Rubio says Iran has lost control of Hormuz, its economy is in 'freefall'

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei accused the United States of using false flag operations to justify the war against Iran in an X post Wednesday.

“Manufacture the incident, assign the blame, and harvest the consequences,” Baghaei wrote, arguing that US and international public opposition to the war created an incentive for what he called fabricated incidents.

Baghaei accompanied the post with a video portraying Iran as the target of past and potential false-flag operations. The video presented a series of historical and recent incidents, including alleged plots involving Iran’s neighbors, the UK airbase bomb plot and the FlyDubai flight incident, as attempts to attribute attacks to Tehran and draw other countries into the war.

Efforts to mediate between Washington and Tehran have reached a deadlock, Al Hadath reported Wednesday, citing a senior source close to the negotiations.

Iran’s ambassador in Paris was rebuked over what France said was a disinformation campaign concerning student protests in the country, the French Foreign Ministry said Wednesday.

The ministry said Iran’s decision to summon the French ambassador in Tehran on October 6 was baseless and called for such “provocations” to end. It said the Iranian envoy was informed that false content disseminated by official Iranian Foreign Ministry accounts was unacceptable.

Tehran had summoned French Ambassador Pierre Cochard on Tuesday over what it described as excessive police violence against student protesters, citing more than 5,000 arrests, serious injuries and reports of police entering schools.

The United States assesses that it can put Iran’s resilience under strain within the next two weeks and is seeking with Israel to foment street unrest, Iranian lawmaker Ali Khezrian said in an X post Wednesday.

“The Zionist regime and the Americans are seeking to create a street uprising through their domestic agents,” Khezrian said.

Weekly flights to Karachi have restarted from Tehran and Mashhad, with one service from each city under the new schedule, airline official Mahmoud Ansari told IRNA Wednesday.

Ansari said the carrier also currently operates international flights from Tehran and Mashhad to Istanbul, as well as services from Tehran and Isfahan to Najaf.

Two Iranian women posing as Israelis were detained in Namibia while traveling with fake Hungarian passports, Israeli media reported Wednesday.

Namibia initially told Israeli authorities that the detainees were Mali and Liel Yahalomi, a mother and daughter who left Israel in August and were later located in Argentina.

Further checks by an Israeli representative found that the women detained in Namibia were Iranian and not the Yahalomis.

Hezbollah received $200 million from Iran last month to help Lebanese displaced by this year’s war with Israel, Reuters reported on Wednesday, citing two people with direct knowledge of the transfer.

The money was sent despite tighter US financial pressure on Iran and growing difficulties in transferring funds to Hezbollah, according to the report.

Intermediaries who moved the money charged a 20% fee because of the risks involved, with one source saying that was four times the usual rate.

A Hezbollah official told Reuters that funds had been secured and that a distribution plan would be announced in the coming days, but did not identify the source of the money.

More than 90% of Iran’s foreign trade by weight and over 80% by value is carried by sea, making the uninterrupted operation of maritime transport crucial to the country’s economic stability, Ports and Maritime Organization chief Mohammad Shakibi Nasab said Wednesday.

President Masoud Pezeshkian told Russian President Vladimir Putin that Iran remains prepared to reach an agreement to end the war with the US and Israel, provided Tehran’s national interests and rights are protected, Fars reported Wednesday.

“Iran is fully prepared to reach a balanced and fair agreement that ensures lasting peace and security in the region,” Pezeshkian said during a phone call with Putin.

“If the United States adheres to international legal frameworks, reaching an agreement is not out of reach,” he added.

Pezeshkian also said Tehran was prepared to cooperate with neighboring countries to establish regional security without the involvement of “extra-regional countries.”

A new mural in Tehran’s Fatemi Square depicts a Chinese dragon swallowing a US eagle alongside the words, “The eagle becomes the dragon’s prey,” written in Persian, Chinese and English.

The mural comes as Tehran continues to tout its strategic partnership with Beijing despite recent signs of strain in ties.