Iran's vice-president for strategic affairs, Mohammad Javad Zarif, says the Islamic Republic has no control over the so-called "Axis of Resistance", and that the militant groups have never acted upon Tehran's orders.
"The resistance fights for itself, for its own goals and land," Iranian VP Javad Zarif said in an interview on Monday.
"Those who claim that the Islamic Republic has weakened think of the resistance as the arms of the Islamic Republic; they see the resistance as our proxy force," he added. "However, history has proven that the resistance has never acted as Iran's proxy force."
"In the first and second 'True Promise' operations, it was Iran that responded to Israel, not the resistance," Zarif said, referring to Iran's April and October attacks against Israel. "Never has it been the case that Iran gives orders and the resistance acts; this is a false perception that the Zionist regime has propagated worldwide."
His comments came a day after Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei denied that Iran uses proxy forces in the region, asserting that groups like Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis act independently out of their own faith and beliefs, not as agents of the Islamic Republic.
In a meeting with religious eulogizers on Sunday, Khamenei addressed what he described as "absurd statements from Western and Israeli officials," dismissing the notion that Iran’s regional influence is based on the use of proxy forces.
"They constantly say that the Islamic Republic has lost its proxy forces in the region! This is another mistake! The Islamic Republic does not have proxy forces. Yemen fights because of its faith; Hezbollah fights because its faith gives it strength to fight; Hamas and Jihad fight because their beliefs compel them to do so," Khamenei said.
"They do not act as our proxies. If one day we want to take action, we will not need any proxy forces."
