NEW YORK, September 24. /TASS/. Iran does not want war in the Middle East, it is Israel that seeks to create a large-scale conflict in the region, Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian stated on Monday.

"We do not want war <...>. We want to live in peace," he said on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. The president’s words were later quoted by the NBC television channel. "More than anyone else we know: if a great war breaks out in the Middle East, nobody in the world would benefit from it. It is Israel that seeks to create this larger conflict," the Iranian president added. Pezenshkian also pointed to the double standards of the US and other Western countries that ignore "Israeli atrocities" in the Gaza Strip.

Iranian Vice President for Strategic Affairs Mohammad Javad Zarif said in an interview with the NBC television channel that Iran is ready to cooperate with all countries in order to end the conflict in the enclave. "We want a more peaceful, more stable world for our citizens and for the citizens of [countries] around the world. We are not looking for war, but we will defend ourselves," Zarif emphasized.

On September 23, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres held a meeting with Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian. The UN chief pointed to the important role Tehran plays in achieving de-escalation of the situation in the Middle East.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7, 2023, when militants from the Gaza Strip-based radical Palestinian movement Hamas staged a surprise attack on Israeli territory from Gaza, killing residents of Israeli border settlements and taking over 250 hostages, including women, children and the elderly. Hamas described its attack as a response to the aggressive actions of Israeli authorities against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. In response, Israel declared a total blockade of the Gaza Strip, home to 2.3 million Palestinians before the crisis, and has been delivering air strikes on Gaza as well as some parts of Lebanon and Syria before starting a ground operation in the Palestinian enclave.

Against this background, tensions began to rise on the Lebanese-Israeli border. Fire from Lebanon and its return from Israel has been unceasing there since October 8, 2023. According to the army press service, Hezbollah facilities are being targeted. From the border areas of Northern Israel, as many as 80,000 people have been evacuated.