The head of Crisis-Making Serpent in Tehran

The head of Crisis-Making Serpent in Tehran / Russian Footprints in Fueling the Tension

The recent tensions in the Middle East, initiated and supported by the Islamic Republic for the killing, assault, and hostage-taking of Israeli citizens starting on October 7 of last year, have led to surprising and perhaps interesting outcomes after a year.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (R) meets with Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on July 30, 2024. (Photo via KHAMENEI.IR / AFP)

The leader of the Islamic Republic, who hypocritically claimed for months after the start of Hamas’s hostage-taking in October last year that he was unaware of the operation, recently expressed his full support for that operation in his Friday prayers sermon in Tehran. This indicates that he and the Revolutionary Guards were behind the scenes of the operation, despite extensive propaganda efforts to suggest that Hamas initiated the October operation independently and without their knowledge.

An image published on Ali Khamenei’s official website on September 25, 2019 showing Khamenei, the Iranian supreme leader, left, alongside Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, center, and Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani. (Khamenei.ir)

When Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Islamic Republic, issued the command for battle against Israel under the title “Al-Aqsa Storm” to his proxies in Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and

later Hezbollah in Lebanon, he never imagined that he was making the greatest political and military mistake of his life. He assumed that, as in the past, after a few days of fighting and the hypocritical outcries of so-called human rights-defending governments and organizations, the flawed cycle of ceasefire with Hamas in Cairo would repeat. The Hamas leaders, as in previous years, would comfortably go from their luxurious hotels in Qatar to Cairo to sign another fruitless

A Houthi supporters raises a Palestinian flag and a machine gun, during a rally to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the war in the Gaza Strip, in Sanaa, Yemen, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. Arabic reads, ” Al-Aqsa Floods”. (AP Photo/Osamah Abdulrahman)

ceasefire agreement, and then wait for Ali Khamenei’s next order for another attack on Israel, followed again by a ceasefire, and so on.

Netanyahu put an end to this dirty game, while the leaders of the Islamic Republic, over the past year (since the beginning of Israel’s attack on Gaza), have been imploring all the governments of the world to mediate and establish a ceasefire to save Hamas and Hezbollah!

Almost no political analyst, even in Iran, denies that the leader of the Islamic Republic follows Putin’s orders, and the Middle East was the only place Putin could enter to distract

File – From left to right: Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister and Putin’s Special Envoy to the Middle East Mikhail Bogdanov, and Hamas head of international relations Mousa Abu Marzouk, during a trilateral meeting in Moscow on October 26, 2023. (Hamas Telegram channel)

NATO and the West, diverting their attention from Ukraine and its armament! The scandal broke when Hamas leaders, after the October 7 disaster last year, headed to Moscow to get the necessary approvals from the Kremlin for their actions!

The Russians, of course, started the game carefully. In exchange for Tehran’s cooperation in the Ukraine war, the Kremlin sent its military advisors to the Houthi-controlled Yemen to provide necessary training to the Shia fighters who have repeatedly targeted Israel and attacked ships in the Red Sea like pirates.

The Insider magazine confirmed a few months ago in a detailed report that Yemen’s Ansar Allah recognized the Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine, and Hezbollah in Lebanon, another Tehran-backed proxy group, sent mercenaries to Russian war fronts in exchange for Russian weapons and money. Moscow did not overlook courting Hasht Alshabie as another Iranian proxy force. The Russian ambassador in Iraq has repeatedly met with leaders of this militant militia group, and Hasht Al-shabie has supported Russian attacks on Ukraine at every opportunity. They have even been regular guests at most Iftar banquets hosted by Russian officials, alongside Hezbollah of Iraq.

However, Moscow has no qualms about playing a double game with the Islamic Republic, and if there is any conflict of interest with Tehran, the Russians are neither restrained nor

An image shared by Iranian official press agency IRNA to highlight growing economic ties between Tehran and Moscow (IRNA)

polite. When the Islamic Republic became a nuisance for the Kremlin in Syria, Moscow openly declared at every opportunity that it was not interested in the presence of Iranian military advisors in Syria. All of this, along with the Russian stance against Tehran during the Arab statement on the three islands, showed that the Kremlin has the slightest regard for Tehran’s interests. The leaders of the Islamic Republic, who had previously received no positive response from China—given that Beijing showed no interest in the 25-year agreement or involvement in Iran’s oil and gas fields—sought a way to break out of complete political isolation by sending weapons to Russia. The Kremlin took full advantage of this confused and unstable situation of the Islamic Republic for its own reasons:

1-The Islamic Republic’s involvement in the Middle East could gradually reduce Tehran’s influence in Syria through Tel Aviv’s strikes, as the IRGC was excessively expanding its authority and territory within Syria, which was pushing the Russians back.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian walk during their meeting on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia, Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024. (Maxim Shemetov, Pool Photo via AP)

2- After Haniyeh’s removal in Tehran, the Russians considered retaliation as Iran’s legitimate

right and, in a way, sought to provoke the Islamic Republic to respond to Israel and create direct conflict between the two countries.

3-  Two days before the second missile attack by the Islamic Republic on Israel, a high-ranking Russian official made a nighttime visit to Tehran for several hours and held talks with several political and security officials!

People receive medical treatment at the scene of Russian shelling, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Oct. 10, 2022. Two explosions rocked Kyiv early Monday following months of relative calm in the Ukrainian capital. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

4- Moscow’s control over Iran-backed proxy militias and its use of them to harm Western and NATO interests (through extortion over the Crimea crisis) seems apparent yet covert!

The Kremlin uses these levers (proxies) to portray the center of crisis not in Ukrine but in the Middle East.

When the Mullahs Become More Brazen!

On the other hand, Tehran itself was not entirely reluctant to engage directly in the Middle East conflict. The Islamic Republic’s initial assessment was that Israel would not dare to confront Tehran directly, allowing them to use “the threat of Israel” as a pretext to gain sympathy in the international community and exploit the leniency and naivety of the U.S., France, and the United Nations, while continuing to develop their nuclear weapons. It soon became evident that the U.S. was strongly opposed to any Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, which gave Tehran the necessary green light. Consequently, members of the Iranian Parliament and the political office of the IRGC in Iran immediately began to more openly discuss the goal of achieving nuclear weapons.

This shift in the balance did not end here. After the White House opposed Israel’s potential plan to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities, the Islamic Republic became more emboldened. Araqchi, the Iranian Foreign Minister, during a trip to Saudi Arabia, told a reporter that Iran provides full military support to its proxy forces (paraphrased).

This clearly shows that the source of sedition—and the so-called head of the snake—is in Tehran, and it’s absolutely relevant to say that the mullahs of the Islamic Republic are arming terrorist and proxy groups in the region. Although these acts of malice result in the killing of many innocent people, Tehran’s continued wickedness has led Arabs to feel profoundly insecure due to the rulers of the Islamic Republic, pushing them toward peace with Israel. Indeed, it was observed that Khamenei’s Arabic sermon in Tehran’s Friday prayers was not only unwelcome but also met with considerable indifference from Arab nations and governments.

Are the Russians the Winners of the Regional Crisis?

It appears that in the “crisis game” in the Middle East, Russia’s role in escalating events has

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov speaks with journalists prior to Russian President Vladimir Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu talks in the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2019. The talks are expected to focus on the situation in Syria. (Maxim Shemetov/Pool Photo via AP)

been significant yet relatively quiet. The Kremlin asserts that the West blames Russia for the Ukraine situation while showing little reaction to Israel’s attacks on Gaza. By drawing this parallel, Russia aims to reduce Western support for Ukraine or at least elicit silence regarding Crimea. It seems Moscow has been somewhat successful in this strategy, as even when Putin speaks about the killing of civilians in Gaza, no one criticizes him for the civilian casualties in Ukraine.