分类： politics

TOKYO – In a move that has reignited long-simmering diplomatic friction across East Asia, Japanese Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi carried out a prayer visit to Tokyo’s divisive Yasukuni Shrine on Saturday. The Shinto shrine has long been viewed by Japan’s neighboring countries China and South Korea as a painful symbol of Tokyo’s 20th-century imperial militarism, a reputation amplified by its enshrinement of convicted World War II class-A war criminals alongside Japan’s war dead.

This latest visit marks far from an isolated occurrence for Koizumi, who has built a pattern of repeated trips to the controversial religious site. The defense minister has routinely traveled to Yasukuni for key anniversaries, including Japan’s annual August 15 marking of the end of World War II, as well as other scheduled occasions over the years.

The contrast between Koizumi’s visit and the plans of another senior Japanese political leader highlights the delicate balancing act Tokyo is navigating between domestic political currents and diplomatic priorities. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, who is also a regular visitor to the shrine, has announced she will refrain from a trip this cycle, choosing to prioritize stabilizing critical diplomatic ties with China and South Korea instead.

For decades, official political visits to Yasukuni Shrine have been a flashpoint for regional tensions. China and South Korea, both of which suffered widespread atrocities under Japanese imperial occupation during the first half of the 20th century, uniformly condemn such visits as evidence that Japanese political leaders have failed to offer full, sincere remorse for wartime harms inflicted across the region.

In a stunning and incendiary remark that has reignited debate over the tense relationship between Israel and one of its longest-standing European allies, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has branded the United Kingdom an “Islamic republic” in comments that lay bare his frustration with shifting public and political attitudes toward Israel’s actions in Gaza and the occupied Palestinian territories.

The comments were made during an interview with Israel’s Army Radio, where Netanyahu contrasted the current UK media landscape with the widespread favorable coverage Israel received during the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. That conflict, which began with a surprise Israeli pre-emptive strike on Egypt, concluded with Israeli forces seizing control of key territories including the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, and Syria’s Golan Heights — territorial holdings that remain at the core of the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict to this day.

“Try to find that [1967-style favorable coverage] now in Britain, which you could call the Islamic republic of Britain,” Netanyahu told the interviewer. When the host pressed whether the same shift could be seen across the entire European continent, Netanyahu doubled down, claiming: “Yes, but you know, someone said the first Islamic republic with nuclear weapons will be the Islamic republic of Britain.”

The Islamophobic remarks come at a pivotal moment in UK-Israel relations, multiple sources familiar with UK government planning told Middle East Eye. Downing Street is set to unveil a package of new policy measures targeting Israeli settlement activity in September, headlined by a proposed ban on imports of goods produced in Israel’s illegal West Bank settlements. The Foreign Office is also drafting plans to impose new targeted sanctions on individuals and groups connected to the Israeli settler movement that has expanded illegal housing and seized Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank.

Critics have pointed out that Netanyahu’s inflammatory rhetoric ignores the long history of consistent UK support for Israel, even amid the current Gaza conflict. In July 2025, the newly elected Labour government under Prime Minister Keir Starmer designated the activist group Palestine Action as a proscribed terrorist organization. The group, which carried out targeted direct action at factories and facilities owned by companies supplying arms to Israel, now faces sweeping legal restrictions: membership and public expressions of support carry a maximum prison sentence of 14 years under UK counterterrorism law. Since the ban came into force, police have arrested more than 3,000 people and brought terrorism charges against over 1,200 activists.

Beyond domestic crackdowns on pro-Palestine activism, the UK has provided direct operational support to Israel during its military campaign in Gaza. UK military forces carried out surveillance flights over Gaza and shared collected intelligence with the Israeli military, while the Ministry of Defence ran ongoing training courses for Israeli military personnel — only halting new participation in these programs late in 2025.

This contradiction between emerging pressure to hold Israel accountable and long-standing military and political support is equally visible in UK arms export policy. In September 2024, the Labour government suspended 29 existing arms export licences for Israel after a government review concluded there was a “clear risk” that British-manufactured equipment could be used to violate international humanitarian law in Gaza. Then-Foreign Secretary David Lammy was quick to clarify that the move was “not an arms embargo”, preserving the vast majority of existing military trade links. By February 2026, Israel remained eligible for exports under 395 active, non-suspended UK licences. 203 of these cover military goods, with the total maximum value of non-F-35 military export licences reaching £130 million.

UK support has also extended to Israel’s regional confrontations beyond Gaza. When the United States launched strikes against Iranian targets in March 2026, Starmer authorized US forces to use British military bases in the region to carry out the operations. Current Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who took over from Starmer, has continued to grant the US this access as of July 2026, backing a regional conflict that Netanyahu has long pushed for Western powers to join.

In a controversial step that analysts and regional observers warn further advances the de facto annexation of Israel’s occupied Palestinian West Bank, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz announced Friday he has ordered the country’s military to draft a plan that would transfer all civilian law enforcement powers in the territory from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to national civilian police.

According to a statement from Katz’s office, the proposed restructuring would task civilian police with building a dedicated force to manage all civilian-related matters in the West Bank, while allowing the military to refocus its resources exclusively on counterterrorism operations targeting Palestinian groups and securing national borders and Israeli communities in the region. Katz argued that the shift aligns with Israel’s governing structure, noting that civilian police oversee civilian affairs in every other part of the State of Israel.

Notably, Friday’s announcement was rolled out without prior coordination with either the IDF or Israel’s national police force. Still, Israeli outlet Israel Hayom reported that military leadership has openly welcomed the proposal and has pushed for the administrative shift for weeks. The push comes in direct response to a request from IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir, who has called for a reduction of the military’s growing non-combat workload in the West Bank amid plans to expand existing Israeli settlements and establish new outposts in the occupied territory.

Two weeks prior to Katz’s announcement, Zamir told the Israeli cabinet that the IDF’s civilian responsibilities in the West Bank have expanded far beyond the force’s core mission, particularly as new settlements are set to be constructed. He specifically pushed back against the requirement that IDF soldiers intervene to address unrest caused by extremist Israeli settlers accused of intimidating and attacking local Palestinian communities, saying the arrangement is untenable. While Zamir confirmed the military has worked alongside police on these matters, he argued it is past time for the IDF to end its involvement in civilian law enforcement tasks. As of Friday, military spokespersons confirmed the IDF has begun preliminary internal staff work to assess a potential redivision of authority between Israeli security bodies operating in the West Bank.

The announcement has already exposed internal political rifts within Israel’s governing coalition. National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who holds oversight authority over the national police force, was not notified of Katz’s planned statement ahead of its public release. As of Saturday, Ben Gvir has not issued any public comment on the proposal. But far-right settler leaders have been quick to praise the announcement, calling for further steps to formalize Israeli control over the entire occupied territory.

Israel Ganz, head of the Regional Binyamin Council which represents Israeli settlements in the central West Bank, said Katz’s order should be followed by the formal cancellation of the 1993 Oslo Accords and the imposition of full Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank. “The time has come to move from temporary management to the full application of Israeli law,” Ganz stated.

A critical detail that has amplified international and expert concern is that Katz’s statement applies to the entire West Bank, with no distinction drawn between the territory’s three administrative zones outlined in the Oslo Accords: Areas A and B, where the Palestinian Authority holds formal civilian control, and Area C, which remains under full Israeli civilian and military authority. While Israel has never formally announced a full annexation of the West Bank — a territory it has occupied militarily since the 1967 Six-Day War — regional and international policy experts have noted that the Israeli government has implemented a series of incremental measures over the past year that amount to de facto annexation. These measures include a consistent push to expand the role of Israeli civilian administrative bodies in the occupied territory while gradually rolling back the military’s formal authority over areas it has long controlled. Under both international law and Israeli domestic law, the IDF is recognized as the official occupying authority in the West Bank and holds all enforcement powers, including those covering civilian governance.

Katz’s announcement also comes against a backdrop of a sharp, well-documented surge in extremist settler violence targeting Palestinian communities across the West Bank. Just days before the defense minister’s statement, dozens of Israeli settlers besieged multiple Palestinian homes in the village of Qusra, located south of the West Bank city of Nablus. Despite public commitments from the IDF that it would remove the settlers from the site, the group remained in place as of Friday.

Veteran Ynet military correspondent Ron Ben-Yishai, who has covered the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for decades, recently argued that the IDF, national police, and Israel’s internal Shin Bet security service have become unable to enforce rule of law in the West Bank. He wrote last week that a small faction of extremist settlers has effectively become the de facto sovereign in large swathes of the territory, with the IDF limited to securing the settlers’ presence and carrying out their demands. Responding to Katz’s announcement Friday, Ben-Yishai confirmed the plan amounts to a formalization of de facto annexation. He also raised questions about the legality of the proposed shift, and noted that the Israeli national police currently lacks the sufficient number of officers required to effectively take over civilian authority across the entire West Bank.

Tensions over one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints have escalated sharply this week, as Iran advances legislative steps to cement its de facto control of the Strait of Hormuz, while the U.S. struggles with mounting military and political fallout from its ongoing confrontation alongside Israel and threatens historic new sanctions against Tehran.

An Iranian parliamentary committee has signed off on the core framework of a sweeping strategic plan that governs security and development across the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf, Valiullah Bayati, spokesperson for the parliament’s internal affairs and councils committee, confirmed to Tasnim News Agency on Friday. The approved outline will now move forward for additional parliamentary review and deliberation.

Under the terms of the proposed plan, vessels and maritime equipment owned by the U.S., Israel, and any other nation Iran classifies as hostile will be barred from transiting the strategic waterway. Bayati emphasized that the restriction is a direct response to longstanding hostile actions taken by these nations against Iran and its people, framing the policy as a defensive measure against ongoing aggression, according to reporting from Al Jazeera.

The move has drawn an immediate harsh response from Washington, which has threatened sweeping new economic penalties even as U.S. military forces have failed to challenge Iran’s effective control of the corridor through which roughly 20% of the world’s oil supplies pass. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Newsmax that the Trump administration will unveil the new sanctions next week, promising measures unprecedented in the history of global economic isolation.

“Watch this space for more announcements coming next week because we are going to apply measures that have never been seen in the history of economic isolation on a country,” Bessent said, adding that the package will combine unprecedented global economic isolation with a continued naval blockade designed to cut off all traffic to and from Iranian ports.

For its part, Iran has doubled down on its claim of full authority over the waterway, with senior Iranian military officials asserting complete control over all maritime movement in the strait. “The Strait of Hormuz is closed. Our control over movements is complete and decisive,” Rear Admiral Ali Ozmaei of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy told Tasnim on Friday. “No movement in this strait escapes the eyes of the IRGC Navy fighters,” he added, noting that “the reality should be seen in the field, not in the communiques and statements of U.S. officials.”

Independent shipping data bears out Tehran’s claim of severely restricted traffic. Maritime analytics firm Kpler recorded just nine commercial commodity vessels passing through the strait on Thursday, an increase from five on Wednesday but still far below the August daily average of 12. Of the nine vessels, five entered the Persian Gulf and four sailed toward the Gulf of Oman, with the vast majority using the Iranian-controlled shipping channel. The count does not include vessels operating with their automatic identification tracking systems disabled, meaning actual unreported traffic could shift the overall total.

Tehran is also moving to insulate its economy from U.S. financial pressure by expanding access to alternative global financial institutions not controlled by Washington. Abdolnaser Hemmati, governor of Iran’s Central Bank, announced this week that Iran will soon complete its accession to the Brics-backed New Development Bank, though the multilateral lender has not yet publicly confirmed the move.

Global energy markets have already responded to the escalating standoff, with crude prices climbing in response to the threat of prolonged disruption to oil supplies. Brent crude climbed above $88 per barrel on Friday, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude rose past $82 per barrel.

The escalating crisis has also exposed deepening strains on U.S. military capabilities, as the extended deployment of an American aircraft carrier in the region has stretched resources and sparked bipartisan political backlash. The U.S. is currently repositioning the USS George Washington to the Middle East to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln, whose crew has now spent more than 260 consecutive days at sea without port access. The deployment will leave the Pacific region without a U.S. aircraft carrier for an unknown period, a clear sign of the widening military costs of the Biden administration’s legacy Iran campaign that the current Trump administration has continued.

Reports of severe shortages, unsanitary living conditions, and deteriorating mental health among the Abraham Lincoln’s crew have sparked alarm from military families and sitting members of Congress. Four U.S. lawmakers, led by California Representative Mike Levin, have called on the Pentagon to provide an explanation for the extended deployment, noting that existing relief plans are insufficient to address the crisis.

U.S. Central Command has denied unconfirmed reports that any sailors have died aboard the carrier, issuing a statement saying that “the Sailors and Marines of the Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group remain resilient and resolved after more than 260 days at sea.” U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who has embraced the informal moniker “Secretary of War,” has dismissed reports of poor conditions as “completely misrepresented.”

The crisis has sparked fierce political pushback, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer calling for Hegseth’s immediate removal. “When Pete Hegseth was nominated, everyone knew he was completely incompetent. Now our brave sailors are paying the price in a horrific and unfathomable way,” Schumer said. “Pete Hegseth must be fired immediately.”