Iran president: comments misread by ‘enemy’

Iranian President Massoud Fezeshkian said his remarks had been “misinterpreted by neighbors and enemies seeking to sow division,” state TV reported Sunday. This was after what was seen as a decision to halt attacks on the Gulf country while the attacks were not halted.

“It has been said repeatedly that we are brothers and that we must maintain good relations with our neighbors. However, although we must retaliate by force for attacks, this does not mean that we have a conflict with (a neighboring) country or that we want to anger its people,” Pezeshkian said.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard said Sunday its forces could wage a fierce six-month war against the United States and Israel, as it attacked a Tehran commander at a beachfront hotel in central Beirut.

Guard spokesman Ali Mohammad Naini said Iran has so far used first- and second-generation missiles, but will use less advanced, advanced long-range missiles in the future.

As the war dragged on into its second week, regional repercussions grew, with Saudi Arabia intercepting a swarm of drones destined for targets including the diplomatic district of the capital Riyadh and saying an attack was carried out on fuel tanks at Kuwait International Airport.

Fear of energy supply

Strikes at Kuwait’s aviation fuel depots have added to concerns about energy supplies and Kuwait’s state oil company has announced it will cut crude production due to threats to the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and gas shipments pass.

Tehran on Saturday accused the United States and Israel of attacking oil depots in the Iranian capital. It was reported to be the first attack on the republic’s oil infrastructure as stock markets plummeted and crude oil prices soared.

The Israeli military said it had attacked “several fuel storage facilities in Tehran” used “to operate military infrastructure.”

The Israeli military also carried out new airstrikes “across Tehran” on Sunday after carrying out a precision strike targeting “key commanders” of the Quds Force, the foreign operations unit of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, at a hotel in central Beirut, popular with tourists.