JEDDAH (Dispatches) – The occupying regime of Israel committed a costly “strategic mistake” with its assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran last week, Iran’s acting foreign minister told AFP in an interview on Thursday.
“The act that the Zionists carried out in Tehran was a strategic mistake because it will cost them gravely,” Ali Bagheri said one day after attending an extraordinary session of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in the Saudi coastal city of Jeddah.
Bagheri said the Zionist regime wants “to expand tension, war and conflict to other countries,” while asserting it is not in a position to fight Iran.
“The Zionists are in no position to start a war against the Islamic Republic of Iran,” he said. “They neither have the capacity nor the strength.”
The meeting on Wednesday of foreign ministers from the 57-member OIC produced a declaration holding Israel “fully responsible” for the “heinous” assassination of Haniyeh, who lived in Qatar and was a major player in talks to end the war in the Gaza Strip.
Bagheri told AFP that OIC members voiced support for Iranian retaliation.
“Those we have spoken to yesterday, whether in phone calls or during in-person meetings, all of them stressed the Islamic Republic of Iran’s right to respond to this terrorist crime,” he said.
“Western countries, who claim they have asked Iran to restrict its response, need to answer questions and are not in the position to advise the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
Yahya Sinwar was named head of Hamas this week following Haniyeh’s assassination. 
Bagheri hailed Sinwar’s appointment on Thursday in a statement published by Iran’s foreign ministry.
“This selection at the current critical moment brings hope, cohesion, authority and victory for the Hamas movement, the heroic nation of Palestine and the axis of resistance,” he said.
Hamas’s Lebanese ally Hezbollah has also pledged to retaliate for Haniyeh’s assassination and that of its military commander Fuad Shukr in an Israeli strike in Beirut hours earlier.
Bagheri said that Hezbollah and other resistance groups in the region, including Yemen’s Ansarullah, had “similar goals” but would make independent decisions on how to pursue them.
“We have similar goals but, in the field, the resistance movement acts based (on) its own... understanding of the situation and its interests,” he said.
An Iranian operation punishing Israel would be “exactly in line with the preservation of the security and stabilization of the region,” he said.
Bagheri called on Washington and other countries to cease sending arms to the Zionist regime that could be used in Gaza, and said economic aid and diplomatic relations with Israel should also be severed.
“The countries who are providing arms and equipment, countries who have economic ties with the Zionist regime, countries who have diplomatic ties with the Zionist regime which is carrying out so many crimes, they need to come and answer why this situation is continuing,” he said.