Thousands of Iranians protested on Friday in the capital Tehran and other cities to condemn Israeli attacks on Lebanon and Gaza, AFP journalists and state media reported.
Officials had on Wednesday called on the nation to demonstrate in support of the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement in Lebanon ‘and to condemn the barbaric crimes of the Zionist regime in Palestine,’ the official IRNA news agency said.
Hezbollah is part of the ‘Axis of Resistance,’ Iran-aligned armed groups across the Middle East which have targeted Israel, and also US forces, in support of Palestinian militants Hamas.
In Tehran after Friday prayers, a protest took place around Enghelab Square in the city centre, an AFP journalist said.
Demonstrators carried portraits of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah as well as Palestinian and Hezbollah flags.
‘Israel is destroyed. Lebanon is victorious,’ they chanted, deploring ‘a bloodbath in Lebanon.’
Protesters also burned Israeli and US flags.
State television aired footage of other demonstrations in Semnan, Qom, Kashan, Kermanshah, Shiraz and Bandar Abbas.
Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, triggering a war with Israel and near-daily cross-border fire from Hezbollah in Lebanon against Israel, which has hit back.
Those exchanges have intensified dramatically over the past week. Israeli raids on Lebanon since Monday have killed hundreds in the deadliest violence since Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war.
As the violence escalates, analysts say Iran is walking a tightrope by trying to support Hezbollah without getting dragged into a full-blown conflict and playing into its enemy’s hands.
Meanwhile, the UN children’s agency condemned this week’s sharp escalation of violence between Israel and Hezbollah, saying that the bombardment of Lebanon was killing children ‘at a frightening rate’.
Hezbollah and Israel have been locked in a deadly exchange of cross-border fire since the Iran-backed group’s Palestinian ally, Hamas, attacked Israel on October 7.
Israel shifted its focus this week from Gaza to its northern front with Lebanon, while Hezbollah has launched barrages of rockets into northern Israel.
Since Monday, Israeli warplanes have bombarded what the military says are Hezbollah targets around Lebanon, leaving around 700 people dead, according to the Lebanese health ministry, which says the majority were civilians.
On Monday and Tuesday, 50 of those killed were children, UNICEF said, citing ministry data.
‘The attacks on Lebanon are killing and injuring children at a frightening rate,’ UNICEF’s Lebanon representative Edouard Beigbeder said, according to the statement.
The situation ‘has moved from crisis to catastrophe. The suffering of children must stop,’ Beigbeder said, calling for a halt in the fighting.
Israel has hit back against accusations of large numbers of civilian casualties, accusing Hezbollah of using civilians as human shields.
