In Court filings made public Friday, Prosecutor Karim Khan urged judges weighing the arrest warrants sought against Israeli officials and Hamas leaders to not delay. [_link]

— Middle East Monitor (@MiddleEastMnt) August 24, 2024

'No Unjustified Delays' - ICC Prosecutor Urges Ruling on Warrants for Israeli Leaders | Palestine Chronicle |

'Sapere aude'

Lapid:On Sep 20 I held a presser and said, Something horrible is going to happen. I'd been at PMO for security briefing; Netanyahu was there. The red flags, warnings, he ignored them all. That's why he shouldn't have been PM since Oct 8 [_link] via @timesofisrael

— David Horovitz (@davidhorovitz) August 24, 2024

Iran is waging its own war on terror | Responsible Statecraft | 22 Jan 2024 |

Just like the US should [but does not] show restraint in retaliating against its enemies, Tehran must too

When terrorist attacks occur in Iran, they rarely generate media coverage, showing an unfortunate indifference to Iranian lives. However, Iran too wages its own war on terrorism. An examination of past attacks and how Iran responded demonstrates that the Islamic Republic's "harsh response" -- its own counter-terrorism strategy -- is an attempt to establish deterrence, as the U.S. and Israel seek to do the same in the region.

The spiral of violence in January 2024

On Dec. 25, 2023, an Israeli strike killed Iranian general Seyed Razi Mousavi in Damascus. At the same time, the U.S. targeted the Iraqi militia Kataib Hizballah, which cooperates with the Islamic Republic, in retaliation for allegedly launching drones at U.S. forces in Erbil.

On Jan. 1, 2024, the U.S. sunk three attacking speedboats in the Red Sea, killing 10 Houthis. On Jan. 2, an Israeli drone strike killed Hamas's deputy leader Saleh al-Arouri in Beirut. On Jan. 3, the ISIS attack in Iran occurred. On Jan. 4, the U.S. assassinated "Abu Taqwa," a mid-level leader of the Iraqi militia Harakat [Hezbollah] al-Nujaba in a drone strike in Baghdad, for his role in attacks on American targets in the region, allegedly at the behest of the Islamic Republic.

• IntelBrief: Mideast Crisis Puts Anti-ISIS Mission at Risk

Then the U.S. and UK launched air strikes on Jan. 11 and 17th on Houthi targets all over Yemen, a militia allied with Iran, followed three days later with the Israeli attack in Damascus. The Islamic Republic will see the timing of these attacks as intrinsically linked.

The ISIS terrorist attacks occurred near the tomb of General Qasem Soleimani, in his hometown, targeting mourners who had congregated there for the fourth anniversary of his assassination. Soleimani, who headed the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' (IRGC) Quds Force, was killed in the early hours of Jan. 3, 2020, by a U.S. drone strike.

There had been speculation about the various actors who may have conducted the attack. From the Islamic Republic's perspective, its enemies are ISIS and its branch in Afghanistan; Arab, Kurdish, and Baluchi separatists; the Iranian exile Mojahedin-e Khalq (MeK) Organization; as well as Israel and/or the U.S. Iran might very well blame all of those actors for working in unison.

The attack in Kerman bore the hallmarks of an ISIS operation and was claimed by the terrorist group. Ethnic separatists usually chose Iranian military targets. Israel tends to conduct targeted assassinations of Iranian scientists, or recently an Iranian general in Syria. But Islamic State's attacks are indiscriminate, and Soleimani did organize the Iraqi militias to combat the terrorist group in Iraq, giving ISIS a reason to retaliate.