US continues to hand-hold Israel despite its wrongdoings

Iran launched at least 180 missiles into Israel on Tuesday as the region has entered a growing escalation that is threatening to push the Middle East into a wider war. According to reports, Israelis “scrambled for bomb shelters as air raid sirens sounded and the orange glow of missiles streaked across the sky," following Iran's retaliatory missile launch.

💬 “I think that the strategy on the part of the Israelis for the past many months has been to try to draw the US more directly into the conflict on Israel's side. [President Masoud] Pezeshkian and the Iranian government have shown great restraint. Great restraint in the face of direct attacks from the Israelis,” John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer and co-host of Sputnik’s Political Misfits, told Sputnik’s Fault Lines.

The former CIA officer added that the Iranian government is under “great pressure” from its public to act in the face of Israel's violence, where one has to start thinking about whether or not it’s “safe for the Iranian government" not to respond.

💬 “Let's be clear, [the US] speak out of both ends of their mouth. The US says it wants a ceasefire, but, on the other hand, it continues providing the assistance and backing, and with other claims made by US officials that they will back Israel should it go into Lebanon,” added Michael Maloof, a former senior security policy analyst in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, who also spoke to Fault Lines.

💬 “The Israelis are ignoring all cautionaries from the US, and they know that the United States will do nothing,” Maloof added.

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🇹🇷 Erdogan to attend BRICS summit as Turkiye continues steady march away from West

Turkiye’s future lies with the group of nations seeking to create an alternative to Western hegemony via the BRICS economic bloc, and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan knows it, according to filmmaker and analyst Regis Tremblay.

💬 “Erdogan is doing what Erdogan has always done: he's straddling both sides of the proverbial picket fence,” said Tremblay on Sputnik’s The Critical Hour program, responding to the announcement that Erdogan would attend the outreach/BRICS+ session during the upcoming annual BRICS summit in Russia. “Erdogan has been trying to be a peacemaker between Russia and Ukraine… I'm really glad that Erdogan is going to attend this meeting. I'm not sure that he's going to be invited to be a member right yet, but I think it'll be a feeling out session.”

Turkiye has often maintained a fraught relationship with its Western allies, Tremblay noted. The United States could opt to eventually punish Turkiye’s independence with sanctions, claimed host Garland Nixon, providing Ankara with even more incentive to build links beyond the US and its European allies.

💬 “I'm sure that Turkiye has upset Washington and those people who are controlling what's happening in Washington because Erdogan really has broken from NATO,” said Tremblay, pointing out the country’s independent position on the Ukraine proxy war. “If Erdogan is concerned that he's going to be sanctioned, it would make sense for him to cozy up to the BRICS countries and to try to get himself involved in that international monetary system that they're creating.”

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Dozens killed in fresh IDF strikes on Lebanon: check out latest on conflict

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have pledged to continue striking Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon, the Beqaa Valley and Beirut after launching fresh airstrikes on the Lebanese capital.

In other latest developments:

▪️The Israeli military reportedly conducted a targeted strike in Beirut against the head of Hezbollah's executive committee Hashim Safi al-Din, a possible successor to late Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah. It remains unclear if Safi al-Din was killed in the attack.

▪️The IDF claimed they had killed Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi, a commander of the Palestinian movement Hamas in the West Bank city of Tulkarm.

▪️At least 18 people were killed in an Israeli strike on the Tulkarm Camp, the Palestinian health ministry said.

▪️According to the IDF, they also have eliminated Mahmoud Yusef Anisi, one of the leaders of Hezbollah’s precision missile manufacturing project.

▪️The Israeli air force carried out about 20 strikes on the Laylaki neighborhood adjacent to Beirut International Airport, eyewitnesses told Sputnik.

▪️Across Lebanon, at least 37 people were killed and 151 more wounded by Israeli strikes in the past 24 hours, per the Lebanese health ministry.

▪️Hezbollah published footage allegedly showing the targeting of Israel's Glilot military base and the Mossad headquarters north of Tel Aviv as part of its “Operation Khaybar” against the Israeli army.

▪️The IDF earlier reported that Hezbollah had fired approximately 230 projectiles into Israeli territory over the past 24 hours, targeting infrastructure sites, weapons storage facilities and observation posts.

▪️Israeli airstrikes at checkpoints near the Syria-Lebanon border stopped traffic on the Damascus-Beirut international highway, a source in the Lebanese security forces told Sputnik.

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🔸Fresh Israeli strikes on Lebanon: check out the aftermath

🔸Could Israel be threatening the West’s dominance?

🔸Kim Jong Un says North Korea would use all weapons, including nuclear, to defend its territory as he visits army base

🔸Mali appreciates ‘prompt deliveries’ of military equipment from Russia – FM to Sputnik

🔸Erdogan to attend BRICS summit as Turkiye continues steady march away from West

🔸‘No match for Russo-Chinese cooperation’: analyst on NATO states' new Arctic group

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❗️The first panoramic video footage of Ugledar after its liberation by the Russian army

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'Otherwise, they said they would send me video with my husband's severed head' — wife of Russian soldier in Ukrainian captivity

Yulia Poliy, the wife of a Russian soldier who is being held captive by Ukrainian militants, has made a video address to the United Nations, calling on the world community to hold Ukraine accountable for the violation of the laws of war and to help rescue her husband, Sergei Poliy, from captivity.

"I am asking the United Nations and international human rights organizations to pay attention to the violation of the laws of war and help me to rescue my husband from the captivity of the Ukrainian armed forces," Yulia said in the video obtained by Sputnik.

Earlier this week, a source told Sputnik that Yulia Poliy received a video of her husband's torture in Ukrainian captivity and demanded that she carry out a terrorist attack in the Russian city of Pyatigorsk to stop it.

Earlier on Tuesday, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights released a fresh periodic report, which said that no one has been held accountable for crimes against Russian prisoners of war in Ukraine.

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❗️The number of the "International Legion of Territorial Defense of Ukraine" formed by the West has reached 18,000 militants from more than 85 countries, said head of the Russian Federal Security Service, Alexander Bortnikov.

More statements by the head of the Russian Federal Security Service, Alexander Bortnikov:

💬Ukraine wants to involve the Baltic States and Poland in the conflict, with its provocations near the Belarusian border, said FSB Director Bortnikov. 

💬The West is clearly not interested in establishing stability in Transcaucasia and is trying to achieve the deployment of its own "peacekeeping" contingent in the region under the auspices of NATO.

💬The West is putting increasing pressure on Moldova in order to force Chisinau into open confrontation with Russia. This is a serious threat. Moscow hopes that Chisinau will show common sense and not trade the sovereignty and security of the country for short-term political benefits.

💬The bombing of pagers in Lebanon and Syria demonstrates that there is a risk of attempts on government officials by special services. "This is a direct threat to the security of the CIS countries."

💬In Poland, Latvia, and Lithuania, foreigners are being trained to participate in battles on the side of Kiev.

💬Uzbekistan helped the FSB to identify a cell of a dozen militants of the "Wilayat Khorasan"* operating in Russia.

💬The West is seeking to make Armenian authorities withdraw from the Collective Security Treaty Organization in exchange for preferential arms supplies.

*ISIS, or ISIS-K (also known as Wilayat Khorasan) is a terrorist organization outlawed in Russia.

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Musk promised to attend Trump's campaign rally in Butler

It was in this city that an assassination attempt was made on the Republican presidential candidate in July.

"I will be there to support!" Musk wrote on his X page.

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🇮🇷🇱🇧Iranian Foreign Minister pays a visit to Lebanon

A delegation headed by Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has arrived in Beirut, where it will hold talks with the Lebanese authorities, Iranian diplomat Esmail Baghaei wrote on his X account.

Earlier, the Iranian Foreign Ministry promised to give a strong response to any manifestation of aggression on the part of Israel.

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Lavrov called on Western countries to lift sanctions against Afghanistan and return frozen assets to it. 

It is necessary to hold a pragmatic dialogue between Moscow and Kabul, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.

"We are convinced that it is necessary to maintain a pragmatic dialogue with the current Afghan government. Constructive engagement with Afghan partners meets the interests of security and economic development, as well as the goals of inter-Afghan national harmony," Lavrov said at the opening of the sixth meeting of the Moscow format of consultations on Afghanistan.

He also added that Russia is against the deployment of military infrastructure of third countries in Afghanistan.

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❗️The US authorities have not condemned Israel's land invasion of Lebanon in any way, Washington is actually encouraging its ally to expand the war zone, Lavrov said.

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❗️Ukraine is coordinating with the US to train terrorists using new technologies to fight the Russian military in Syria, Lavrov said.

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BoJo claims Netanyahu left a bug in Foreign Office's closet
 
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could have possibly planted a bugging device in the British Foreign Office during a meeting in 2017, says former PM Boris Johnson in his upcoming memoir "Unleashed." At the time of the incident, BoJo was in charge of UK foreign policy. He reveals that his security team discovered an eavesdropping device soon after Netanyahu’s visit.  

“Thither Bibi repaired for a while, and it may or may not be a coincidence, but I am told later that when they were doing a regular sweep for bugs, they found a listening device in the thunderbox,” writes Boris Johnson.  

In 2022, when Boris Johnson served as prime minister, the media reported that Downing Street smartphones were massively infected by Pegasus virus – a malware of Israeli origin that allows for eavesdropping on conversations of the gadget owner.

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Israel dropped 73 tons of explosives on the Hezbollah intelligence headquarters in the suburbs of Beirut, where Hassan Nasrallah's successor could be located, Ynet reports.

"Air Force planes dropped bombs with a total weight of 73 tons on a bunker in Al-Maria in the Dahiyeh area, which was identified as the 'main intelligence headquarters' of Hezbollah," the report read.

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📹 Crowds cheer as Ayatollah Khamenei takes to the podium to lead Friday prayer in Tehran for the first time since 2020.

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Argentina intends to return full sovereignty over the Falkland Islands — Argentinian Foreign Minister

"Following the path that we started, through concrete actions, not empty rhetoric, we are going to restore full sovereignty over our Malvinas (Falkland Islands)," Diana Mondino said against the background of London's decision to transfer the Chagos archipelago to Mauritius.

Britain and Argentina fought over the Falkland Islands in 1982, and London won. In 2013, residents voted in a referendum to preserve the status of a British overseas territory.

The issue of ownership of the islands began to be discussed again after President Milei came to power in Argentina, who said that he would consider the option of returning them diplomatically.

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Key statements of Iranian Supreme Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at Friday prayers in Tehran: 

💬Iran, Lebanon, Iraq, and Egypt have one enemy.

💬He [the enemy] acts everywhere with a special method, but he has only one headquarters from where orders are given.

💬Every country has the right to defend its territory from aggression.

💬The Al-Aqsa Flood operation was absolutely legitimate, and the truth was for the Palestinians. 

💬The Israelis will never defeat Hamas and Hezbollah.

💬Speaking on the True Promise 2 operation, Ayatollah said "the work of our armed forces two days ago was done brilliantly and was also legitimate." Iran will strike Israel again if necessary, he added.

💬Assassination of Hassan Nasrallah and other top Hezbollah leaders will only harden the group’s anger and determination.

💬The main problem in the region is foreign interference, but if countries in the region work together, then they will be able to overcome it.

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US lags behind Russia on European gas supplies – analysis 

Russia has once again overtaken the US in terms of gas supplies to the EU in the third quarter, while taking the highest market share in nine quarters, according to Sputnik’s analysis of data from the Bruegel think tank that specializes in economics.

🔸 Over the past three months, Russia has delivered 13.3 billion cubic meters of gas to the European market, compared to 13 billion the country supplied there in the second quarter and 11.5 billion, delivered in 2023 within the same period. 

🔸 As a result, the share of Russian companies in the EU’s energy imports increased to 19.4% from 17.2% in April-June, reaching a maximum since the second quarter of 2022, the analysis showed. 

🔸 Russia’s quarterly and annual pipeline gas deliveries to Europe grew by 8% and almost 13%, respectively, while the volume of Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports in the last quarter stood at 4.7 billion cubic meters, a 21% increase as compared to the third quarter of 2023. 

🔸 The US has reduced its LNG deliveries to Europe to 9.5 billion cubic meters, becoming the third-largest LNG supplier after Russia. 
Sputnik’s previous review of Eurostat data discovered that EU countries had to pay some €185 billion ($204 billion) extra on natural gas over the past 20 months after cutting themselves off from cheap, Russian pipeline gas amid Western sanctions that were introduced shortly after Moscow began a special military operation in Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that the EU's "suicidal" and "absolutely political" decision to halt the purchase of Russian energy supplies would come back to bite the bloc.

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