TEHRAN – In his speech delivered on the occasion of World Quds Day, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei shone a light on a range of regional issues that were sidelined in recent years by some regional and global parties.

On top of these issues is the question of Palestine which has been the main subject of many diplomatic initiatives the most important of which was the unveiling of the so-called “deal of the century” proposed by the Trump administration in early 2020. The Trump peace plan was nipped in the bud as it failed to garner support from almost all of the international community.

Despite its failure, the Trump deal rekindled old speculations that the Palestinian question has lost its relevance to many Arab and Muslim peoples, not to mention the Arab states. The trend of normalization of diplomatic relations between Israel and some Arab states was deemed the last nail in the coffin of the Palestinian cause as the normalization deals led many pundits to opine that Arab states are no longer conditioning establishment of relations with Israel to finding a resolution to the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

But all these speculations proved wrong, according to the Leader of the Islamic Revolution. Ayatollah Khamenei said Israel is now declining and a new equation is taking shape in Palestine while the previous projects of normalization have come to naught. “Quds Day passes by us this year, and everything foretells of a new equation for Palestine, today and tomorrow,” the Leader said in a televised speech delivered in Arabic. 

Ayatollah Khamenei referred to many developments inside and outside Palestine forcing Israel to hunker down and adopt a defensive position instead of an offensive one. “The ‘unbreakable will’ in the Palestinian arena and throughout West Asia is replacing the so-called ‘invincible army’ of the Zionists. This criminal army was forced to switch its offensive line to the defensive one,” he said.

The Leader noted, “In the political arena, we see the most important supporter of the usurping entity [Israel], I mean America, suffering successive defeats: a defeat in the war in Afghanistan, a defeat in exercising maximum pressure on Islamic Iran, a defeat in front of the Asian powers, a defeat in controlling the global economy, and a defeat in its internal management where there is the emergence of a deep rift in this administration.”

The situation in Israel is also moving on a trajectory of decline, he said. “The usurping entity is floundering in the political and military arena within a complex web of problems,” Ayatollah Khamenei asserted. 

The Leader pointed to a significant change in the national mood of Palestinians inside and outside their territories. They now support a military confrontation with Israel, according to Ayatollah Khamenei. 

“Polls indicate that nearly seventy percent of the Palestinians in the lands of forty-eight and sixty-seven, and in the diaspora camps, are calling on the leaders of Palestine for a military confrontation against the usurping entity. This is an important phenomenon, as it means the complete readiness of the Palestinians to confront the usurping entity. It also means the public is giving green light to the jihadist factions to exercise their role whenever they deem the time necessary,” he stated.

Highlighting resistance movements in the 1948 territories, east Jerusalem, al-Aqsa Mosque, and the Gaza strip as well as demonstrations in Jordan, the Leader said, “Palestine as a whole has been transformed into a theater of resistance. The Palestinian people have now united their word regarding the continuation of the jihad.”

Ayatollah Khamenei said, “These events, and what the Palestinian arena witnessed in recent years, have canceled all settlement projects with the Zionist enemy. It is not possible to implement any project regarding Palestine in the absence of its owners, the Palestinians, or in opposition to their point of view. This means the nullification of all previous agreements such as Oslo, the two-state solution, the deal of the century, or the recent humiliating normalization.”

The Leader strongly denounced the normalization trend, saying, “We condemn the treacherous approach to normalization. We condemn the phenomenon of ‘the feasibility of normalization’ and what some Arab governments have said to America of the need to expedite the liquidation of the Palestinian issue.”

He noted, “The Islamic Republic of Iran is supportive of the resistance front, and supportive of the Palestinian resistance. We have said this repeatedly and acted on what we say, and we insist on that.”