Iran’s Supreme Leader Says Enemies Will Receive ‘Crushing Response’

The US and Israel will “definitely receive a crushing response”, Iran’s supreme leader said after Israel attacked Iran a week ago.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei made the comments during a speech to students on Saturday ahead of the 45th anniversary of the 1979 siege of the US embassy in Tehran.

The threat comes as Iran evaluates whether and how to respond to an Israeli attack last month that Iran said killed four soldiers and was a retaliation for an Iranian missile attack on Israel in early October.

The Iranian attack was in response to the killings of leaders of Hezbollah and Hamas – Iranian-backed armed groups fighting Israel – and a senior Iranian commander.

Khamenei said Iran’s enemies, including Israel and the United States, “will definitely receive a crushing response for what they are doing to Iran, the Iranian people and the resistance front.”

Iran’s so-called “axis of resistance” is an alliance of Tehran-backed factions that includes Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and heavily armed groups in Iraq and Syria.

Most of them have been designated as terrorist organizations by some Western states. Israel is said to have caused serious damage to Iran’s air defenses and missile capabilities in the October 26 attack, although Iran has not admitted this.

Israel views Iran as a crucial sponsor of the Hamas attacks that killed about 1,200 people on October 7 last year.

More than 250 people were also taken into the Gaza Strip as hostages.

Israel has since launched a major operation in the Gaza Strip, in which more than 43,300 people have been killed, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

Israel also went on the offensive against Hezbollah in Lebanon in September, after nearly a year of cross-border fighting and rocket attacks that Hezbollah launched in support of the Palestinians the day after the Hamas attacks.

Israel has said it wants to ensure the safe return of tens of thousands of northern Israelis displaced by the conflict.

Since then, more than 2,800 people have been killed in Lebanon and another 1.2 million have been forced from their homes, according to Lebanese authorities.

Israeli authorities say more than 60 people have been killed by Hezbollah rockets, drones and rockets in northern Israel and the occupied Golan Heights.

Relations between the United States and Iran have not properly stabilized since November 4, 1979, when Iranian protesters kidnapped more than 50 American diplomats and embassy staff, sparking a hostage drama that lasted 444 days.