Qatar restores ambassador to Iran amid regional crisis

Agencies

August 24, 2017

Qatar says its ambassador will return to Tehran more than 20 months after he was recalled in protest over the ransacking of Saudi Arabia's missions by protesters angry at Riyadh's execution of a prominent Shia Muslim cleric.

In a statement released on Thursday, the Qatari foreign ministry said its ambassador would "return to resume his diplomatic duties", as Doha wanted to strengthen ties in all fields with the Islamic republic.

The information office did not specify an exact date for the ambassador's return - or provide his name - but said Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani discussed "bilateral relations and means of boosting and developing them" in a telephone call with his Iranian counterpart Javad Zarif.

The decision to restore ties with Iran comes amid a diplomatic dispute between Qatar and several Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt and Bahrain.

They accuse Doha of meddling in the internal affairs of other countries and financing terrorism - a charge Qatar has dismissed as "baseless".

'A different direction'

Qatar recalled its ambassador to Tehran in January last year after Saudi Arabia cut ties with the Islamic Republic, accusing Iran of failing to protect its embassy in the capital and consulate in Mashahd against protesters who had ransacked them.

Demonstrators stormed the Saudi Embassy in Tehran over the kingdom’s execution of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, a Shia leader who had rallied anti-government protests in the kingdom's eastern province.

Saudi Arabia said the execution was justified as part of its "war on terrorism".

Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, a research fellow at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University said the decision to install the ambassador shows Qatar is prepared "to go in a different direction".

"It could very well be calculated toward reinforcing the point that Qatar will not bow to this regional pressure placed upon it," she told the AP news agency.

Qatar, which is dependent on food imports, imported the vast majority of its food from its Arab Gulf neighbours before they imposed a punishing trade and travel blockade.

Since June 11, Doha has been receiving fresh food supplies from the Iran, which has also allowed Qatar's national carrier to use its airspace.

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Israeli forces invade southwestern Syria, set up checkpoint in Quneitra

News Network

November 24,2025

Israeli forces have pushed over the Syrian frontier, erecting a checkpoint and stopping vehicles in the southwestern city of Quneitra, in yet another breach of the Arab country’s sovereignty.

The violation took place on Sunday, when the troops made their way across the border, setting up the outpost near the Ain al-Bayda junction in northern Quneitra, Syrian outlets reported.

According to the al-Ikhbariya paper, an Israeli detachment positioned itself at the junction, halting cars and conducting searches.

The Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) reported that three Israeli military vehicles then moved further into the northern countryside, deploying between the town of Jubata al-Khashab and the villages of Ofaniya and Ain al-Bayda. The agency added that a separate Israeli unit mounted a new incursion in the central region, approaching the villages of Umm Batina and al-Ajraf.

Residents said such activities have surged in recent months, pointing to Israeli advances onto farmland, leveling of extensive forested areas, arrests, and spread of mobile checkpoints.

The Israeli regime began markedly increasing its military aggression against Syria last year.

The escalation coincided with increasingly ferocious onslaughts throughout the country by the so-called Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) Takfiri terrorist group, which the government of President Bashar al-Assad had confined to northwestern Syria. The HTS, however, managed to overthrow the government as the Israeli attacks would pummel the country’s civilian and defensive infrastructure.

Various reports have shown that, during the escalation, the regime conducted more than 1,000 airstrikes on the Syrian territory and over 400 ground raids into the south.

Following the collapse of the Assad government, Tel Aviv also widened its grip over the occupied Golan Heights by taking control of a demilitarized buffer zone, in defiance of a 1974 Disengagement Agreement. Earlier this month, senior Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, visited the buffer zone, prompting expressions of alarm on the part of the United Nations.

The United States, the regime’s biggest ally, has, meanwhile, been fraternizing the HTS head Abu Mohammed al-Jolani amid the widely reported prospect of rapprochement with Tel Aviv.

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