Iranian and Pakistani warships had planned a joint Red Sea drill to start Friday, Nov. 30 in Port Sudan. It was rumored in Khartoum that the Pakistani Shashmir carrying nuclear arms or nuclear-related equipment had docked Thursday ready to meet two Iranian warships. Washington then warned Tehran that the US-Iranian nuclear talks due to open Saturday, Dec. 1, would be called off, if this first ever joint drill between a Muslim nuclear power and a close nuclear candidate went ahead.

Iranian Defense Minister Brig. Gen. Ahmad Vahidi confirmed Nov. 9 that two Iranian SU-25 jet fighters had fired at an unarmed US MQ-Predator drone over the Persian Gulf a week earlier. debkafile: In September, Tehran twice warned that US targets would be at risk if Israel struck Iranian interests. After an Iranian missile factory was bombed in Khartoum, Iran and Sudan pointed the finger at Israel. In consequence, on Nov. 1, Iranian fighters shot at – and missed – the US drone.

Barack Obama’s decision to go for direct talks with Iran comes too late to stop its nuclear program. He is left with bargaining over the size of the Iranian nuclear arsenal and its disposal with Ali Khamenei holding most of the high cards.

Less than 24 hours after Sudan’s Omar Bashir pledged “decisive steps against Israeli interests” for the destruction of the Iranian missile plant in Khartoum, Palestinian rocket teams early Sunday, Oct. 28, fired Grad missiles as target finders against Israel’s nuclear reactor in Dimona. This is reported exclusively by debkafile. They missed, but Hamas is expected to keep on trying to improve its aim, having undertaken to serve Tehran as its southern, anti-Israel operational arm, like Hizballah in the north.

Sudan’s President Omar Bashir said Saturday, Oct. 27 that “Israeli interests are now legitimate targets.” He spoke after Iranian generals secretly examined the rubble left by an air attack on Oct. 24 of the Shehab ballistic missile factory in Khartoum.  While Israel has not commented on the attack, Sudan’s Information Minister said “military experts” had determined it was destroyed by Israel-made missiles. debkafile: The high rank of the Iranian investigating team attests to the consternation in Tehran over the Yarmouk factory's loss.

The rules are simple: The duelists are masked, they fight in the shadows and their main weapon is the element of surprise. The latest joust took place in Khartoum where unidentified bombers obliterated a factory complex manufacturing Iranian ballistic and other missiles as Tehran’s strategic reserve for emergencies. A ...

The Yarmouk Complex near Khartoum, which was bombed Wednesday, Oct.  24, by four fighter-bombers, recently went into manufacturing Iranian ballistic surface-to-surface Shehab missiles under license from Tehran, debkafile discloses. Western intelligence believes they were meant as Tehran’s strategic reserve stock in case its own ballistic arsenal was hit by Israeli bombers. No information was available about the comings and goings of Iranian missile specialists to Khartoum, or whether Tehran planned to stage missile attacks against Middle East targets from Sudan.

Mikhail Margelov is the first Russian diplomat ever named to perform a shared mission for the Russian, US and German governments. An Arabist with fluent English, he will be acting on their behalf in the Libyan and Syrian crises after helping to ease tensions in Sudan.

King Abdullah is determined to save his friends from the fate suffered by Egypt's Hosni Mubarak. The second-generation Saudi royals have got together to pull the kingdom away from its long dependence on the US and command its own fate and interests, even at the price of clashing with ...

Two Middle East powers strike out without the United States to foil the spread of weapons of mass destruction – Israel in Sudan; Saudi Arabia in Iran.

In accusing Israel of killing the two passengers of a Hyundai Sinai near Port Sudan Tuesday, April 5, Khartoum claimed a missile was fired from an aerial drone or a vessel on the Red Sea. debkafile's exclusive sources reveal that a special operations team landed by sea and used a surface missile to hit the car and kill two top executives of the Iranian-Hamas arms smuggling network in Sudan.This network works with a gang which once served Osama bin Laden.