Pezeshkian warns Iran will fight rather than submit to foreign pressure
TEHRAN — Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Friday that Iran would not surrender to pressure aimed at forcing it to give up its military and defensive capabilities, saying the country would continue to defend what he described as its rights.
“We will fight” if Iran is forced into submission, Pezeshkian said in a televised interview marking the second anniversary of his inauguration.
Pezeshkian rejected any possibility of Iran abandoning its military capabilities, questioning whether Tehran could accept demands that would leave it without the means to defend itself.
He also praised Iran’s armed forces for their response to what he described as recent U.S. and Israeli aggression against the country.
Pezeshkian commended the Iranian Army, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Aerospace Forces, saying Iranian forces had mounted a strong defense.
“Our fighters … put up a fierce defense and astonished the world,” he said.
Pezeshkian accuses U.S., Israel of seeking regional coalition
Pezeshkian accused the United States and Israel of trying to rally Persian Gulf countries against Iran following the latest conflict.
He said Tehran was working to prevent such efforts and called for unity among Muslim countries, saying differences between Sunni and Shiite Muslims should not be used to divide the region.
The Iranian president also rejected allegations that Tehran seeks to expand its territory or attack neighboring countries.
“We have no intention of attacking other countries, seizing territory, or expanding our borders,” he said, while accusing Israel of pursuing ambitions for a “Greater Israel.”
Pezeshkian said Iran shared borders with neighboring countries and wanted peaceful relations with them.
However, he criticized regional countries for allowing U.S. forces to use their territory to launch attacks against Iran.
Referring to a strike on a school in Minab in southern Iran that he said killed 168 people, Pezeshkian questioned where the attack had been launched from.
He said Iran did not seek to target neighboring countries but would respond against locations from which attacks were launched.
“We do not want to target those countries; we strike the place from which we are attacked,” Pezeshkian said, referring to Iranian retaliatory strikes against U.S. interests in countries that Tehran says allowed their territory to be used for attacks on Iran.
