The commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force on Monday threatened renewed attacks by Iran and its terrorist proxies against Israeli and U.S. targets across the region.
Esmail Ghaani, in a statement, praised the Iranian-backed Houthi terror group for its “timely and powerful” missile attacks against Israel earlier in the day.
He said the strikes showed the “intelligence of the resistance front” and warned that, “if necessary, others will also come,” according to Iran’s official IRNA outlet.
“From the Strait of Hormuz to Bab al-Mandab, and from the Persian Gulf to the Red Sea, a new security belt of the resistance will be formed,” stated Ghaani, whose elite paramilitary branch is tasked with conducting covert operations outside the borders of the Islamic Republic.
“Borderless fighters are overlooking your passage chokepoints,” he warned Jerusalem and Washington. “Continue the aggression and they will grab you by the throat.”
Iran’s military warned earlier on Monday that it would carry out “far more severe and crushing” missile attacks against Israel if the Jewish state continued military operations against Hezbollah.
“The cessation of armed forces operations is hereby announced,” stated the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, Iran’s highest operational military command, according to a translation by Tehran’s Press TV outlet. The announcement came after U.S. President Donald Trump said that Israel and Iran must “immediately stop shooting.”
The regime threatened to resume attacks “if aggression and hostile acts continue, including in Southern Lebanon.”
The announcement came after Iran and its Houthi proxy targeted Israel with several volleys of ballistic missiles, in what the Islamic Republic said was a response to Jerusalem striking Hezbollah targets in Beirut.
In a televised address on Monday evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the Israel Defense Forces had refrained from further strikes after responding to the Iranian attacks, but warned that the Jewish state would respond with “overwhelming force” if the regime resumed its assaults.
“At the moment, we are holding our fire, because after we struck the terror regime in Tehran, it ceased attacking us,” he said. “In the event that the terror regime in Iran makes the mistake of resuming attacks on us, we will respond with overwhelming force.”
Iran and Hezbollah have tried to impose a “new equation” on Israel that is “intolerable and unacceptable,” according to the Israeli prime minister.
“They thought they would fire at Israel from Lebanese territory and from Iran, and we would not act. That did not happen, and it will not happen,” Netanyahu said. “Not on my watch.”
