As world powers are negotiating in Switzerland with Iran a deal on Tehran’s nuclear program in exchange for lifting sanctions against Tehran, the commander of the powerful Basij paramilitary forces of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said that “erasing Israel off the map” is “non-negotiable.”
Mohammad Reza Naghdi was quoted as saying in Farsi: "The destruction of Israel is non-negotiable and the freedom of Palestine is one of our highest priorities."
He also threatened Saudi Arabia, saying that the offensive it is leading in Yemen “will have a fate like the fate of Saddam Hussein.”
Iran's Fars news agency reported on Naqdi's speech but left out in its English story any reference to Israel, instead highlighting threats he made toward the Saudis for their intervention against the Iranian-supported Houthis in Yemen.
The Basij is a powerful volunteer religious militia established in 1979 under the Revolutionary Guards and loyal to Iran's most powerful man, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. It has served as a moral police and to suppress dissent.
Naqdi’s comments were made public as Iran and six world powers prepared to issue a general statement agreeing to continue nuclear negotiations in a new phase aimed at reaching a comprehensive accord by the end of June, after a 31 March deadline elapsed.
In 2014, Naqdi declared that Iran was stepping up efforts to arm West Bank Palestinians for battle against Israel, adding the move would lead to Israel’s annihilation, Iran’s Fars news agency reported.
“Arming the West Bank has started and weapons will be supplied to the people of this region,” Naqdi said.
“The Zionists should know that the next war won’t be confined to the present borders and the Mujahedeen will push them back,” he added. Naqdi claimed that much of Hamas’s arsenal, training and technical knowhow in last summer conflict with Israel was supplied by Iran.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that it was outrageous that the world negotiates with Tehran as one of its military leaders says Israel's destruction is “non-negotiable.” “This is unconscionable,” Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu said that the concessions offered to Iran in Lausanne“would ensure a bad deal that would endanger Israel, the Middle East and the peace of the world.”
He said that the international community needed to insist on a better deal that would significantly roll back Iran's nuclear infrastructure.
A better deal, he added, “would link the eventual lifting of the restrictions on Iran's nuclear program to a change in Iran's behavior.”
As the talks continue, he said, “Iran is accelerating its campaign of terror, subjugation and conquest throughout the region, most recently in Yemen.”
Iran, the prime minister said, “must stop its aggression in the region, stop its terrorism throughout the world and stop its threats to annihilate Israel. That should be non-negotiable and that's the deal that the world powers must insist upon.