Vladimir Putin works his Middle East connections. For his first international outing since the war in Ukraine, he went to Iran to meet with supreme leader Ali Khamenei and Turkish strongman Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Iran and Russia are seeking closer ties in the face of Western sanctions. Also on the agenda: negotiations over blockaded imports of Ukrainian grain and the situation in Syria.
Middle East Matters take a closer look at the movement #No2Hijab campaign in Iran, where women are openly defying dress codes imposed by the Islamic Republic. The Twitter campaign encourages women to take videos of themselves without their veils out in public. A number of women have been arrested since the call was made ahead of the "National Day of Hijab and Chastity" on July 12th.
For more on this story, we're joined from New York by journalist and activist Masih Alinejad. In 2014, she started her own social media campaign called "My Stealthy Freedom", where she shared pictures of unveiled Iranian women sent to her.
In this edition, we also discuss the filming of an action film produced by Jackie Chan in an area in Syria once overrun by the Islamic State Group. The film is meant to be a huge box office draw, but it is also delving into politics, as it is expected to glorify the Chinese Communist government.
