标签： Asia

On Saturday, the heart of Iran’s capital Tehran swelled with massive crowds of mourners, kicking off six days of national funeral ceremonies for former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who was killed more than four months prior on the opening day of the U.S.-Israel military campaign against Iran.

Khamenei’s flag-draped coffin, with his iconic black turban resting atop it, was displayed at Tehran’s Grand Mosalla, the city’s central venue for large state religious and national gatherings. Thousands of mourners, many clad in traditional black mourning attire, began streaming into the site hours before the official ceremony commenced, arriving well before dawn to pay their final respects.

Local state Iranian television officially marked the start of the national funeral proceedings just after 6 a.m. local time. Across the sprawling crowd, many participants carried bright red flags emblazoned with the Farsi word for “Martyr”, and resonant chants of “Death to America”, “Death to Israel”, and “Revenge, revenge” rang out across the capital venue.

Iranian authorities project that between 15 and 20 million people will take part in the funeral events held in Tehran alone, making it one of the largest public gatherings in the nation’s modern history. The multi-day commemoration will include additional memorial events held in neighboring Iraq before Khamenei’s final burial in the northeastern Iranian holy city of Mashhad, a site of profound religious significance for Shia Muslims globally.

High-ranking dignitaries from more than 100 countries around the world have confirmed their attendance to honor the former leader. Notable attendees include Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Army Chief Field Marshal Asim Munir, both of whom played a central mediating role in facilitating talks between Iran and the United States during the recent conflict. Senior diplomatic and political delegations from Russia, China, India, and Afghanistan are also scheduled to participate in the official ceremonies.

Global observers are directing particular attention to one unconfirmed appearance: that of Mojtaba Khamenei, Ali Khamenei’s son and successor as Iran’s current supreme leader. Mojtaba Khamenei was injured during the opening phase of the war, assumed the role of supreme leader in March following his father’s death, and has only communicated with the Iranian public through written statements since the conflict began, having made no public appearances to date.

For the vast majority of Iranians alive today, Ali Khamenei was the only supreme leader they have ever known. He assumed the role of supreme leader in 1989 following the death of Iran’s revolutionary founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, after previously serving as Iran’s president throughout the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War. Over his nearly 40-year tenure as Iran’s highest authority, relations between Iran and the United States remained consistently hostile, a defining feature of his leadership. Iranian officials had publicly called for a massive national turnout to honor Khamenei, who was 86 at the time of his death.

A landmark legal challenge has been launched against Florida Governor Ron DeSantis by the United States’ largest Muslim civil rights advocacy organization, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), over a controversial state law that labeled CAIR a domestic terrorist organization — placing the civil rights group in the same legal category as some of the hemisphere’s most violent international drug cartels.

The lawsuit, filed Thursday, brings together three major non-profit legal and advocacy organizations: CAIR itself, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). The legal teams describe the designation enshrined in House Bill 1471 (HB 1471) as entirely unfounded, constitutionally flawed, and a direct threat to fundamental First Amendment rights.

In an official statement announcing the legal action, CAIR emphasized that the terrorist designation exposes the organization to immediate and irreversible damage. If enforced, the law would allow Florida state authorities to shut down all of CAIR’s programming, advocacy, and community operations across the state. Beyond CAIR, Florida’s new terror list also includes two additional vaguely defined entities: the Muslim Brotherhood, a transnational Islamist movement that has no documented active operations in the United States and no centralized global headquarters, and antifa, the loose decentralized anti-fascist movement that has no formal structure, membership roster, or fixed operating base.

The law grants Florida officials sweeping power to attach crippling stigmatizing labels to non-profit organizations, then deploy a broad range of state powers to immediately silence and disable the targeted group, its staff, its members, and any other individuals connected to the organization. Penalties include harsh criminal charges, civil fines, and administrative sanctions that reach far beyond standard regulatory measures, CAIR argues in the suit.

Alongside CAIR, the Muslim Brotherhood, and antifa, DeSantis has proposed adding more than 90 other organizations to the state’s terror registry. That list includes major international groups like the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Venezuela-based transnational criminal gang Tren de Aragua, and Mexico’s notorious Sinaloa Cartel, one of the deadliest drug trafficking organizations in the world.

The current designation traces back to HB 1471, a bill approved by the Florida state legislature in March this year, signed into law by DeSantis in April, and implemented on July 1. This is not the first time DeSantis has attempted to blacklist CAIR: in December 2023, the governor issued a unilateral executive order to place the group on a terror watchlist, but that action was blocked by a federal judge earlier this year.

In his ruling blocking the initial executive order, federal judge Mark Walker centered his decision on a core constitutional question: whether a state governor can, outside of a formal emergency, unilaterally label one of the nation’s largest civil rights groups a terrorist organization and cut off any government benefits to individuals or entities that provide material support or resources to the group. Walker’s ruling was clear: “This Court finds he cannot.”

Now, CAIR is asking the court to issue an emergency injunction to block enforcement of HB 1471 entirely, arguing the new law retains all the constitutional flaws of the original executive order.

The text of HB 1471 states that any person or entity that provides support to a designated terrorist group can face criminal prosecution, and it also includes a provision asserting that no religious code — a measure widely interpreted to target Sharia law, which is protected under First Amendment religious freedom provisions for many American Muslims — can supersede Florida state law.

In their legal challenge, CAIR and its co-counsel point out that the designation process laid out in HB 1471 lacks basic due process protections. The law does not require state officials to provide the targeted organization with formal notice that includes all justifications for the designation, all material evidence — both incriminating and exculpatory — that decisionmakers relied on to approve the label. It also does not require the state to prove, or even provide evidence, that the targeted organization has violated any existing state or federal law.

Founded in 1994, CAIR is a U.S.-based non-profit focused on protecting civil liberties for Muslim Americans, and it funds almost all of its work through public donations from American citizens of all faith backgrounds. Edward Ahmed Mitchell, CAIR’s deputy national director based in Washington, D.C., previously told Middle East Eye that when similar executive orders targeting CAIR were in effect in Florida and Texas, the organization was blocked from purchasing property and barred from accessing state government contracts. Both states have also added the Muslim Brotherhood to their domestic terror lists.

Republican leaders, most notably Texas Senator Ted Cruz, have repeated longstanding claims that the Muslim Brotherhood maintains secret influential ties to CAIR and seeks to impose Sharia law across the United States. CAIR has repeatedly pushed back against these accusations, noting that more than 95% of its annual budget comes from individual donations from the American public, including both Muslim and non-Muslim supporters.

Internationally, the Muslim Brotherhood is designated a terrorist organization by several Middle Eastern nations, including the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Syria, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. At the U.S. federal level, the Trump administration issued an order designating specific national chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon as terrorist organizations, but no such designation applies to the movement as a whole or to any U.S.-affiliated groups. Critics of these designations have long argued that blacklisting the Muslim Brotherhood is largely a geopolitical concession to authoritarian monarchies and authoritarian regimes in the Middle East that view the popular reformist movement as a threat to their hold on power.

Cruz has argued that the movement, which retains widespread public support in many parts of the Arab world thanks to its combination of Islamic religious identity, grassroots political organizing, and community social welfare programs, poses a direct threat to U.S. national security. But when asked by Middle East Eye how the Muslim Brotherhood threatens U.S. security, Nathan Brown, a leading expert on Middle East politics at George Washington University and a trustee of the American University in Cairo, offered a blunt response: “None at all.”

During a high-profile October press conference in Cairo focused on a Gaza ceasefire deal, a small but symbolic moment laid bare a quiet shift in geopolitics. As U.S. President Donald Trump gathered regional and European leaders to stand behind him for photos, French President Emmanuel Macron rejected the role of a backdrop prop. Instead, he invited Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to join him at a table in the audience – an arrangement the 72-year-old Turkish leader readily accepted.

This quiet act of defiance against the U.S.-led event staging capped years of frosty relations between Paris and Ankara, and it may signal the start of a new chapter for the two NATO allies, multiple sources with knowledge of internal negotiations told Middle East Eye. For years, the pair have been locked in bitter disagreements over the Syrian civil war, the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and competing territorial claims in the Eastern Mediterranean. Today, shifting global alignments and overlapping security interests have created unprecedented momentum for a full reset.

“France is envisaging the future of European security with Turkey as one of its pillars,” one senior Western source close to diplomatic talks explained.

This potential new partnership is not happening in isolation. It comes amid a noticeable cooling of relations between Turkey and Russia, a shift that has not gone unnoticed in Paris. There have been no bilateral presidential visits between Ankara and Moscow since 2023, and the frequency of high-level engagements between Erdoğan and Russian President Vladimir Putin has dropped sharply. Turkey has also increasingly aligned with Western sanctions regimes targeting Moscow, and it has declined to renew its long-term major natural gas purchase agreements with Russia.

Gerard Araud, a former French ambassador, said many French policymakers have been impressed by Turkey’s deft navigation of the war in Ukraine. “Turkey has succeeded in antagonising almost no one while, at the same time, effectively siding with Kyiv,” he noted. Araud argued that as France prepares for long-term Russian pressure on the continent, Ankara has emerged as a critical geopolitical player. “We think that in Paris there is a strong feeling that, on one side, the Americans are gradually reducing their security commitments to Europe; that whoever is elected in the 2028 U.S. presidential election, we will not return to the close transatlantic security cooperation of the past,” he explained. “We will be facing Russian pressure. And in this equation, I think Turkey is obviously an important factor.”

Overlapping regional priorities further underpin the push for closer ties. In Syria, both France and Turkey have thrown their support behind interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s new administration. In Lebanon, both countries back the creation of a strong central government and oppose aggressive Israeli military actions in the country. On the Iranian nuclear file and regional tensions surrounding Tehran, both Paris and Ankara favor a negotiated peaceful resolution. As Israel adopts an increasingly hardline stance toward Turkey, it has also sparked repeated diplomatic crises with France over Lebanon, reinforcing shared interests between the two countries.

Beyond geopolitics, a major partnership in the defence and arms industry is emerging as a cornerstone of the reset. Last week, Turkish Defence Minister Yasar Guler confirmed Ankara is deeply interested in purchasing SAMP/T air defence systems, manufactured by a French-Italian defence consortium. For years, Paris blocked the sale over political tensions and disagreements over Ankara’s demand for joint production rights. But intelligence outlet Intelligence Online reported in May that Macron has ordered a full review of the SAMP/T deal to find ways to accommodate Turkish co-production demands, ahead of his planned visit to Ankara for next week’s NATO summit. Senior French diplomat Alice Rufo, a recent member of Macron’s inner circle, has already traveled to Ankara to hold talks with top Turkish defence officials, boosting expectations that an agreement could be announced during the summit.

Private defence firms have already begun building ties. Leading French aerospace and defence group Safran recently signed a strategic partnership agreement with Turkey’s top drone manufacturer Baykar, focused on co-developing integrated systems combining optronic sensors, navigation technology, and guided weapon capabilities for unmanned aerial and air-to-ground missions. Under the deal, Baykar’s popular TB2 combat drones will be outfitted with Safran’s Euroflir electro-optical surveillance system. French government sources also confirm Paris is considering expanding defence dialogue to cover partnerships in drone and helicopter development.

Turkey’s defence industry has grown into a global powerhouse in recent years, with national defence exports hitting $10 billion in 2024. Ankara now exports warships, combat drones, and ammunition to countries across the world, including many NATO allies. Araud noted that Europe’s own defence industrial sector has faced major setbacks, pointing to the recent collapse of the €114 billion Future Combat Air System programme earlier this month over intractable disagreements between French and German defence contractors. “Turks have been quite good in this field,” he said. “What the Turks are doing, first, is cheaper; second, it is more robust. While some Turkish weapons may not match the highest sophistication of Western systems, the war in Ukraine has proven that this affordability and durability is a major advantage. Tomorrow’s war will require the ability to produce large volumes of reliable, low-cost weaponry.”

Still, not all analysts are optimistic about the pace of a Franco-Turkish reset. Dorothee Schmid, head of the Turkey and Middle East Department at French leading think tank IFRI, warned that deep structural divisions remain. “France considers that Turkey has embarked on an autocratic course and is pursuing a power-based policy centred on its own interests, which are not compatible with those of Europeans,” she said.

Longstanding frictions continue to complicate negotiations. Macron has declined all invitations to visit Ankara from Erdoğan since 2022. Sources say a full state visit by Macron could only move forward if Turkey reopens its border with Armenia, a step that would be politically popular with France’s large Armenian diaspora community. Another persistent irritant is Ankara’s decision to bar Turkish citizens from attending French embassy-operated schools in Turkey. Turkish officials argue they need reciprocal legal arrangements approved by parliament to resolve the issue, while French officials say the policy has poisoned bilateral relations. The dispute has lingered in bureaucratic gridlock, and the schools have gradually lost students and fallen into decline.

“In short, the two sides are continuing to negotiate, but against a backdrop of low levels of trust,” Schmid said. “The NATO summit in Ankara is expected to provide an opportunity for Turkey to showcase its power, which never fails to surprise the French: the two countries have entered into a sort of systemic symbolic rivalry.”

The Eastern Mediterranean remains another core point of contention. France has a bilateral defence treaty with Greece, and during a visit to Athens earlier this year, Macron publicly reaffirmed the pact during an event at the Roman Agora, emphasizing Paris’ commitment to defending Greek sovereignty against any potential Turkish aggression. Araud argued that this strong show of support for Greece ran counter to Macron’s own signature foreign policy doctrine of *en meme temps* – “at the same time” – which holds that seemingly contradictory initiatives are used to maintain ties with competing regional actors.

“Senior French officials agree with me that Paris should improve its ties with Turkey, and Macron went a bit overboard in his overtures to Greece. Macron is aware of it, and he wants to improve the relationship with Turkey,” Araud said. “Macron has a very good analysis of foreign policy, I think, but when implementing it, from time to time, he ends up reaching the opposite goal.” Turkish officials dismiss Macron’s rhetoric around defending Greek sovereignty as a sales tactic to boost French arms exports to Athens, noting that Turkey has no plans to attack Greek territory. “It is a nothing burger, really,” one senior Turkish official said.

A final wildcard is French domestic politics: Macron is set to leave office in April 2025, and his potential successors could adopt a far different policy toward Turkey, particularly if right-wing National Rally leader Marine Le Pen or her protégé Jordan Bardella win the presidency. However, multiple sources confirmed that Turkish diplomats have already engaged in quiet outreach to Le Pen’s team for months, laying groundwork for continued cooperation regardless of the election outcome.