04 June 2007
Iran's president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said the world would soon witness the destruction of the State of Israel. According to the Iranian news agency IRNA, the hard-line president said that last summer's war between Israel and Hezbollah showed for the first time that the "hegemony of the occupier regime [Israel] had collapsed, and the Lebanese nation pushed the button to begin counting the days until the destruction of the Zionist regime." “The countdown to this regime’s destruction started through the hands of Hezbollah’s children,” Ahmadinejad said in a speech to foreign visitors in Tehran.
"God willing, in the near future we will witness the destruction of the corrupt occupier regime," Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying during a speech to foreign guests mostly from African, Arab and neighboring countries who attended ceremonies marking the 18th anniversary of the death of Ayatollah Khomeini, who is known as the father of Iran's Islamic Revolution in 1979.
An Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman responded by saying: "Ahmadinejad offers only death and destruction. Today, he is the most serious challenge to regional peace and security.” Iranian officials expressed bewilderment over the uproar caused by the comments, saying that Ahmadinejad was merely restating one of Khomeini’s central beliefs that the Jewish state was doomed to destruction.
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