Advisor to Iran's Leader: Hezbollah Missiles Ready to Strike Israel

Yahya Rahim Safavi, military advisor to Ayatollah Khamenei, announced Hezbollah's missile readiness to target Israel. According to Young Journalists Club, Mr. Rahim Safavi made these remarks during the pre-Friday prayer sermon in Tabriz. He stated, "Hezbollah forces have become a powerful force to confront Israel; according to the leader of Hezbollah, today Hezbollah Lebanon will not compromise with Israel, and Hezbollah's missiles are always ready to be fired at Israel." These statements come after the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) retaliated against deadly attacks by several ISIS members in Tehran by firing six missiles at their positions in Syria for the first time. Although Israel did not consider the IRGC's missile operation against ISIS successful, it has warned about Hezbollah's military enhancement with advanced weapons. General Gadi Eisenkot, Chief of Staff of the Israeli Army, stated that Tel Aviv "will act decisively to prevent advanced weapons from reaching Hezbollah, Iran's ally." Some Israeli military experts have recently expressed concern that the delivery of missiles like Qiam and Zulfiqar from Iran to Hezbollah could be detrimental to Israel in future military crises between Hezbollah and Israel. The report from IRIB also indicated that the military advisor to the Supreme Leader stated in another part of his remarks that "Saudi Arabia will take its wish to bring war inside Iran to the grave." This refers to comments made by Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia's Minister of Defense, who recently stated in an interview that Riyadh would not wait for war to enter Saudi Arabia and is working to draw the battle into Iran. Rahim Safavi added that Saudi Arabia has been "defeated" in Yemen and the region and blames Iran for its "defeat." He further stated that for this reason, the country is trying to bring "war" to Iran and that "after repeated defeats, followers of Saudi Arabia have publicly established their connection with Israel." The military advisor to Ayatollah Khamenei labeled Israel and "some of the monarchies in the region" as the cause of the spread of "Salafism and Wahhabism," adding that "their goal was to create terrorists for civil war, and some countries also showed a positive attitude towards this action." According to him, "all these actions were aimed at creating discord among Muslims and infiltrating Iran, even many deviants and deceived individuals joined this group, and some from Iran also participated with ISIS in Syria." Relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia have cooled following the deaths of hundreds of Iranians in last year's Hajj and the attack by Hezbollah forces on the Saudi embassy in Iran, with both countries openly threatening each other. Riyadh and Tehran support opposing sides in the Syrian civil war and the battles in Yemen, effectively engaging in a proxy war against each other. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei also referred to Saudi leaders as "fools" earlier in June and described the country as a "milking cow" from which, according to him, "the enemies of Islam milk it, and when it has no milk left, they slaughter it." Following the deadly attacks by five ISIS members in Tehran, which resulted in the deaths of at least 17 people, Iran's permanent representative to the UN requested the Secretary-General and the Security Council to pay attention to the "terrorist" incident in Tehran and the "motivations and collusions" of the perpetrators of these attacks, implicitly accusing Saudi Arabia of involvement in these attacks.