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IOL News
11 hours ago
- Business
- IOL News
Crude sinks as Trump delays decision on Iran strike
A fire blazes in the oil depots of Shahran, northwest of Tehran, on June 15 after further attacks from Israel. Speculation had been swirling that Trump would throw his lot in with Israel, but on Thursday he said he would decide "within the next two weeks" whether to involve the United States, giving diplomacy a shot to end the hostilities. Image: Atta Kenare / AFP Oil prices tumbled Friday and equity traders fought to end a volatile week on a positive note after Donald Trump said he would consider over the next two weeks whether to join Israel's attacks on Iran. Speculation had been swirling that Trump would throw his lot in with Israel, but on Thursday he said he would decide "within the next two weeks" whether to involve the United States, giving diplomacy a shot to end the hostilities. While tensions are sky high amid fears of an escalation, the US president's remarks suggested the crisis could be prevented from spiralling into all-out war between the Middle East foes. Since Israel first hit Iran last Friday, the two have exchanged deadly strikes and apocalyptic warnings, though observers said the conflict has not seen a critical escalation. European foreign ministers were due to meet their Iranian counterpart on Friday in Geneva. In a statement read out by White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, the president said: "Based on the fact that there's a substantial chance of negotiations that may or may not take place with Iran in the near future, I will make my decision whether or not to go within the next two weeks." Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Next Stay Close ✕ Ad Loading Leavitt added: "If there's a chance for diplomacy the president's always going to grab it, but he's not afraid to use strength as well." Both main oil contracts were down around two percent Friday but uncertainty prevailed and traders remained nervous. "Crude still calls the shots, and volatility's the devil in the room -- and every trader on the street knows we're two headlines away from chaos," said Stephen Innes at SPI Asset Management. "Make no mistake: we're trading a geopolitical powder keg with a lit fuse. "President Trump's two-week 'thinking window' on whether to join Israel's war against Iran is no cooling-off period -- it's a ticking volatility clock." Stocks were mixed following a public holiday in New York, with Hong Kong, Taipei, Mumbai and Bangkok all up with London, Paris and Frankfurt. Seoul's Kospi led the gains, rising more than one percent to break 3,000 points for the first time in nearly three and a half years. The index has risen every day except one since the June 4 election of a new president, which ended months of political crisis and fuelled hopes for an economic rebound. Tokyo fell as Japanese core inflation accelerated, stoked by a doubling in the cost of rice, a hot topic issue that poses a threat to Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba ahead of elections next month. There were also losses in Shanghai, Sydney, Singapore, Manila and Jakarta. The Middle East crisis continues to absorb most of the news but Trump's trade war remains a major obstacle for investors as the end of a 90-day pause on his April 2 tariff blitz approaches with few governments reaching deals to avert them being imposed. "While the worst of the tariffs have been paused, we suspect it won't be until those deadlines approach that new agreements may be finalised," said David Sekera, chief US market strategist at Morningstar.
IOL News
12 hours ago
- Politics
- IOL News
Iranian Embassy responds to Israeli aggression
Smoke billows from an explosion near the Azadi Tower in Tehran. The Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) building was struck in an Israeli attack on June 16, cutting live coverage immediately. The blast occurred as the presenter was live on TV lambasting Israel before she was seen leaving the live broadcast, Iranian media reported, sharing a video of the incident. Image: Atta Kenare / AFP Statement by the Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Pretoria In Response to the Aggression of the Zionist Regime Against the Sovereignty of Iran June 2025 In the Name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, The Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Pretoria strongly condemns the recent act of aggression by the Zionist regime against the sovereign territory of the Islamic Republic of Iran. In a deliberate and unlawful attack, the occupying and rogue regime targeted multiple sites in Tehran and other cities, including civilian neighbourhoods, military installations, and nuclear infrastructure. This heinous assault resulted in the martyrdom of some of Iran's most devoted military commanders, scientists, scholars, and innocent civilians, including women and children. It represents a blatant violation of Iran's national sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as a grave breach of international law. The Zionist regime's actions constitute a flagrant violation of Article 2(4) of the Charter of the United Nations and amount to an unprovoked act of aggression against a UN member state. In accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter, the Islamic Republic of Iran has reaffirmed its inherent right to self-defence and has acted within its legal framework to defend its people and sovereignty. Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Next Stay Close ✕ As conveyed in the official communications from Foreign Minister Dr Seyed Abbas Araghchi to the United Nations Secretary-General and the President of the Security Council, Iran has demanded urgent action by the international community to uphold peace and security and to hold the aggressor accountable. A separate letter has also been submitted to the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in response to the targeted strike on peaceful nuclear facilities, requesting an emergency session of the Board of Governors. These violations would not happen without the direct support and coordination of the United States and its allies, whose role in enabling and encouraging such reckless acts cannot be ignored. The responsibility for the consequences of this aggression lies not only with the Zionist regime but also with all those who support and shield it. The Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran reiterates the country's firm commitment to international peace, multilateralism, and the principles of international law. Iran will continue to pursue diplomatic and legal tools and channels while safeguarding its national security with resolve and responsibility. The Embassy expresses its sincere appreciation to the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) of the Republic of South Africa for its clear and principled stance in condemning the violation of Iran's sovereignty by the Zionist regime. This position reflects South Africa's longstanding commitment to justice, peace, and the rule of international law.
Yahoo
a day ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
A New Middle East Is Unfolding Before Our Eyes
Demonstrators wave flags as they gather before a mockup of Jerusalem's Dome of the Rock during a rally in solidarity with the government against Israel's attacks on Iran in Tehran on June 14, 2025. Credit - Atta Kenare—AFP/Getty Images It might be difficult to discern through the black clouds billowing from bomb craters in Tehran, but Iran has spent most of the 21st century as the region's rising power. Until recently, things had really been going its way. In Iraq, the U.S. toppled Saddam Hussein, then departed, having turned Iran's largest and most dangerous neighbor from an enemy to a vassal even before Tehran's militias rescued Baghdad from ISIS, and then stayed. The forces Iran sent to Syria did double duty, rescuing the Assad regime while opening an arms pipeline to Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militia fighting beside them. Based in Lebanon, Hezbollah was the crown jewel in the 'Axis of Resistance' that Iran had arrayed against Israel. And for more than 80 years, opposition to Israel had defined the Middle East. For the Islamic Republic of Iran, it still does. Removal of the Jewish state from 'Islamic lands' is core to the ideology of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, which casts Iran in the unlikely role of leader of the Muslim world. America is the Great Satan, but for Iran's proxies in Baghdad, Lebanon, and Yemen, Israel is the target. So on the eve of Oct. 7, 2023, the leaders of Hamas, the only prominent Palestinian node in the axis, had reason to assume that after breaching Israeli defenses on the Gaza Strip and pouring into Israel by the thousands, they would not be fighting alone for long. But the axis of resistance barely resisted at all. Hezbollah launched a few missiles a day toward Israel when the 'Zionist entity' was most vulnerable. Iran's leaders had scanned the battlefield, and, seeing an opponent backed not only by U.S. arms and intelligence, but also a nuclear arsenal, remembered why they were investing in one of their own: survival. In the words of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, creator of the theocratic system that governs Iran, 'The preservation of the system is the highest priority.' Solidarity with the Palestinians was laudable, but there's also such a thing as self-interest. The problem, for both Iran and the Palestinian cause, is that the rest of the Middle East had already come to the same conclusion. During the two decades Iran was extending its military reach in the name of the Palestinians, the wealthy kingdoms of the Persian Gulf had been making common cause with the Jewish state. The fact is, most of the Arab world had made some accommodation or other with Israel. Egypt and Jordan, which share borders with Israel, signed peace treaties with it after suffering repeated military defeats at its hands. The Gulf states aligned with Israel in large part out of a shared enmity for Iran. As home to Islam's dominant Sunni branch, the kingdoms know Iran not only as radical, but as the nominal leaders of the minority Shi'ite branch, and thus a rival. Saudi Arabia, custodian of Islam's holy sites, has its own claim to leadership of the world's Muslims. As autocratic states, the Gulf kingdoms were also eager clients for an Israeli tech sector that had grown out of its military. Surveillance, not least of millions of Palestinians under occupation (and obliged to use Israeli phone systems), generated startups like the spyware firm NSO Group, which soon found clients in the Arab regimes. One, the United Arab Emirates, was the first nation to cement diplomatic ties with Israel under the Abraham Accords, the signal diplomatic achievement of the first Trump Administration. Three other Arab states followed, and the Saudis keep signaling their intention to do the same once the situation in Gaza permits. But Gaza churns on, a war Israel had not expected, and has no plan to win, because at bottom it's not a military affair. The Palestinian question—What to do about the people who claim the same land Jewish Israelis do?—will still be waiting when the shooting stops. The war on Iran, by contrast, is one Israel spent years planning for, and opened with the playbook of deception, decapitation, and precision strikes on missile sites that decimated Hezbollah in the space of a month last September, freeing Israelis from the dread of the militia's 100,000 missiles, and exposing Iran to the Israeli offensive that began June 13. Read more: How Netanyahu Pushed Trump Toward War That day, a shepherd posted cell phone footage of an Israeli C-130 low in the sky over Syria, sheep bells clanking over the roar of the engines. The Assad family had fled the country months earlier, helpless to keep rebels out of Damascus without Hezbollah. Iran sent a plane to evacuate its generals to Tehran. There, the question is how Israel will choose to define victory. Regime change did not go so well in Iraq. And the stated goal of demolishing Iran's nuclear facilities appears impossible without U.S. airstrikes. That decision rests with Donald Trump. His choice may alter the region in unforeseen ways. But by reaching past the Palestinians to embrace Israel, as well as the sheiks of the Gulf, the U.S. President already has described the contours of its new, more transactional reality. In 1945, the mere prospect of an Israeli state inspired a boycott by every Arab one, in the name of the Palestinians. Eighty years later, an Arab nation can declare outrage that 55,000 have been killed in Gaza, then dispatch jets to intercept Iranian missiles aimed at Tel Aviv, joining Israeli warplanes in the skies over a new Middle East. 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Wall Street Journal
2 days ago
- Wall Street Journal
White House: U.S. Isn't Joining Attacks on Iran
Smoke billows from an explosion near the Azadi Tower in Tehran on Monday. (Atta Kenare/AFP/Getty Images)
IOL News
4 days ago
- Politics
- IOL News
Israel-Iran conflict a threat to the international system, say world leaders
A fire blazes in the oil depots of Shahran, northwest of Tehran, on June 15 after further attacks from Israel. Image: Atta Kenare / AFP ISRAEL and Iran traded deadly fire for a fourth day yesterday in their most intense confrontation in history, fuelling fears of a drawn-out conflict that could engulf the Middle East. The longtime foes have fought a prolonged shadow war through proxies and covert operations, with Israel battling several Iran-backed groups in the region, including Hamas in the Gaza Strip since October 2023. In a major campaign launched early Friday, Israeli fighter jets and drones struck nuclear and military sites in Iran, also hitting residential areas and fuel depots. Iran's health ministry says at least 224 people have been killed and more than 1,200 wounded. Tehran has responded with barrages of missiles and drones that hit Israeli cities and towns, killing at least 24 people and wounding 592 others, according to the prime minister's office. Israel has also killed many top military commanders and atomic scientists in Iran as part of an offensive that officials say seeks to end nuclear and missile threats from the Islamic republic. The Israeli military said that after a wave of strikes yesterday, its forces had destroyed one third of Iran's surface-to-surface missile launchers. "We have now achieved full air superiority over Tehran," said military spokesperson Effie Defrin. That followed a wave of intense air raids across the country, from the western border with Iraq to the capital Tehran and as far east as Mashhad, where the airport was hit. Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Next Stay Close ✕ Ad loading In Tehran early Monday, Israel said it hit command centres belonging to the Quds Force, the foreign operations arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The Israeli army later issued an evacuation order for Tehran's northern District 3, stating in the coming hours it "will operate in the area, as it has in recent days throughout Tehran, to strike military infrastructure of the Iranian regime". Reza Sayyad, spokesperson for the Iranian armed forces, said their targets in Israel included "sensitive and important" security sites as well as "the residences of military commanders and scientists". Sayyad, in a televised address, vowed a "devastating response" to the Israeli attacks, while the Revolutionary Guards in a statement warned they would hit more "vital targets" in Israel "until its complete destruction". Residential areas in both countries have suffered, with Israel accusing Iran of deliberately targeting civilians. After deadly overnight missile fire, Defence Minister Israel Katz warned that "the residents of Tehran will pay the price -- and soon". The conflict has rapidly escalated despite calls from world leaders to halt the attacks.
