Ayatollah Ali Khamenei threatens Israel and the US with a “devastating response” to the Israeli attack

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran's supreme leader threatened Israel and the United States on Saturday with a “devastating response” to attacks on Iran and its allies.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei spoke as Iranian officials increasingly threaten another attack against Israel after the attack on the Islamic Republic on October 26th Military bases and other locations were attacked and at least five people were killed.

Any further attacks from either side could affect the entire Middle East, which is already reeling The Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip and Israel's ground invasion of Lebanon, into a larger regional conflict that is imminent the US presidential election this Tuesday.

“The enemies, whether the Zionist regime or the United States of America, will certainly receive a devastating response to what they do to Iran, the Iranian nation and the resistance front,” Khamenei said in a video released by Iranian state media.

The Supreme Leader did not provide any information about the timing of the impending attack or its scope. The U.S. military operates at bases across the Middle East, with some troops now occupying one Terminal high altitude area defenseor THAAD, battery in Israel.

The aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln is likely in the Arabian Sea, while Pentagon press secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said Friday that more destroyers, fighter squadrons, tankers and B-52 long-range bombers would be coming to the region to deter Iran and his militant allies. Early Sunday, the U.S. military's Central Command said B-52s from the 5th Bomb Wing at Minot Air Force Base had arrived in the Middle East, without elaborating.

Khamenei, 85, had taken a more cautious approach in previous remarks, saying officials would weigh Iran's response and that Israel's attack “should neither be exaggerated nor downplayed.” Iran launched two major direct attacks on Israel in April and October.

But attempts by Iran to downplay the Israeli attack failed, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press showed Damage to military bases near Tehran in connection with the country's ballistic missile program as well as at a Revolutionary Guard base used for satellite launches.

Iran's allies, described by Tehran as the “Axis of Resistance,” have also been badly hurt by the ongoing Israeli attacks, particularly Lebanon's Hezbollah and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Iran has long used these groups both as an asymmetric way to attack Israel and as a shield against direct attack. Some analysts believe these groups want Iran to do more to support them militarily.

However, Iran is grappling with its own problems at home as its economy struggles under the weight of international sanctions has faced widespread and diverse protests for years. After Khamenei's speech, the Iranian rial fell to 691,500 against the dollar, near an all-time low. When Tehran concluded its nuclear deal with world powers in 2015, it cost 32,000 riyals to the dollar.

Gen. Mohammad Ali Naini, a spokesman for Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which controls the ballistic missiles needed to attack Israel, gave an interview published by the semi-official Fars news agency shortly before Khamenei's remarks were made public. In it, he warned that Iran's response would be “wise, powerful and beyond the imagination of the enemy.”

“The leaders of the Zionist regime should look out of their bedroom windows and protect their criminal pilots in their small territory,” he warned. Israeli Air Force pilots apparently used air-launched ballistic missiles in the Oct. 26 attack.

Khamenei met with university students on Saturday to mark Student Day, which commemorates a Nov. 4, 1978 incident in which Iranian soldiers opened fire on students protesting against the shah's rule at Tehran University. The shooting killed and wounded several students and further heightened tensions in Iran at the time, eventually leading to the Shah's flight from the country and the Islamic Revolution of 1979.

The crowd loudly greeted Khamenei and chanted: “The blood in our veins is a gift to our leader!” Some also made a hand gesture – similar to a “timeout” signal – given by the Assassinated Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in 2020 in a speech in which he threatened that American troops who arrived in the Middle East standing up would return horizontally “in coffins.”

This Sunday, according to the Persian calendar, Iran marks the 45th anniversary of the hostage-taking at the US embassy. On November 4, 1979, Islamist students stormed the embassy led to the 444-day crisis that cemented the decades-long hostility between Tehran and Washington that continues to this day.