Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) chief Hossein Salami has pledged that the IRGC would obliterate the US, Israel and Saudi Arabia if they cross what he described as Tehran’s red lines.
“We have shown restraint ... we have shown patience towards the hostile moves of America, the Zionist regime (Israel) and Saudi Arabia against the Islamic Republic of Iran ... but we will destroy them if they cross our red lines,” Salami said.
The statement comes after IRGC Navy Commander Ali Reza Tangsiri warned early last month that “bitter fate” is in store for any country that encroaches on Iran’s sea border.
He also said that the capture of American and British forces who had entered Iran’s territorial waters in the past were only “warnings” to the forces seeking to breach the country’s maritime boundaries.
The statement was preceded by IRGC Aerospace Force Chief Amirali Hajizadeh saying in September that “everybody should know that all American bases and their aircraft carriers, at a distance of up to 2,000 kilometres around Iran, are within the range of our missiles.”
He spoke just a day after two drone attacks on oilfields in Saudi Arabia, which were claimed by Houthis and blamed by Washington and Riyadh on Tehran which denied the allegations.
In a separate development that time, Yahya Rahim Safavi, a top IRGC Commander, promised that Iran would respond in kind to any US plot against the Islamic Republic.
“If the Americans think of any plots, the Iranian nation will respond from the Mediterranean, to the Red Sea and to the Indian Ocean,” Safavi emphasised.
Iran Denies Involvement in Tanker Attacks
This came after Riyadh, Washington and London accused Iran of being behind the 14 September drone attacks on Saudi Arabia’s Aramco oil facilities. Iran has rejected any involvement in the strikes.
US President Donald Trump’s response to the incident has also included the introduction of more anti-Iranian sanctions.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani claimed in a speech at the UN General Assembly in New York that the US sanctions were acts of “international piracy” and “merciless economic terrorism.”
Earlier, Washington blamed Tehran for staging a number of attacks on commercial tankers in the Gulf of Oman and the Strait of Hormuz, while Iran vehemently denied its involvement.
These developments, along with the downing of a US spy drone in the Strait of Hormuz further added to tensions that have been running high in the Persian Gulf since the Trump administration withdrew from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), on 8 May, 2018. Exactly a year later, Tehran announced that it had suspended some of its obligations under the JCPOA.
