Iran’s Raisi Says Israeli Actions ‘May Force Everyone’ to Act

A handout picture provided by Iran's Presidency on October 28, 2023, shows Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi during an interview with the Qatari state-owned news television network Al-Jazeera in Tehran. (Photo by Handout / Iranian Presidency / AFP)
A handout picture provided by Iran's Presidency on October 28, 2023, shows Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi during an interview with the Qatari state-owned news television network Al-Jazeera in Tehran. (Photo by Handout / Iranian Presidency / AFP)
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Iran’s Raisi Says Israeli Actions ‘May Force Everyone’ to Act

A handout picture provided by Iran's Presidency on October 28, 2023, shows Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi during an interview with the Qatari state-owned news television network Al-Jazeera in Tehran. (Photo by Handout / Iranian Presidency / AFP)
A handout picture provided by Iran's Presidency on October 28, 2023, shows Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi during an interview with the Qatari state-owned news television network Al-Jazeera in Tehran. (Photo by Handout / Iranian Presidency / AFP)

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Sunday said Israel's ongoing bombardment of Gaza "may force everyone" to act in the latest warning issued by Tehran since the start of the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Israel has been pounding the tiny Palestinian territory since Hamas gunmen stormed across the border on October 7 and, according to Israeli officials, killed more than 1,400 people, most of them civilians.

Since then, more than 8,000 people have been killed, half of them children, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza, an impoverished strip of land which is home to 2.4 million people.

"The crimes of the Zionist regime have crossed the red lines, and this may force everyone to take action," Raisi said on X, formerly Twitter, on Sunday.

"Washington asks us to not do anything, but they keep giving widespread support to Israel," he said.

"The US sent messages to the Axis of Resistance but received a clear response on the battlefield," he said, using a term often used by Iranian officials to refer to Iran and its allies like Lebanon's Hezbollah, Yemen's Houthi militias and other Shiite forces in Iraq and Syria.

Although it was not immediately clear what he was referring to, there have been a string of attacks on US forces in Iraq and Syria as well as increasing exchanges of fire between Hezbollah and Israeli forces on the Lebanon border since the Gaza conflict began.

Iran, which financially and militarily backs Hamas, hailed the October 7 attacks as a "success".

But it has insisted it was not involved in the onslaught, during which 230 people were also taken hostage, according to Israeli authorities.

"Iran considers it its duty to support the resistance groups, but ... the resistance groups are independent in their opinion, decision, and action," the Iranian president said in an interview with Al Jazeera on Saturday, according to excerpts released by state news agency IRNA.

"The United States knows very well our current capabilities and knows that they are impossible to overcome," he said.



Russia Launches Nearly 150 Drones against Ukraine as Trump Doubts Putin's Desire for Peace

A view shows ruins of buildings in the abandoned town of Marinka (Maryinka), which was destroyed in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict in the Donetsk region, a Russian-controlled area of Ukraine, April 1, 2025. (Reuters)
A view shows ruins of buildings in the abandoned town of Marinka (Maryinka), which was destroyed in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict in the Donetsk region, a Russian-controlled area of Ukraine, April 1, 2025. (Reuters)
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Russia Launches Nearly 150 Drones against Ukraine as Trump Doubts Putin's Desire for Peace

A view shows ruins of buildings in the abandoned town of Marinka (Maryinka), which was destroyed in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict in the Donetsk region, a Russian-controlled area of Ukraine, April 1, 2025. (Reuters)
A view shows ruins of buildings in the abandoned town of Marinka (Maryinka), which was destroyed in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict in the Donetsk region, a Russian-controlled area of Ukraine, April 1, 2025. (Reuters)

Russia launched a sweeping drone assault across Ukraine overnight into Sunday, targeting multiple regions, officials said, after US President Donald Trump cast doubt over Russian President Vladimir Putin’s willingness to end the war.

One person was killed and a 14-year-old girl wounded in the city of Pavlohrad in the Dnipropetrovsk region, which was hit for the third consecutive night, regional Gov. Serhii Lysak said.

The attacks came hours after Russia claimed to have regained control over the remaining parts of the Kursk region, which Ukrainian forces seized in a surprise incursion last August. Ukrainian officials said the fighting in Kursk was still ongoing, The AP news reported.

Trump said Saturday that he doubts Putin wants to end the more than three-year war in Ukraine, expressing new skepticism that a peace deal can be reached soon. Only a day earlier, Trump had said Ukraine and Russia were “ very close to a deal.”

“There was no reason for Putin to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, cities and towns, over the last few days,” Trump wrote in a social media post as he flew back to the United States after attending Pope Francis’ funeral at the Vatican, where he met briefly with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump also hinted at further sanctions against Russia.

The Trump-Zelenskyy conversation on the sidelines of the pope’s funeral was the first face-to-face encounter between the two leaders since they argued during a heated Oval Office meeting at the White House in late February.

Russia fired 149 exploding drones and decoys in the latest wave of attacks, the Ukrainian air force said, adding that 57 were intercepted and another 67 jammed.

One person was wounded in drone attacks on the Odesa region and one other in the city of Zhytomyr. Four people were also wounded in a Russian airstrike on the city of Kherson on Sunday morning, according to local officials.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said Sunday that air defenses shot down five Ukrainian drones in the border region of Bryansk, as well as three drones over the Crimean peninsula, which was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014.

Five people were wounded when Ukrainian forces shelled the city of Horlivka in the partially occupied Donetsk region, the city’s Russian-installed Mayor Ivan Prikhodko said.