06/09/2013 11:00
Iranian leader: U.S. will 'definitely suffer' if it leads strike on Syria
Iran's Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Thursday the United States -- which, in addition to being one of his country's chief adversaries, has led the push to punish Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government over chemical weapons -- has no right to make "humanitarian claims (given) their track record" in Iraq, Afghanistan and at the military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, CNN reported.
The turmoil in the Middle East, Iran's leader said in remarks reported by state-run Press TV, is a "reaction of the global arrogance" that is rooted Washington. Should the United States and allies strike Syria, he added, it won't be able to "eliminate (the) resistance."
"We believe that the Americans are committing a folly and mistake in Syria and will, accordingly, take the blow and definitely suffer," said Khamenei.
He spoke on the same day Hezbollah issued its first official statement since the effort began to strike al-Assad's forces in the wake of an August 21 chemical weapons attack outside Damascus that, the United States estimates, killed more than 1,400 people, many of them children.
The group, which is popular in parts of the Arab world yet labeled a terrorist organization by the United States, claimed that any military action against Syria's government is "a form of direct and organized terrorism."
"These threats fail to conceal the true objectives of this strike aimed at mobilizing Israeli (strength) in the region in an attempt to impose the Western colonial grip," Hezbollah alleged in a statement read by parliamentarian Hassan Fadlallah, as reported by Lebanon's official National News Agency.