Former Guards chief wants army to help wipe Israel
off map
TEHRAN, Nov 17 (AFP) - The former head of Iran's elite Revolutionary
Guards began soliciting volunteers Thursday for a new army to defend the
Palestinians, vowing to fight until Israel is eliminated from the world.
"We are not saying that we will send forces into the occupied territories,"
Mohsen Rezaie told some 1,000 people gathered for the first meeting of
the international anti-Zionist group he has been promoting.
"But there are those in Iran who want there to be a presence for
a resistance against Israel," he said, cited by the official IRNA
news agency.
"The Iranian nation will remain on the battlefield of struggle
against Zionism until Israel completely disappears from the face of the
world," said Rezaie, now secretary of Iran's oversight Expendiency
Council.
He called on Islamic nations to create an air-defence shield to prevent
further Israeli bombardments of the Palestinians, a day after the Jewish
state pounded Palestinian targets across the West Bank.
An AFP photographer said application forms for a new military force
were distributed to the crowd, who were told that applicants would be tested
for suitability.
Iran does not recognise Israel and supports the Palestinian intifada,
or uprising, against the Jewish state which has left more than 230 people
dead in the past seven weeks, most of them Palestinians.
Foreign ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi said Thursday that "serious
international action" was needed to stop Israel's "crimes"
against the Palestinian people.
"The Palestinian nation's intifada will continue until their rights
are restored, and the killing of the courageous Palestinian people's children
will only increase the flames of resistance and anger," Asefi said,
cited by IRNA.
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