DUBAI: Iranian lawmakers approved plans on Monday to expand military spending to five percent of the budget, including developing the country’s long-range missile program which US President-elect Donald Trump has pledged to halt.
The vote is a boost to Iran’s military establishment — the regular army, the elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and defense ministry — which was allocated almost 2 percent of the 2015-16 budget.
But it could put the Islamic Republic on a collision course with the incoming Trump administration, and fuel criticism from other Western states which say Tehran’s recent ballistic missile tests are inconsistent with a UN resolution on Iran.
The resolution, adopted last year as part of the deal to curb Iran’s nuclear activities, calls on Iran to refrain from work on ballistic missiles designed to deliver nuclear weapons. Tehran says it has not carried out any work on missiles specifically designed to carry such payloads.
Tasnim news agency said 173 lawmakers voted in favor of an article in Iran’s five-year development plan that “requires government to increase Iran’s defense capabilities as a regional power and preserve the country’s national security and interests by allocating at least five percent of annual budget” to military affairs.
Only 10 lawmakers voted against the plan, which includes developing long range missiles, armed drones and cyber-war capabilities.
The Obama administration says Iran’s ballistic missile tests have not violated the nuclear agreement with Tehran, but Trump, who criticized the accord as “the worst deal ever negotiated,” has said he would stop Iran’s missile program.
“Those ballistic missiles, with a range of 1,250 miles, were designed to intimidate not only Israel ... but also intended to frighten Europe and someday maybe hit even the United States,” he told the American Israel Public Affairs Committee AIPAC in March. “We’re not going to let that happen.”
TESTS “INCONSISTENT” WITH DEAL
The increase in military spending is part of a growth plan for 2016-2021 first announced in July 2015 by the Khamenei.
Khamenei supported last year’s nuclear deal with world powers that curbed Iran’s nuclear program in return for lifting of international sanctions. However, he has since called for Iran to avoid further rapprochement with the West, and maintain its military strength.
Iran has test-fired several ballistic missiles since the nuclear deal and the US Treasury has imposed new sanctions on entities and individuals linked to the program.
Former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said last year that the missile launches were “not consistent with the constructive spirit” of the nuclear deal, but did not say whether they actually violated the UN resolution.
The United States, Britain, France and Germany wrote to Ban in March about the missile tests, which they said were “inconsistent with” and “in defiance of” the council resolution.
Most UN sanctions on Iran were lifted after the deal but Iran is still subject to a five-year UN arms embargo — unless approved in advance by the UN Security Council.
Although the embargo is not technically part of the nuclear agreement, the UN resolution enshrining the deal requires the UN Secretary-General to highlight any violations.
In a report submitted to the Security Council before he was succeeded by Antonio Guterres on Jan. 1, Ban expressed concern that Iran may have violated the embargo by supplying weapons and missiles to Hezbollah.
Iran to expand military spending, develop missiles
Iran to expand military spending, develop missiles
Lebanon holds local polls in first vote since Israel-Hezbollah war
BEIRUT: Lebanon on Sunday began the first stage of long-delayed municipal elections, the first vote since a devastating war between Israel and Hezbollah and after a new national government was formed.
Polls opened at 7:00 am (0400 GMT) for voters in the Mount Lebanon district, a heavily populated area with mixed political and religious affiliations that includes Beirut’s southern suburbs, a Hezbollah stronghold that was heavily damaged by Israeli strikes.
“We have come to exercise our right and have our voices heard,” said Hashem Shamas, 39, a Hezbollah supporter, after voting in south Beirut’s Shiyah neighborhood.
According to the interior ministry, 9,321 candidates including 1,179 women are running in the Mount Lebanon district.
Lebanon is supposed to hold municipal elections every six years, but cash-strapped authorities last held a local ballot in 2016.
President Joseph Aoun emphasized the vote’s importance to “give confidence to the people and internationally that Lebanon is rebuilding its institutions and is back on the right track.”
Aoun was elected in January and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam formed a government the following month, ending a more than two-year vacuum as Lebanon’s balance of power shifted following the Israel-Hezbollah war.
The new authorities have promised reforms in order to gain the trust of the international community, as well as unlock billions in bail-out funds amid a five-year economic crisis. They have also vowed a state monopoly on bearing arms.
Hezbollah was left badly weakened in more than a year of hostilities with Israel, with a slew of commanders including the group’s longtime chief, Hassan Nasrallah, killed and its strongholds pummelled in the south and east and in south Beirut.
Israel has continued to strike targets in Lebanon despite a ceasefire and still has troops in five areas it considers “strategic.”
In April 2024, the municipal polls were postponed amid the hostilities, which escalated in September into a major Israeli bombing campaign and ground incursion before the ceasefire about two months later.
Aoun urged voters not to let sectarian, “partisan or financial factors” impact their vote.
Religious and political affiliations are usually key electoral considerations in multi-confessional Lebanon, where power is shared along sectarian lines.
Municipal ballots however provide a greater margin for local community dynamics to play a role.
Polls are set to close at 7:00 p.m. on Sunday.
Areas of northern Lebanon will vote on May 11, with Beirut and the country’s eastern Bekaa Valley area set to go to the polls on May 18, while voters in the heavily damaged south will cast ballots on May 24.
Lebanese army says Hamas handed over suspect in missile launches toward Israel
CAIRO: The Lebanese army said on Sunday that Hamas handed over a suspect involved in launching missiles towards Israel in March, days after Lebanon warned the Palestinian group not to conduct operations that compromise Lebanese security or sovereignty.
UAE to lift Lebanon travel ban on May 7
- UAE will lift a ban for its citizens traveling to Lebanon as of May 7, 2025
DUBAI: The UAE Foreign Ministry announced Sunday that it will lift a ban on its citizens traveling to Lebanon as of May 7, 2025, following a visit by the Lebanese head of state last week, according to WAM News Agency.
The decision comes after a joint statement issued on Thursday, announcing that Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed agreed to implement measures to facilitate travel and improve movement between the two countries.
The UAE banned its citizens from traveling to Lebanon in 2021. Lebanese citizens were not banned from traveling to the UAE.
Paramilitaries launch first attack on Port Sudan: army
- The paramilitaries have expanded the scope and frequency of their drone attacks on army-held areas since losing control of areas including most of the capital Khartoum in March
- UN agencies have also moved their offices and staff to Port Sudan, where hundreds of thousands of displaced people have sought refuge from the war.
PORT SUDAN: Sudanese paramilitaries on Sunday struck Port Sudan, the army said, in the first attack on the seat of the army-aligned government in the country’s two-year war.
The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), at war with the regular army since April 2023, have increased their use of drones since losing territory including much of the capital Khartoum in March.
Army spokesman Nabil Abdullah said in a statement that the RSF “targeted Osman Digna Air Base, a goods warehouse and some civilian facilities in the city of Port Sudan with suicide drones.”
He reported no casualties but “limited damage” in the city, on Sudan’s Red Sea coast.
AFP images showed smoke billowing from the area of the airport in Port Sudan, about 650 kilometers (400 miles) from the nearest known RSF positions on the outskirts of Khartoum.
In the eastern border town of Kassala, some 500 kilometers south of Port Sudan, near Eritrea, witnesses said three drones struck the airport on Sunday for the second day in a row.
An AFP correspondent in Port Sudan said his home, about 20 kilometers from the airport, was shaking as explosions were heard early Sunday.
A passenger told AFP from the airport that “we were on the way to the plane when we were quickly evacuated and taken out of the terminal.”
On social media, users shared videos which AFP was not able to immediately verify showing a large explosion followed by a cloud of smoke rising from the blast site.
Flights to and from Port Sudan, the country’s main port of entry since the start of the war, were suspended until further notice, a government source told AFP.
The rare attacks on the airports in Port Sudan and Kassala, both far from areas that have seen much of the fighting since April 2023, come as the RSF has expanded the scope and frequency of its drone attacks.
The paramilitaries led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo have been battling the regular army, headed by Sudan’s de facto leader Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, in a devastating war that has killed tens of thousands of people and uprooted 13 million.
In the early days of the war, the government relocated from Khartoum to Port Sudan, which until Sunday’s attack had been spared the violence.
UN agencies have also moved their offices and staff to Port Sudan, where hundreds of thousands of displaced people have sought refuge from the war.
The conflict has left Sudan, Africa’s third largest country, effectively divided.
The army controls the center, east and north, while the RSF has conquered nearly all of the vast western region of Darfur and parts of the south.
Lacking the army’s fighter jets, the RSF has relied on drones, including makeshift ones, for air power.
Missile launched from Yemen lands near Israel’s main airport
- Yemen's Houthis claim missile attack on Israel's main airport
- Sirens were activated in Tel Aviv and other areas in the country
TEL AVIV: A missile landed inside the perimeter of Israel’s main airport on Sunday, wounding six people, halting flights and gouging a wide crater, in an attack claimed by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi militants.
The Israeli military said “several attempts were made to intercept” the missile that was launched from Yemen, a rare Houthi attack that penetrated Israel’s air defenses.
A video issued by Israel’s police force showed officers standing on the edge of a deep crater with the control tower visible in the distance behind them. No damage was reported to airport buildings or runways.
The police reported a “missile impact” at Ben Gurion airport, Israel’s main international gateway.
An AFP photographer said the missile hit near the parking lots of Terminal 3, the airport’s largest, with the crater less than a kilometer (0.6 miles) away from the closest tarmac.
“You can see the area just behind us: a crater was formed here, several dozen meters (yards) wide and several dozen meters deep,” central Israel’s police chief, Yair Hezroni, said in the video shared by the force.
It was not immediately clear whether the impact was caused by the Yemeni missile or by an interceptor.
The attack was claimed by Yemen’s Houthis, who say they act in support for Palestinians in war-ravaged Gaza.
“The missile force of the Yemeni armed forces carried out a military operation targeting Ben Gurion airport” with a “hypersonic ballistic missile,” the Houthis said in a statement, referring to their own forces.
Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency service said it had treated at least six people with light to moderate injuries.
An AFP journalist inside the airport at the time of the attack said he heard a “loud bang” at around 9:35 am (0635 GMT), adding the “reverberation was very strong.”
“Security staff immediately asked hundreds of passengers to take shelter, some in bunkers,” the AFP journalist said.
“Many passengers are now waiting for their flights to take off, and others are trying to find alternative flights.”
An incoming Air India flight was diverted to Abu Dhabi, an airport official told AFP.
A passenger said the attack, which came shortly after air raid sirens sounded across parts of the country, caused panic.
“It is crazy to say but since October 7 we are used to this,” said the passenger, who did not want to be named, referring to the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel that sparked the war in Gaza.
“A missile might come at any time and life stops for some time. Today at the airport there was panic and even I was scared, because the blast was big.”
Israel’s airport authority said that “departures and arrivals have resumed” at Ben Gurion, a short while after they had been interrupted due to the missile fire.
The airport “is open and operational,” the aviation authority said in a statement.
Defense Minister Israel Katz threatened a forceful response, saying: “Anyone who hits us, we will hit them seven times stronger.”
The armed wing of Palestinian Islamist group Hamas praised the missile attack on Israel's airport that was claimed by the Houthis.
“Yemen... escalates its attacks on the heart of the illegitimate Zionist entity, surpassing the most advanced defense systems in the world and striking its targets with precision,” Abu Obeida, spokesman for the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, said in a statement.
