Israel hastens own demise by targeting resistance commanders: Ex-IRGC chief
A former chief commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has warned that the Israeli regime’s targeted killings of resistance commanders were accelerating its own demise.
Mohsen Rezaei made the remarks during a funeral ceremony held in honor of unidentified martyrs in the southeastern city of Kerman on Monday.
He said the regime “imagines it can advance [its agenda] through assassinations,” and believes that striking Lebanese and Iranian commanders would force nations into submission.
“In reality,” Rezaei added, “with every commander it (the regime) assassinates, it takes one more step towards its own demise.”
Rezaei, currently a member of the Islamic Republic’s Expediency Council, underlined that resistance leaders did not represent governments or states. “These commanders belong to nations, to the oppressed. Their martyrdom [therefore] cannot be meaningless for the peoples.”
The remarks followed Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah’s officially confirming the martyrdom of its senior commander, Haytham Ali Tabatabai, and four other members of the group in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut’s southern suburbs.
Hezbollah confirms martyrdom of Commander Tabatabai in 'treacherous Israeli attack'https://t.co/kym1RkEoVo
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Rezaei stressed that despite relentless Israeli pressure, the Axis of Resistance in Lebanon “is today stronger than during the era of Martyr Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah,” referring to Hezbollah’s former revered secretary general, who was martyred in an Israeli attack against the Lebanese capital last year.
The official advised that the resistance should rethink its long-standing attitude of strategic patience, noting that “the criminal Israeli regime exploits restraint.” Any shift in strategy, however, is for Lebanon’s resistance forces to decide, he added.
Rezaei went on to laud the Iranian nation for their numerous instances of historic resistance in the face of foreign aggression, including their heroic defense of the country during an Iraqi-imposed war in the 1980s and an Israeli-American one in June.
Without such sacrifices, “Iran would have faced the fate of countries occupied during the First and Second World Wars.”
The veteran commander, meanwhile, highlighted Kerman’s symbolic place in regional geopolitics, noting it as the city from which General Qassem Soleimani, former commander of the IRGC’s Quds Force, had hailed.
He credited the Iranian resistance and steadfastness for inspiring the decades-long acts of resistance that have been taking place throughout the West Asia region, including in Lebanon, Iraq, and Yemen.
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