MOSCOW, August 9. /TASS/. Moscow is in talks with Tehran and other regional players to prevent escalation in the Middle East, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told reporters.

"Well, of course, we are communicating with everybody there," said Bogdanov, who is also the Russian president's special envoy for the Middle East and African countries.

According to the senior Russian diplomat, Moscow is pushing for de-escalation in the Middle East as it is urging all regional players to exercise restraint. "We are calling on everybody to refrain from escalating the situation from turning into a disaster for all regional players. And of course, political ways out of the existing problems must be found," Bogdanov said.

The situation in the Middle East deteriorated sharply after the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, the chief of the political bureau of the Palestinian radical movement Hamas, in Tehran and Fuad Shukr, a commander of the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah, in Beirut. Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah blamed the attacks on Israel as they threatened it with retaliation. The Jewish state never commented on Haniyeh’s killing, while it claimed that the attack on Shukr was in response to the strike on the Druze town of Majdal Shams in the Israel-controlled Golan Heights which killed 12 people. However, Hezbollah denied involvement in the attack.