JEDDAH/GAZA: Iran accused the Zionist entity on Thursday of wanting to spread war in the Middle East, as diplomatic efforts sought a regional de-escalation following the killings of Tehran-allied militant leaders. Ali Bagheri, Iran’s acting foreign minister, told AFP the Zionist entity had committed “a strategic mistake” by killing Hamas’ political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran last week - hours after the assassination in Beirut of Hezbollah’s military chief.

Although the Zionist entity has not admitted to killing Haniyeh, Iran and its allies have vowed to retaliate, setting the region on edge as the Gaza war raged on into its 11th month. The Zionist entity seeks “to expand tension, war and conflict to other countries”, but has neither “the capacity nor the strength” to fight Iran, Bagheri said.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking at a military base on Wednesday, said was “prepared both defensively and offensively” and “determined” to defend itself. Haniyeh’s group named a successor - Yahya Sinwar, who the Zionist entity says had a key role in planning Hamas’ unprecedented Oct 7 attack. Analysts believe Sinwar - Hamas’ leader in the Gaza Strip since 2017 - has been both more reluctant to agree to a ceasefire and closer to Tehran than Haniyeh, who lived in Qatar.

On the diplomatic front, a Zionist decision to revoke the diplomatic status of Norway’s envoys to the Palestinian Authority over “anti-(Zionist) behavior” drew anger from Oslo. “Today’s decision will have consequences for our relationship with the Netanyahu government,” said Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide.

Norway - a key facilitator in the Zionist-Palestinian peace process, particularly in the secret negotiations that led to the Oslo Accords of the 1990s - swiftly summoned the Zionist ambassador to lodge a formal protest. Norway accused the hard-right government of Netanyahu of adopting an “extreme” response. “This is an extreme action that first and foremost affects our ability to help the Palestinian population”, Barth Eide said. “A short while ago, I summoned (the Zionist entity’s) representative to Norway and met her at the foreign ministry to protest against this decision,” the minister told journalists.

The Palestinian Authority accused the Zionist entity of resorting to “baseless pretexts” to put pressure on any government that tries to halt “violations against our people”. A statement from its foreign ministry expressed “condemnation and strong disapproval of the decision by the (Zionist) occupation

authorities to restrict the work of Norwegian diplomats operating in the occupied State of Palestine, including Jerusalem”.

On the ground in Gaza, fighting continued on Thursday with the Zionist military issuing its latest evacuation order and rescuers and medics reporting at least 13 killed in strikes. The front pages of some of the Zionist entity’s leading newspapers on Thursday cited “assessments” that Iran may be rethinking its course of action, reportedly in part due to US pressure.

Officials and leaders in the Middle East and beyond have called for calm, with Britain’s minister for international development, Anneliese Dodds, telling AFP on a visit to Jordan: “We must see a de-escalation”. The United States, which has sent extra warships and jets to the region, has urged both Iran and the Zionist entity to avoid an escalation.

France’s President Emmanuel Macron spoke Wednesday with his Iranian counterpart Masoud Pezeshkian and later with Netanyahu, telling both to “avoid a cycle of reprisals”, according to the French presidency. Zionist military chief Herzi Halevi told troops “we are not stopping” targeting the leaders of “our most dangerous enemies”, vowing to “find” and “attack” Sinwar too, according to an army statement.

Also on Wednesday, the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation, meeting in the Saudi city of Jeddah, declared that the Zionist entity was “fully responsible” for Haniyeh’s “heinous” killing. Bagheri said OIC members voiced support for Iranian retaliation. “Western countries, who claim they have asked Iran to restrict its response... are not in the position to advise the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

The Zionist-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip has already drawn in Tehran-aligned militants in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen. Lebanese Hamas ally Hezbollah, which has traded near-daily cross-border fire with Zionist troops throughout the Gaza war, has vowed retaliation for military chief Fuad Shukr’s killing.

And in Yemen, the Iran-backed Houthis said Thursday their retaliation for a deadly Zionist strike last month on the Red Sea port of Hodeida was “inevitable and will come”. The Houthis, who have carried out maritime attacks since November in a campaign they say is in solidarity with Gaza, claimed a drone attack on Tel Aviv a day before the Hodeida strike.

A Lebanese government official told AFP on Thursday that “there are efforts to calm the situation” across the region including with a continued push to secure a Gaza truce after months of stalled negotiations. “But we must stay alert, even if tensions have relatively subsided over the past two days,” said the source, requesting anonymity. Numerous airlines have suspended flights to Lebanon due to security fears.

The Zionist military campaign in Gaza has killed at least 39,699 people, according to the territory’s health ministry, mostly women and children. Netanyahu, who has resisted making an apology for security failures over the Zionist entity’s worst-ever attack, said in an interview published Thursday that he was “sorry, deeply, that something like this happened”. “You always look back and you say, ‘Could we have done things that would have prevented it?’” Netanyahu told Time magazine.

The Zionist military meanwhile issued a new evacuation order for parts of Khan Yunis, southern Gaza’s main city, telling Palestinians to flee places from where “rockets are launched” at the Zionist entity. The civil defense agency said a Zionist strike targeting a Khan Yunis house killed at least five people. In the territory’s north, AFP journalists reported air strikes and constant shelling overnight in Gaza City, where medics said eight people were killed in two separate incidents. – Agencies