The United States and its allies are “trapped” in the Red Sea and should prepare for the closure of waterways stretching all the way to the western gates of the Mediterranean Sea, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Chief of Staff Mohammad Reza Naqdi has warned.
“With the continuation of the crimes [in Gaza], the United States and its allies should await the birth of new powers of resistance and the closure of the rest of the waterways and roads to them,” Naqdi said at a ceremony commemorating Hasan Irlu, a late IRGC commander and former Iranian ambassador to Yemen.
“Yesterday the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz was a nightmare for them, today the Bab al-Mandab Strait and the Red Sea have trapped them, and with the continuation of these crimes, they will soon await the closure of the Mediterranean Sea, [the Strait of] Gibraltar and other waterways,” the commander added. “Oppression that has gone too far should await the storm,” he warned.
“The Zionist regime and the United States have gone mad due to the severity of the crimes and brutality they have committed, and they cannot even recognize their own interests,” Naqdi suggested, saying the two powers seem incapable of “learning from past events.”
“If not for the severity of their past crimes in Lebanon, Hezbollah would not be able to attack Israel on a daily basis…If they had not caused a bloodbath in Palestine in the past, Hamas would not have been able to pull the sword on them so powerfully today. If it wasn’t for their heinous crimes in Iraq and the Abu Ghraib torture center and the bloodiness launched by Daesh*, Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces would not have been created to hit America over the head on a daily basis. If they didn’t drop so many bombs in the markets of Saada and Sanaa, Ansar Allah [the Houthis, ed.] would not have reached the status and authority they have in Yemen and been able to close the Red Sea,” the senior IRGC officer said.
Naqdi did not elaborate on what kinds of operations specifically may be taken to close regional waterways to US forces and their allies. However, US media and news agencies immediately interpreted the commander’s words as an explicitly Iranian “threat” to “close the Mediterranean.”
The Biden administration Friday accused Iran of being “deeply involved in planning the operations against commercial vessels in the Red Sea” as part of a “long-term material support and encouragement of the Houthis’ destabilizing actions in the region.”
Iran has been open about its political and moral sympathies for and support for the Houthis, but has consistently denied many years of claims by US officials of the provision of material or military support to the Yemeni militia since its rise to power over much of the country in late 2014.
That said, the Houthis are often mentioned by Iranian leaders and commentators as members of the Axis of Resistance, a loose, informal and unofficial political and military coalition opposed to Israel and American imperialism in the Middle East. Syria, Hezbollah, and Palestinian militias in Gaza are also typically listed as members of the informal grouping.
Naqdi’s remarks come against the background of growing tensions in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden as the US works to assemble a multinational coalition consisting mostly of NATO nations to try to secure the waterways after a month of Houthi hijackings and missile attacks against Israeli-owned commercial ships, as well as vessels thought to be heading to or from the Jewish State. The attacks have had a severe impact on Israel’s southern ports, and have prompted a handful of powerful international shipping concerns to stop the transit of any commercial cargoes through the Red Sea.
The nascent US-led coalition has already run into difficulties, with some allies committing just handfuls of ship-less seamen, and others deciding to sit out the US military adventure altogether, preferring any naval assets they have in the region to go it alone.
* Also known as ISIS, a terrorist group outlawed in Russia and many other countries.