Iran’s supreme leader, Mojataba Khamenei, denied on Friday Tehran’s role in recent attacks in Turkiye and Oman, claiming that it was a “false flag tactic” by Israel instead.

“I should also remark that the attacks against Turkiye and Oman – both of which have good relations with us — targeting certain locations in these countries, were in no way carried out by the armed forces of the Islamic republic or the other forces of the Resistance Front.

“This is a ploy by the Zionist enemy (Israel), employing the false flag tactic to create discord between the Islamic republic and its neighbours, and it may also occur in some other countries,” Khamenei said in a statement published on his Telegram channel and official Iranian media on the occasion of Nowruz, the Persian New Year.

This is Mojtaba’s second message since becoming Iran’s supreme leader following the assassination of his father and the previous supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Ali Khamenei was assassinated on February 28, when the US and Israel launched attacks on Iran, triggering a conflict that has expanded to the rest of the Middle East as well and the impact of which is being felt elsewhere, too, amid a global fuel crunch.

During the war, Gulf countries have also come under attack, and while Tehran accepts responsibility for some of the attacks targeting US bases and assets, it denies having a role in others. Iran has previously also denied responsibility for attacks in Turkiye and Oman.

Mojtaba also extended greetings to the Iranians on the occasion of Nowruz and Eidul Fitr.

He also extended condolences to the families of the “martyrs” of the ongoing war, which he said was imposed on Iran.

Mojtaba recalled that on the war’s first day, “with tearful eyes and sad and broken hearts, we bade farewell to” Ali Khamenei. He also recalled the children killed in the strike on a school in Minab and other “martyrs of this war”.

He said that the current war was taking place after the enemy suffered from an illusion that it could create “fear and despair” by killing the head of the establishment and a number of influential military figures.

However, he said, the people dealt the enemy a “confusing blow” to the point where “he began to utter numerous contradictory words and many absurdities, which is a sign of lack of mindfulness and the existence of cognitive weakness”.

He also advised the country’s media to refrain from focusing on weaknesses, saying that “one of the enemy’s courses of action is his media operations, which in these days, in particular, intends to undermine national unity and consequently national security by targeting the minds and souls of some among the people”.

He further said that people’s livelihoods and welfare should be considered a “focal point” against the “economic war waged by the enemy”.

He announced that this year’s slogan would be “resistance economy in light of national unity and national security”.

Talking about Iran’s neighbours, he said, “I consider our eastern neighbours to be very close to us. For a long time, I have known Pakistan to be a country that was especially beloved by our martyred leader, a sentiment that was evident in the emotion in his voice during Friday prayer sermons over the devastating floods that threatened the lives of our religious brothers there.

“For various reasons, I have always held this view myself and have not refrained from expressing it in various meetings,” he said.

He took the opportunity to urge Pakistan and Afghanistan to “establish better relations with each other”, adding that he was “ready to take the necessary steps”.

He ended his statement by expressing the hope that the new year would be “ a good year full of triumph and all kinds of spiritual and material relief for our nation, our neighbours, and Muslim nations, and especially for the elements of the Resistance Front”.