Iran army chief warns ‘Zionists will burn’ if US attacks Syria
Tehran, Damascus step up threats ahead of anticipated American strike on Assad regime; Jerusalem still thinks it unlikely Damascus would tangle with Jewish state
August 28, 2013, 9:46 pm
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An
Iranian navy vessel launches a missile during a drill in the Sea of
Oman in January 2012 (photo credit: AP/ISNA, Amir Kholousi)
Amid increasingly hostile
threats from Syria and Iran that Israel will be attacked if the US
carries out an anticipated punitive strike against the regime of
President Bashar Assad for its chemical weapons use, Israel reportedly
sent messages to Damascus via third parties Wednesday warning Assad that
any attack will be met with a forceful IDF response.
Iran’s leaders also issued warnings Wednesday to the United States over military intervention against their Syrian ally.
Iran’s chief of staff Hassan Firouzabadi was
quoted by Israel’s Channel 2 Wednesday declaring that “if the US
attacks, the Zionists will burn,” and an Iranian journalist said to be
close to Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reportedly warned that
Israel would “face tens of thousands of missiles.”
Taleb Ibrahim, a Syrian analyst, warned on
state television that an American strike would prompt a three-front
attack on Israel — by Syria, Iran and Hezbollah. A second Syrian
television commentator, meanwhile, was quoted saying that “the land [of
Israel] will tremble.”
Hassan Firouzabadi, left, with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2011. (Screenshot: Youtube)
On Tuesday night, Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon, and IDF Chief of General
Staff Benny Gantz all publicly warned Assad not to tangle with Israel.
Those public statements were reinforced by private messages, conveyed
via third parties, Channel 2 reported Wednesday night. The US-led strike
is not expected to be so extensive as to bring down Assad, whereas if
Israel is hit,military sources have said in recent days, its response
could well spell the demise of the Assad regime.
At the same time, Israel has been at pains to
make clear that it has no desire to be drawn into the Syrian conflict,
which has escalated internationally after Assad’s force used alleged
chemical weapons to kill several hundred Syrian civilians in the suburbs
of Damascus last Wednesday — crossing a “red line” set by US President
Barack Obama to outlaw the employment of weapons of mass destruction..
The IDF has not raised its overall alert level, although some weekend
leaves for soldiers in the north are reportedly likely to be cancelled.
And the Israeli security cabinet was briefed Wednesday to the effect
that the likelihood of Assad striking at Israel remained low.
Nonetheless, Israel on Wednesday began calling
up about 1,000 reservists, and deploying anti-missile systems in the
north. Iron Dome batteries also remain in Eilat and close to Gaza,
should rocket fire emanate from the Sinai or the Hamas-controlled Gaza
Strip. Haifa’s Mayor Yona Yahav was briefed Wednesday by Home Front
Command authorities and told to ensure that bomb shelters in the city
were in good order. Israel is expected to be given several hours’
advance notice of an American-led strike.
In comments Wednesday directed at the US,
Khamenei said in a meeting with members of the new Iranian cabinet in
Tehran that “The US threats and possible intervention in Syria are a
disaster for the region. And if such an act is done, certainly, the
Americans will sustain damage like when they interfered in Iraq and
Afghanistan.” He cautioned the US and its allies that their military
intervention in Syria would yield no result but blazing fire and an
increase in nations’ hatred of them, the Fars news agency reported.
“Starting this fire will be like a spark in a
large store of gunpowder, with unclear and unspecified outcomes and
consequences,” Khamenei said.
The speaker of the Iranian parliament , Ali
Larjiani, said, “The result of such an unwise measure (a military attack
on Syria) is regional anarchy which will entangle the naïve countries
of the region.” Speaking in parliament, he said that if any war is waged
against Syria, “the country which has been destroyed by the terrorists
during the past two years will not sustain so much damage as the
warmongers will receive in this war.”
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