Iran's Ayatollah makes a 'dangerous' appeal

The Supreme leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has urged the Islamic Ummah to sympathise and provide assistance to Kashmir, and called the United States an arrogant, 'self-styled commandant of the Islamic region and the real sponsor of the Zionist regime'.

"Today, the major duties of the elite of the Islamic Ummah is to provide help to the Palestinian nation and the besieged people of Gaza, to sympathise and provide assistance to the nations of Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq and Kashmir, to engage in struggle and resistance against the aggressions of the United States and the Zionist regime, to safeguard the solidarity of Muslims and stop tainted hands and mercenary voices that try to damage this unity, to spread awakening and the sense of responsibility and commitment among Muslim youth throughout Islamic communities," Khamenei's office quoted him, as saying, in his message to the Hajj pilgrims.

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"The extensive propaganda of the enemy to spread Islamophobia, its offhand efforts to create discord among Muslim sects, to incite sectarian prejudices, to bring about pseudo-confrontations between the Sunnis and the Shi'ah, to create disunity between Islamic states and to aggravate their differences, to change them into hostility and unsolvable conflicts, its employment of intelligence and espionage outfits to propagate corruption and immorality amongst the youth -- all these are nervous and bewildered responses to the steady and firm advances of the Islamic Ummah towards awakening, honour and freedom," he added.

Khamenei noted that in today's world, the "Zionist regime is no more the undefeatable monster of 30 years ago."

"The United States and the West are also no more the unquestionable decision-makers of the Middle East that they were two decades ago."

"Contrary to the situation that existed ten years ago, the nuclear know-how and other complex technologies are no longer considered inaccessible daydreams for Muslim nations of the region," he added.

In his message, Khamenei went on to say, "Today the arrogant United States, the self-styled commandant of the Islamic region and the real sponsor of the Zionist regime, is bogged down in the quagmire of its own making in Afghanistan. As a result of all its crimes against the people of Iraq, it is in the course of becoming isolated in that country. It is hated more than ever before in disaster-stricken Pakistan."

He said that the influence of the anti-Islamic front was receding while the wave of Islamic awakening was "steadily advancing and growing in depth day by day."

"On the one hand, this hopeful and promising situation should inspire us, the Muslim nations, to keep marching ahead towards the desirable future with ever greater confidence. On the other hand, the past lessons and experience should make us more vigilant than ever before," said the spiritual leader.

"This general imperative undoubtedly calls for greater commitment from religious scholars, political leaders, intellectuals and youth than the others and requires them to be at the vanguard of the struggle," he added.