Just 1 In 3 Iranians Set To Vote In Election Poll Reveals

The crisis comes amid severe cold weather and seen hugely reduced power across Baghdad and various governorates.

Severe snowfall and gas scarcities have already plunged Iran into chaos, resulting in the shutdown of schools, flight cancellations, and office closures. According to media reports and official statements, half of Iran's provinces have either shuttered schools or shifted to remote learning due to the harsh cold weather, gas shortages, and heating facility challenges since Monday.

The Iraqi Ministry of Electricity announced the reduction in the generating units' loads, leaving an immense shortage approximately 4,000 thousand megawatts.

The interconnection lines transmitting electricity between Iraq and Iran have also ceased operations due to the cold wave.

"The Ministry is currently coordinating closely with the Ministry of Oil through an ongoing operations room to compensate it with nationally produced fuel and gas until the supplied gas is pumped again in the required quantities," stated the Iraqi Ministry of Electricity on Wednesday.

Gas shortages have escalated into a crisis in Iran in recent years, despite the country possessing one of the world’s largest gas reserves. Iranian power plants have been forced to resort to consuming mazut for months before winter to preserve gas, a practice that has exacerbated severe air pollution in major cities, as has also happened in many previous years.

The launch of Pars 1 satellite on a board a Soyuz rocket taking off from the far east Amur region of Russia was announced by Islamic Republic state media on Thursday.

The satellite, weighing 134 kg (295 pounds), is equipped with three cameras which officials claim will survey Iran's topography from its orbit approximately 500 km (310 miles) above the Earth's surface.

The launch occurred at the Vostochny Cosmodrome, near the border with China and approximately 1,500 km (930 miles) away from the port of Vladivostok.

"Our current domestic launch bases do not yet have the ability of injecting satellites at the right inclination for a sun-synchronous orbit, hence our use of a Russian launch base," Iran's Information and Communications Minister, Issa Zarepour told the state TV.

The collaboration follows Russia's previous launch of Iran's Khayyam sensing satellite into orbit in 2022 from Kazakhstan's Baikonur Cosmodrome, indicating a growing scientific partnership between the two countries despite US sanctions.

Iran's satellite initiatives have drawn attention from Western nations, particularly regarding concerns that they may be linked to Iran's missile development program, overseen by the aerospace division of the Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

While Iran asserts that its satellite endeavors aim to enhance communication capabilities, international security experts believe that they are closely intertwined with the country's missile development efforts.

Recent US intelligence assessments suggest that Iran's satellite launches could potentially expedite the development of its intercontinental ballistic missiles.

The news comes ahead of voting on Friday for Iran’s parliament and the Assembly of Experts in what is being criticized as a “stage-managed” mockery of democracy.

West Azarbaijan police force commander Rahim Jahanbakhsh told the hardliner-linked Mehr news agency on Wednesday: “They were moderators of some pages in the cyberspace." He did not identify the detainees or give details of their webpages.

Any calls to boycott the upcoming elections will be dealt with, he threatened.

Located in northwestern Iran, West Azerbaijan province is bordered by Iraq, Azerbaijan and Turkey. Urmia is the capital and largest city of the province which is home to both Azeri and Kurdish ethnicities.

On Tuesday, Iran's Cyber-Police (FATA) issued a warning regarding online political activities ahead of the elections.

FATA Chief Vahid Majid said, "Violations in the virtual sphere are being addressed to stop the elections from being marred by inaccurate content."

Political activists, opposition parties and large sections of the public have pledged to boycott the elections.

Earlier in the month, Narges Mohammadi, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and imprisoned human rights activist, denounced the upcoming elections as "staged managed."

"I, along with the people, will aim to declare the Islamic Republic's lack of legitimacy and the oppressive regime's rift with the people by sanctioning the theatrical elections," read a statement shared on her local media accounts.

Over the past weeks, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has repeatedly made fervent appeals for voter turnout.

According to the NGO, the attack resulted in the deaths of two Syrian Hezbollah supporters, while six other people were wounded.

Syria's defense ministry also reported Israeli strikes near Damascus Wednesday night, marking the latest in a series of attacks against Iran-backed forces in the region.

“The Israeli enemy launched air strikes from the direction of the occupied Syrian Golan, targeting a number of sites in the Damascus countryside,” the ministry said in a statement carried by state media.

The Israeli Defense Forces did not comment on the strike.

Lebanese television channel Al Maydeen, known for its pro-Iranian stance, reported a significant explosion heard in the heavily fortified Sayeda Zainab neighborhood of the Syrian capital, where a major Shiite shrine is located. No additional details were provided.

The neighborhood is in southern Damascus, where Iran-backed groups have a string of underground bases.

Since at least 2013, Israel has conducted numerous airstrikes in Syria, primarily aimed at pro-Iranian forces, including Hezbollah.

The frequency of the strikes has increased during the nearly five-month conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. A number of Iranian Revolutionary Guard officers have been killed in suspected Israeli strikes on Syria since December.

Since the conflict began on October 7, Hezbollah has launched multiple attacks from Lebanon into northern Israel, prompting retaliatory strikes that have considerably escalated tensions along the border.

Israel seldom provides commentary on specific strikes within Syria but has consistently stated its determination to prevent Iran from expanding its influence in the region.

The Syrian Observatory For Human Rights is based in the UK with access to a wide network of sources in Syria.

“We have to enforce our sanctions, particularly on the energy sector,” said Senator Ben Cardin (D-M), chairman of the influential committee. “And I think there is going to be consensus in this committee to strengthen those tools.”

The Senate hearing Wednesday was the latest in a series of Congressional attempts to deal with Iran’s increasingly aggressive behavior in the Middle East, propping up an array of armed groups to destabilize the region and advance the regime’s interest at the expense of almost everybody else, including ordinary Iranians.

“Iran will find ways to finance its proxies to the detriment of its own people,” Senator Cardin said in his concluding remarks of the hearing. “The first priority of their budget is these terrorist activities.”

The Iranian regime is the main sponsor of Lebanese Hezbollah, Hamas, Yemen's Houthis, and several armed groups in Syria and Iraq, all of which rely on Iran’s funds, weapons and training. The groups are bound by material interest and fulfilling Tehran's policy of forcing the US military out of the Middle East.

The Biden administration should announce that they make no distinction between Iran and its proxies,” former special representative for Iran Brian Hook told the committee, “anything that a proxy does, we will attribute agency to the Iranian regime and they will be held accountable as if it was a direct attack.”

President Joe Biden’s policy on Iran was a major theme in the hearing. Most participants criticized Biden and his team for “not doing enough” to stop or “deter” Iran. Senator Jim Risch (R-ID), ranking member of the foreign relations Committee, explained how and why, in his view, things have gone wrong.

“At the beginning of the Biden Administration, the president’s Iran policy was abundantly clear and that was an attempt to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal regardless of the cost,” he said. “The administration chose engagement and appeasement over containment and isolation… Three years later, Iran is more emboldened and empowered than before, and the Middle East is in turmoil.”

Suzanne Meloney, Director of Foreign Policy at the Brooking Institution –and the only other witness alongside Hook– stressed the need for a change in approach.

“There was a period in time in which negotiations with Iran proved that they could be fruitful in terms of getting concessions on real security risks that we have with respect to the regime,” Meloney said.. “I think that time is now firmly over. The current leadership within Iran has no interest in making concessions to the United States.”

Iranian officials have never hidden their intention to “rid” the Middle East of American forces. In the past few years, they have pressed on with their missile program and have made advanced drones that Russia uses against Ukraine.

“I cannot overstate how bad policy has allowed Iran, Russia, China, and North Korea to move from being transactional partners to strategic allies with each other,” Senator Risch said, “This is a failure of American policy that will have consequences for years to come.”

Curiously, no official from the Biden administration was present at the public hearing. Unnamed officials had agreed to take part in a confidential meeting only – which was held at the subcommittee level Wednesday, according to Senator Cardin.

It’s unclear why the administration preferred not to have any representation at the Senate hearing. One reason could be the ongoing investigation about former Iran envoy Robert Malley, whose security clearance was taken away last year for alleged mishandling of classified documents.

Malley was a key figure in framing Biden’s policy on Iran (and the Middle East more generally). Out of public sight since June 2023, his name keeps surfacing whenever Iran and Biden’s Iran policy is discussed. So it did in the Senate hearing Wednesday.

Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN) claimed Malley was the one who “stopped enforcing [Iran] sanctions wholeheartedly” in the hope that the regime would agree to limit its nuclear activities as part of an unwritten agreement. He forced the administration to “look the other way,” so that Iran could sell oil to China, Hagerty said. “It’s a disgrace.” 

The alternative –most of those present at the hearing seemed to agree– would be ‘tightening the screw’.

“My view on the Iranian regime is that you’re more likely to get the deal you want with crippling sanctions,” Hook said. “If you create a positive environment Iran is going to play cat and mouse with you as long as you let them.”