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Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei officially endorses relative moderate as president
- Masoud Pezeshkian will take office as Middle East tensions escalate over the Israel-Gaza war and Iran -backed Hezbollah in Lebanon
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Iran’s supreme leader formally endorsed Masoud Pezeshkian as the country’s president on Sunday, after he won an election this month by pledging a pragmatic foreign policy and easing repression at home.
Pezeshkian, a relative moderate who will be sworn in on Tuesday, is taking office at a time of escalating Middle East tensions over the Israel-Gaza war and Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Iran warned its arch foe Israel on Sunday against what it called any new adventure in Lebanon, after Israeli authorities blamed Hezbollah for a rocket attack on Saturday that hit a football ground in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights killing 12 people, and vowed to inflict a heavy response.
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Hezbollah denied any responsibility for the strike.
In a ceremony broadcast live on state television, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei gave his approval for Pezeshkian, and in a speech afterwards, the supreme leader reiterated Iran’s long-standing anti-Israel stance.
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“The Zionist regime (Israel) is not a state, it is a criminal gang, a bank of killers, and a terrorist band,” Khamenei said in his speech, while praising the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas for its resistance against Israel in Gaza.
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