IPAN Calls on PM Albanese to forcefully urge the US to call in its political and military support for Israel's actions in Palestine/Gaza and Iran. At the meeting with President Trump he must make it clear that the Australian people want an end to wars and preparations for war with AUKUS and the upcoming Talisman Sabre exercise in Australia IPAN stands with US progressives SUPPORT IPAN www.ipan.org.au
“Trump must act immediately to suspend all military support to Israel and stop allowing US arms to fuel war crimes, mass civilian death, and regional collapse,” said one critic.
Progressive US lawmakers and human rights defenders demanded an end to unconditional American armed and diplomatic support for Israel after it launched a series of attacks on Iran early on Friday, reportedly killing senior military officials and civilians including nuclear scientists, women, and children in a dramatic escalation that Iranian leaders vowed to avenge.
Israeli forces carried out at least five waves of airstrikes, targeting not only Iran’s nuclear facilities but also its military leadership and capabilities, Al Jazeera reported. In addition to airstrikes, Israeli and international media reported that operatives from Mossad, Israel’s foreign spy agency, also conducted assassination and sabotage attacks in Iran.
The Israel Defence Forces claimed Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander-in-chief Major General Hossein Salami and Iranian Armed Forces chief of staff Major General Mohammad Bagheri were assassinated, as were numerous Iranian nuclear scientists.
IDF attacks targeted cities, including the capital Tehran, Natanz, Isfahan, Arak, Tabriz, and Kermanshah. Iranian television reports showed bombed-out apartment towers and said an unknown number of civilians, including women and children, were killed in the strikes.
The attack on Natanz — home to Iran’s primary nuclear enrichment facility — sparked fears of radiological contamination.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the attack — dubbed Operation Rising Lion — a “pre-emptive strike”, a dubious form of warfare previously waged by forces including imperial Japan during the bombing of Pearl Harbour and the George W. Bush administration in Iraq.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog said the attacks were meant to “neutralise an immediate and existential threat to our people”, an apparent reference to Iran’s nuclear program. Successive US administrations, including President Donald Trump’s, have concluded for decades that Iran is not trying to develop nuclear weapons.
During his first term, Trump unilaterally abrogated the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, also known as the Iran nuclear deal.
Last year, Israel and Iran carried out limited tit-for-tat attacks following the former’s assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, who led the Lebanon-based resistance group Hezbollah, and Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh.
This time, Iranian leaders vowed “severe punishment”, with fears that the US could be targeted due to its staunch support for Israel as it wages what the international community increasingly views as a genocidal war on Gaza. While US Secretary of State Marco Rubio claimed his country was not involved in the attacks, Israeli officials insisted there was close co-ordination with the Trump administration.
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei said on Friday that “in the early hours of today, the Zionist regime extended its filthy and bloodstained hand to commit a crime in our beloved country, exposing its vile nature more than ever by targeting residential areas”.
“With this crime, the Zionist regime has prepared a bitter and painful fate for itself – and it will undoubtedly face it,” Khamenei added.
As the world braced for Iran’s response to the attacks, US progressives called for a diplomatic solution and an end to American support for Israel.
“The Israeli Government bombing Iran is a dangerous escalation that could lead to regional war,” Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) said on social media.
She asserted that Netanyahu, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza and is facing a domestic criminal corruption trial, “will do anything to maintain his grip on power”.
“We cannot let him drag our country into a war with Iran,” she added. “Our government must stop funding and supporting this rogue genocidal regime.”
Referring to negotiations on a new Iran nuclear deal, Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) said: “Just as talks with Iran were set to resume, Netanyahu launches a strike and declares a state of emergency. He is provoking a war Americans don’t want.
“We should not allow ourselves to be dragged into yet another conflict, against our will, by a foreign leader pursuing his own agenda of death and destruction.”