IRGC chief: Israel, US facing a ‘quagmire’ in Gaza
Chief commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Major General Hossein Salami says Palestinian youths are adapting to new reality in Gaza, where Israel and the US are facing a “quagmire”.
“Palestinian youth are adapting to the new conditions and have just learned the rules of the war. They have created a quagmire for America and Israel not only on the battlefield but also in politics, intelligence and security,” he said in the central Iranian city of Isfahan on Thursday.
“Gaza will become a burial ground for the Zionists. They used to fight inside fortifications and behind walls and thought that those walls would protect them from God’s wrath, but God’s punishment will reach them from where they don’t think,” he added.
“Today, they have crossed the walls and exposed their tanks to Palestinian youths who hunt the tanks and bulldozers from close range, so that 180 of their 1,600 tanks have been destroyed to date, which means more than 10% of them have been wiped out.”
Gen. Salami said Israel must expect more surprises like Operation al-Aqsa Storm which saw Palestinian resistance fighters overrun occupied territories in the single worst event in the history of Israel.
“Just as the al-Aqsa Storm came from a place the enemy did not calculate, they must wait for other storms that will reach them from where they do not figure out,” he said.
“The Muslims of the world today are more empathetic than ever, and even in the non-Muslim world a world stands against America and its partners,” Gen. Salami added.
The IRGC chief said arrogant powers have joined hands in “a disgusting and very humiliating show”, waging war on children in Gaza which is a sign of the end of their empire.
“The Zionist regime, the United States and some European countries have gone to war with babies inside the operating rooms of hospitals in Gaza, and they want to show that they are powerful by occupying the ICUs and CCUs.
“Isn’t it humiliating that the world’s largest apparent empires take pride in killing children and babies and consider the capture of hospital operating rooms as their field of victory?
“Isn’t it a shame that the world powers have surrounded people in a strip so that they could not get water, fuel and food? They hit fuel tanks and kill patients and revel in their firepower.
“This is a sign of the end of their empire because whenever they act frenziedly it is a sign of their inner collapse because some animals make a lot of noise when they die.”
Gen. Salami said the fear of an early collapse as predicted by Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei has “robbed the enemy of strategic logic and even tactical and operational logic”.
“What do the enemies want to vanquish? Can the will of a country be broken by bombing? – those who hold the body of their martyred children in their hands and thank God and praise the perseverance that the Prophet of Islam (Peace be upon Him) and the verses of the Qur’an emphasize.”
Gen. Salami said the Palestinians “have learned from the Qur’an that … the path to happiness passes through the field of defense and patience in the face of adversity, and the promise of God’s dawn, conquest, and victory will be fulfilled on this path”.
“The oppression of the honorable people of Gaza will finally do its job and we think about the days of victory and conquest and see it near and God’s victory is nigh,” he said.
As for Israeli settlers, he added, “confusion, anxiety and fear of the future of a land that is no longer inhabited” has gripped “those who have come from all over the world with the promise of life, but a reverse migration has begun and this story will continue”.