Iranian official warns Israel that its embassies are not safe

Jerusalem: A top Iranian military adviser on Sunday warned Israel that none of its embassies were safe following a strike in Damascus last week blamed on Israel that killed 12 people, including two elite Iranian generals.

Regional tensions have threatened to draw the Middle East into a wider conflict as Israel’s war against Hamas marks six months.

Israel has been preparing for an Iranian response to the strike without directly acknowledging its involvement. The remarks by Gen. Rahim Safavi signaled that the attack on a diplomatic mission could be met with a similar response.

“None of the embassies of the (Israeli) regime are safe anymore,” Safavi, a military adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was quoted as saying by the semi-official Tasnim agency. Safavi spoke at a memorial ceremony in Tehran for the Iranian Revolutionary Guard generals who were killed in the strike that flattened an Iranian consular building in Damascus. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was prepared for any response.

“Whoever harms us or plans to harm us, we will harm them,” he told a Cabinet meeting. “We follow that principle in practice, all the time as well as in recent days.”

The surging regional tensions came at the six-month mark of the war, which was sparked when Hamas militants charged from Gaza into Israel, killing 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking about 250 captive. Israel retaliated with fierce bombardment and a ground offensive that have killed more than 33,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to local health authorities.

Also Sunday, Israel’s military announced it was drawing back forces from the 98th paratroopers division who had been operating in the area of Khan Younis in

southern Gaza.