Mideast Week in Review - June 5 // FAI ONLINE

Israel — The Israeli Air Force (IAF) conducted a massive exercise over the Mediterranean Sea last Tuesday as part of Operation “Chariots of Fire.” Over 100 aircraft participated in a simulated operation to strike multiple targets simultaneously, generally understood to represent nuclear sites inside Iran.

The exercise came on the same day that the UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) announced that Iran now has enough enriched uranium to construct a nuclear bomb in a matter of days. Iran has also failed to account for the presence of nuclear particles found by the IAEA at three undeclared sites, as nuclear talks between the Islamic Republic and Western powers continue to stall.

Iran - Street demonstrations continued in the nation of Iran last week, as hundreds took to the streets across the country to show public solidarity against the regime’s food price hikes last month, as well as its mismanagement of a building collapse in the city of Abadan two weeks ago, which killed at least 26 people.

Protestors blocked streets with fires on Monday night in Bushehr, southern Iran, while amateur video uploaded to social media showed police officers physically assaulting an unarmed protester on Tuesday in Shahin Shahr, central Iran. A shadowy organization of dissidents calling themselves the “Resistance Units” (PMOI/MEK) took control of over 5,000 state-managed security cameras on Thursday in an act of defiance against the regime. An Iranian-based human rights monitoring group reported a sharp increase in prisoner executions during the most recent spate of protests. At least 52 prisoners were hanged in prisons across Iran in May, including at least three women and two minors. Most of the condemned were charged with “premeditated murder” and “drug-related” crimes.

Meanwhile, details emerged in the Kuwaiti press on Saturday that another key Iranian figure, Dr. Ayub Ansari, has died under suspicious circumstances. Ansari was admitted to the hospital last Tuesday for suspected food poisoning and died of internal bleeding shortly after eating dinner with a relative near a military facility in the area of Yazd, Iran. Dr. Ansari held a doctorate in aeronautics engineering and was allegedly a leader in the Iranian government’s missile development program. He is the third figure in Iran’s clandestine services and special programs to die in the last two weeks.

Syrian Kurdistan - Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan repeated his threat to order another invasion of northern Syria this week, claiming that a military operation to create a 30-kilometer “security zone” along the expanse of the Syrian-Turkish border was “legitimate,” while US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken warned that such an operation would “further undermine regional stability and put at risk US forces in the coalition’s campaign against ISIS.” Turkish warplanes began a heavy bombardment against Kurdish positions in the northwestern Syrian city of Manbij on Friday, which Erdogan fingered as a primary target of the upcoming offensive.

Sunni Islamist militias allied with Turkey in Syria have expressed their support for the proposed offensive, which would target Kurdish-majority areas along the Syrian-Turkish border, where President Erdogan hopes to resettle up to one million Syrian Arab refugees. The Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad called Erdogan’s plan “a serious threat to peace and security in the region,” while a new organization calling itself the North Thunderbolt Operations Room released a statement announcing a “general mobilization.” The group was formed recently in Tel Rifaat by a conglomerate of Kurdish militias, Syrian regime army units, and pro-Iranian militias in an effort to retake Turkish-occupied land along the border. Hostilities continued between the Turkish military and Kurdish-led SDF forces during the week, with the SDF striking a Turkish military facility in the border town of Tel Abyad, killing two and wounding four, while Turkish artillery strikes targeted the town of Shweik Shash nearby, as well as Abu Raseyn.

Meanwhile, a street protest in the northwest Syrian city of Afrin and other Turkish-occupied communities showcased public dissatisfaction with electricity shortages and prices. At least one civilian was unexplainedly killed and several more injured during the demonstrations, which were directed at a Turkish electrical company operating in northwest Syria.

Yemen - The Saudi-sponsored Yemeni government and the Houthi rebel movement, which controls the capital city of Sana’a, agreed to extend a two-month ceasefire for an additional two months on Thursday. The ceasefire has been the first major respite in fighting between the Houthis and the Saudi-led Sunni Arab Coalition since the outbreak of the Yemeni Civil War six years ago.

Yemen was already the Middle East’s most impoverished nation before the conflict began in 2015, which has largely devolved into a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran. The Islamic Republic arms and trains the Shiite Houthi rebels. The war has killed over 130,000 people, including at least 12,000 civilians, one-quarter of them children. Despite the ceasefire, at least 19 Yemenis have been killed in the last two months, mostly as a result of land mine explosions.

As the incidence of “wars and rumors of wars” continues to increase across the Middle East, we implore the Maranatha global family to join us in prayer for the opening of a “great, effectual door” for Good News in the region. We firmly believe that ongoing hostilities, upheaval, and chaos create opportunities for the message of the Prince of Peace.

Maranatha!