TOP HEADLINES:

• France, Germany, and UK Say Iran continues to develop nuclear program and install centrifuges
• Blinken’s Meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman Open and Candid
• Erdogan to Appoint First Female Head of the Central Bank Amid the Lira’s Decline
• United States Urges Israeli Military to Reassess Use of Lethal Force After Killing a Palestinian Child
• Aid has reached only 3% of stricken people in Khartoum, World Food Program says

IRAN

1. French, German, and British statement: Iran continues to develop its nuclear program and install centrifuges (Alarabiya). In a joint statement on Tuesday, France, Germany, and Britain announced that Iran continues to install advanced centrifuges to enrich uranium and that its stockpile of enriched uranium is more than 21 times the permissible limit.
2. E3, US Issue Statement On Iran As UN Nuclear Meeting Opens (Iran International). As the International Atomic Energy Agency’s board of governors began its quarterly meeting Tuesday, countries expressed concerns over Iran’s activities.
3. Iran’s President to Visit Latin America (Tasnim News). Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi will leave Tehran on June 11 for a three-nation tour of Latin America.

GULF REGION & YEMEN

4. Blinken’s Meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman Open and Candid (The National). US Secretary of State Antony Blinken held “open and candid” talks with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Jeddah early Wednesday, a US official said…Meeting after midnight in the seaside city, a US official said the senior officials spoke for an hour and 40 minutes. They discussed the wars in Yemen and Sudan.
5. Kuwait Eelects Opposition-led Parliament Featuring One Woman (Nahar Net). Opposition lawmakers won a majority in Kuwait’s parliament in the Gulf state’s seventh general election in just over a decade, with only one woman voted into office, according to results announced on Wednesday.
6. Houthi Militia Setting up Launchers for Rockets and Drones in Ma’rib and Al-Jawf (Al Arabiya). The Houthi militia transported ballistic missiles from its warehouses in Sana’a to the governorates of Ma’rib and Al-Jawf, in northeastern Yemen and installed them in positions it occupies on the battle fronts.
7. GCC Launches Gulf-European Conference to Combat Extremist Ideology (Alkhaleej Online). The Gulf Cooperation Council announced the launch of the Gulf-European Conference on Combating Extremist Ideology, with the participation of specialists from the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and the concerned authorities in the Council and the European Union.
8. Saudi-American Statement Calls for Sudanese Talks in Jeddah on Facilitating Humanitarian Aid (Alarabiya). Washington and Riyadh “call on the parties to agree on a new ceasefire and to implement it effectively to build a permanent cessation of military operations.”
9. Bahrain: We Aspire to Enhance Cooperation with Türkiye After Erdogan’s Victory (Al Khaleej Online). Bahraini Deputy Prime Minister Sheikh Khalid bin Abdullah Al Khalifa said that the relations between his country and Turkey are strong and based on respect and understanding, expressing Manama’s aspiration to enhance cooperation and trade exchange with Ankara after the elections in which President Recep Tayyip Erdogan won.
10. Canada’s Arms Exports Boom to Saudi Arabia, Israel, Qatar (Al Monitor). Some 92% of Saudi Arabia’s purchases were armored combat vehicles, with most of the shipments coming from a $15 billion contract reached in 2014 but only approved for export by Canada’s current government.

TURKIYE

11. Erdogan to Appoint First Female Head of the Central Bank Amid the Lira’s Decline (New Arab). The US Bloomberg Agency and Turkish media said that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is heading to choose Hafeza Ghaya as head of the Turkish Central Bank to succeed his current president, Shihab Qafji Oglu, as the first woman to hold this position in the country, at a time when the price of the Turkish lira witnessed a sharp decline in Dealings on Wednesday. 
12. Turkish Troops Wrap up Deployment to Kosovo (Daily Sabah). The last batch of troops from the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) arrived in Kosovo late Tuesday after the NATO member joined a joint task force to de-escalate ethnic tensions in the Balkan country.
13. Mitsotakis Says Will Seek out Erdoğan at NATO Summit if Elected (Daily Sabah). Greece’s former Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, the front-runner in national elections on June 25, said on Tuesday that if he wins, he will try to meet President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at next month’s NATO summit in the Lithuanian city of Vilnius.

Syria

14. ISIS Attacks Increase Against the SDF in Northeastern Syria (Zaman Al Wasl). Members of the “Syrian Democratic Forces” (SDF) were killed and wounded on Tuesday as a result of attacks claimed by cells of the “Islamic State” organization in the countryside of Al-Hasakah Governorate, northeastern Syria.
15. Iranian Militias Kill five civilians East of Homs (Zaman Alwasl). 5 civilians working in the wheat harvest were killed on Tuesday as a result of an attack carried out by military groups affiliated with Iranian militias in the eastern countryside of Homs governorate, within the Syrian desert.
16. Greek Airline To Operate Direct Flights Between Damascus and Athens (Enab Baladi). The Director General of Civil Aviation of the Syrian regime, Bassem Mansour, announced the operation of direct flights between Damascus and the Greek capital, Athens. And according to what was reported by the official Syrian News Agency ( SANA ), yesterday, Sunday, June 6, the Damascus-Athens line will later connect with the German cities of Dusseldorf and the Swedish capital, Stockholm. The company operating the flights, according to Mansour, is the “Air Mediterranean” company, and according to Mansour, it is scheduled to operate one flight per week. 

ISRAEL AND PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES

17. United States Urges Israeli Military to Reassess Use of Lethal Force After Killing a Palestinian Child (Times of Israel). On Tuesday, the United States urged Israel to investigate its use of lethal force during military operations among civilians, a day after a two-year-old Palestinian boy was accidentally shot dead by Israeli troops during a crossfire in the West Bank last week.
18. Israel Threatens to “Bomb Lebanon Into Stone Age” if Hezbollah Starts War (Nahar Net). Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has threatened to bomb Hezbollah and Lebanon “into the stone age” if the Lebanese, Iran-backed group “makes a mistake” and “starts a war against Israel.”
19. OECD Projects More Moderate Growth for Israel, Citing Judicial Overhaul Tensions Risk (Times of Israel). International economic organization slightly lowers Israeli GDP forecast to 2.9% in 2023 and 3.3% in 2024, notes underperformance of shekel and local stock market.
20. For the Second Time in Months, Israeli Finance Minister Smotrich is Boycotted During Visit to France (Aljazeera). Israeli newspapers said – today, Wednesday – that French officials and leaders of major Jewish organizations in France boycotted Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich during his visit to Paris because of his extremist positions that sparked angry international reactions.

EGYPT AND NORTH AFRICA 

21. Aid has reached only 3% of stricken people in Khartoum, World Food Program says (The National). As fighting between Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the army enters a second month, the World Food Programme (WFP) says aid has reached only 3 per cent of people in need in Khartoum. Abdel Mageed Yahia, WFP UAE country director and representative for the GCC, told The National lack of access in Sudan was “unprecedented” in comparison to other war zones in the region.
22. Algeria Elected to UN Security Council (Sky News Arabia). On Tuesday, the United Nations General Assembly elected Algeria, Guyana, Sierra Leone, Slovenia, and South Korea to membership in the UN Security Council for two years starting on January 1, 2024, while Belarus allied with Russia in its war on Ukraine, failed to obtain a seat.
23. Egypt Wants Gaza Border Crossing to Return to Palestinian Authority Control (Jerusalem Post). The terminal, the only crossing point between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, has been under Hamas’ control since its violent takeover of the Gaza Strip in 2007.
24. Postponement of the Official Signing of the Bouznika Agreement Regarding Elections in Libya (New Arab). On Tuesday night, Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita announced the delay of the official signing of the “Bouznika Agreement” on electoral laws in Libya, which will frame the legislative and presidential elections.

LEBANON

25. Assad Calls for Dialogue and Consensus in Lebanon in Meeting with Aoun (Nahar Net). Former president and Free Patriotic Movement founder Michel Aoun held a meeting Tuesday in Damascus with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad…A statement issued by Aoun’s office said the ex-president briefed Assad on “the dangerousness of the European stance that is rejecting the return of the displaced Syrians to their country and seeking to integrate them into the Lebanese society.”
26. Hezbollah, Allies Coordinate Steps Ahead of Presidential Vote (Nahar Net). After Speaker Nabih Berri called for a presidential election session, a media report said Hezbollah and the Amal Movement launched coordination meetings to study the choices that can be taken in the face of the rival camp’s plan.

JORDAN

27. Jordan Thwarts Attempt to Smuggle a Shipment of Captagon into its Territory from Syria (Enab Baladi). The Jordanian customs at the Jaber-Nassib border crossing thwarted an attempt to smuggle 67 kilograms of the narcotic “Captagon,” which was prepared inside a secret cache “in a technical way,” according to a statement issued by the Jordanian Customs Department.

IRAQ

28. Prominent ISIS Leader killed in an operation north of Baghdad (Al Arabiya). Today, Wednesday, the Baghdad Operations Command and the Security Media Cell in Iraq announced the killing of four ISIS members, one of them a prominent leader, in a security operation in the north of the Iraqi capital…Adnan al-Luhaibi, the ISIS “governor of north Baghdad,” was killed in an elaborate ambush.
29. US Ambassador: Changing Iraq’s System of Government is a Matter for the Iraqis Themselves (Mustaqila). The US ambassador to Iraq, Alina Romanowski, considered that the issue of changing the Iraqi system belongs to the Iraqis themselves, noting that her focus is in another direction…The American ambassador said in an interview with the Iraqi Shafaq News agency, “This question is directed to the Iraqis. My focus is on expanding the 2008 Strategic Framework Agreement between the United States and Iraq beyond security into a comprehensive relationship that delivers results for the Iraqi people.”
30. Iraqi Security Closes 20 Smuggling Routes Between Iran and Iraq (Iraqi News).  An Iraqi official confirmed on Tuesday that the Iraqi border forces embarked on a security plan to close illegal smuggling routes in the eastern Diyala governorate near the borders with Iran.