The Levant Files

Iran has executed political prisoner Erfan Shokourzadeh after accusing him of cooperating with U.S. intelligence and Israel’s Mossad, according to Mizan, the judiciary’s news agency, as reported by Iran International. The execution took place on May 11. Mizan stated that the case involved alleged collaboration with “the U.S. intelligence service and the spy service of Mossad.” Shokourzadeh was reportedly recruited by a prominent scientific organization active in the satellite field due to his professional expertise, though the institution was not named. The judiciary-affiliated outlet alleged that he had transferred classified information to “enemy services,” but did not provide documentary evidence. Iran International reported that Shokourzadeh was arrested in February 2025 by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ intelligence organization on charges of espionage and cooperation with hostile countries. He was held in solitary confinement for nine months. In the days leading up to the...

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi has been transferred from a hospital in Zanjan to Pars Hospital in Tehran after authorities suspended the enforcement of her prison sentence to allow medical treatment, according to Iran International, citing her lawyer Mostafa Nili and the Narges Foundation. Nili said late Sunday that the order was issued following a forensic medical opinion that Mohammadi needed treatment outside prison and under the supervision of her own doctors because of what he described as “multiple illnesses,” Iran International reported. He added that she was moved by ambulance from Zanjan and admitted to Pars Hospital in Tehran. The Narges Foundation said Mohammadi had spent 10 days hospitalized in Zanjan before being transferred for urgent treatment by her own medical team in Tehran after the posting of what it called a “heavy bail” and the postponement of her sentence, according to Iran International. The foundation thanked the international community for its sol...

A quiet but significant transformation is reshaping Yemen's military command structure: Salafi commanders, once confined to mosques and religious outreach, are now holding senior leadership positions across the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC)-controlled governorates, backed by Saudi Arabia's strategic and financial support. According to the Middle East Eye, g awed, a 43-year-old Salafi preacher from Lahj governorate, embodies this shift. Before 2015, he traveled between mosques teaching a strictly apolitical interpretation of Islam — a tradition inherited from Salafi scholar Muqbil al-Wadi'i, who established a religious centre in Dammaj, Saada, in the 1980s. When the Houthis advanced into Lahj, Gawed and his followers took up arms. "We didn't fight for political reasons; we fought to protect our lands and our faith from the Houthis as they tried to invade our villages and distort Islam," he told Middle East Eye. The Salafi movement's path to military...

Ankara capitalises on Gulf insecurity and US supply backlogs to cement its role as a major regional defence partner As conflict reshapes the security calculus of the Middle East, Turkey is quietly positioning itself as the region's go-to arms supplier — transforming instability into a strategic and commercial windfall. Writing from Ankara for Middle East Eye, correspondent Ragip Soylu reports that Gulf and Arab states are increasingly turning to Turkish defence manufacturers as Washington's delivery pipelines for Patriot and THAAD systems remain backed up for years. The catalyst is stark: since the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran erupted in late February, Gulf states — Kuwait, the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia — have found themselves under mounting pressure. Iranian long-range drones have successfully destroyed several radar installations across the region, exposing critical gaps in their air defence architecture that existing systems were not designed to fill. Ankara moved swiftly to e...

As the United States and Iran remain locked in an escalating military standoff, one country appears to be reaping significant strategic and economic rewards: Russia. That is the assessment of Alexander Gabuev, director of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, who spoke with Foreign Policy editor in chief Ravi Agrawal in an interview published May 11. The most immediate benefit for Moscow is financial. According to Gabuev, every $10 rise in crude oil prices per barrel translates into approximately $100 million in additional monthly revenue for the Russian state and its energy companies combined. Citing calculations by his Carnegie colleague Sergey Vakulenko, Gabuev noted that Russia earned $9 billion from oil sales in April alone — double its pre-invasion oil revenues. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz has kept crude prices elevated, effectively functioning as a massive subsidy for Putin's war economy. But the windfall extends beyond oil. Gabuev identified three distinct advantages ...

Nearly half of Lebanese citizens oppose disarming Hezbollah — not out of loyalty to the Iran-backed militia, but because of deep-seated grievances against the Lebanese government itself, according to new research published in Foreign Policy. Writing in Foreign Policy on May 11, Nils Mallock, a research fellow at King's College London's Cross-Border Conflict Evidence, Policy, and Trends (XCEPT) program, and Nafees Hamid, the program's research and policy director, argue that conventional Western strategies for dismantling Hezbollah's arsenal are fundamentally misreading Lebanese public opinion. The findings come at a precarious moment. Lebanon launched its most ambitious Hezbollah disarmament plan last September, deploying Lebanese Armed Forces south of the Litani River and seizing weapons. But following U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran, Hezbollah's retaliatory rocket barrages into northern Israel, and Israel's subsequent air and ground campaign — which has killed mo...

A new regional security alignment is taking shape across the Middle East and South Asia, as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Pakistan, and Egypt draw closer together in what analysts describe as a strategic hedge against a retreating American presence — and a rising Israeli assertiveness in the region. Writing for his Substack  page, geopolitical analyst Ricardo Martins (May 10, 2026) argues that this emerging quadrilateral framework is not driven by religious solidarity but by cold strategic calculation. Drawing on political scientist Barry Buzan's theory of Regional Security Complexes, Martins contends that the four nations — the most militarily powerful Muslim-majority states in their respective subregions — have developed interlocking threat perceptions that are now translating into concrete defense cooperation. Each member brings distinct motivations to the table. Turkey, according to Martins citing Chatham House, is engaged in "opportunistic hedging," seeking leverage within N...

U.S. President Donald Trump has effectively squandered his deterrence against Iran through a cycle of unfulfilled threats and repeated concession offers, leaving Washington with few good options as the Gulf conflict enters a dangerous new phase, according to Amos Harel, military affairs analyst at Haaretz. Iran on Sunday rejected the latest American diplomatic proposal to end the war, despite sustaining severe economic damage and facing a vast military imbalance with the United States. Harel writes that Tehran's continued defiance stems directly from Trump's pattern of issuing bold warnings only to return to the negotiating table empty-handed — a pattern that has convinced Iranian leaders they hold the strategic upper hand. The standoff now centers on the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has effectively closed to international shipping. Tehran is demanding an end to hostilities, guaranteed maritime passage for its own interests, the lifting of international sanctions, and a binding...

In a move that would baffle most functioning democracies, Turkey's state broadcaster TRT has reportedly removed one of its prime-time news anchors from air after she committed the heinous, civilization-threatening act of announcing, on live television, that she too is — brace yourself — a mother of a furry animal. TRT 1's Ana Haber anchor Işıl Açıkkar, clearly unaware that she was sitting atop a powder keg of conservative outrage, closed her Mother's Day broadcast with the warmly innocent words: "Ben de bir patili annesiyim" — "I am also a mother with a pawed one." She was, of course, referring to her pet. Within hours, Turkey's social media moral police had mobilized with the kind of speed and fury usually reserved for actual emergencies. By the next day, Açıkkar had been quietly pulled from broadcast. TRT has yet to issue an official explanation, presumably because no press office has yet figured out how to write "we fired her for liking dogs...