{"id":2425,"date":"2021-01-15T06:15:59","date_gmt":"2021-01-15T12:15:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/?p=2425"},"modified":"2021-01-18T12:56:06","modified_gmt":"2021-01-18T18:56:06","slug":"2425","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/2021\/01\/15\/2425\/","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

In the central dessert, a day after the at-sea short-range missile tests.\u00a0 \u201cIran tests ballistic missiles, drones in military exercise, state TV says,\u201d<\/a> Reuters, January 15, 2021.<\/p>\n

\u201cIran tests suicide drones that look similar to those used in Saudi attacks,\u201d<\/a> Jon Gambrell, AP, Defense News, January 15, 2021.<\/p>\n

\u201cIran Deems Signal ‘Criminal Content,’ Removes From Local App Stores,\u201d<\/a> Golnaz Esfandiari, RFE\/RL,\u00a0January 15, 2021.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018Tactical cooperation\u2019 marks Iran-al-Qeda ties, experts say,\u201d<\/a> The Arab Weekly, January 15, 2021.<\/p>\n

An open message to Iran\u2014Il Milano is where the Quds Force was to blow up the entire restaurant, including the Saudi Ambassador to the U.S. several years ago.\u00a0 So now this story\u2014\u201cEarlier this week, Israeli warplanes apparently targeted positions and arms depots of Iran-backed forces in Syria. At least 57 fighters were killed and dozens of others wounded. Israeli airstrikes on Iranian targets in Syria is nothing new. But what is new about this episode is how those strikes were carried out. A senior U.S. intelligence official with knowledge of the attack told The Associated Press that the airstrikes were carried out with intelligence provided by the United States. The official said the strikes targeted a series of warehouses in Syria that were being used in a pipeline to store and stage Iranian weapons, as well as serving as a pipeline for components supporting Iran\u2019s nuclear program. The U.S. official, who requested anonymity to speak about the matter, said U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo discussed Tuesday\u2019s airstrike with Yossi Cohen, chief of Israel\u2019s spy agency Mossad, at a public meeting in the popular Washington restaurant Caf\u00e9 Milano on Monday. This series of events is significant for two reasons. Not only is it a rare incidence of publicized cooperation between the two countries over choosing targets in Syria, but it comes at a fraught moment in U.S. foreign policy. American public cooperation with this latest Israeli airstrike came after a bitter presidential election, punctuated by a deadly siege of the Capitol and all while the incoming Biden transition team has complained of a lack of cooperation by Trump\u2019s Pentagon. Pompeo on Tuesday accused Iran of having secret ties with the al-Qaida network and imposed new sanctions on several senior Iranian officials. Pompeo\u2019s comments come just a week before the Trump administration leaves office and appeared aimed at Biden\u2019s stated desire to resume negotiations with Iran over the 2015 nuclear deal. Trump withdrew from the deal in 2018. In a speech to the National Press Club just, Pompeo attacked Iran for alleged secret ties with al-Qaida, citing newly declassified intelligence suggesting Tehran harbored the group\u2019s No. 2, Abu Muhammad al-Masri, who was killed in August, reportedly by Israeli agents.\u201d\u00a0 Fascinating.\u00a0 See \u201cIn waning days, Trump shakes up CENTCOM to increase Arab-Israeli efforts against Iran,\u201d<\/a> Howard Altman, Military Times, January 15, 2021.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the central dessert, a day after the at-sea short-range missile tests.\u00a0 \u201cIran tests ballistic missiles, drones in military exercise, state TV says,\u201d Reuters, January 15, 2021. \u201cIran tests suicide drones that look similar to those used in Saudi attacks,\u201d Jon Gambrell, AP, Defense News, January 15, 2021. \u201cIran Deems Signal ‘Criminal Content,’ Removes From … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2819,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2532],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-update"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2819"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2425"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2448,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2425\/revisions\/2448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/coatesn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}