Iran says Israeli regime seeks to divide Muslim countries

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Bahram Qassemi says the Israeli regime is striving to create rifts among Muslim countries and cover up its 70-year-long occupation of Palestine and the massacre of Palestinian people.

Qassemi made the remarks on Friday in response to a question regarding Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s unannounced trip to Oman a day earlier.

While criticizing the Israeli PM's trip to Muscat, he said Muslim states, under pressure from the United States, should not allow Tel Aviv to create further trouble for the region.

The Israeli regime "is undoubtedly seeking to create rifts among Muslim countries and cover up 70 years of occupation, aggression and massacre of the oppressed Palestinian people," Qassemi stated.

Netanyahu along with a delegation, including Yossi Cohen, the director of the Mossad spy agency, and National Security Adviser Meir Ben-Shabbat, arrived in Muscat on Thursday night and flew back to the occupied Palestinian territories later on Friday, making it the first such meeting in over 20 years.

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A joint statement by Netanyahu and Oman’s ruler Sultan Qaboos said the two sides “discussed ways to advance" the so-called Middle East peace process and “a number of issues of mutual interest to achieve peace and stability in the Middle East.”

It seems that since US President Donald Trump came to power, Netanyahu has been lobbying the Zionist regime and pressuring Muslim states to "normalize diplomatic relations with the usurpers of Muslims' first qibla,” Qassemi added, referring to the holy city of Jerusalem al-Quds.

“History and experience have proved that surrendering to the illegitimate demands of the US and the Israeli regime will further embolden them to exert pressure and advance their agenda in the region and to ignore the inalienable rights of the Palestinian nation,” he further said.

Muscat and Tel Aviv have no diplomatic relations, and the last Israeli leader to visit Oman was then-prime minister Shimon Peres in 1996.

Earlier this week, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas also visited the Persian Gulf Arab state for three days.

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