NNA – President Ebrahim Raisi said Sunday that Iran supported the Palestiniansrsquo; right to self-defense and accused Israel of being a danger to the region, a day after Hamas militants attacked Israel.
ldquo;Iran supports the legitimate defense of the Palestinian nation,rdquo; Raisi said, quoted by state television.
ldquo;The Zionist regime (Israel) and its supporters are responsible for endangering the security of nations in the region, and they must be held accountable in this matter.rdquo;
Earlier on Sunday, Raisi spoke with leaders of Palestinian militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad, state media said.
ldquo;Raisi discussed the developments in Palestine in separate phone calls with Ziyad al-Nakhalah, secretary general of the Islamic Jihad Movement, and Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the (Hamas) political bureau,rdquo; state news agency IRNA reported, without giving further details.
Hamas said Raisi expressed his support for the operations against Israel to Haniyeh, who, in turn, assured Raisi that the military operation would expand from Gaza to other arenas.
Militants from Hamas, which controls the Gaza strip, penetrated Israel at dawn on Saturday under cover of a massive rocket barrage.
Israelrsquo;s government said the worst fighting in decades has killed more than 600 Israelis and that Hamas took more than 100 people hostage. On the Gaza side at least 313 were reported dead.
Iran hailed the Palestinian attack calling it a ldquo;proud operationrdquo; and a ldquo;great victory.rdquo;
ldquo;This victorious operation, which will facilitate and accelerate the collapse of the Zionist regime, promises the impending destruction of the Zionist regime,rdquo; said Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior adviser to Iranrsquo;s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
ldquo;I am congratulating this great and strategic victory, which is a serious warning to all compromisers in the region,rdquo; he added in a letter to Hamas and Islamic Jihad on Saturday.
The Islamic Republic hosted talks with leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad in June.
At the time, Raisi said that Israel was seeking to normalize ties with more Arab and Muslim countries ldquo;to discourage young Palestinians from (seeking to) liberate the occupied territories,rdquo; according to the Iranian presidency. —- AlArabiya Newsnbsp;
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