United States has become a proxy of Israel

Historically, the United States has used many countries as its proxy, but lately, the super power has become a proxy of Israel. Many of our readers may raise eyebrows on our expression, but they are advised to read today’s post dispassionately.

According to pentagon, the US military struck more than a dozen Houthi targets in Yemen on Friday, attacking the bases and weapons systems.

US Central Command (Centcom) forces conducted strikes on 15 Houthi targets around 5.00pm local time. The targets included “Houthi offensive military capabilities,” according to a statement from the command, which is responsible for protecting US interests in the Middle East.

“These actions were taken to protect freedom of navigation and make international waters safer and more secure for US, coalition, and merchant vessels,” the statement adds.

US officials earlier told The Associated Press that US military aircraft and warships bombed Houthi strongholds at roughly five locations.

Houthi media said the strikes hit Yemen’s capital Sanaa, the airport in Hodeida, the south of Dhamar city and the southeast of al-Bayda province — the latter of which has several Houthi military outposts.

The Houthi media also blamed the strikes on US and British forces, but the United Kingdom said it was not involved.

Houthi rebels have launched steady attacks on international shipping in the Red Sea near Yemen since last November. The air and sea attacks, which they say are in solidarity with Palestinians in Israel’s war with Hamas, have been met with US retaliatory strikes.

The Houthis earlier this week claimed to have shot down another American-made MQ-9 Reaper drone over Yemen, with the US military acknowledging it had lost a drone.

The militia group also claimed responsibility for an attack aimed at three US ships in the Red Sea. US officials say Navy destroyers intercepted the two Houthi drones and more than half a dozen missiles and that there was no damage to its vessels, according to the AP.

The American strikes in Yemen also come amid the backdrop of a growing regional escalation after Iran’s major missile attack on Israel this week in response to a ramped-up Israeli airstrike campaign in Lebanon against the Tehran-backed Hezbollah.

 

No supporter of Palestinians except Iran

On Monday October 07, a year of Israeli genocide in Gaza will complete. A new front has been opened in Lebanon. Israel and Iran have attacked each other.

 Following are the takeaways from conflict: 1) Israel has emerged superior due to extensive support from the United States and European countries, 2) Iran has received many dents because of lack of support from other countries, 3) Iran is virtually alone, most of its missiles have been intercepted by Arab Muslim countries and 4) oil rich Arab countries are under the hegemony of United States and avoid even condemning Israel. 

Therefore, Iran has two option 1) accept Israel’s hegemony or 2) continue to support Palestinians and accept killing of its people.

The chances of getting any support from oil rich Arab countries are the least.

Iranian leader defends strikes on Israel

Iran's missile strikes on Israel were "correct, logical, and lawful", Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told a vast crowd that had gathered to hear him speak in Tehran on Friday.

The supreme leader described the attack as the "minimum punishment" for what he called Israel's "astonishing crimes" while leading Friday prayers in the capital, something he has not done since 2020.

Khamenei's speech came three days after Iran fired nearly 200 missiles at Israel, in what it said was retaliation for the assassination of Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah.

The Farsi-speaking supreme leader delivered part of his speech in Arabic.

During his sermon, Khamenei praised Nasrallah and voiced support for Hamas and Hezbollah, which he said provided "vital service to the entire region and the entire Islamic world".

He said Iran-aligned armed groups "will not back down" in their conflict with Israel, which entered a new phase after Hamas raided Israel almost one year ago.

Iran is the main supporter of Hezbollah and Hamas, as well as other armed groups around the Middle East which have attacked Israel. They often dub themselves the "Axis of Resistance".

In recent weeks, several senior leaders of Iran-backed groups and Iran's powerful military wing, the Revolutionary Guards, have been killed in Israeli strikes or presumed Israeli assassinations.

The supreme leader's appearance in front of a crowd of tens of thousands in Tehran is a sign of the gravity of the moment for the Iranian regime, which is facing widespread domestic discontent.

It could be read as an attempt to show strength and restore Iran’s credibility as leader of the “Axis of Resistance”.

The public appearance was also intended to show that Khamenei is not in hiding, after reports emerged that he had been taken to a secure location following Nasrallah's assassination.

The Grand Mosalla Mosque was flooded with people after Iranians were given free transport to attend the sermon. A large Palestinian flag was seen in the crowd. Khamenei holds ultimate power in Iran, but very rarely leads Friday prayers himself.

The last time he did was in 2020, after the US killed Iran's most senior military commander, Qassem Soleimani. The time before that was in 2012.

Iran is still reeling from the loss of its allies Nasrallah and Hamas's political leader Ismail Haniyeh, who was assassinated in Tehran in July.

Israel is widely considered to be behind Haniyeh's killing, though it has never commented on his death.

Khamenei also told the crowd that Iran would retaliate if, as expected, Israel launched a response to Tuesday's missile attack.

"If we needed to do that again, we would do it again in the future," Khamenei told supporters.

On Thursday, US President Joe Biden suggested a possible Israeli strike on Iran's oil infrastructure had been discussed, as Israel continued to weigh up how to strike back at Tehran.

Courtesy: Saudi Gazette

PSX benchmark index up 2.76%WoW

Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) continued its bullish momentum throughout the week ended on October 04 2024. With expectation of further interest rate cut and IMF’s EFF approval the benchmark KSE-100 index gained 2,240 points or 2.76%WoW to close at 83,532 points.

Overall, the bullish sentiments were driven by high dividend yielding sectors that included Fertilizers and E&P, as falling fixed-income yields led to a rerating of these sectors.

CPI dropped down 6.93%YoY in September 2024 since January 2021. Additionally, in the auction held on October 02, the yields for the 6-month and 12-month T-Bills decreased by 334 and 326 bps, respectively.

Trade balance for September 2024 posted US$1.78 billion deficit.

OMCs’ aggregate offtakes were reported at 1.27 million tons in September 2024, up 20%YoY

As against this cement offtakes for September 2024 were reported at 3.67 million tons, down 5%YoY, largely due to subdued domestic demand amid economic slowdown and higher constructions costs.

Average daily trading volume declined 12.1%WoW to 342.3 million shares, from 389.4 million shares traded a week ago.

Foreign exchange reserves held by State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) increased by US$1.2 billion WoW after the receipt of first trance from the IMF to US$10.7 billion as of September 27, 2024.

The PKR largely remained stable against the greenback throughout the week, closing the week at PKR 277.52 to a US$.

Other major news flow during the week included: 1) Pakistan and Russia ink barter deal to boost agri trade 2) Refineries demand action on key issues before upgrades, 3) Pakistan and Malaysia pledge to deepen ties, 4) IPPs talk status remains under wraps and 5) the GoP buys back PKR351 billion treasury bills.

Textile Spinning, Leather & Tanneries, Oil & Gas Exploration Companies, Fertilizer and Tobacco were amongst the top performers, on the other hand, Modarbas, Vanaspati & Allied Industries, Close-End Mutual Funds, Woollen & Inv. Banks/ Inv. Cos/Securities Cos. were amongst the worst performers.

Major net selling was recorded by Foreigners with a net sell of US$26.1 million. Mutual Funds absorbed most of the selling with a net buy of US$26.1 million.

Top performing scrips of the week were: AIRLINK, NCPL, PKGP, PPL, and FFC, while laggards included: TRG, FHAM, INIL, EPCL, and EFUG.

According to AKD Securities, following the approval of the IMF’s executive board and the subsequent receipt of the first tranche of US$1.02bn, market sentiments are poised for improvement.

Additionally, easing inflation with September 2024 CPI reported at 6.93%YoY, coupled with ongoing monetary easing, is expected to keep equities in focus, with the market trading at an attractive P/E of 3.6x and a DY of 13.1%.

The brokerage house recommends the sectors benefiting from monetary easing and structural reforms, particularly high dividend yielding stocks, which are expected to rerate as yields align with fixed income returns. 

Message for Biden, No War with Iran

The day President Joe Biden said his administration and Israeli leaders were discussing an attack on Iranian oil infrastructure, a coalition of over 80 advocacy groups implored the US leader to halt Israel's march toward regional war.

The National Iranian-American Council (NIAC) led the groups in a letter to Biden asserted that it is not in the national interest for the US to be led into a war with Iran by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government.

The letter's signatories include Just Foreign Policy, Friends Committee on National Legislation, IfNotNow, US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, CodePink, Peace Action, and the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.

"The primary ask behind this letter is that the Biden administration utilize the significant leverage it has to rein in Netanyahu as he continues to proceed with a consistently failed 'de-escalation through escalation' approach throughout the region that has cost countless civilian lives," NIAC explained.

As stated in the letter, "It is in the strong national interest to utilize diplomacy, backed by full American leverage—including withholding further offensive weapons transfers to Israel's military—to move all the parties back from the brink and toward a cease-fire that ends the devastation of Gaza and Lebanon and reverses the slide to regional war."

"Moreover, we urge you to recognize and respect that Congress has not authorized military force against Iran or militias backed by Iran, and that any potential military action against Iran could only proceed following a debate and passage of a war authorization before entering our troops into any imminent hostilities in the region," the groups continued.

"President Biden has recently spoken of steps he has taken to wind down America's military footprint abroad," the letter adds. "However, unless he acts quickly and decisively through diplomacy, it appears that a new endless war will be his legacy."

The US provides Israel with billions of dollars worth of armed aid and diplomatic cover for its yearlong war on Gaza, which has killed or wounded more than 148,000 Palestinians and is the subject of an International Court of Justice genocide case.

Fears of a full-blown regional war have mounted recently as Israel escalates hostilities by assassinating Hamas and Hezbollah leaders in Tehran and Beirut and as Israeli forces invade southern Lebanon accompanied by a bombing campaign that has left thousands of Lebanese dead and wounded.

Hezbollah, the Lebanon-based political and paramilitary group, has been engaged in limited cross-border projectile attacks on Israel in solidarity with Gaza, resulting in scores of deaths and injuries.

"The wars in the Middle East are just getting more and more dangerous, not only with Lebanon, but now with Iran," CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin said Wednesday in a video urging Americans to call their members of Congress to demand peace. "Netanyahu has been trying to drag the US into a war with Iran for years, and unfortunately, there are many members in this Congress... who are all too eager to go along with him."

Benjamin highlighted remarks by US lawmakers including Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) who said Tuesday that attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities are "fair game."

"Let's remember it's Israel that has nuclear weapons, not Iran," said Benjamin, who added that attacking Iran would encourage Tehran's allies "to strike US soldiers in the region."

Benjamin also noted Sen. Robert Wicker's (R-Miss.) call for regime change in Tehran—one of the latest in a long line of such calls over the past 45 years—and admonished US officials for "forgetting the disastrous attempts of regime change that the US did recently in Iraq, in Libya, in Afghanistan," and that "the present government in Iran is there precisely because of the US overthrowing their democratically elected government in 1953."

"We want to live in peace," Benjamin added. "We want to stop supporting the genocide that Israel is carrying out... We don't want any more weapons sent to the region... We the American people don't want war with Iran. We want to live in peace."

 

Courtesy: Common Dreams

Iran’s Missile Assault on Israel, US perspective

Iran launched at least 180 ballistic missiles at Israel in a massive two-wave assault on October 01, 2024. Millions of civilians sought protection in bomb shelters. The risk of a regional war mounted as Jerusalem pledged retaliation.

Iran “made a big mistake – and it will pay for it,” warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “We will keep to the rule we have determined: Whoever attacks us – we attack them.” US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said that there would be “severe consequences” for Iran’s “significant escalation.”

Iran’s second direct attack on Israel in five months was retaliation for Israel’s killing of three men:

·         Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas political chief who was killed on July 31 in Tehran

·         Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader who was killed on September 27 in Beirut

·         Brig. Gen. Seyyed Abbas Nilforoushan, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander who was killed in the same airstrike in Beirut

Reportedly, most of the Iranian missiles were intercepted by Israeli forces or US Navy destroyers or landed in open areas.

Israel’s layered air defenses include the Arrow 2 and Arrow 3, which are designed to intercept ballistic missiles. 

Jordanian forces also downed missiles.

Several missiles impacted in central and southern Israel but caused minimal damage. Two Israelis were slightly injured by shrapnel in Tel Aviv. But no Israeli fatalities were reported. One Palestinian civilian in the West Bank city of Jericho was also killed.

Iran’s primary targets appeared to be the headquarters of the Mossad spy agency in Tel Aviv, Tel Nof Air base in central Israel, and Nevatim Air Base in the southern Negev Desert, which houses advanced F-35 warplanes.

Iran said that Hatzerim Air Base in the Negev Desert was also a target. Some of the bases were hit, but no aircraft, munitions or critical infrastructure were damaged.

The attack “appears to have been defeated and ineffective, and this is testament to Israeli military capability and US military,” President Joe Biden told reporters on October 01.

Iranian officials claimed that the attack, dubbed Operation True Promise 2, was a resounding success. The IRGC said that 90 percent of the missiles hit their targets.

President Masoud Pezeshkian boasted that Israel’s air defenses were “more fragile than glass” and vowed a “more crushing response” to any retaliation.

Iran’s mission to the United Nations said that the assault was a “legal, rational, and legitimate response” to what it labeled as “terrorist attacks” by Israel. Iranians gathered to show their support for the armed forces on October 01 and 02 in Tehran and in the provinces.

The attack, dubbed Operation True Promise 2, appeared to be Iran’s attempt to establish deterrence against Israeli attacks on its territory as well as its allies in the so-called “Axis of Resistance.”

The death of Nasrallah following devastating strikes on Hezbollah commanders, weapons and infrastructure was a huge blow to Iran’s longstanding “forward defense” doctrine.

For decades, the Islamic Republic has relied on its militia allies across the Middle East to pressure Israel and deter strikes on Iranian soil. Hezbollah — sitting on Israel’s northern border with an arsenal of rockets, missiles and drones — was the centerpiece of this strategy.

Operation True Promise 2 was a follow-on to Tehran’s April 13-14 unprecedented assault on Israel, Operation True Promise.

The first attack was retaliation for Israel’s April 01 airstrike on Iran’s diplomatic mission in Damascus that killed three Revolutionary Guards generals as well as other military officials.

The October attack was approximately twice the size of the April assault in terms of scope, according to an initial Pentagon assessment.

Iran also exclusively fired ballistic missiles, including advanced Fattah-1 and Kheibar Sheykan models, which can travel to Israel within 12 minutes and are difficult to intercept.

The April attack included a wider variety of weapons but was easier for Israel to repel.

Iran launched 170 suicide drones, more than 120 ballistic missiles, including older types, and more than 30 cruise missiles.

Israel reported that 99 percent of the weapons were shot down or intercepted before even reaching Israel, with help from US, Jordanian and other unnamed regional players.

Cruise missiles, which take some two hours to reach Israel, and drones, which can take up to nine hours to reach Israel, are easier to shoot down and allow more time for defensive preparations.

Israel retaliated on April 19 with a strike that was calibrated to avoid further escalation but also send Iran a clear message.

Israeli warplanes, from outside of Iranian airspace, reportedly fired three missiles at an air defense radar system, part of the security umbrella over the Natanz nuclear facility. Not only did the missiles damage the target, they went undetected.

Courtesy: US Institute of Peace

 

Israel bans UN chief in row over Iran

The Secretary General of the United Nations, António Guterres, has been banned from entering Israel over his response to Iran's ballistic missile bombardment.

In a statement, Israel's Foreign Minister Israel Katz called Guterres an "anti-Israel secretary general who lends support to terrorists".

Writing on social media site X, formerly Twitter, after Iran fired about 180 missiles into Israel, Guterres said he condemned "the broadening of the Middle East conflict with escalation after escalation" and said these "must stop".

He said the region "absolutely" needed a ceasefire, but did not specifically mention the Iran attack.

In a statement on Wednesday, Katz declared the UN secretary general persona non grata, saying that anyone who "cannot unequivocally condemn Iran's heinous attack on Israel does not deserve to step foot on Israeli soil".

He specifically criticized Guterres for "his anti-Israel policy since the beginning of the war".

Tuesday's attack by Iran is the latest in a series of escalations, starting almost a year ago with attacks on Israel by Hamas, and recently involving increased fighting between Iran-backed Hezbollah and Israel.

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to the unprecedented attack on southern Israel on October 07, 2023 by Hamas gunmen, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage

Since the attack, a military campaign in Gaza has now killed a total of 41,689 people, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

Over the course of the conflict, there have been a number of clashes between Israel and the United Nations about the situation in Gaza and the West Bank.

There has also been friction between Israel and the UN over the role of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.

In January 2024, Israel alleged that a number of the agency's staff members had been involved in the October 07 attacks.

In response to this, the agency launched an investigation - with a number of its international funders withdrawing support for it, before later reinstating it. In August, nine staff members were dismissed over potential involvement in the attacks.

During the conflict, UNRWA has criticized Israel for air strikes in Gaza which have killed its staff members.