• Minister Khatib does not immediately refer to any specific incident.
• “Those who act in this direction are enemy’s agents,” says Khatib.
• During war, US vetoed an Israeli plan to kill the supreme leader.
  

Iran’s intelligence ministry has warned of attempts by foreign adversaries, including the United States and Israel, to target supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and destabilise the Islamic republic.

The country’s ISNA news agency reported on Saturday that intelligence minister Esmail Khatib cautioned “the enemy seeks to target the supreme leader, sometimes with assassination attempts, sometimes with hostile attacks”.

While it was not immediately clear if the minister was referring to a specific incident, and Iranian officials often allege foreign plots, statements on threats against Khamenei’s life had been rare prior to a 12-day war between Israel and Iran in June.

“Those who act in this direction, knowingly or unknowingly, are the infiltrating agents of the enemy,” Khatib added, referring directly to Israel and the United States.

During the conflict earlier this year, Israel targeted senior Iranian military officials, nuclear scientists and sites as well as residential areas, with the US later joining with strikes on key nuclear facilities.

Asked about reports during the war that US President Donald Trump vetoed an Israeli plan to kill the supreme leader out of concern it would escalate the Iran-Israel showdown, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was dismissive but said the move would “end the conflict”.

At the time, Trump had also said that Iran’s supreme leader was a “very easy target” and that “we are not going to take him out, at least not for now.”

He later said in a post on Truth Social that he had saved Iran’s supreme leader from “A VERY UGLY AND IGNOMINIOUS DEATH”.

The 86-year-old Khamenei has been Iran’s supreme leader since 1989 and has the final say on all state affairs.

Earlier this month, Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian said he was particularly concerned for Khamenei’s life during the war and feared that the country’s institutions “would start fighting among each other.”

In July, Khamenei said Israel’s attacks during the war were intended to weaken the Islamic republic, sow “unrest and bring people into the streets to overthrow the system”.

A ceasefire between Iran and Israel has been in place since June 24, but both Israel and the United States have threatened new strikes if Tehran revives its nuclear programme.

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said late Saturday that six Democrats involved in a video calling on military officers to refuse illegal commands “should be in jail.”

The Republican leader’s remarks came after he accused the Democratic lawmakers on Friday of “seditious behaviour, punishable by death.”

Democrats slammed Trump’s comments as “absolutely vile” threats against the six senators and representatives, all of whom have served in the military or intelligence community.

Trump took to social media on Saturday night, writing:

“THE TRAITORS THAT TOLD THE MILITARY TO DISOBEY MY ORDERS SHOULD BE IN JAIL RIGHT NOW, NOT ROAMING THE FAKE NEWS NETWORKS TRYING TO EXPLAIN THAT WHAT THEY SAID WAS OK.”

He said that the Democrats’ message was “SEDITION AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL” and that “THERE CAN BE NO OTHER INTERPRETATION OF WHAT THEY SAID”.

The video posted on social media Friday called on the military to “refuse illegal orders” and featured Arizona’s Mark Kelly, Michigan’s Elissa Slotkin, along with Jason Crow of Colorado, Chris Deluzio and Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania and Maggie Goodlander of New Hampshire.

They did not specify which orders they were referring to, but Trump has ordered the National Guard into multiple US cities, in many cases against the wishes of local officials, in a bid to bring alleged rampant unrest under control.

Abroad, Trump has also ordered strikes on a series of alleged drug-smuggling vessels in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean that have left more than 80 people dead and which experts say are illegal.

Trump has alluded to the death penalty on previous occasions.

In 2023, former US military officer Mark Milley told a journalist he had secretly called his Chinese counterpart after the January 6, 2021 riots at the US Capitol to reassure Beijing that the United States remained “stable” and had no intention to attack China.

Trump subsequently wrote on social media that “in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH!”

• Crash at Dubai Airshow clouds export drive, say analysts.
• Light combat jet crucial for India’s military modernisation.
• Experts say too early to pinpoint cause of crash.

The crash of India’s Tejas fighter in front of global arms buyers at the Dubai Airshow is the latest blow to a key national trophy, leaving the jet reliant on Indian military orders to sustain its role as a showcase of home-built defence technology.

The cause of Friday’s crash was not immediately known but it capped a week of jockeying for influence at the event, attended by India’s arch-rival Pakistan six months after the neighbouring foes faced off in the world’s largest air battle in decades.

Such a public loss will inevitably overshadow India’s efforts to establish the jet abroad after a painstaking development over four decades, experts said, as India paid tribute to Wing Commander Namansh Syal, who died in the crash.

Crash at showcase event in Dubai

“The imagery is brutal,” said Douglas A Birkey, executive director of the US-based Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, referring to the history of crashes at air shows where nations and industries seek to tout major national achievements.

“A crash sends quite the opposite signal: a dramatic failure,” he said, adding, however, that while the Tejas would suffer negative publicity, it would most likely regain momentum.

Dubai is the world’s third-largest air show after Paris and Britain’s Farnborough, and accidents at such events have become increasingly rare.

In 1999, a Russian Sukhoi Su-30 crashed after touching the ground during a manoeuvre at the Paris Airshow, and a Soviet MiG-29 crashed at the same event a decade earlier. All crew members ejected safely, and India went on to place orders for both jets.

Fighter sales “are driven by high order political realities, which supersede a one-off incident,” said Birkey.

Powered by GE engines

The Tejas programme began in the 1980s as India sought to replace vintage Soviet-origin MiG-21s, the last of which retired as recently as September after numerous extensions due to slow Tejas deliveries by Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd.

The state-owned company has 180 of the advanced Mk-1A variant on order domestically, but has yet to begin deliveries due to engine supply chain issues at GE Aerospace.

A former HAL executive who left the company recently said the crash in Dubai “rules out exports for now”.

Target markets included Asia, Africa, and Latin America, and HAL also opened an office in Malaysia in 2023.

“The focus for the coming years would be on boosting production of the fighter for domestic use,” the former executive said, requesting anonymity.

But the Indian Air Force is worried about its shrinking fighter squadrons, which have fallen to 29 from an approved strength of 42, with early variants of the MiG-29, Anglo-French Jaguar and French Mirage 2000 set to retire in the coming years.

“The Tejas was supposed to be their replacement,” an IAF officer said. “But it is facing production issues”.

As an alternative, India is considering off-the-shelf purchases to fill immediate gaps, with options including more French Rafales, two Indian defence officials said, adding that India still plans to add to about 40 Tejas already in service.

India is also weighing competing offers from the U.S. and Russia for 5th-generation F-35 and Su-57 fighters — two advanced models also rarely sharing a stage in Dubai this week.

‘Base’ for future programmes

India has for years been among the world’s biggest arms importers, but has increasingly projected the Tejas as an example of self-reliance with Prime Minister Narendra Modi taking a sortie in the fighter in November 2023.

Like most fighter programmes, the Tejas has fought for attention at the intersection of technology and diplomacy.

Development was initially held up partly by sanctions following India’s 1998 nuclear tests as well as problems in developing local engines, said Walter Ladwig, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in London.

But the jet’s long-term significance is “likely to lie less in sales abroad than in the industrial and technological base it creates for India’s future combat-aircraft programmes,” he said.