Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian warned at the United Nations on Thursday that if Israel's retaliation against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip doesn't end then the United States will "not be spared from this fire."
"I say frankly to the American statesmen, who are now managing the genocide in Palestine, that we do not welcome (an)expansion of the war in the region. But if the genocide in Gaza continues, they will not be spared from this fire," he told a meeting of the 193-member General Assembly on the Middle East.
"Iran stands ready to play its part in this very important humanitarian endeavor, along with Qatar and Türkiye. Naturally, the release of the 6,000 Palestinian prisoners is another necessity and responsibility of the global community," he added.
For his part, Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp chief Hossein Salami said that the Israeli army doesn’t dare to carry out a ground invasion.
The IRGC-affiliated Fars news agency quoted Salami as saying that Israel is a strange body that was implanted in the region, and it causes bleeding every now and then.
He further warned that the Americans would burn in the fire they started, Fars added.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has said the visit of US President Joe Biden and other Western leaders to Israel indicates they fear the Zionist regime was falling apart.
Khamenei said Wednesday the US manages the war, describing Washington as "a definite accomplice of the criminals in the Palestinian cause”.
A well-informed source said that Washington urged Iran and the “resistance” groups to endorse “self-control”, according to the official IRNA news agency.
The source added that two messages have been sent from the US to Iran and dozens of messages from the US and some Western countries to the “resistance” groups in the region, especially the Lebanese Hezbollah.
The source went on to say that Iran announced that the “resistance” groups work independently and don’t follow Tehran in their steps and that the Al-Aqsa Strom operation was planned and implemented without logistical support from Iran.
Earlier this week, Iranian security officials told Reuters Iran's strategy was for Middle East proxies like Hezbollah to pursue limited strikes on Israeli and US targets but to avoid a major escalation that would draw in Tehran.
Citing people familiar with intelligence related to the attack, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that roughly 500 militants from Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad underwent specialized combat training in Iran in the weeks leading up to the October 7 attack on Israel.
The training was led by officers from the Quds Force, the arm of IRGC, the report said. Senior Palestinian officials and Quds Force chief Esmail Ghaani were present at these exercises.
"My warning to the ayatollah [is] that if they continue to move against those troops, we will respond, and he should be prepared," Biden told reporters, referring to Iran's supreme leader.
“The US messages were neither directed to the leader of the Islamic Revolution nor were they anything but requests from the Iranian side. If Biden thinks he has warned Iran, he should ask his team to show him the text of the messages,” Deputy Chief of Staff for Political Affairs to Iran President Mohammad Jamshidi said on his X account.
On Tuesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned that Washington would act swiftly and decisively if Iran or its proxies attacked US personnel anywhere.
