Senior Iranian Official: 150,000 Missiles in Lebanon, Syria, Gaza Are Meant to Deter Israel

Former Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Sheikholeslam, who has served as Iran's ambassador to Syria, said in an August 27, 2019 interview on Ofogh TV (Iran) that Iran has invested in the "huge defensive and strategic endeavor" of deploying roughly 150,000 missiles in Lebanon, Syria, and the Gaza Strip that are meant to be launched at Israel at Iran's discretion. He said that since the U.S. has defined Israel's national security as part of its own national security, this strategy is Iran's greatest deterrent against both countries, and he claimed that Israel would have certainly attacked Fordow, Bushehr, and Natanz dozens of times were it not for Iran's missiles in these countries. Sheikholeslam went on to say that a ballistic missile launched from Iran would take eight minutes to get to Israel and would be detected by American and NATO radars in the region. In contrast, he explained that missiles launched from Lebanon would start a rapid descent almost as soon as they can be detected and monitored. In addition, Sheikholeslam said that Iran does not intend to drive Israel into the sea or to use nuclear weapons against it. Rather, he said that Iran's military capabilities are exclusively for purposes of deterrence and that Iran simply wants the Zionists to "understand" that they have violated the rights of the Palestinians and to leave the region, especially since they "have citizenship in several European countries anyway."

Israel