Maqam-e-Ibrahim shines ... like visitors’ faith

Tehran: Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has launched “extensive” retaliatory missile and drone strikes against the occupied territories in response to the Israeli regime’s terrorist attack of April 1 against the Islamic Republic’s diplomatic premises in the Syrian capital Damascus.

The Corps announced launching the strikes in a statement on Saturday night, defining the mission as "Operation True Promise."

“In response to the Zionist regime’s numerous crimes, including the attack on the consular section of Iran’s Embassy in Damascus and the martyrdom of a number of our country’s commanders and military advisors in Syria, the IRGC’s Aerospace Division launched tens of missiles and drones against certain targets inside the occupied territories,” the statement read.

Iran's Defense Minister Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Ashtiani, meanwhile, warned that “Whatever country that could open its soil or airspace to Israel for a [potential] attack on Iran, will receive our decisive response.”

The Israeli attack had resulted in the martyrdom of Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a commander of the IRGC's Quds Force, his deputy, General Mohammad Hadi Haji Rahimi, and five of their accompanying officers.

The terrorist attack drew sharp condemnation from senior Iranian political and military leaders, who vowed "definitive revenge."

During a speech in Tehran on Wednesday after leading the Eid al-Fitr prayers, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei said the Israeli regime “must be punished and will be punished” for the deadly strike on the Iranian diplomatic premises.

The Leader added, “The evil Zionist regime committed another mistake ...  and that was the attack on the Iranian consulate in Syria. The consulate and diplomatic missions in any country are considered to be the territory of that country. When they attack our consulate, it means they have attacked our soil."

In a subsequent statement, the IRGC said the retaliation came after 10 days of "silence and neglect" on the part of the international organizations, especially the United Nations Security Council, to condemn the Israeli aggression or punish the regime in line with Article 7 of the UN Charter.

Iran then resorted to the retaliatory strikes, the Corps added, "using its strategic intelligence capabilities, missiles, and drones" to attack "targets of the Zionist terrorist army in the occupied territories, successfully hitting and destroying them."

The statement, meanwhile, warned the United States -- the Israeli regime's biggest supporter -- that "any support or participation in harming Iran's interests will result in a decisive and regrettable response by the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic."

"Furthermore, America is held responsible for the evil actions of the Zionist regime, and if this child-killing regime is not restrained in the region, it will bear the consequences," it noted.

The Corps concluded the statement by cautioning third countries against letting their soil or airspace be used for attacks against the Islamic Republic.

The spokesman for the Yemeni Armed Forces has said it has carried out new operations against American and British targets in retaliation for their aggression on the country.

Brigadier General Yahya Saree said on Friday that Yemen’s naval forces struck a British oil tanker in the Red Sea with missiles.

Saree also said the military also shot down an American MQ-9 drone in Sa’ada province.

He added that the new operations were also a show of solidarity with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, amid the Israeli genocide there. 

“The Yemeni Armed Forces salute all the people of Yemen for their faithful response to the call of the fighter leader Sayyed Abdulmalik Badr El-Din Al-Houthi, may Allah protect him, in their unprecedented large-scale interaction in support of our oppressed brothers in the Gaza Strip, affirming support for the Armed Forces in their military operations against the ‘Israeli’ enemy and against the American-British aggression supporting it in the Red and Arabian Seas and the Indian Ocean,” Saree said.

He stressed that the Yemeni armed forces will continue operations in the Red and Arabian Seas as well as the Indian Ocean until the Western-backed Israeli genocide comes to a halt.

Since the start of the brutal campaign in Gaza, the regime has killed more than 34,300 Palestinians and injured over 77,000 others. It has cut off fuel, electricity, food and water to the more than two million Palestinians living there.

The Yemeni Armed Forces have been targeting Israeli vessels or those “associated” with the occupying regime in the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea since October 7, 2023.

The regime ignited its bloody war machine in the besieged Palestinian territory on that October day in response to Operation Al-Aqsa Storm conducted by the resistance movement Hamas.

The maritime attacks have forced some of the world’s biggest shipping and oil companies to suspend transit through one of the world’s most important maritime trade routes.

Tankers are instead adding thousands of miles to international shipping routes by sailing around the continent of Africa rather than going through the Suez Canal.

The pro-Palestine maritime campaign has also prompted airstrikes by the US and its allies on Yemen – in violation of the Yemeni sovereignty and international law.

In consequence, Yemen’s armed forces have declared US and British vessels as legitimate targets.

Some 62,000 Israeli settlers have fled areas in the northern sector of the 1948 Israeli-occupied lands amid fear of strikes by Lebanon’s Hezbollah resistance movement in retaliation for the bloody onslaught on Gaza, latest reports have revealed.

Lebanon’s al-Mayadeen television news channel, citing Israeli media outlets, reported on Sunday evening that the number of settlers that have evacuated the area as a result of Hezbollah’s operations now stands at a staggering 62,000.

The report noted that 30,000 of the settlers have evacuated northern occupied Palestine on their own as fears are mounting among the residents that Hezbollah fighters continue to carry out daily operations with no signs that they are deterred by any action the Israeli army is taking.

Israeli media outlets further noted that 40% of the evacuees are considering no return to the region.

Moreover, 38% of those who voluntarily left the area, no longer intend to return to their previous places of residence in the northern occupied territories.

This comes as Hezbollah targeted a facility housing Israeli soldiers in the Shomera settlement earlier on Sunday with a barrage of rockets.

The Lebanese resistance group also struck surveillance devices newly installed around the Dovev military barracks, completely destroying the hardware.

Hezbollah said in a statement that it attacked the deployment positions of Israeli soldiers south of the Jal al-Alam site, using heavy-caliber Burkan (Volcano) missiles.

In another statement, the resistance group announced that its fighters struck surveillance equipment at the Misgav Am military site, which Israeli forces had lately re-positioned.

Surveillance equipment at the al-Malkiya base was also targeted and destroyed, it said, adding that the operation was carried out with a salvo of rockets.

The Israeli regime has repeatedly attacked southern Lebanon since October 7, when it launched a genocidal war on Gaza that has killed at least 34,097 Palestinians, most of them women and children.

In retaliation, Hezbollah has launched near-daily rocket attacks on Israeli positions.

At least 349 people have been killed on the Lebanese border, including 68 civilians.

Hezbollah has already fought off two Israeli wars against Lebanon in 2000 and 2006. The resistance forced the regime to retreat in both conflicts.