Iranian hacker group targets Israeli kindergartens' PA systems

The advice from the close Trump allies who are also prominent Iran hawks is some of the first pushback yet on the administration by senior members of his party.

Trump ended the Secret Service protection for former national security advisor John Bolton, former secretary of state Mike Pompeo and former special envoy for Iran Brian Hook last week.

All had previously run afoul of Trump politically.

The security details had been in place during the administration of Joe Biden since intelligence and law enforcement officials assessed Iran sought to kill them for their role in Trump's decision to assassinate Iranian General Qassem Soleimani in 2020.

"I would encourage the president to revisit the decision for those people who are being targeted by Iran," chair of the US Senate intelligence committee and longtime Trump backer Tom Cotton told Fox News Sunday.

"I've reviewed the intelligence in the last few days. The threat to anyone involved in President Donald Trump's strike on Soleimani is persistent. It's real. Iran is committed to vengeance against all of these people," Cotton said.

Another longtime backer of the president Lindsey Graham said pulling the security of key officials who implement American policy was not the right move.

"Whether you like John Bolton or not, that's not the question for me ... We need to make sure that if you serve in our government and you take on a foreign power at the request of the administration that we do not leave you hanging," Graham told CNN.

Bolton told the network last week that the threat to his life from Iran persisted but Trump told reporters the men could afford security details with their own money.

Mohsen al-Mandalawi made the comment in a recent interview with Reuters, reflecting on significant shifts in the Middle East, including the weakening of Iran-aligned armed groups in Gaza and Lebanon and the overthrow of Syria's President Bashar al-Assad by rebel forces.

"Today, we have stability. Foreign companies are coming to Iraq," said Mandalawi, himself a businessman with interests in Iraqi hotels, hospitals and cash transfer services.

"Iraq has started to take on its natural role among Arab states. Iran is a neighbor with whom we have historical ties. Our geographical position and our relations with Arab states are separate matters," he said, speaking at his office in Baghdad's fortified Green Zone, home to government institutions and foreign embassies.

"I don't think that the weakening of Iran will negatively impact Iraq."

Mandalawi’s support for limiting the power of Iran-backed armed groups comes despite his affiliation with Iraq's Shiite Coordination Framework, a bloc of politicians with close ties to the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Iraq attempts to balance its relations with Tehran and Washington has been complicated by attacks on US troops and Israel by these groups following the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war on October 7, 2023.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein recently said that Baghdad is actively working to persuade these factions to disarm.

Mandalawi acknowledged that this process will take time but believes it is achievable given Iraq's growing focus on political and economic development.

"Limiting arms to the state is important and I hope that it will be implemented," he said.

"Since the massacre on Oct 7th, Israel has been fighting a war against the multidimensional Iranian threat on seven fronts. We have made many achievements and dramatically weakened those who seek our destruction," he said.

Since the Gaza war began, sparked by Iran-backed Hamas's attacks on Israel, the most deadly single day for Jews since the Holocaust, Israel has faced attacks from Iran's allies across the Middle East, including Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq and the occupied West Bank. Israel has since pounded Hamas in Gaza and massively debilitated Hezbollah in Lebanon, Iran's most powerful ally.

"Iran and its partners continue to threaten the regional and global stability. The upcoming months present us with the challenges that require military readiness," Katz added.

It comes as President Donald Trump just announced that military support for Israel, which had been put on hold by the Biden administration, is now en-route to Israel.

“A lot of things that were ordered and paid for by Israel, but have not been sent by Biden, are on their way!” Trump wrote on his social media app Truth Social on Saturday.

The Biden administration had withheld weapons including 2,000 pound bombs as it tried to force Israel towards a ceasefire and the release of more humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip.

Trump said to reporters aboard Air Force One on Saturday, “we released them (the bombs). We released them today. And they’ll have them. They paid for them and they’ve been waiting for them for a long time. They’ve been in storage.”

Last week, when asked by a reporter in the Oval Office whether he would support Israel striking Iran's nuclear facilities, President Trump said: "Obviously, I'm not going to answer that question."

"It would really be nice if that could be worked out without having to go that further step ... Iran hopefully will make a deal, and if they don't make a deal, I guess that's okay too."

Without elaborating, Trump said he would be meeting various "very high-level people" in the coming days to discuss the Iran dossier.

“Forces and allies in the region have been instructed to act with caution as [the regime] feels an existential threat with Trump’s return,” the Iranian official said.

“In Iraq and Yemen, forces have been told not to target any American assets, and if they do, they are explicitly warned against using Iranian weapons,” the official added.

“They have been told to keep defensive positions for a while and to avoid any actions that might provoke the Americans.”

Last week, Iraq's Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein said Baghdad is seeking to convince Iran-backed armed factions in the country to lay down their weapons or join the official security forces.

Iran’s UN ambassador also denied any involvement in or support for the training of Yemen's Houthis, just days before US President Donald Trump re-designated the group as a "foreign terrorist organization".

"As a result of the Biden administration’s weak policy, the Houthis have fired at US Navy warships dozens of times, launched numerous attacks on civilian infrastructure in partner nations, and attacked commercial vessels transiting Bab al-Mandeb more than 100 times," the announcement said.

The Iranian delegation plans to visit polling stations in the capital to closely monitor the electoral process.

Alexander Lukashenko, who has been in power since 1994, is seeking his seventh term in office.

The election has been widely criticized by opposition figures and international observers as lacking genuine competition. Many opposition leaders are either imprisoned or in exile, leading to allegations that the election is a mere formality to extend Lukashenko's rule.

The European Parliament has denounced the election as a sham, urging the international community not to recognize its results and to support the Belarusian people's pursuit of democracy and human rights.

Iran's own electoral process has been criticized by international observers, including Freedom House, which has noted the influence of Iran's Guardian Council, an unelected body that vets candidates, as a key factor limiting the country's democratic standards.

Freedom House says of Iran's democratic process: "The Islamic Republic of Iran holds elections regularly, but they fall short of democratic standards due in part to the influence of the hard-line Guardian Council, an unelected body that disqualifies all candidates it deems insufficiently loyal to the clerical establishment. Ultimate power rests in the hands of the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and the unelected institutions under his control."