The US government warned on Monday against a possible "series of major attacks" by Iran on Israel, possibly within days, joining European governments in calling on Tehran to "repudiate" any plans to do so.
However, Iran's President Massoud Pezheskian stressed that his country reserves the "right to retaliate" against any attack against it, during a telephone conversation with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who urged him to avoid military escalation.
The US "shares the concern" of Israel that an attack by Iran and its allied movements in the region is imminent, John Kirby, spokesman for the National Security Council of the US presidency, told reporters at the White House.
Washington, which announced in the last 24 hours that it is further strengthening the American military presence in the Middle East, foresees, according to him, "a series of significant attacks", which could be launched as early as "this week", by Iran and its allies of, such as in particular the powerful Hezbollah movement of Lebanon.
The issue was raised during a telephone conversation between US President Joe Biden and the heads of state or government of France, Germany, Italy and Britain.
The five leaders demanded, in a joint statement released afterwards, that Iran not act, "withdraw" its threat to attack Israel, a move that would have "very serious consequences" for the security of the Middle East .
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer both called for a de-escalation of tensions during separate phone calls with the Iranian president.
"Iran will never give in to pressure, sanctions, coercion (…) it considers it has the right to retaliate against any aggressor, based on international norms," the latter countered, according to a statement carried by the official Iranian news agency. IRNA after his conversation with the head of the German government.
The White House noted that if an Iranian attack does take place, it "would potentially have ramifications for the negotiations" scheduled to take place as soon as Thursday, with the hope of agreeing to a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip, which would be accompanied by the release of Israeli hostages in the enclave and Palestinians imprisoned in Israeli prisons.
In a telephone conversation with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammad Zia al-Sudani, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken - who is reportedly preparing for a new tour in the region - once again underlined Iraq's "responsibility to protect the international coalition from attacks by Iranian-backed paramilitary groups."
Meanwhile, a spokesman for the military arm of Hamas announced yesterday that militants "killed one hostage" and wounded "two female hostages" in "two separate incidents" in the Gaza Strip, where - according to the Israeli military - 111 Israeli hostages are still being held, of which at least 39 are believed to be dead.
Iran and its allies have threatened Israel with "severe" punishment following the July 31 assassinations in Tehran of Hamas leader Ismail Haniya, an action attributed to Israel, and this July 30 of a leading figure in the Lebanese military wing of Hezbollah. , by Fouad Soukr, in a bombing in a southern suburb of Beirut that the Israeli military confirmed was carried out.
In April, Tehran had already launched an unprecedented direct attack, sending hundreds of drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles into Israeli territory in retaliation for a bombing that leveled the Iranian consulate in Damascus on April 1, killing among others senior officers of the Revolutionary Guards, also attributed to Israel.
The situation remains extremely tense in Lebanon, where there are daily exchanges of fire on the border between Hezbollah, a movement close to Iran, and the Israeli army.
This last one continues its activity in the Gaza Strip, especially in areas where, according to him, units of Hamas and its allied factions have reappeared.
Yesterday, there was shelling in Khan Younis and Rafah, in the south, according to residents.
In the northern part of the enclave, the effort to identify victims continued after Saturday's bombing of a school in Gaza City, which killed at least 93 people, according to civil protection.
The Israeli army, according to which the school was a "command center" of Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, maintains that with the bombing it "eliminated" 31 fighters of the two armed Palestinian movements.
Israel has vowed to wipe out Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip since 2007, which the US and EU designate as a terrorist organization after it attacked southern sectors of the Israeli territory on October 7, in which they lost the lives of 1.198 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli data.
At least 39.897 people have been killed so far in the large-scale Israeli military operations launched in retaliation in the small Palestinian enclave under siege, according to the latest figures from the Hamas government's health ministry.
Source: protothema.gr
