Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on Saturday accused Israel of committing "shameless crimes" against children, not combatants.
His comments, quoted by Reuters, came a day after an Israeli air strike on the Lebanese capital, Beirut, in which senior Hezbollah commander Ibrahim Aqil was eliminated, along with 15 other Hezbollah terrorists, including senior commanders in its Radwan Force chain of command.
Lebanon’s Health Ministry claimed the strike killed at least 31 people, including three children and seven women.
Friday’s strike followed the explosions of pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah terrorists. Lebanon blamed the explosions on Israel, which has not commented.
Khamenei said Israel was not even hiding its different forms of "shameless crimes" in Gaza, Judea and Samaria, Lebanon and Syria.
It is not combating "fighting men, but ordinary people," Khamenei claimed during a conversation with a group of envoys from Muslim countries in Tehran.
"Unable to hurt the real fighters in Palestine, they are venting their malicious anger on small children, on hospital patients, and on schools filled with young children," added the Supreme Leader.
Khamenei, whose country is the main supporter of Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis, often threatens Israel and has several times taken to social media since the start of the war in Gaza, where he has posted in Hebrew and continued to threaten the Jewish state.
Khamenei posted in Hebrew in April, after an air strike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus which killed seven Revolutionary Guards, two of them generals, and which was blamed on Israel.
“With God's help we will make the Zionists regret their crime of aggression against the Iranian consulate in Damascus,” he wrote at the time.
Later, after Iran retaliated for the strike in Damascus by launching hundreds of drones and missiles at Israel, Khamenei again posted in Hebrew.
“Holy Al-Quds will be in the hands of the Muslims, and the Muslim world will celebrate the liberation of Palestine,” he wrote in Hebrew, alongside footage of Iranian missiles being intercepted over the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.
Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir responded, "Are you talking about the same holy Al-Quds that you wanted to shell yesterday and the Israeli defense prevented you from doing so?"