to Lebanon, my life for Iran has been a popular slogan chanted every time protests against the government arise.

Our own people are being crushed by inflation, sanctions and coronavirus, said Maryam, a 51-year-old who works in the hospitality business and did not want her last name published for fear of retaliation by the Iranian authorities. Why doesnt our government resolve the problems of Iranians instead of worrying about Palestinians?

The rockets that were fired into Israel killed 12 people and sowed terror across much of the country. But they also invited a devastating response from Israels vastly superior military, whose airstrikes killed scores of militants, destroyed 340 rocket launchers and caused the collapse of 60 miles of underground tunnels.

While the Israeli strikes may temporarily set back the military capability of Irans Gaza allies, Israels international standing does seem to be taking a beating with cracks in the once rock-solid support of Western allies.

Iran watched in dismay last year as four Arab countries the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco normalized ties with Israel and declared Iran the biggest threat to regional stability. In the months before the Gaza fighting, Tehran lobbied intensely to prevent other Arab countries from following suit.

Then Israels airstrikes in Gaza killed at least 230 Palestinians, including 65 children, according to Palestinian officials. The assault also displaced more than 77,000 civilians. The heavy toll, which outraged Arab public opinion, could dim the prospects of any more countries in the region normalizing relations with Israel anytime soon.

The wrecked civilian infrastructure in Gaza could also give Iran a chance to bolster its influence once again through aid for rebuilding efforts.

On Friday, Irans supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, commended Palestinians for their battle against Israel and said all Muslim nations must assist Palestinians with military development, with financial developments.

On the newly popular social-networking app Clubhouse, hundreds of Iranian conservatives and members of the hard-line Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps rejoiced when rockets from Gaza penetrated Israels Iron Dome defense system and hit civilian neighborhoods.

They celebrated the violent clashes erupting across Israeli cities between Jewish and Arab residents. And they felt that the Israeli strikes on Iran, including the assassinations of a top nuclear scientist and a leader of Al Qaeda, had been at least partly avenged.

It feels like we had rage stuck in our throats against Israel, especially after the assassinations. And with every rocket fired, we gave a collective, deep sigh of relief, said Mehdi Nejati, 43, an industrial project manager in Tehran who moderated a daily Clubhouse chat on developments in Gaza.

There was also much boasting on social media about Irans role in enabling militants to amass more advanced rockets.

While Israel will have to continue to contend with Irans influence in Gaza going forward, Tehrans support for the militants there is just one of the many factors standing in the way of a longer-term peace, said Mr. Javedanfar, the political analyst.

Confronting Iran is only going to be part of the solution for Israels challenge in Gaza, he said. A bigger part of the challenge can be solved with smarter Israeli policies in Jerusalem.

Read more:
Iran, a Longtime Backer of Hamas, Cheers Attacks on Israel ...

An Iranian-flagged tanker seized by Indonesia in January over the suspected illegal transfer of oil has been released, an Indonesian official and Iranian state media said on Saturday.

Wisnu Pramandita, a spokesman for the Indonesian coastguard, said the Iranian-flagged tanker, the MT Horse, was released on Friday after a court decision earlier in the week.

The court ruled the vessel could leave Indonesia, while the captain would be subject to a two-year probation without any fine, the spokesman said.

Irans state broadcaster said the vessel had resumed its mission before returning home.

Jakarta has said it seized the MT Horse over the suspected illegal transfer of oil in Indonesian waters, while Iran's foreign ministry said the seizure was over "a technical issue and it happens in shipping field". read more

"The MT Horse, belonging to the National Iranian Tanker Company that had been detained in Indonesian waters since January 24, was released on Friday, said state broadcaster Seda va Sima. This vessel has now resumed its mission before returning to the countrys waters."

SHANA, the Iranian oil ministry news agency, quoted the tanker company as saying, "The MT crew, with their sacrifice and firm determination to pursue their mission, safeguarded Irans national interest in maintaining the export of its oil and petroleum products.

Tehran, under harsh U.S. sanctions that mainly target its oil exports, has been accused of concealing the destination of its oil sales by disabling tracking systems on its tankers.

Last year, it used the MT Horse to deliver 2.1 million barrels of condensate to fellow U.S.-sanctioned Venezuela.

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Iranian tanker seized by Indonesia is released after 4 months - Reuters