Array
– Iran’s supreme leader vowed in a rare address on Friday that his allies around the region would keep fighting Israel, as he defended his country’s missile strike on its foe.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s address in Tehran follows Iran’s second ever direct attack on Israel. It was also the first since exchanges of fire between Tehran-backed Hezbollah fighters and Israeli troops escalated into full-blown war in Lebanon.
Speaking ahead of the first anniversary of Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel that triggered the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip, Khamenei defended the Palestinian group’s “logical and legal” actions and hailed its “fierce defence” against Israeli forces.
The unprecedented Hamas attacked resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people and has drawn global condemnation.
Beyond Tehran, crowds of protesters gathered in Jordan and in Bahrain, which both have ties with Israel, after Friday prayers in a show of support for Iran-backed Hamas and Hezbollah.
In Amman, demonstrators carried portraits of militant leaders killed by Israel and posters hailing the October 7 attack as a “sign of pride, glory and dignity”.
Nearly a year into the Gaza war, Israel has shifted its focus to securing its border with Lebanon, aiming to allow tens of thousands of Israelis displaced by cross-border Hezbollah rocket attacks to return home.
The Israeli military launched an intensified wave of strikes on Hezbollah strongholds around Lebanon, killing more than 1,000 people since September 23, according to Lebanese authorities, and forcing hundreds of thousands to flee their homes in a country already mired in economic crisis.
The attacks have killed an Iranian general, a host of Hezbollah commanders and, in the biggest blow to the group in decades, assassinated its leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
“The resistance in the region will not back down with these martyrdoms, and will win,” Khamenei said, speaking in Arabic.
The Iranian leader charged that Israel was a “malicious regime” which “will not last long”.
There was no immediate response from Israeli leaders as much of the country celebrates the Jewish new year.
