Iran: Israeli Assault on Syria Not to Remain Unanswered

 Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian strongly condemned Israel’s continued aggression against Syria, and vowed that the Damascus government will deliver a crushing and decisive response to the Zionist regime’s raids.

Amir Abdollahian made the remarks during a joint press conference with his Syrian counterpart Faisal al-Mekdad in Damascus on Wednesday.

The Iranian minister stressed that Tehran “vehemently condemns Israel’s recurrent attacks against Syria.

“The Zionist regime’s criminal activities targeting Syria would not go unanswered,” he warned.

Since 2011, Syria has been gripped by foreign-backed militancy, as a result of which Daesh (also known as ISIS or ISIL) and other terror groups emerged in the country. 

Israel has been one of the main supporters of terrorist groups that oppose the democratically-elected government of President Bashar Al-Assad since the foreign-backed militancy erupted in Syria. The Zionist regime frequently targets military positions inside Syria, especially those of the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah which has played a key role in helping the Syrian Army in its fight against foreign-backed terrorists.

Iran was the first country to rush to Syria’s assistance following the outbreak of the foreign-backed violence in the Arab country. Tehran maintains an advisory mission in Syria at the request of Damascus with the aim of helping the war-ravaged country get rid of the foreign-backed militants who have been fighting against the democratically-elected Syrian government since 2011. Several members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) have so far martyred in battle against terrorists in the war-torn Syria.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Amir Abdollahian advised the United States to take its military forces out of Syria, with both Tehran and Damascus warning about underway efforts by Washington and its allies to regroup terrorists in the Arab country toward achieving their goals.

“We advise the American military forces to go back home, and also advise the United States officials to leave the region to its inhabitants,” the Iranian foreign minister added.

The top diplomat asserted that Iran would continue supporting the Syrian leadership, army, and people until the return of stability to the Arab country.

“Syria and the region’s security is our serious common concern. Syria is a very important country in our region that no party can ignore,” he continued.

Mekdad, for his part, stated that the US and other Western countries’ “aggressive policies” against Iran and Syria, especially their investment in terrorism as means of their trying to realize their political goals, continue.

US forces were first sent to Syria in 2014, beginning with a contingent of special operators followed by more conventional ground troops the next year, most embedded with Kurdish fighters in the country’s oil-rich Northeast. Though then-President Barack Obama maintained the deployment was focused only on combating the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS, ISIL or Daesh) terrorists, Washington had long intervened in Syria’s war against terror groups, sending and overseeing countless arms shipments to militants seeking to overthrow the government in Damascus.

Though American involvement in the conflict slowed under the next administration, in 2019 President Donald Trump noted some US troops would remain in Syria “for the oil”, openly suggesting Washington would simply “keep” the energy resources. 

Subsequent reporting in 2020 would later reveal that the Trump administration had approved a deal between a US energy firm and Kurdish authorities controlling Northeast Syria to “develop and export the region’s crude oil” – a contract immediately condemned as “illegal” by Damascus. However, while that particular deal would later fall through after President Joe Biden took office, Syrian authorities have continued to accuse Washington of plundering its resources and some 900 US troops remain in the country illegally.

Syria, Iran, Russia and China have repeatedly called on Washington to stop plundering Syria’s national resources and respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Arab country, calling on foreign occupation forces and their mercenaries to leave the war-ravaged country.

The US has in numerous reports been proved to have created, trained and supported Daesh and other terror outfits to wreak havoc across the oil-rich region to plunder its resources.

A number of captured Daesh militants have in recent years confessed to close cooperation with US military forces stationed at illegal bases in Syria on carrying out various acts of terror and sabotage. American troops have also airlifted hundreds of members of the Daesh terror group from a Syrian prisons to US military facilities.

Moreover, the US has long history of killing anti-terror commanders in the Middle East.

Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), and his Iraqi trenchmate Abu Mahdi Al-Muhandis, the second-in-command of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), were martyred along with their companions in a US drone strike in early January 2020.

The two anti-terror commanders were tremendously respected and admired across the region for their instrumental role in fighting and decimating the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group in the region, particularly in Iraq and Syria.

Tehran has stressed that Washington’s claim of war on terrorism is merely a pretext to continue occupying the Arab country and plundering its wealth, calling on foreign occupation forces and their mercenaries to leave the war-ravaged country.