Iran’s supreme leader warns missile attack on Israel ‘will be done again if necessary’
Iran’s supreme leader has claimed its missile attack on Israel was “fully legal and legitimate” – as he warned “it will be done in the future again if it becomes necessary”.
In a rare speech, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei also described the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October as a “legitimate” act – and he urged Tehran’s allies to “double your efforts and capabilities” against a “common enemy”.
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Mr Khamenei had a rifle by his side as he gave his first address at Friday prayers in five years after Iran fired a barrage of at least 180 missiles at Israel on Tuesday night.
The strikes were in retaliation for a series of Israeli strikes on Lebanon which killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and other members of the militant group’s top command.
Hezbollah is designated a terror group by the UK, the US and other Western nations.
Mr Khamenei praised the Iranian retaliation in his address on Friday, telling those gathered at the Mosalla mosque in Tehran: “The shining job by our armed forces two or three nights ago was fully legal and legitimate.”
“It will be done in the future again if it becomes necessary,” he added.
The 85-year-old’s hand occasionally grasped the barrel of a rifle that stood to his left, a custom that has been followed by Friday prayer leaders across the country for decades.
Iran’s supreme leader holds a weapon during his speech. Pic: WANA/Reuters
Iran said it hit most of its targets on Tuesday but there have been no reports of casualties and Israel claimed it intercepted many of the missiles.
The Iran attack was the latest escalation as fears have grown of an all-out war in the region since Hamas carried out an attack on Israel in October last year – killing around 1,200 people and taking a further 250 hostage.
Israel has responded by launching air and ground attacks in Gaza – with the Hamas-run health ministry in the territory saying so far more than 41,000 people have been killed. The ministry doesn’t differentiate between civilians and fighters.
In his 40-minute speech just days away from the anniversary of the Hamas attack, Mr Khamenei said the Palestinian militant group’s incursion was a “legitimate” action and that “every country has the right to defend itself from aggressors”.
A ceremony was held in Iran to commemorate killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. Pic: WANA/Reuters
It is not the first time Mr Khamenei has praised the Hamas incursion, as shortly after the attack he said Israel’s “own actions are to blame for this disaster”.
In his speech on Friday, Iran’s supreme leader urged nations from “Afghanistan to Yemen and from Iran to Gaza and Yemen” to be ready to take action against Israel and praised those who had died doing so.
“Our resisting people in Lebanon and Palestine, you brave fighters, you loyal and patient people, these martyrdoms and the blood that was shed shouldn’t shake your determination but make you more persistent,” he said.
Reflecting on the Iranian strikes on Israel, Mr Khamenei told Tehran’s allies in region: “We’re defending ourselves but we’re also defending you against a common enemy that through violence and terror seeks to destroy our way of life.”
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Mr Khamenei also told Israel adversaries to “double your efforts and capabilities… and resist the aggressive enemy”.
A ceremony commemorating the death of Nasrallah was held before the supreme leader’s speech.
Most high-ranking Iranian officials, including Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and top Revolutionary Guard generals, attended the ceremony.
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Moment Israel intercepts Iranian drones
Mr Khamenei’s last appearance at Friday prayers was after the death of Revolutionary Guard General Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in 2020 in a US drone strike in Baghdad.
Also on Friday, Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi arrived in Lebanon’s capital Beirut, where he was expected to discuss with Lebanese officials the ongoing fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.
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Meanwhile, Israel carried out a series of massive air strikes in southern suburbs of Beirut overnight and another that cut off the main border crossing between Lebanon and Syria, a crossing point for tens of thousands of people fleeing Israeli bombardment.
Israel launched a ground incursion into Lebanon on Tuesday and its forces have been clashing with Hezbollah militants in a narrow strip along the border.
Israel claims around 250 Hezbollah fighters have been killed since the ground operation began, while at least 10 Israeli soldiers have died in the action.
Donald Trump has agreed to send “top of the line weapons” to NATO to support Ukraine – and threatened Russia with “severe” tariffs if it doesn’t agree to end the war.
Speaking with NATO secretary general Mark Rutte during a meeting at the White House, the US president said: “We’ve made a deal today where we are going to be sending them weapons, and they’re going to be paying for them.
“This is billions of dollars worth of military equipment which is going to be purchased from the United States,” he added, “going to NATO, and that’s going to be quickly distributed to the battlefield.”
Weapons being sent include surface-to-air Patriot missile systems and batteries, which Ukraine has asked for to defend itself from Russian air strikes.
Pic: Reuters
Mr Trump also said he was “very unhappy” with Russia, and threatened “severe tariffs” of “about 100%” if there isn’t a deal to end the war in Ukraine within 50 days.
The White House added that the US would put “secondary sanctions” on countries that buy oil from Russia if an agreement was not reached.
It comes after weeks of frustration from Mr Trump against Vladimir Putin’s refusal to agree to an end to the conflict, with the Russian leader telling the US president he would “not back down” from Moscow’s goals in Ukraine at the start of the month.
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Trump says Putin ‘talks nice and then bombs everybody’
During the briefing on Monday, Mr Trump said he had held calls with Mr Putin where he would think “that was a nice phone call,” but then “missiles are launched into Kyiv or some other city, and that happens three or four times”.
“I don’t want to say he’s an assassin, but he’s a tough guy,” he added.
Earlier this year, Mr Trump told Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy “you’re gambling with World War Three” in a fiery White House meeting, and suggested Ukraine started the war against Russia as he sought to negotiate an end to the conflict.
After Mr Trump’s briefing, Russian senator Konstantin Kosachev said on Telegram: “If this is all that Trump had in mind to say about Ukraine today, then all the steam has gone out.”
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Meanwhile, Mr Zelenskyy met with US special envoy Keith Kellogg in Kyiv, where they “discussed the path to peace” by “strengthening Ukraine’s air defence, joint production, and procurement of defence weapons in collaboration with Europe”.
He thanked both the envoy for the visit and Mr Trump “for the important signals of support and the positive decisions for both our countries”.
At least 30 people have been killed in the Syrian city of Sweida in clashes between local military groups and tribes, according to Syria’s interior ministry.
Officials say initial figures suggest around 100 people have also been injured in the city, where the Druze faith is one of the major religious groups.
The interior ministry said its forces will directly intervene to resolve the conflict, which the Reuters news agency said involved fighting between Druze gunmen and Bedouin Sunni tribes.
It marks the latest episode of sectarian violence in Syria, where fears among minority groups have increased since Islamist-led rebels toppled President Bashar al Assad in December, installing their own government and security forces.
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In March, Sky’s Stuart Ramsay described escalating violence within Syria
The violence reportedly erupted after a wave of kidnappings, including the abduction of a Druze merchant on Friday on the highway linking Damascus to Sweida.
Last April, Sunni militia clashed with armed Druze residents of Jaramana, southeast of Damascus, and fighting later spread to another district near the capital.
But this is the first time the fighting has been reported inside the city of Sweida itself, the provincial capital of the mostly Druze province.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reports the fighting was centred in the Maqwas neighbourhood east of Sweida and villages on the western and northern outskirts of the city.
It adds that Syria’s Ministry of Defence has deployed military convoys to the area.
Western nations, including the US and UK, have been increasingly moving towards normalising relations with Syria.
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Concerns among minority groups have intensified following the killing of hundreds of Alawites in March, in apparent retaliation for an earlier attack carried out by Assad loyalists.
That was the deadliest sectarian flare-up in years in Syria, where a 14-year civil war ended with Assad fleeing to Russia after his government was overthrown by rebel forces.
The city of Sweida is in southern Syria, about 24 miles (38km) north of the border with Jordan.
The man convicted of the murder of British student Meredith Kercher has been charged with sexual assault against an ex-girlfriend.
Rudy Guede, 38, was the only person who was definitively convicted of the murder of 21-year-old Ms Kercher in Perugia, Italy, back in 2007.
He will be standing trial again in November after an ex-girlfriend filed a police report in the summer of 2023 accusing Guede of mistreatment, personal injury and sexual violence.
Guede, from the Ivory Coast, was released from prison for the murder of Leeds University student Ms Kercher in 2021, after having served about 13 years of a 16-year sentence.
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Since last year – when this investigation was still ongoing – Guede has been under a “special surveillance” regime, Sky News understands, meaning he was banned from having any contact with the woman behind the sexual assault allegations, including via social media, and had to inform police any time he left his city of residence, Viterbo, as ruled by a Rome court.
Guede has been serving a restraining order and fitted with an electronic ankle tag.
The Kercher murder case, in the university city of Perugia, was the subject of international attention.
Ms Kercher, a 21-year-old British exchange student, was found murdered in the flat she shared with her American roommate, Amanda Knox.
The Briton’s throat had been cut and she had been stabbed 47 times.
(L-R) Raffaele Sollecito, Meredith Kercher and Amanda Knox. File pic: AP
Ms Knox and her then-boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were placed under suspicion.
Both were initially convicted of murder, but Italy’s highest court overturned their convictions, acquitting them in 2015.
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