Khamenei's advisor: 'New war between Israel and Iran may occur at any time'
Seyed Yahya Rahim Safavi, an advisor to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, alluded to the possibility of renewed conflict between Israel and Iran on Sunday, Persian media reported.
"A new war between Iran and Israel may occur at any time. We must adopt an offensive strategy; the best defense is an attack," Safavi said in a video statement.
"There is no agreement between us and the Israelis and Americans," Safavi said, adding that Iran is reportedly preparing for the "worst-case scenario."
Both Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and the commander-in-chief of Iran's military, Amir Hatami, made similar claims earlier this month.
"A 1% threat must be perceived as a 100% threat. We should not underestimate the enemy and consider its threats as over," Hatami said, according to the official IRNA news agency.
At the same time, Araghachi claimed that "everything is possible, and it is not just Iran that should be worried in concerned," in an interview with the Iranian Student News Agency.
Ongoing cyber war
Even so, despite the current impermanent ceasefire, the ongoing cyber war between Iran and Israel has never stopped.
'Although there is a ceasefire in the physical world, in the cyber arena, [the attacks] did not stop,' Boaz Dolev, chief executive of the Israeli cyberintelligence company ClearSky, told the Financial Times.
Cyberattacks came from both sides. Israel launched a cyberattack campaign with over 20,000 attacks during the 12-day war, mainly to gather intelligence. At the same time, Iran attempted to maximize civilian casualties by including messages that appeared to be from the Home Front Command, which advised Israelis to avoid bomb shelters.
"You can do whatever you want in cyberspace," said Menny Barzilay, a cybersecurity expert who served as the chief information security officer of the IDF intelligence services. "And probably no one will say anything.'
This is a developing story.
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