Iran Votes in First Elections Since 2009

Iranians are going to the polls Friday to choose their parliament in the first election since 2009, when opposition groups took to the streets to protest the disputed presidential election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. 

But, as the BBC reports, this time Ahmadinejed's supporters are facing the opposition of another conservative camp: the supporters of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, with whom the president has had a falling out over the past year. The Green Movement will not be participating in the elections, which will determine the balance of power in parliament leading up to the more important presidential elections in 2013. 

Over 48 million people are eligible to vote in Iran. The results of the election, which will essentially recalibrate the balance of power between two similar conservative groups, are unlikely to change the country's stance on its controversial nuclear program, the BBC explains.

Meanwhile, President Obama and Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are preparing to meet on Monday to discuss the rising tensions concerning Iran's nuclear program. As the New York Times explains, the purpose of the discussions is, in part, to find common ground on the "red line" between diplomatic and military action to stop Iran's nuclear program.

Israel wants military action sooner rather than later, seeing Iran's capacity to build a weapon quickly as the point at which military force should intervene, while the U.S.'s stance is to wait until an actual weapon is being built.