ISRAEL PM BLASTS NEW IRANIAN PREXY AS ‘HANGMAN OF TEHRAN’

Israel's prime minister on Sunday criticized Iran's election of hardline judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi as the country's next president, Sara Lemel reported for Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa).

"Raisi's election is, I would say, the last chance for the world powers to wake up before returning to the nuclear agreement, and to understand who they are doing business with. These guys are murderers, mass murderers," Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett told a Cabinet meeting on Sunday.

"Of all the people that Khamenei could have chosen, he chose the 'Hangman of Tehran,' the man infamous among Iranians and across the world for leading the Death Committees, which executed thousands of innocent Iranian citizens throughout the years," he said referring to Raisi's role in executing regime opponents during his time as judiciary chief.

"A regime of brutal hangmen must never be allowed to have weapons of mass destruction that will enable it to not kill thousands, but millions," Bennett said.

Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid also criticized the election. "The new president of Iran is a radical who is responsible for the deaths of thousands of Iranians," he tweeted late on Saturday.

"His election should awaken a new determination to immediately halt Iran's nuclear program" and put an end to Tehran's destructive regional aspirations, he said. Israel and Iran are arch-enemies.

Israel accuses Tehran of continuing to develop nuclear weapons, threatening the existence of the Jewish state. Khamenei has described Israel as a tumor in the Middle East region, to be removed with via jihad, or holy war, by the Palestinians. Israel is also internationally known to possess nuclear weapons.

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