“What happened last night was not a strike,” said Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian in an interview with NBC News earlier on Friday, before adding, “They were more like toys toys that our children play with – not drones.”
During the interview, which took place in New York where the FM is attending a UN Security Council session, Amir-Abdollahian explained “As long as there is no new adventurism by Israel against our interests, then we are not going to have any new reactions.”
However, the FM stressed, that if Tel Aviv “takes decisive action against my country and this is proven to us, our response will be immediate and to the maximum, and will cause them to regret it.”
Regarding the Iranian retaliation, Amir-Abdollahian said it was “a warning” noting that Tehran “could have hit Haifa and Tel Aviv…We could have also targeted all the economic ports of Israel.”
However, the FM emphasized, “our red line was civilians…we only had a military purpose.”
On October 7 and Gaza
Amir-Abdollahian reiterated what Iran previously stressed, which is that Tehran had no prior knowledge of Hamas’ Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, stressing that Hamas stands as a liberation movement opposed to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land.
Israeli occupation Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to the Iranian FM, is “unhinged” and has stalled all negotiations about the prisoner exchange by making excessive demands to compensate for the IOF’s failure to meet its objectives in the ongoing genocidal war in Gaza.
Amir-Abdollahian explained that Tel Aviv’s has “not been able to destroy Hamas or to arrest the leaders inside Gaza, has not been able to disarm Hamas, has not been able to destroy the weapons and equipment.”
As a result, the Iranian FM noted, “Israel” had “to resort to killing women and children,” adding “and now at the negotiating table, they are trying to get what they could not get on the ground.”
Hamas is “ready to go ahead with the release of the prisoners within the format of a humanitarian political package encompassing everything,” Amir-abdollahian said, before he added, “I think now is a good time, there is a good chance for this.”
Source: AlMayadeen
