Iranian President Criticizes Azerbaijan for Establishing Relations with Israel

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Monday criticized Azerbaijan for establishing relations with Israel, in an indirect hint at Baku’s appointment of its first ever ambassador to Israel last March.

The president made the remarks in a meeting in Tehran with Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov who is on a visit to the Iranian capital for the Second round of the 3+3 Regional Platform Meeting dubbed Time for Peace, Cooperation, and Progress in the South Caucasus.

“The Zionist regime is neither your friend, nor the friend of any other Muslim country,” Raisi said, adding that the situation in Gaza is an image before all the regional countries to see that the Westerners, especially the US, are not friends of regional countries and rather seek their racist interests.

Tensions between Tehran and Baku escalated for a month after Azerbaijan improved its diplomatic relations with Iran’s arch-enemy Israel, and opened an embassy in Israel in late March, despite Iran’s objections.

Iran had also accused Azerbaijan and the Iraqi Kurdistan Region of being behind attacks on its military and nuclear facilities. It said the assaults carried Israeli prints.

In July, Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen accused Iran of planning an attempted attack on his country's embassy in Azerbaijan, where security apparatuses have arrested an Afghan citizen for plotting the attack against the embassy.

On Monday, the Iranian President said his country considers negotiation and dialogue between neighboring countries as a solution to regional issues.

Raisi said after meeting with Bayramov that problems of the region cannot be solved with the intervention of foreign forces.

Bayramov is on a visit to the Iranian capital for the Second round of the 3+3 Regional Platform Meeting, which was also attended by the foreign ministers of Russia, Türkiye and Armenia to discuss the South Caucasus region's issues. The Georgian minister did not attend.

IRNA said the meeting focused on the developments going on in the Caucasus region, as well as peace talks between Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Armenia and Azerbaijan have been at loggerheads over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Recently, the two countries recently signaled willingness to sign a peace treaty formally ending their conflict following Azerbaijan's victory in Karabakh and the exodus of almost all the region's 120,000 ethnic Armenians.

On Monday, Azerbaijan said it had begun a series of joint military exercises with close ally Türkiye, the first since Baku retook the breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh last month.

Azerbaijan's defense ministry said in a statement that the drills were being held across Azerbaijan, including in Baku, the Nakhichevan exclave which borders Türkiye, and in what the ministry called the “liberated territories” of Karabakh.

It added that up to 3,000 military personnel were participating in exercises named for the founder of modern Türkiye, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

Türkiye, which supports Azerbaijan, and Russia, which is an ally of Armenia, play a major role in the region.

However, the latest attack on Karabakh has reshuffled the cards. Yerevan blamed Russia for failing to ensure Armenian security and to stop Azerbaijani forces, a claim that Moscow denies.

Yerevan fears that its wealthier, better-armed, and Turkish-backed neighbor may seek to bolster its influence by linking the Nakhchivan exclave to its territory after attacking southern Armenia.

Meanwhile, Armenia seems ready to resort to western countries to ensure its own protection.

“Iran, considering its powerful and influential position, is ready to help resolve the existing discords between Azerbaijan and Armenia,” Raisi told the Azerbaijani FM.

For his part, Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said, “The presence of outsiders in the region will not only fail to solve any problems but will also complicate the situation further.”

He added, “The war in South Caucasus has ended, and it is time for peace and cooperation.”

Meanwhile, Abdollahian referred to the recent developments in Gaza.

“What is happening in Gaza is a definite war crime committed by the Zionist entity against humanity,” he affirmed, calling on the international community to send a unified and strong message to the Israeli entity to stop war crimes against civilians immediately, lift the siege, send humanitarian aid, and oppose the forced displacement of the population of Gaza.

A leading US government agency that tracks foreign disinformation has terminated its operations, the State Department said Tuesday, after Congress failed to extend its funding following years of Republican criticism.
The Global Engagement Center, a State Department unit established in 2016, shuttered on Monday at a time when officials and experts tracking propaganda have been warning of the risk of disinformation campaigns from US adversaries such as Russia and China, AFP reported.
"The State Department has consulted with Congress regarding next steps," it said in a statement when asked what would happen to the GEC's staff and its ongoing projects following the shutdown.
The GEC had an annual budget of $61 million and a staff of around 120. Its closing leaves the State Department without a dedicated office for tracking and countering disinformation from US rivals for the first time in eight years.
A measure to extend funding for the center was stripped out of the final version of the bipartisan federal spending bill that passed through the US Congress last week.
The GEC has long faced scrutiny from Republican lawmakers, who accused it of censoring and surveilling Americans.
It also came under fire from Elon Musk, who accused the GEC in 2023 of being the "worst offender in US government censorship [and] media manipulation" and called the agency a "threat to our democracy."
The GEC's leaders have pushed back on those views, calling their work crucial to combating foreign propaganda campaigns.
Musk had loudly objected to the original budget bill that would have kept GEC funding, though without singling out the center. The billionaire is an advisor to President-elect Donald Trump and has been tapped to run the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), tasked with reducing government spending.
In June, James Rubin, special envoy and coordinator for the GEC, announced the launch of a multinational group based in Warsaw to counter Russian disinformation on the war in neighboring Ukraine.
The State Department said the initiative, known as the Ukraine Communications Group, would bring together partner governments to coordinate messaging, promote accurate reporting of the war and expose Kremlin information manipulation.
In a report last year, the GEC warned that China was spending billions of dollars globally to spread disinformation and threatening to cause a "sharp contraction" in freedom of speech around the world.

Iranian President Criticizes Azerbaijan for Establishing Relations with Israel