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Iranian FM Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, a Hard-Line Diplomat, Dies in Helicopter Crash

The Iranian national flag flies at half-mast at the Iranian consulate, following the deaths of Iran's President Raisi and Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian, in Karachi, Pakistan, 20 May 2024. (EPA)
The Iranian national flag flies at half-mast at the Iranian consulate, following the deaths of Iran's President Raisi and Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian, in Karachi, Pakistan, 20 May 2024. (EPA)
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Iranian FM Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, a Hard-Line Diplomat, Dies in Helicopter Crash

The Iranian national flag flies at half-mast at the Iranian consulate, following the deaths of Iran's President Raisi and Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian, in Karachi, Pakistan, 20 May 2024. (EPA)
The Iranian national flag flies at half-mast at the Iranian consulate, following the deaths of Iran's President Raisi and Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian, in Karachi, Pakistan, 20 May 2024. (EPA)

Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, Iran's foreign minister and a hard-liner close to the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard who confronted the West while also overseeing indirect talks with the US over the country's nuclear program, died in the helicopter crash that also killed the country's president, state media reported Monday. He was 60.

Amir-Abdollahian represented the hard-line shift in Iran after the collapse of Tehran's nuclear deal with world powers after then President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew the United States from the accord. Amir-Abdollahian served under President Ebrahim Raisi, a protege of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, and followed their policies.

He was close to Iran's Revolutionary Guard, once praising the late Gen. Qassem Soleimani, slain in a US drone strike in Baghdad in 2020.

Amir-Abdollahian served in the Foreign Ministry under Ali Akbar Salehi in 2011 through 2013. He then returned for several years under Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who was a key player in the nuclear deal reached under the administration of the relatively moderate President Hassan Rouhani.

But Zarif and Amir-Abdollahian had a falling out, likely over internal differences in Iran's foreign policy. Zarif offered him the ambassadorship to Oman, but he refused.

He became foreign minister under Raisi with his election in 2021. He backed the Iranian government position, even as mass protests swept the country in 2022 after the death of Mahsa Amini, a woman who had been detained earlier over allegedly not wearing a headscarf to the liking of authorities. The monthslong security crackdown that followed the demonstrations killed more than 500 people and saw more than 22,000 detained.

In March, a UN investigative panel found that Iran was responsible for the “physical violence” that led to Amini’s death.

During the Israel-Hamas war, Amir-Abdollahian met with foreign officials and the leader of Hamas. He also threatened retaliation against Israel and praised an April attack on Israel. He also oversaw Iran's response to a brief exchange of airstrikes with Iran's nuclear-armed neighbor Pakistan and worked on diplomacy with the Taliban in Afghanistan, with whom Iran had tense relations.

Amir-Abdollahian is survived by his wife and two children.

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On Lebanon Border, Israel and Hezbollah’s Deadly Game of Patience

Smoke is seen as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is intercepted following its launch from Lebanon, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, at Kibbutz Eilon in northern Israel, July 23, 2024. (Reuters)
Smoke is seen as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is intercepted following its launch from Lebanon, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, at Kibbutz Eilon in northern Israel, July 23, 2024. (Reuters)
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On Lebanon Border, Israel and Hezbollah’s Deadly Game of Patience

Smoke is seen as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is intercepted following its launch from Lebanon, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, at Kibbutz Eilon in northern Israel, July 23, 2024. (Reuters)
Smoke is seen as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is intercepted following its launch from Lebanon, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, at Kibbutz Eilon in northern Israel, July 23, 2024. (Reuters)

In deserted villages and communities near the southern Lebanon border, Israeli troops and Hezbollah fighters have watched each other for months, shifting and adapting in a battle for the upper hand while they wait to see if a full scale war will come.

Ever since the start of the Gaza war last October, the two sides have exchanged daily barrages of rockets, artillery, missile fire and air strikes in a standoff that has just stopped short of full-scale war.

Tens of thousands have been evacuated from both sides of the border, and hopes that children may be able to return for the start of the new school year in September appear to have been dashed following an announcement by Israeli Education Minister Yoav Kisch on Tuesday that conditions would not allow it.

"The war is almost the same for the past nine months," Lieutenant Colonel Dotan, an Israeli officer, who could only be identified by his first name. "We have good days of hitting Hezbollah and bad days where they hit us. It's almost the same, all year, all the nine months."

As the summer approaches its peak, the smoke trails of drones and rockets in the sky have become a daily sight, with missiles regularly setting off brush fires in the thickly wooded hills along the border.

Israeli strikes have killed nearly 350 Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon and more than 100 civilians, including medics, children and journalists, while 10 Israeli civilians, a foreign agricultural worker and 20 Israeli soldiers have been killed.

Even so, as the cross border firing has continued, Israeli forces have been training for a possible offensive in Lebanon which would dramatically increase the risk of a wider regional war, potentially involving Iran and the United States.

That risk was underlined at the weekend when the Yemen-based Houthis, a militia which like Hezbollah is backed by Iran, sent a drone to Tel Aviv where it caused a blast that killed a man and prompted Israel to launch a retaliatory raid the next day.

Standing in his home kibbutz of Eilon, where only about 150 farmers and security guards remain from a normal population of 1,100, Lt. Colonet Dotan said the two sides have been testing each other for months, in a constantly evolving tactical battle.

"This war taught us patience," said Dotan. "In the Middle East, you need patience."

He said Israeli troops had seen an increasing use of Iranian drones, of a type frequently seen in Ukraine, as well as Russian-made Kornet anti tank missiles which were increasingly targeting houses as Israeli tank forces adapted their own tactics in response.

"Hezbollah is a fast-learning organization and they understood that UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) are the next big thing and so they went and bought and got trained in UAVs," he said.

Israel had responded by adapting its Iron Dome air defense system and focusing its own operations on weakening Hezbollah's organizational structure by attacking its experienced commanders, such as Ali Jaafar Maatuk, a field commander in the elite Radwan forces unit who was killed last week.

"So that's another weak point we found. We target them and we look for them on a daily basis," he said.

Even so, as the months have passed, the wait has not been easy for Israeli troops brought up in a doctrine of maneuver and rapid offensive operations.

"When you're on defense, you can't defeat the enemy. We understand that, we have no expectations," he said, "So we have to wait. It's a patience game."