Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei says Iran’s “courageous resistance” has made the country better prepared to confront the US, Al Jazeera reports.

In a statement to mark National Persian Language Preservation Day and commemorate the poet Ferdowsi, Khamenei says Iran “has demonstrated during the recent Sacred Defence (against the US-Zionist invasion) that Ferdowsi’s legendary tales are a reality of their lives and a reflection of their heroic character”.

He adds that the “valiant, Quranic concepts” in Ferdowsi’s epic poem Shahnameh “unite all Iranian ethnicities and social strata in preserving their identity, independence and in the battle against the ‘Zahhak-like’ aggressors”, referring to the personification of evil in Iranian mythology.