Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the Foreign Ministry on Saturday night to contact the six major world nations who signed a nuclear deal with Tehran and “demand immediate punitive measures be taken in the wake of Iran’s repeated and gross violations on the missiles issue.

“This is an important step in and of itself, and is also a test of the major powers in enforcing the nuclear agreement,” Netanyahu said.

The statement followed a series of Iranian military weapons tests last week that ended with Tehran crowing that it could now reach Israel with a long-range ballistic missile capable of destroying the Jewish State. The Islamic Republic even inscribed the missiles with a message in Hebrew that read, “Must destroy Israel.”

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Hossein Jaberi Ansari claimed Thursday (March 10) the missile drills did not violate the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JPCOA) nuclear agreement between Tehran and the six major world powers.

Speaking to journalists, the spokesperson said the missile exercises also did not go against Resolution 2231 of the United Nations Security Council.

“Despite some Western allegations, the ballistic missiles fired in the nationwide exercises did not violate the JCPOA or the UN Resolution 2231.

“The short- medium- and long-range ballistic missiles fired during the drills were for deterrence and defense,” he said. “None of them could carry nuclear warheads, which by the way, is not in Iran’s defense doctrine,” he added.

Israeli intelligence experts said, however, the long-range ballistic missiles tested on Wednesday were indeed capable of carrying nuclear warheads.

Ansari claimed that Tehran had issued a statement following the adoption of the UN Security Council Resolution 2231 endorsing the JCPOA, which stipulated, “Iran will continue to take the necessary measures to strengthen its defense capabilities in order to protect its sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity against any aggression and to counter the menace of terrorism in the region.

“In this context, Iranian military capabilities, including ballistic missiles, are exclusively for legitimate defense. They have not been designed for WMD capability, and are thus outside the purview or authority of the Security Council resolution and its annexes.”

The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) began the ballistic missile exercises last Tuesday, March 8. Called ‘Eqtedar-e Velayat‘, the command, tactical and special exercises were intended to test advanced missile defense systems as well as “showcase the deterrence power and the clout of the IRGC forces in defending the country’s territorial integrity against foreign threats,” according to the semi-official FARS news agency.

The drills were held in different geographical locations, using ballistic missiles fired from silos in Central Iran and mountain ranges in the North. The IRGC also fired two Iranian-made “Qadr H” ballistic missiles from the Eastern Alborz Mountains as part of ongoing IRGC drills.

Commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps Aerospace Force Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh was quoted by FARS on Wednesday as saying Iran’s long-range ballistic missiles can fly 400 kilometers above the ground to hit targets at 2,000 kilometers “within 12 to 13 minutes.”

Israel Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon sent an urgent letter to members of the UN Security Council this weekend calling for condemnation of Tehran’s test launch of the ballistic missiles this week.

“Iran continues to disregard its obligations to UN resolutions,” Danon wrote. “This latest provocation makes it clear that the ‘smile campaign’ of the current regime is nothing more than a smokescreen to disguise the real intentions of the ayatollah regime.”

Danon added that the missile tests were “a gross violation” of Security Council resolution 2231, which endorsed the nuclear agreement and which restricts Iran from launching missiles capable of carrying a nuclear warhead.

Iran kept its promise and released the U.S. Navy sailors with their two small boats back into the Persian Gulf late Wednesday, but not before snapping a wealth of images and probably scrutinizing the vessels right down to the last bolt.

Tehran made certain to get as much mileage as possible from the unexpected windfall of the boats that drifted Tuesday a scant mile (two kilometers, 1.2 miles) into its territorial waters.

Seizing both, Tehran’s Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif assured U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry that the crews of a lone female and nine male sailors would be released “promptly.”

But they were held for 24 hours on Farsi Island in the Persian Gulf – home to a base of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps — for as long as could reasonably be managed without an international public relations disaster. Although Iran does not usually concern itself with public relations, this time it was important.

After all, Iran is on track for “implementation day” shortly — the day when the economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic are to be lifted. On that day billions of dollars are to start flowing again into its coffers, and oil can once again begin flowing in the other direction, towards its still-loyal European customers.

Meanwhile, the IRGC technicians had plenty of time to examine previously inaccessible American technology and equipment, photograph it from every angle and probably sample it as well. Perhaps some tinkering? Anything taken? These are questions that will only be answered once the sailors are safely back to base and debriefed, and engineers can go over the equipment.

The sailors were also filmed in humiliating circumstances, on their knees with hands behind their heads — good footage for reminding folks on the home front and abroad who’s the boss on the high seas, and at home, when it counts.

That footage and those snaps are now being released to the Iranian and global public. The images will also jog the memories of anyone old enough to remember the days of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, those who watched the coverage of the American Embassy hostages in Tehran.

The message is crystal clear:  If you choose to sail into Persian Gulf waters, beware. We await you, and at any opportunity we will pounce. This is an area under our complete control. Enter at your own risk.

The lack of response by Washington when a Middle East nation violates UN Security Council resolutions – like the test of a ballistic missile by Iran last October – is an invitation to an escalation at some point down the line.

More to the point, the message to Tehran when its Navy fires a rocket almost directly at an American military vessel — as it did last month — and life continues with “business as usual” is one that is dangerous and very unwise.

In the Middle East, a non-response is perceived as weakness, vulnerability and availability for more of the same. For those who look to the U.S. as an ally, this is a very bad message indeed.

The elite Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is retreating from Syria.

Just 700 of the elite forces remain in the country, according to Bloomberg. The figure does not, however, include Iranian military advisers embedded among the Syrian armed forces since 2012.

More than 7,000 troops were fighting for the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in October, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. By late October, U.S. General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, testified that just 2,000 Iranian troops were fighting in the country.

The deaths and injuries of top officers in major military campaigns this year has clearly taken its toll on the force, and convinced Iran enough is enough. “They are losing lieutenants,” former U.S. Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford told Bloomberg. “When you lose lieutenants it means you are losing people fighting on the front lines.”

Israel’s Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon told the Saban Forum at the Brookings Institute last Friday that the campaign to take back control of the Idlib province and other areas that have come under rebel control has been a “failure.”

Ya’alon cited the “incompetence” of the Syrian armed forces, and the “lack of determination of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps” as factors in that failure.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has taken up the battle, however, with Moscow’s military forces escalating their air campaign in Aleppo. Russia remains firm that Assad is the best option for leadership in Syria, despite the fact that only a small bit of territory around Damascus actually remains under his control.

The rest of what once was Syria has been carved up into small emirates and bits of territory divided among the rebel groups, Al Qaeda-linked forces and the Da’esh (ISIS) terror organization.

Is Tel Aviv doing business with Iran? Good question. Not really. Tel Aviv is doing business with a Chinese firm that is doing business with Iran.

Arison Group’s Shikun & Binui Solel Boneh Infrastructure and China Railway Tunnel Group won a tender for nearly NIS 3 billion ($750 million) by Israel’s NTA Metropolitan Mass Transit System to build the Tel Aviv Light Rail “Red Line.”

The line will link the northeastern Tel Aviv suburb of Petach Tikvah with the city’s southeastern suburb, Bat Yam. A significant amount of the line will run underground, according to Deal Maker’s Hub, in effect creating Tel Aviv’s first subway system. It is expected to be the first of a network of Light Rail Transit (LRT) and Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) lines to be operated by the NTA.

But CRTG is a subsidiary of China’s CREC construction firm, which has ties with the Iranian Khatam-al Anbiya Construction Company owned and operated by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps. (IRGC)

(Yes, it’s the same IRGC that is developing nuclear weapons technology for the Islamic Republic of Iran, the one that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu keeps warning about.)

Earlier this year, Iran began building a $2.73 billion high-speed railway network that will extend about 400 kilometers, from Tehran to Isfahan.

That railway line is being built by China Railway Engineering Corporation (CREC) in cooperation with Iran’s Khatam Al Anbiya Construction Company.

According to a report published in February (2015) by the Tehran Times, the project, launched by President Hassan Rouhani during a visit to Qom, will continue for the next four years. Iran will provide $1.8 billion of the financing through the China Export and Credit Insurance Corporation.

The Delhi Police has concluded that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) was behind the February 13, 2012 bomb attack on an Israeli diplomat, according to a report by the Times of India.

The Delhi Police investigation report states that the suspects began planning the attacks on Israeli diplomats in India and other countries in January 2011 with the help of a local Indian journalist named Syed Mohammad Ahmad Kazmi, in apparent retaliation for the as-yet unsolved assassinations of a number of Iranian nuclear scientists. Kazmi, a veteran freelance journalist who worked part-time for Iran’s news agency IRNA, was the first person arrested in connection with the attack. The report revealed that Kazmi had established relations with the individuals – and by extension the IRGC – almost 10 years prior to the attacks, suggesting that the Iranian regime has established a significant covert network in India.

In the attack, Tali Yehoshua-Koren, the wife of the Defense Ministry’s representative to India, was injured when a motorcyclist attached a magnetic bomb to the embassy car in which she was driving in.

The report identifies five IRGC members in the car bombing, and while Delhi Police passed the details on to Iran in the hopes of obtaining more information, Iran has thus far been uncooperative. Houshang Afshar Irani, the central suspect, was the motorcyclist who attached the bomb to Yehoshua-Koren’s car, and he stated on his tourist visa that his profession in Iran was in building construction.

Sedaghatzadeh Masoud was accused by the Delhi police of being the operational head of the cell, and of planning not only the Delhi attack but the thwarted attack of the same nature on the same day in Tbilisi, Georgia and the botched attack against Israeli diplomats in Bangkok the following day. His profession was listed as sales employee in a commercial company in Iran.

The other suspects are Syed Ali Mahdiansadr, Mohammad Reza Abolghasemi, and Ali Akbar Norouzishayan. The investigation concluded that the five suspects entered the country on tourist visas and left immediately after the attack.

The police report also found that the cell extended beyond the five IRGC members, to include an Iranian woman – identified as Leila Rohani – who is suspected of playing a supporting role in the attacks in Delhi, Tbilisi, and Bangkok. The police allege that Rohani assisted the IRGC cell in the Bangkok attack of February 14 by finding them an apartment, and absconded to Tehran before police could arrest her.

At the time, Israel blamed Iran for the “coordinated series of attacks.”

Mehr quotes the deputy commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) who said that Iran’s enemies’ strategic interests in the region are within the range of Iranian missiles.

“In our strategic planning, we have defined a radius named the radius of deterrence, which includes all strategic interests of the enemy in the region, so that we can manage the battle at any level in case of the outbreak of war,” Brigadier General Hossein Salami said during a televised interview broadcast live on Iranian television on Saturday.

Salami said that the IRGC is capable of destroying the enemy’s moving military targets using its domestically produced ballistic missiles.

According to former Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Iran’s newest missile has a range of at least 1,200 miles, which would include Israel, as well as and Iraq and the 134,000 U.S. troops stationed there. The radius also includes U.S. allies such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey, all of them Sunni Arab-dominated countries that are rivals of Shiite Iran.

In May, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned of a new regional “arms race.”

“I say with certainty that we are able to hit all moving targets using ballistic missiles which follow a curved path, travel several times faster than sound after entering the atmosphere, and can hardly be tracked and destroyed,” Salami said.

In addition, he said that the Naval Force of the IRGC has been equipped with cruise missiles which are radar-evading and enjoy advanced capabilities in terms of range, precision, and maneuverability.