July 09, 2008	Wednesday	Rajab 5, 1429

TEHRAN, July 8: Iran will hit Israel, US shipping in the Gulf and American interests around the world if it is attacked over its disputed nuclear activities, an aide to Iran’s Supreme Leader was quoted as saying on Tuesday.

“The first bullet fired by America at Iran will be followed by Iran burning down its vital interests around the globe,” the students news agency ISNA quoted Ali Shirazi as saying in a speech to elite Revolutionary Guards.

The United States and its allies suspect Iran is trying to build nuclear bombs. Tehran says its programme is peaceful.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said major world powers had decided to send European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana to Iran for talks on an incentives package they offered last month to induce Tehran to change its nuclear policy.

Sarkozy did not say when Solana would travel to Tehran. Iran formally replied on Friday to the offer by the United States, France, Britain, China, Russia and Germany.

France said Iran’s response had ignored the world powers’ demand for a suspension of uranium enrichment before talks on implementing the package -- a condition rejected on Monday as illegitimate by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Shirazi’s comments intensified a war of words that has raised fears of military confrontation and helped boost world oil prices to record highs in recent weeks.

“The Zionist regime is pressuring White House officials to attack Iran. If they commit such a stupidity, Tel Aviv and US shipping in the Persian Gulf will be Iran’s first targets and they will be burned,” Shirazi was quoted as saying.

Shirazi is Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s representative to the Revolutionary Guards.

In Jerusalem, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s spokesman, Mark Regev, declined to comment on the threat to hit Tel Aviv, saying only: “Shirazi’s words speak for themselves.”

Israel, believed to be the Middle East’s only nuclear-armed power, has vowed to prevent Iran from acquiring an atomic bomb.

The United States says it wants to resolve the dispute by diplomacy but has not ruled out military action.

In April, Israel’s Infrastructure Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, who is a former army general and defence minister, told Israeli media: “An Iranian attack will prompt a severe reaction from Israel, which will destroy the Iranian nation.”

Iran has threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz if it comes under attack. About 40 per cent of globally traded oil moves through the Gulf waterway.

The Revolutionary Guards’ commander of artillery and missile units, Mahmoud Chaharbaghi, said 50 brigades of his forces had been equipped with what he called smart cluster munitions.

“All our arms, bullets and rockets are on alert to defend Iranian territory,” Hemayet daily quoted him as saying.

US and British naval forces wrapped up military exercises in the Gulf and said they were “unrelated” to tensions with Iran.

The Bahrain-based US Fifth Fleet said Exercise Stake Net took place in the central and southern Gulf and was part of training aimed at protecting the region’s oil infrastructure.—Reuters