TEHRAN (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 02nd September, 2019) Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, upon arrival in Moscow on Sunday, has said that he plans to discuss Israel's actions in the middle East at talks with Russian top diplomat Sergey Lavrov, among other issues.
The two diplomats will hold talks on Monday, just several days before Tehran is expected to proceed with the third round of steps to disengage from the nuclear deal. The visit also comes amid rising US-Iranian tensions in the Persian Gulf, efforts to establish truce in Syria's Idlib and escalation on the Israeli-Lebanese border.
"Along with bilateral issues, we will also discuss regional issues - Syria, a matter that requires coordination; Yemen, which also needs coordination; - as well as the aggression of the Zionist regime in the region," Zarif told reporters.
On Sunday, tensions in the region took a new turn after Israeli drones dropped flammables on a Lebanese grove near the border with Israel in an anti-Hezbollah operation, triggering forest fires. In response, several anti-tank missiles were fired from Lebanon to target facilities in northern Israel, which in its turn fired some 100 projectiles on Lebanon's southern settlements.
The fire exchange followed Israel's drone strike on the Hezbollah office near Beirut last week and its attack on Palestinian militant positions in eastern Lebanon.
Beirut has described the incidents as "aggression" and an "attack" on its sovereignty. The Jewish state, in turn, vows to continue fighting the Iran-backed and Lebanon-based Hezbollah, which it considers to be among its main rivals in the region.
