{"id":524525,"date":"2026-03-07T11:11:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T11:11:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/524525\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T11:11:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T11:11:11","slug":"irans-president-defies-us-demands-while-apologising-for-strikes-on-neighbours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/524525\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran&#8217;s president defies US demands while apologising for strikes on neighbours"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>President Masoud Pezeshkian made the statement in a pre-recorded address aired by state television.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/https:\/\/prod.static9.net.au\/fs\/6bca50a3-9957-4779-8f68-a1d46039b3ec.jpeg\"   alt=\"\"\/>Masoud Pezeshkian, the President of Iran, attends the United Nations General Assembly at United Nations headquarters, on Sept. 25, 2025. (AP Photo\/Angelina Katsanis, File) (AP)<\/p>\n<p>He blamed the killing of the country&#8217;s supreme leader and other top officials for what sounded like a loss of command and control in the armed forces in recent days.<\/p>\n<p>Pezeshkian&#8217;s statement on Saturday said the country&#8217;s three-man leadership council had been in touch with the armed forces over the attacks.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I should apologise to the neighbouring countries that were attacked by Iran, on my own behalf,&#8221; the president said. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;From now on, they should not attack neighbouring countries or fire missiles at them, unless we are attacked by those countries. I think we should solve this through diplomacy.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/https:\/\/prod.static9.net.au\/fs\/ccfab687-41dc-4087-a978-7bd5a7828fba.jpeg\"   alt=\"Fujairah, United Arab Emirates\"\/>Smoke rises after an explosion in the industrial zone, caused by debris after interception of a drone by air defence, according to the Fujairah media office on March 05, 2026, in Fujairah, United Arab Emirates (Christopher Pike\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<p>Iran&#8217;s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which has been at the forefront of the war, answers only to the country&#8217;s supreme leader. However, an Israeli airstrike killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 86, at the start of the war February 28.<\/p>\n<p>The comments came as intense Iranian fire targeted the Gulf Arab states early Saturday as Israel and the United States kept up their airstrikes targeting the Islamic Republic.<\/p>\n<p>There were repeated attacks Saturday morning on Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.<\/p>\n<p>NEVER MISS A STORY: Get your breaking news and exclusive stories first by following us across all platforms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Masoud Pezeshkian made the statement in a pre-recorded address aired by state television. Masoud Pezeshkian, the President&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":524526,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-524525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/524525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=524525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/524525\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/524526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=524525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=524525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=524525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}