WarSclerotic

Iranian Defense Minister Brig. Gen. Amir Hatami arrived in Syria on Sunday for meetings with senior defense and military officials as part of a two-day visit according to Iran’s Tasnim news agency.

“We hope to have a productive role in the reconstruction of Syria,” Hatami said on arrival in Syria, according to Fars News.

The backdrop for this visit is the support provided by Iran to Syrian President Bashar Assad in a civil war currently raging in his country. Last week, however, clashes erupted between Syrian forces loyal to Assad and Hezbollah – the Iranian-backed Lebanese militia, over control of commercial passageways.

The Sky network in Arabic reported Saturday that clashes broke out in the eastern Deir ez-Zor district in Syria, with one Hezbollah fighter killed. According to the report, the clashes were prompted by conflicting bids for control over a commercial passageway along the Euphrates River and the income it generates.

This was not the first time that Hezbollah fighters clashed with local forces, despite fighting shoulder to shoulder against rebel forces in the civil war. Last week, Hezbollah forces confronted a different Syrian militia loyal to Assad in the village of Abu Kamal over similarly disputed profits.

Also last week, during a visit to Israel, U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton said Iran should remove its forces from Syria.

Bolton said the United States, Israel and Russia share the common goals of removing Iranian and Iranian-backed forces from Syria and ending Iran’s support for Hezbollah.

According to Bolton, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the July summit in Helsinki with U.S. President Donald Trump that he did not think Russia has the same interests in Syria as Iran “and that he’d like to talk about ways to get” Iran out of the country.

However, a U.S. administration official familiar with the meeting said the Russian leadership believes securing Iran’s withdrawal from Syria would be difficult.

Senior Iranian officials have said their military presence in Syria is at the invitation of the Assad government and they have no immediate plans to withdraw.

More than 1,000 Iranians, including senior members of the elite Revolutionary Guards, have been killed in Syria since 2012.

Meanwhile Sunday, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said America is waging a psychological war against Iran and its business partners.

“[America’s] focus is on a psychological war against Iran and its business partners,” Zarif said.

Trump pulled the United States out of the 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers in May and is reimposing sanctions on Tehran. Other parties to the accord are trying to find ways to save the agreement.

The decision to withdraw from the nuclear accord has hurt the United States, Zarif said, according to the Iranian Students’ News Agency.

“From the time that Trump announced the withdrawal from the nuclear deal, America has not been able to reach its goals,” Zarif said.

Washington aims to force Tehran to end its nuclear program and its support of terrorist groups and proxy militias in the Middle East.

Zarif added that the nuclear deal has led to political conflict within Iran.

“There are some in the country who, instead of laying the groundwork for using the opportunities presented by the nuclear deal, chose a political fight,” Zarif said, according to the Iranian Students News Agency. “And this political fight led to despair and disappointment.”

Hard-line critics of the deal have lashed out at Iranian President Hassan Rouhani after America’s withdrawal, claiming the agreement was a form of capitulation.