Third day of the new Iran after the fall of Khamenei in attacks by Israel and the United States, with the regime trying to reorganize itself while the bombings continue and international tension grows. Washington maintains military pressure, Europe shows its division and the conflict begins to impact the global economy. This is how Carlos Alsina summarizes the turbulent international news with which the week begins.
A triumvirate in Tehran and calls for rebellion
We enter the third day of the new Iran, which is unknown what it will be like. With Khamenei fallen due to the attacks by Israel and the US, the regime has chosen a triumvirateamong whom is President Pezeskhian, to remain standing. Meanwhile, Donald Trump urges the population who took to the streets in January to protest to do so again to overthrow the theocratic regime.
Also from his exile in the United States, the shah’s son, Reza Pahlavi, has asked Iranians to celebrate what he considers the last breath of the regime, but above all to guarantee their safety.
Little is known about what is happening inside Iran because the internet shutdown that the ayatollahs have been applying for weeks has been joined since yesterday afternoon by that of the state radio and television, after being attacked. It is on the official channel where images of groups of Iranians crying over Khamenei’s death had been shown. Other videos that have been sent abroad show citizens celebrating him and tearing down monuments built in his honor.
Operation Epic Fury: military escalation and division in the West
The Operation Epic Fury continues despite the fact that yesterday afternoon the Iranian authorities have shown themselves willing to talk. The Iranian Foreign Minister called his counterpart from Oman, a country that had been mediating with the United States, to affirm that the regime is willing to stop the escalation and restore stability. That is, to make the regime endure by accepting American requests.
President Trump, who initially announced his willingness to begin a dialogue process, later stated that the attacks could continue for at least four weeks.
The first survey in the United States on the attacks, carried out by Ipsos and Reuters, has already been published: the 43% disapprove and 27% support them. Among Republican voters, support rises to 55%, while 7% of Democrats see them well.
Meanwhile the bombings and war propaganda continue. Trump congratulates himself for having killed fifty Iranian leaders during the operation, including former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and for having destroyed the Iranian naval headquarters and sunk nine of its ships.
Shipping companies suspend traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. Freight transportation becomes more expensive and the oil market goes into chaos.
The foreign ministers of the European Union advocated moderation last night, equally condemning the attacks by the United States and Israel and the response of Iran, which they ask not to carry out indiscriminate military attacks. The division in Europe was evident when, at the same time that the 27 agreed on this basic declaration, the governments of Paris, Berlin and London announced their willingness to attack Iran to defend their interests in the region.
An Iranian drone crashed into a British base in Cyprus last night, leaving no casualties, and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer declared that Britain has agreed to allow the United States to use British military bases to attack Iranian missile sites. He moderated, however, his speech, and said that they will not attack. At least for now.
In Spain there is also division. Pedro Sánchez dedicated a good part of his speech last night at the opening of the Mobile World Congress to talking about what is happening in the Gulf, insisting that it is not necessary to take sides: that you can be against the theocratic regime and against the way in which the United States and Israel have decided to behead it.
Zapatero, Plus Ultra and the Senate commission
And Zapatero. Summoned by the Popular Party to the Senate commission to testify about his relationship with Plus Ultra and that of his friend Julio Martínez, in the middle of the electoral campaign in Castilla y León, where the former president is from. The PP trusts that what they may say will harm the socialist candidate Carlos Martínez.
If on Friday the president of the airline company explained in this commission that there was neither favorable treatment nor interference in the rescue, today Zapatero will have to answer whether or not he pressured Sánchez – and Ábalos – to rescue Plus Ultra or if the advice for which he and his daughters were paid through Relevant Analysis were linked to that rescue. The Zapatero family took 600,000 euros for these concepts and 450,000 Martínez has assumed to have received from Plus Ultra for his efforts.
