Speaking at an international conference in support of Palestine in Tehran on Tuesday, Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior advisor to the Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, said the Palestinian people should be strong and capable of defending themselves as the only ways to ease their sufferings.
“Unity of all groups and resistance against enemies either the regional enemy, that is the Zionist regime [of Israel], or the international enemy, that is the US, are imperative,” Velayati added.
He pointed to Israel’s recent 50-day war on the Gaza Strip and emphasized that Iran has proposed a “fair and democratic” solution to the Palestinian issue.
“Palestinians either those who are present in the Palestinian land or those who have been driven out should return to their land and all people including Muslims, Christians and the Jews must express their opinion about their country’s destiny in a democratic process,” the top Iranian official pointed out.
The Israeli military unleashed aerial attacks on Gaza in early July and later expanded its military campaign with a ground invasion into the Palestinian territory.
Over 2,130 Palestinians lost their lives and some 11,000 were injured in the raids. It is noteworthy that mam Khomeini was the first marja'-i taqlid (source of religious guidance) and great religious leader to authorise the use of monies received for charitable disbursement to support the Palestinian combatants.
When the Quds-occupying regime perpetrated yet another crime in its long list of crimes and set fire to the al-Aqsa mosque, Imam Khomeini, with complete foresight and in stark contrast to the policy adopted by others on the matter, which was to endeavour to have the mosque rebuilt, stressed the need to preserve the vestiges of Israel's crimes as a symbolic factor to incite and encourage the Muslims to rise up against the existence of the main reason for the crime, that is the occupying regime.
He said, "They set fire to the Masjid al-Aqsa. We cry out: 'Leave the Masjid al-Aqsa half-burned to the ground; do not erase all traces of the crime!' But the Shah's regime opens an account, sets up a fund, and starts collecting money from the people supposedly to rebuild the Masjid al-Aqsa, but really to fill the pockets of our rulers while also covering up the crime committed by Israel.
" From the very beginning, he introduced the Islamic aspect and the ideological dimension of the struggle with Israel as the most effective factor in the movement for mobilizing the oppressed Palestinian nation and attracting support for them from the Islamic ummah. He considered other methods of struggle, such as reliance on Arab nationalism and nationalist views along with other imported and non-Islamic ideologies, as a departure from the path of struggle for the freedom of Quds.
He had a clear insight into the internal problems besetting the Islamic world, amongst them the weakness, inability or subordinate nature of some of the heads of Islamic states. Consequently, he emphasised the importance of public knowledge and awareness in the Islamic world stemming from the principles of belief and the umma's common faith and culture, and of avoiding sectarian differences.