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Co-written with Daniel Wagner (@CountryRiskMgmt) of Risk Cooperative (@RiskCoop).

An official response to ISIS deadly twin attacks in Tehran on June 7, Irans medium-range missile strikes were a clear message not only to many in the region, but to Washington as well, that the Islamic Republic will not hesitate to respond decisively to forces hostile toward Iran.

Irans strikes against Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) targets in Syrias Deir ez-Zor governorate on June 18 marked the Islamic Republics first missile strikes in a foreign country since Tehran attacked the Peoples Mujahedin of Iran (MEK), a militant political organization, in Diyala, Iraq, with ballistic missiles in 2001.

Though the Iranian missiles hit targets in Syria, Tehran was most intent on delivering a message to Saudi Arabia. Irans Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) blamed Riyadh (and Washington, too) for the ISIS attacks in Irans capital. For years, Tehran has also accused Saudi Arabia of sponsoring terrorism in Irans peripheral provinces where Sunni-majority ethnic communities (Baloch, Kurdish, Arab, etc.) live, and where there has been a history of militancy against the Islamic Republic waged by groups with grievances stemming from marginalization in the country as well as some with separatist ambitions.

With Saudi and Iranian leaders having recently exchanged increasingly heated threats about direct military confrontation, Tehrans launch of missiles at a foreign country marks yet another sign of escalation in the Saudi-Iranian geopolitical rivalry for dominance in the Middle East. Saudi King Salmans decision to elevate his son Mohammad bin Salman (MBS) to crown prince, several days after Irans strikes on eastern Syria, can only further inflame bilateral tensions based on MBS anti-Iranian and increasingly sectarian foreign policy vision for the Middle East.

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Iran and the United States' Competition in Eastern Syria - HuffPost

The Trump administration is planning to step up its lobbying against parts of a bipartisan Senate bill slapping new sanctions on Russia and Iran, a senior official said - an effort that comes as Congress works to clear up an unexpected roadblock to the measure that could give the White House more time to air its concerns to sympathetic House Republicans.

The White House opposes provisions that could be seen as pre-empting the president's powers, the official said. Of particular concern is a congressional review process that would allow the House and Senate to block the president from lifting sanctions.

The House blocked progress on the Senate-passed Countering Iran's Destabilizing Activities Act earlier this week, arguing that it flouted the constitutional provision requiring revenue-raising bills to originate in the House. That prompted accusations from Democrats that the House Republican leaders were trying to stall the bill at Trump's request.

While the procedural snag could be cleared as soon as next week, it remains unclear when the House will take final action.

The Trump administration has publicly warned against impeding presidential prerogatives to relieve sanctions. "We would ask for the flexibility to turn the heat up when we need to, but also to ensure that we have the ability to maintain a constructive dialogue," Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told the House Foreign Affairs Committee last week.

The White House official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk more freely, said the administration's concern is one of separation of powers and not policy toward Russia. The official said the White House expects to see previous officials from Democratic administrations voicing the same concern as the debate plays out in the House.

For Trump, however, the issue is politically fraught because his relationship with Russia and whether Moscow interfered in the 2016 presidential election have become central themes of his presidency and is the subject of investigations by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III and congressional committees. The sanctions bill was passed by the Senate in response to Russia's continued involvement in the wars in Ukraine and Syria and for its alleged meddling in the election.

The president continues to express anger and annoyance at the focus on Russia's role in the election even as his public comments on the matter, such as calling it "all big Dem HOAX!" in a series of tweets earlier this week, have kept the issue in the news.

White House aides this week said the president isn't denying Russia tried to meddle in the election.

"I think he's made it clear and been consistent that while everyone agrees the result of the election wasn't influenced, he think that it probably was Russia," deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters Thursday.

House aides said Thursday a solution was being crafted in coordination with the Senate to address the constitutional issue, which dealt with possible revenue from fines that could be levied under the bill.

"Absent Senate action to return the bill and cure the Origination Clause issue, the House will act to preserve its Constitutional rights and 'blue slip' the Senate-passed bill," a Ways and Means Committee aide said, using Capitol Hill lingo for the constitutional objection.

Senate leaders have not said whether they will accept the House's proposed fix, and House leaders have not committed to schedule the bill for a floor vote. But if senators sign off on the proposed changes - which one House GOP aide described as "technical, not substantive" - the bill could be on the floor in July. While the four House committees with jurisdiction over sanctions have not committed to whether they will formally review the legislation a course of action, at least some, including the Foreign Affairs Committee, are expected to waive their right to hold hearings to expedite its passage.

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Edward R. Royce, R-Calif., told reporters this week that he was prepared to move the bill. "One way or the other, we have to do it very quickly," he said Wednesday, according to the Hill.

If the House takes up the measure, it could set up a veto fight with the White House that Congress is likely to win. A veto-proof majority of senators already voted in favor of the measure. But a showdown between Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress over Russia sanctions would be politically problematic for the party.

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan, R-Wis., told reporters Thursday that he personally supports the new sanctions and that Royce is "very eager to move this bill."

"So we want to get this bill cleaned up. We need Foreign Affairs to do their scrub of this legislation, which is what we do every time a bill comes over from the Senate," he said. "But Chairman Royce has indicated he wants to get moving on this quickly, and we want to honor that."

Karoun Demirjian contributed to this report.

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White House will step up lobbying against Iran, Russia sanctions bill now stalled in Congress - Chicago Tribune

A profound disappointment. The reform-oriented and recently re-elected president, Hassan Rouhani, has capitulated. A member of the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, it was he after all who approved the decision not to implement the UNESCO education agenda in Iran.

Many Iranians tweeted comments such as: "Rouhani said: I will forgo many things, but not the Education 2030 agenda. Today, as chairman of the Council of the Cultural Revolution, he definitively scrapped the agenda's action plan."

The global Education 2030 agenda was approved by ministers from all over the world in 2015. The Iranian government, led by President Rouhani, also signed on. Signatories committed themselves to - among other things - guaranteeing access to education for all people, irrespective of age, sex and religion. The Education Agenda is one of the UN's 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

For Iran's most senior political and religious leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, this is tantamount to a conspiracy. "What was conceived as sustainable development is merely a plan to spread Western values and culture throughout the world," Khamenei declared abruptly last spring, shortly before the presidential election. He sharply criticized Rouhani for his cooperation with UNESCO. Iran would "not bow" to the UNESCO education agenda, said Khamenei. Rouhani responded that the religious leader had been wrongly informed - the agenda would be adapted to the Islamic culture of Iranian society.

This was the start of a battle between the government and the conservative opposition for and against the UNESCO education agenda, which has ended with the aforementioned defeat for Rouhani. Khamenei, who has the last word on everything in Iran, declared tersely, "We ourselves know best what's good for us!'

Angry Iranians gave free rein to their sarcasm on social media. "The religious leader doesn't like the Education 2030 agenda because it was written in the West. What he's happy to take from the West are ballistic missiles, nuclear energy and cranes for public executions," tweeted one user.

Baha'i banned from studying

For many Iranians, the rejection of the education agenda has tangible consequences. "Our children are not allowed to study. Since the Islamic Revolution in Iran this has been forbidden to all adherents of the Baha'i religion," said Simin Fahandej in an interview with DW. Fahandej is the spokesperson for the international Baha'i community at the UN in Geneva. The Baha'i are one of the biggest religious minorities in Iran. There are no official statistics, but Iranian media estimates that there are between 40,000 and 300,000 Baha'i in the country.

Other religious minorities, such as Zoroastrians, Mandaeans, Jews and Christians, who make up 2 percent of the country's 80 million people, are protected in Iran. However, the Iranian government does not recognize Bahaism as a religion, because its founder, Baha'u'llah, lived after the Prophet Muhammad, whom Muslims believe was the last of the prophets. The Islamic Republic regards Baha'u'llah's followers as apostates, and subjects them to numerous forms of repression.

Unlike the Baha'i people, religious minorities like Jews and Christians are protected in Iran

After the Iranian government rejected the action framework of the Education Agenda, activists posted photos online of Baha'i people who were executed in 1983 on account of their faith. One of the photos shows 17-year-old Mona Mahmudnizhad. She taught children who had had to leave school because they were Baha'i. For this, she was condemned to death.

"In 1993 a secret Iranian government memorandum found its way into the public domain. It said that the Baha'i should be kept illiterate and uneducated. The Iranian authorities don't want to change that," said Fahandej.

Discussion of women's rights is banned

Women are also discriminated against in matters of education. The UNESCO agenda's demand that they be granted equal rights also provoked fierce debate in Iran. The UNESCO Education 2030 Agenda aims to achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls, and the regime hardliners don't like that one bit.

"As soon as people start talking about women and their rights, all conversations and any kind of cooperation are over," Farideh, a women's rights activist, told DW. "The rulers see any kind of discussion about women's rights as an attack on their culture."

Women are barred from majoring in numerous subjects at Iranian universities

Farideh is one of the activists who started an initiative for women to have equal status under Iranian law - the "One Million Signatures Campaign for Women's Rights." Many of her associates, like the human rights activist and journalist Narges Mohammadi, are now in jail. Many of them also supported President Rouhani in the election, because he promised equal rights for women. He frequently spoke out against segregation of the sexes in universities, giving rise to hope that he would put an end to gender-specific education. Iranian women students are currently excluded from majoring in 77 subjects, such as accountancy and engineering.

"There could be many advantages for us in working with UNESCO," said Farideh. "We don't have to implement every item; the Iranian government isn't obliged to do this, anyway. But we could have greatly improved our education system through this international exchange."

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Education for all? Not in Iran - Deutsche Welle

Irans atomic energy chief Ali Akbar Salehi, who helped forge the 2015 nuclear agreement, warned the United States on June 23 against upsetting the balance of power in the Middle East by siding with arch-rival Saudi Arabia.

Writing in the Guardian newspaper, Salehi said Tehran views a lavish" deal U.S. President Donald Trump's administration recently announced to sell Saudi Arabia $110 billion in weapons as "provocative."

"This is especially the case if the national defense efforts of Iran...are simultaneously opposed and undermined," he said, alluding to steps the Trump administration has taken to increase U.S. sanctions on Iran for developing ballistic missiles even as it has ramped up arms sales to Riyadh and its allies.

"It would be unrealistic to expect Iran to remain indifferent to the destabilizing impact of such conduct," said Salehi, an MIT graduate who has also served as Iran's foreign minister and was a senior negotiator on the nuclear deal.

Salehi stressed that Washington's strong tilt toward Tehran's rivals in the Middle East not only risks setting off a regional arms race and "further tension and conflict" in the region, but it imperils the "hard-won" nuclear deal, which took two years to negotiate.

If the nuclear deal is to survive, he said the West must change course. "The moment of truth has arrived."

Trump, who visited Saudi Arabia on his first trip as president earlier this month, seems largely unconcerned that his showy support for the kingdom threatens to blow up the nuclear accord or set off a renewed arms race in the Middle East. He has openly shown disdain both for Iran's leaders and the nuclear deal.

Trump and the Saudis frequently blame Iran for wars ranging from Yemen to Syria, as well as for restive minority Shi'ite populations within the borders of the kingdom and other Persian Gulf states ruled by Sunni Muslims.

The Saudis, like Trump, were strongly opposed to the nuclear deal. But while Trump has promised to dismantle the disastrous deal, he has not so far taken any concrete steps to do so.

His administration has indicated it will adhere to the deal, which requires Iran to curb its nuclear activities in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions, as long as Tehran continues to do so.

But Salehi's article in the Guardian suggested that Iran's so far strict honoring of the deal may come into doubt in the future if the United States continues to disregard Irans "genuine security concerns" and "stokes Iranophobia" in the region.

Salehi urged the United States and its Western partners to "save" the nuclear deal with "reciprocal gestures" showing a commitment to engagement with Iran.

Iranian voters recently showed their preference for engagement with the West by re-electing President Hassan Rohani with his pro-Western platform, but engagement is simply not a one-way street and we cannot go it alone," Salehi said.

"Unfortunately, as things stand at the moment in the region, reaching a new state of equilibrium might simply be beyond reach for the foreseeable future, he said.

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Iran's Nuclear Chief Warns US Against Tilting Power Balance In Middle East - RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty

The tests are not prohibited under the landmark 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and six major powers, which eased economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for its verifiable promises of peaceful nuclear work.

But Security Council Resolution 2231, which put the agreement into effect, called on Iran not to test ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads.

When Iran conducted missile tests in March 2016, critics led by the United States and Israel were infuriated, calling the countrys behavior a violation of the Security Council resolution and a sign that it would not honor provisions of the nuclear accord. Iran rejected the accusation.

In a report to the Security Council last July on compliance with Resolution 2231, Ban Ki-moon, then the secretary general, said he was concerned that the missile tests might not be consistent with the constructive spirit demonstrated by the nuclear accord. He called on Iran to refrain from conducting such launches, given that they have the potential to increase tensions in the region.

Mr. Guterress report, his first on Irans compliance with the resolution, also called on the country to refrain from missile tests. But it did not echo Mr. Bans broader concerns about them.

A spokesman for Mr. Guterres, Stphane Dujarric, did not immediately respond to a query about the difference.

Iran has long contended that the missiles are its defensive bulwark in an increasingly hostile region. Since it has already promised not to make nuclear weapons, its leaders have said, the missiles by definition cannot carry them. Iran has also argued that Resolution 2231s language does not ban missile tests.

Some disarmament experts suggested that Mr. Guterress report decreased the possibility of United Nations penalties against Iran over its missile development.

Daryl G. Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, a Washington-based group, said the difference between Mr. Bans and Mr. Guterress reports was subtle.

Mr. Guterres may have adjusted the language in the report out of recognition that further sanctions of Iranian entities tied to missile development or production will not likely succeed in reducing, or even slowing, Irans ballistic missile program, Mr. Kimball said.

Sanctions intended as punishment for missile tests, he said, could even strengthen hard-liners in Iran who want to accelerate the program in response to U.S. pressure.

A version of this article appears in print on June 22, 2017, on Page A11 of the New York edition with the headline: U.N. Leader Softens Predecessors Criticism of Iran Missile Tests.

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UN Leader Softens His Predecessor's Criticism of Iran Missile Tests - New York Times