By Afshain Afzal

Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a statement on 31 July 2024, “The criminal and terrorist Zionist regime martyred our dear guest in our house and made us bereaved; it also prepared the ground for a harsh punishment for itself.” The question arises will Iran carry out a direct attack on Israel or the US, other than some symbolic volley of rockets inside Israeli territory? The answer is “No”. It will be encouraging if Tehran reacts within the space provided by International Law. One wonders every time Iran and Lebanon intensify rocket attacks on Israel when there is hope of peace between Jews and Muslims over the issue of complete independence of Palestine.

We all are waiting for the International Court of Justice (ICJ) verdict and implementation of arrest warrants of war criminals declared by the International Criminal Court (ICC). At this juncture, focusing on a single event inside Iran will reduce the broader canvas and harm the Palestinian cause. More so, Hamas did not recognize former Hamas leader Ismail Haniyah as sincere to the Palestinian cause as Hamas has adopted the path of peace and obedience of International Law. Tehran reported that Ismail Haniyah died as a result of Israeli attack at his Tehran residence but it is yet to be ascertained as Iran recently arrested some of her Intelligence personnel while the pattern of attack matches the operations of one of the strongest allies of Israel. Israel has not officially admitted the attack and preferred to keep the silence over the assassination.

Iran has accused Israel of carrying out a cowardly attack inside Iran and vowed to take decisive action against the aggressor but the Iranian tone is too mild otherwise by now action would have been taken. Meanwhile, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) will hold an open-ended extraordinary meeting of its executive committee at the foreign ministers’ level at OIC General Secretariat in Jeddah tomorrow,  7th August 2024, to discuss the ongoing crimes of the Israeli intrusion and war crimes against the Palestinian people. An outcome of the conference will be a strong condemnation of Israel's genocide of Palestinian orthodox Muslims and a need for greater unity amongst Muslim nations and allies over the issue of complete withdrawal of Israeli and foreign allies forces from Gaza, full independence and sovereignty of the State of Palestine. We all are waiting for ICJ’s decision, which will be followed by a consolidated response by Muslim nations and allies.