Hezbollah says Saudi behind blasts at Iran’s Beirut embassy

Lebanese women hold pictures of a Lebanese man who was killed a day after two suicide bombings struck the Iranian Embassy, during his funeral procession, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2013. Thousands of people attended the funerals in Ghobeiri, a stronghold of Hezbollah in southern Beirut. At least 23 people were killed and more than 140 were wounded in Tuesday’s twin suicide attacks. AP

BEIRUT, Lebanon – Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah on Tuesday blamed Saudi Arabia for a twin suicide attack on the Iranian embassy in Beirut that killed 25 people last month.

The Abdullah Azzam Brigades, an Al-Qaeda affiliate that claimed responsibility for the attacks, “has an emir and he is Saudi, and I am convinced that it is linked to the Saudi intelligence services, which direct groups like this one in several parts of the world,” Nasrallah told Lebanese broadcaster OTV.

While Hezbollah and its regional backer Iran support Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad, Saudi Arabia backs rebel fighters seeking his ouster.

The November 19 bomb attacks on the Iranian embassy came amid major regime offensives on several key fronts in Syria’s brutal war, among them Damascus province and Aleppo.

A day after the attack, Saudi Arabia condemned the “cowardly and terrorist” bombings.

In his remarks to OTV, Nasrallah said the blasts that hit the embassy, which is located in Hezbollah’s southern Beirut bastion, were “linked to Saudi Arabia’s rage against Iran over its failure” in Syria.

Saudi Arabia is “making Iran pay the price for the consequences of the failure of its plans in the region,” he added.

While Riyadh’s regional rival Tehran has “tried for years to open the doors (for talks) with Saudi Arabia, the one that closed all the doors and windows… was Saudi Arabia,” said Nasrallah.

“The problem with Saudi Arabia since the beginning is that it has dealt with Iran as an enemy,” he added.