BERLIN: Amid heightened tensions between Iran and Israel, Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock on Thursday warned of a regional war. German Foreign Minister said this during a phone call with her Iranian counterpart Hossein Amir-Abdollahian.
“All actors in the region are urged to act responsibly and exercise restraint. With this in mind, I spoke to my Iranian counterpart today,” Baerbock said at a news conference with her Chilean colleague Alberto van Klaveren.
“These days, all diplomatic telephone lines are running hot to prevent regional escalation in the Middle East. Nobody can add any more fuel to the fire now. Really no one can have an interest in a conflagration with completely unforeseeable consequences,” she added.
Israel’s foreign minister warned Wednesday that his country’s military would strike Iran directly if Tehran launched an attack from its territory against Israel.
His remarks came in the wake of heightened tensions between the rival powers in the aftermath of the killings of Iranian generals in an Israeli airstrike on the Iranian Consulate in Syria earlier this month.
On Wednesday, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei vowed to retaliate against Israel over the attack on its consulate in Damascus.
Tehran holds Israel responsible for the strike that leveled the building, killing 12 people. Israel has not acknowledged its involvement, though it has been awaiting an Iranian response to the attack.
The strike killed Gen. Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a senior figure in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard who led the group’s elite Quds Force in Lebanon and Syria until 2016. The 11 others who died included six Revolutionary Guard members, four Syrians and a Hezbollah member.
