Iranian President Hassan Rouhani is blaming Israel for – per Iran’s Fars news agency – being the “main cause of regional insecurity” across the Middle East. The recently inaugurated revolutionary-era cleric made the comments in an interview aired Thursday with NBC’s Ann Curry, blasting the Jewish state for bringing “instability to the region with its war-mongering policies.”
Rouhani sits atop a country that has been repeatedly blasted by the U.S.’s Gulf allies for fomenting “sedition” throughout the region and for “interference” in their internal affairs, including by working to overthrow Bahrain’s government, pressing territorial claims against the UAE, endangering Kuwait via unsafe nuclear practices, conducting extensive espionage in Saudi Arabia, and bringing the entire Middle East to the brink of a spiraling nuclear arms race.
Egypt has similarly blasted Tehran for interfering in the African country’s internal affairs.
In Iraq, Iranian-backed Shiite militias are on one side of what increasingly risks becoming another full-blown sectarian civil war.
Iran has provided logistical aid to terrorists in Yemen, and has been linked to Al Qaeda elements inside that country.
Iran also sponsors the Palestinian terror group Hamas and the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah, both of which have within the last decade triggered hot wars by attacking and kidnapping Israelis.
As for Lebanon domestically, Hezbollah has been described by analysts as the single greatest force working to destabilize the country’s security, institutions, and political system.
And of course, Iranian support has been the key element in ensuring the survival of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad regime, with Tehran channeling troops and supplies from across the Middle East and enabling Assad’s forces to continue waging a war that has cost over 100,000 lives and seen the gassing of thousands of Syrian civilians. That conflict has spilled over into Lebanon, Turkey, and Iraq, and has critically undermined the stability of the Jordanian monarchy.
Curry ran out of time before she could follow up with Rouhani about the contrast between the scope of Iran’s regional activities and his assertion that Israel is the root cause of Middle East insecurity.
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