The U.S. Middle East envoy called the foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar and Iraq to ask them to deliver a message to Iran urging it to lower tensions with Israel following a suspected Israeli air strike on Iran's embassy in Syria, a source with knowledge of the situation said.
White House Middle East czar Brett McGurk asked the officials to contact the Iranian foreign minister to convey a message that Iran should de-escalate with Israel, which they did, said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
An Iranian news agency briefly stoked tensions when it published an Arabic report on social media platform X saying all airspace over Tehran had been closed for military drills. The agency then removed the report and denied it had issued such news.
Axios reported late on Wednesday that Gen. Erik Kurilla, the U.S. military commander in charge of the Middle East was expected to arrive in Israel Thursday to coordinate around a possible attack on Israel by Iran and its proxies, two Israeli officials said.
Iran's foreign ministry said on Wednesday the foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Iraq spoke on the phone with Iran's foreign minister and discussed regional tensions.
Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Israel "must be punished and it shall be" for the Damascus strike that killed seven Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps members. Among them was Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a senior commander in the Quds Force, an elite overseas unit of the Revolutionary Guards.
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The funeral of slain IRGC commanders in an attack on Damascus attributed to Israel, last week
(Photo: AFP)
Also on Wednesday U.S. President Joe Biden said that his administration's commitment to protect Israel against threats from Iran and its proxies is iron clad. "We're going to do all we can to protect Israel's security," he said.