'Iranians' voice echoed in Muslim world'

Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei says the Iranian nation’s voice has resonated through Muslim countries, resulting in the Tunisia revolution and the Egypt uprising.

“Today, developments in North Africa, [including] Egypt, Tunisia and some other countries have a special meaning for the Iranian nation,” the Leader stated.

“This is what was always referred to as the Islamic awakening created by the victory of the great Revolution of the Iranian nation,” Ayatollah Khamenei said in the Friday Prayers sermons in Tehran.

The Leader noted that Tunisia’s former president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was dependent on the US and even the CIA.

“In Tunisia, which is a Muslim nation with a long Islamic history with great Muslim scholars coming from Tunisia; people had to carry a special card to go to mosques under Ben Ali’s rule, a card that the government did not give to everyone.”

The Leader further pointed to the Ben Ali regime’s anti-Islam moves such as prohibiting collective and individual prayers in mosques and the hijab ban.

“As soon as this traitor (Ben Ali) fled, female students went to university wearing hijab,” Ayatollah Khamenei highlighted, saying the move indicates a deep Islamic motive among the Egyptians that Arab leaders have been trying to conceal.

The Leader described the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak as the “lackey of the Zionist regime [of Israel].”

Ayatollah Khamenei said that the US and Israel have become helpless in the face of freedom-seeking Egyptians and noted that defeat awaits them in Tunisia and Egypt.

The Leader made a reference to Egyptians’ fight for “dignity and honor” and noted that Mubarak’s biggest crime was turning Egypt into tool in the hands of the US.

Ayatollah Khamenei recalled Egypt’s glorious past before Mubarak rose to power and its remarkable role in leading the Arab world’s efforts to defend the Palestinian nation against the Israeli enemy.

“Egypt in short periods in 1967 and 1973 was the first and largest country to engage in war over the issue of Palestine into was along with Syria. Other Muslim nations did not enter into these wars with Israel, but Egypt sent soldiers, army, people and aid to the battlefield but they were not succeed, however,” the Leader recalled.

“Egypt was a sanctuary for Palestinians and even many of the revolutionaries from other countries, but such a nation has been in the past 30 years in the hands of a person who does not support liberation but opposes seeking liberation, who is not anti-Israeli but a colleague, confidant, and lackey of the Zionists,” the Leader regretted.

Ayatollah Khamenei noted how the Israeli leaders relied on Mubarak in all their anti-Palestinian moves, including the blockade of the Gaza Strip.

“On the issue of Gaza, if Mubarak did not help Israel, they would have never succeeded in besieging the territory.”

The Leader recalled how Mubarak prevented not only Egyptian aid convoys but also humanitarian fleets from other countries from crossing into the Gaza Strip while it was burning in the fire of an Israeli war in 2009.

“Of course the US and more than them Israelis are in great distress and are desperately seeking a solution to the crisis in Egypt, solution they will never find. Thus they have turned to deceiving people and pretend to support for people.”

Ayatollah Khamenei said that the Egyptian army would join the masses and line up against the enemy.

Ayatollah Khamenei said the Islamic Revolution in Iran obstructed plots by Western countries aimed at establishing weak and vulnerable regimes in the Middle East.

The Leader said Iran’s enemies have been launching a psychological war against the country over for the past 32 years, pointing to the 2009 post-election events in Iran as the enemies' latest scenario to damage the Islamic Revolution.

Ayatollah Khamenei said their plots, however, would have no effect on the Iranian nation.