Out of the fog that claimed the life of Iran’s president, some clarity is emerging about Tehran’s next steps.

The bad news for Western capitals and those Iranian activists pushing for change is that there’s little hope of a relaxation of political oppression, or of the antagonism directed at the US and its allies, according to Western officials. They see the authoritarian regime as robust enough to carry on its current trajectory after Ebrahim Raisi’s death in a helicopter crash. 

ICC seeks arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Hamas leaders

The chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC) said on Monday he was seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar on war crimes charges.

Karim Khan said in a statement that the charges relate to the 7 October attack on Israel by the Hamas militant group, and also to the Israeli military response in Gaza. A panel of ICC judges will consider whether to accept the application.

The decision to seek charges against the Israeli leader comes despite a US warning that it could jeopardise the chance for a ceasefire deal. The Israeli government also slammed the move, calling it a “deep distortion of justice”.

“We submit that the crimes against humanity charged were committed as part of a widespread and systematic attack against the Palestinian civilian population pursuant to state policy,” Khan wrote. “These crimes, in our assessment, continue to this day.”

Khan is also seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and two other Hamas leaders, military chief Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al-Masri and political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh. Hamas is considered a terrorist organisation by the US and the European Union.

Netanyahu called the move “a moral outrage of historic proportions.” In a social media posting on X on Monday, he said the prosecutor “is callously pouring gasoline on the fires of anti-Semitism that are raging across the world”.

“Drawing parallels between the leaders of a democratic country determined to defend itself from despicable terror to leaders of a blood-thirsty terror organization is a deep distortion of justice and blatant moral bankruptcy,” Benny Gantz, an Israeli opposition leader in the country’s three-man war Cabinet, said in a post on X.

“The prosecutor’s position to apply for arrest warrants is in itself a crime of historic proportion to be remembered for generations,” he said. Israel’s foreign minister, Israel Katz, told state-owned broadcaster Kan that he would ask other foreign ministers to make clear they won’t enforce any warrants if they’re issued.

US President Joe Biden called Khan’s decision “outrageous”, saying in a statement on Monday that “whatever this prosecutor might imply, there is no equivalence — none — between Israel and Hamas”.

In a separate statement, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the US “fundamentally” rejected Khan’s move, saying that the decision “does nothing to help, and could jeopardise, ongoing efforts to reach a ceasefire agreement.”

Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid said before the US statements that he expected “that the Biden administration will stand behind us, and we expect Congress to come together and condemn these arrest warrants”.

Earlier this month, the ICC ordered an end to attempts to threaten its officials, days after the US and allies raised concerns that the court may issue arrest warrants for Israeli officials.

Europe was split over the move made on Monday, with some politicians welcoming the announcement. The request “for arrest warrants against both Hamas and Israeli officials is an important step in the investigation of the situation in Palestine”, Belgian Foreign Minister Hadja Lahbib said in a post on X, adding that crimes in Gaza must be prosecuted “at the highest level, regardless of the perpetrators”.

But the Czech Republic, which has long been a staunch supporter of Israel, condemned the inclusion of Israeli officials in the application.

“The proposal of ICC’s chief prosecutor to issue an arrest warrant on a representative of a democratically elected government together with leaders of an Islamic terrorist organization is frightening and absolutely unacceptable,” Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said on X.

The ICC investigates and tries individuals charged with genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of aggression. Israel hasn’t ratified the ICC’s statute and doesn’t recognise its jurisdiction but the State of Palestine has been a member of the court since 2015. The US has also never been a party to the ICC.

Last year, the court issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin for war crimes related to the alleged abduction of children from Ukraine, a move that was dismissed by the Kremlin.

Saudi king’s health, Iran president’s death spur succession bets

Out of the fog that claimed the life of Iran’s president, some clarity is emerging about Tehran’s next steps.

The bad news for Western capitals and those Iranian activists pushing for change is that there’s little hope of a relaxation of political oppression, or of the antagonism directed at the US and its allies, according to Western officials. They see the authoritarian regime as robust enough to carry on its current trajectory after Ebrahim Raisi’s death in a helicopter crash.

Less clear is how Raisi’s passing changes the calculus for whoever will eventually succeed the Islamic Republic’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who is in his mid-80s.

Those considerations, along with renewed questions over the health of Saudi Arabia’s elderly king, mean that the focus has turned to transition in each of the Middle East powers. That adds another layer of uncertainty, and potential instability, to months of regional turmoil triggered by the Israel-Hamas war.

“All of these developments are a great reminder that nobody controls the narrative, and the discussions about the state of Middle East risk and geopolitical risk more broadly are extremely fluid,” Tina Fordham, the founder of Fordham Global Foresight, told Bloomberg Television on Monday.

Last year, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan famously described the Middle East as “quieter today” than at any time in the past two decades — the week before Hamas attacked Israel and set off the war in Gaza.

As well as that conflict, and heightened tensions between Israel and Iran, is the fact that the 88-year-old Saudi King Salman is being treated for lung inflammation. That caused his son to scrap his travel plans and is another complicating factor in Washington’s push for a US defence agreement with Riyadh. That plan, which Iran opposes, would see the kingdom also normalise ties with Israel.

“Could the passing of the king interrupt that flow or perhaps reduce the risk appetite for considering something like that?” Fordham asked. “I am inclined to say no, but it does put a spanner in the works for the diplomacy underway.”

Sullivan was in Riyadh on Saturday for talks with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman that focused on “a comprehensive vision for an integrated Middle East region”, according to a State Department readout. He then travelled to Israel, where he reminded Netanyahu of the need for “a political strategy” that can be allied to his military campaign for a postwar Gaza.

That same day, the Iranian authorities lost contact with the president’s helicopter, which went down in the country’s northwest, also killing Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian.

For Tehran, the deaths are unlikely to derail its detente with Saudi Arabia that was brokered by China last year, said Hasnain Malik, a Dubai-based strategist at Tellimer. Nor was Iranian support for regional proxies such as Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Yemen-based Houthi group likely to waver, he said.

What it does do is remove one potential candidate for succession to the Supreme Leader and may increase the probability that Khamenei’s son Mojtaba Khamenei may follow him.

The Iranian government, traditionally prone to conspiracy theories, has been clear in its messaging that the crash was due to bad weather, and has not blamed external actors for the incident. That’s a sign that Iran is giving priority to internal stability and an orderly succession rather than stoking the flames of regional tensions, according to a senior foreign diplomat who tracks Iran.

In Saudi Arabia, the king’s son has already been handed the main levers of power and MBS, as he’s commonly known, has run the day-to-day business of the kingdom as crown prince since 2017.

The kingdom’s oil strategy has been dominated for much of the past decade by MBS and publicly articulated in recent years by his half-brother, Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman. For decades, the kingdom has prized continuity and stability, both in its oil personnel and the policies they adopt. That suggests its strategy — predicated on an alliance with Russia and other exporters known as Opec+, which is curbing supplies to prop up crude prices — would likely continue unaffected.

Opec’s No 1 and No 3 powers in terms of output, respectively, Saudi Arabia and Iran were expected to press ahead toward establishing warmer diplomatic relations, since both see the value of maintaining that path, said Hasan Alhasan, senior fellow for Middle East policy at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

“They’ve also shielded these relations from broader regional dynamics so the Saudi-Iranian relationship seems to be standing on its own feet at the moment,” he said.

That’s a development being closely watched by Russia, which has forged deeper ties with both countries since its invasion of Ukraine.

“The best option for Russia is to see relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia improving further,” said Elena Suponina, a Middle East analyst based in Moscow. “But there are fears that Israel will interfere with this.” DM