Accessibility links

Breaking News

Iran

FILE - Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei waves after voting during the presidential election in Tehran, Iran, June 28, 2024. On Saturday, the day after an Israeli airstrike on Beirut, he said Israel is committing "shameless crimes" against children, not combatants. 
FILE - Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei waves after voting during the presidential election in Tehran, Iran, June 28, 2024. On Saturday, the day after an Israeli airstrike on Beirut, he said Israel is committing "shameless crimes" against children, not combatants. 

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Saturday that Israel is committing "shameless crimes" against children, not combatants.

His comments came a day after an Israeli airstrike on the Lebanese capital, Beirut, killed at least 31 people, including three children and seven women, according to the Lebanese health ministry.

Friday's strike, which according to a source targeted a building next to a nursery, was the deadliest in a year of conflict between Israel and the Iranian-backed Lebanese Hezbollah militia.

It followed two days of attacks in which pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah members exploded. Lebanon blamed the attacks on Israel, which has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement.

Khamenei said Israel was not even hiding its different forms of "shameless crimes" in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon and Syria.

It is not combating "fighting men, but ordinary people," Khamenei told a group of envoys from Muslim countries in Tehran in remarks broadcast on state TV.

"Unable to hurt the real fighters in Palestine, they are venting their malicious anger on small children, on hospital patients, and on schools filled with young children."

Also on Saturday, in a show of strength, Iran unveiled its "Jihad" single-stage liquid-fuel ballistic missile with a high-explosive detachable warhead and a range of 1,000 kilometers, according to state TV.

The missiles were displayed, along with other military hardware, during a parade marking the anniversary of the start of the 1980-88 war with Iraq.

A missile is carried on a truck in front of a portrait of the late Iranian revolutionary founder Ayatollah Khomeini during an annual armed forces parade, just outside Tehran, Iran, Sept. 21, 2024.
A missile is carried on a truck in front of a portrait of the late Iranian revolutionary founder Ayatollah Khomeini during an annual armed forces parade, just outside Tehran, Iran, Sept. 21, 2024.

Iran unveiled a new ballistic missile and an upgraded one-way attack drone at a military parade Saturday, state media said, amid soaring regional tensions and allegations of arming Russia.

Iran stands accused by Western governments of supplying both drones and missiles to Russia for use in its war with Ukraine, a charge it has repeatedly denied.

The solid-fuel Jihad missile was designed and manufactured by the aerospace arm of Iran's Revolutionary Guards and has an operational range of 1,000 kilometers, state news agency IRNA said.

The Shahed-136B drone is an upgraded version of the Shahed-136, with new features and an operational range of more than 4,000 kilometers, it added.

New President Masoud Pezeshkian attended the annual parade in Tehran, commemorating the 1980-88 war with Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

"Today, our defensive and deterrent capabilities have grown so much that no demon even thinks about any aggression towards our dear Iran," he said.

"With unity and cohesion among Islamic countries... we can put in its place the bloodthirsty, genocidal usurper Israel, which shows no mercy to anyone, women or children, old or young."

The Middle East has been in turmoil since Iran-backed Palestinian militant group Hamas attacked Israel on October 7 sparking war in Gaza and drawing in Iranian allies around the region.

The tensions have intensified in recent days as the focus of Israel's firepower has shifted north to the Lebanon border where its troops have been battling Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.

An Israeli air strike on Hezbollah's Beirut stronghold killed 16 members of its elite Radwan Force on Friday, a source close to the group said, hot on the heels of deadly sabotage attacks on the group's communications earlier this week.

Britain, France, Germany and the United States slapped new sanctions on Iran earlier this month, alleging that it had been providing ballistic missiles for Russia's war effort in Ukraine.

Load more

Special Report

XS
SM
MD
LG