International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi meets the deputy chief of the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran, Behrouz Kamalvandi, upon his arrival at Mehrabad International Airport in Tehran, Iran November 13, 2024. Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran/WANA
| Photo Credit: Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran

International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi is set to visit Tehran on Wednesday (November 13, 2024) for crucial talks on Iran’s nuclear programme, warning just ahead of his trip that room for manoeuvre is narrowing.

His visit comes only two days after the defence minister of Iran’s nemesis Israel warned the Islamic republic was “more exposed than ever to strikes on its nuclear facilities”.

Israel has long accused Iran of seeking to acquire nuclear weapons, a claim Tehran denies.

The two countries have traded missile strikes this year, as tensions soar over Israel’s war with Iran’s allies, Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The strikes have brought to the surface their years-long shadow war and fuelled fears of a wider Middle East conflict.

“The margins for manoeuvre are beginning to shrink,” Grossi said in an interview with AFP ahead of his visit, adding that “it is imperative to find ways to reach diplomatic solutions”.

While the IAEA is allowed to carry out inspections in Iran, Grossi stressed the need for “more visibility” into Iran’s nuclear programme, given its scale and ambition.

“They have a lot of nuclear materials that could be used eventually to make a nuclear weapon, the IAEA chief told CNN on Tuesday, adding: “They do not have a nuclear weapon at this point.”

Trump’s warning

Grossi’s trip comes after Donald Trump — who pulled out of a hard-won nuclear deal with Iran negotiated under Barack Obama — was voted back into the White House.

Mr. Trump said last week that he was not seeking to harm Iran and instead wanted its people to have “a very successful country”, while insisting “they can’t have a nuclear weapon”.

In 2015, major world powers including the United States reached an agreement with Iran on its nuclear programme after 21 months of talks.

The text provided for an easing of international sanctions on Iran in exchange for guarantees that it would not seek nuclear weapons.

But Mr. Trump withdrew from the agreement in 2018 before re-imposing US sanctions on Iran.

A year later, Iran started to gradually roll back its commitments to the nuclear deal, which only allowed Tehran to enrich uranium to 3.65 percent purity.

The IAEA says Iran has considerably increased its reserves of enriched uranium to 60 percent, close to the 90 percent needed to develop an atomic bomb.

It is against this backdrop that Grossi is schedule to visit Iran for the first time since May.

In a statement, the IAEA said it would hold “high-level meetings with the Iranian government” and conduct “technical discussions on all aspects”.

Cameras unplugged

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, who came to office in July with hopes of improving ties with the West and having sanctions lifted, favours a revival of the nuclear deal.

But all efforts to get the nuclear agreement off life support have so far failed.

The IAEA chief has repeatedly called for more cooperation from Iran.

In recent years, Tehran has decreased its interaction with the UN agency by deactivating surveillance devices needed to monitor the nuclear programme and effectively barring its inspectors.

The foundations of Iran’s nuclear programme date back to the late 1950s, when the United States signed a civil cooperation agreement with Iran’s then Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

In 1970, Iran ratified the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which requires signatory states to declare and place their nuclear materials under the IAEA control.

But with Iran threatening to hit back at Israel for its latest missile strikes, some lawmakers in the Islamic republic have called on the government to revise its nuclear doctrine to pursue nuclear weapons.

The parliamentarians called on supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who wields ultimate authority in Iran, to reconsider his long-standing religious edict or fatwa banning nuclear weapons.

The Islamic republic has maintained its policy against acquiring nuclear weapons, insisting its nuclear activities were entirely peaceful.

A handout picture provided by the office of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on October 27, 2024, shows him waving before a meeting in Tehran.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Sunday (October 27, 2024) said Israel’s attack on the Islamic republic “should neither be exaggerated nor minimised”.

“The evil perpetrated by the Zionist regime (Israel) two nights ago must not be exaggerated or minimised,” he said in a post on X.

Without elaborating, he describing the deadly attack as a “miscalculation”.

On Saturday (October 26, 2024), Israel carried out air strikes against military sites in Iran in response to Tehran’s missile attack on October 1, itself a retaliation for the killing of Iran-backed militant leaders and a Revolutionary Guards commander.

Israel strikes on Iran highlights: Four Iranian soldiers killed by Israeli airstrikes; Hezbollah launches drone strike at Israeli airbase

At least four Iranian soldiers were killed in the attack which Iran said caused “limited damage” to a few radar systems.

The Israeli military has warned Tehran against responding.

Iranian officials and media have since downplayed the Israeli strikes, highlighting Iran’s defensive capabilities but issued no vows of a direct response.

Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian paid tribute to the killed soldiers, hailing their efforts in “defending their land without fear.”

Israel waited for almost four weeks to avenge the ballistic missile attack from Iran on October 1. Yesterday, Israeli fighter jets flew for over 1,000 kilometres and conducted “precise strikes” on military facilities in Tehran and nearby provinces.

Commuters drive along a street in Tehran on October 26, 2024. Residents of Tehran awoke and went about their business as planned on October 26 after their sleep was troubled by Israeli strikes that triggered blasts that echoed across the city.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Israel bombed military targets in Iran on Saturday (October 26, 2024), killing at least two soldiers, fulfilling a vow to avenge a missile barrage and stirring fears of a full-scale West Asia war.

Israel warned Iran would “pay a heavy price” if it responded to the strikes, and the United States and Britain both demanded Tehran not escalate the conflict further.

The Islamic republic insisted it had the “right and the duty” to defend itself, while its Lebanese ally Hezbollah said it had targeted a southern Israeli airbase and a northern intelligence base.

Confirming the strikes after explosions and anti-aircraft fire echoed around Tehran, the Israel military said it had hit Iranian missile factories and military facilities in several regions.

The “retaliatory strike has been completed and the mission was fulfilled”, while Israeli aircraft “returned safely”, a military spokesman added.

Iran confirmed an Israeli attack had targeted military sites in Tehran province around the capital and other parts of the country, saying the raids caused “limited damage” but killed two soldiers.

Direct attack

“Iran has the right and the duty to defend itself against foreign acts of aggression,” the foreign ministry said, citing Article 51 of the UN Charter.

Israel had vowed to retaliate after October 1, when Iran fired about 200 missiles in only the second ever direct attack against its arch-foe. Most of those missiles were intercepted but one person was killed.

The Israeli retaliation drew condemnation from Hamas, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria and Saudi Arabia, which warned against further escalation. Jordan stated that Israeli jets had not used its airspace.

Hezbollah, the Lebanese movement backed by Iran, said it had fired rockets at Israeli soldiers near the village of Aita al-Shaab in southern Lebanon, and launched drones against Israel’s Tel Nof air base.

Tel Nof is south of Tel Aviv and, if confirmed, the drone mission would be the militia’s first attempt to hit it in this round of fighting.

Israel is already engaged in combat on two fronts.

Since last month, it has been conducting a war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, including strikes that have killed senior leadership and ground incursions seeking to destroy missile sites.

And, for more than a year since Hamas launched the October 7 cross-border attack, Israel has been fighting a war in Gaza that has caused mass civilian casualties in the densely populated Palestinian territory.

The United Nations has warned the “darkest moment” of that conflict was unfolding, with Palestinians facing a dire humanitarian crisis and daily Israeli bombing.

Along with Hezbollah and Hamas, Iranian-allied groups in Yemen, Iraq and Syria, have carried out attacks during the fallout from the Gaza war.

At roughly the same time as Israel struck targets in Iran, the Syrian state news agency SANA said an Israeli air attack targeted military positions in central and southern Syria.

Israel strikes back. Iranian military bases in the capital Tehran and other cities were struck by missiles earlier today. The attack is a ‘response’ to Iran’s air strikes on October 1 when over 200 rockets and ballistic missiles rained down on Israel to avenge the killing of ally Hezbollah’s chief, Hassan Nasrallah. 

The early morning strikes “caused limited damage”, says Iran but Israel claims that it now has “wider freedom” to open in skies over Iran. The aftermath of the strikes resulted in a complete lockdown of the airspace in Iran, Syria and Iraq. 

As per FlightRadar24, an open-source flight tracking website, no aircraft is flying over the three countries. However, Iran has now announced that it will resume flights after the attacks.

Syria said Israel launched air strikes from the occupied Golan Heights and Lebanon on the capital Damascus, prompting them to activate air defence systems. Syria is part of the Iran-led ‘Axis of Resistance’, a group of Shia militias and political groups, against Israel and the US in the region.

Iraq said it is preserving the safety of civil aviation in its airspace and decided to lockdown the skies after the attacks. Prohibiting airspace after attacks is part of standard operation procedures of states for security reasons to prevent intrusion of enemy aircraft in the territory and make it easy for air defence systems to identify friendly aircraft in the airspace.

For Updates: Air Strikes On Iran Military Targets Completed, Says Israel

‘Will Face Proportional Reaction’

The tensions never simmered in the region and now Iran says it is ready to respond to the ‘act of aggression’.

Iran is prepared to respond to any Israeli “aggression,” Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency reported, citing sources. “There is no doubt that Israel will face a proportional reaction for any action it takes,” Tasnim quotes the sources as saying.

The Israeli army has warned Iran that it will “pay a heavy price” if it begins a new round of escalation. Iran said the attack caused “limited damage”.

The United States confirmed it was informed of the impending strike, although no US personnel or assets were involved in the operation. Sean Savett, spokesperson for the White House National Security Council, termed Israel’s actions as “an exercise of self-defence and in response to Iran’s ballistic missile attack against Israel.” 

“We urge Iran to cease its attacks on Israel so that this cycle of fighting can end without further escalation,” said US National Security Council spokesman Sean Savett.