Iranian general: Israel has an army of glass

Former Iranian Defense Minister General Ali Samahani said Sunday that his country had never launched a war and has no plans to do so. In the same breath, he noted that Iran had the ability to respond to Israel's army, which is "made out of glass".

"We know Israel will be very vulnerable in light of Iran's reactions," he declared.

Samahani, who serves as head of the Islamic Republic's center for defensive strategic studies and is a member of several organizations affiliated with the Tehran government, made the remarks in an interview with the Fars news agency.

"Israel has built a military country, and if the honor and strategy of the army is destroyed, as in the Second Lebanon War, nothing is left," he said.

The former minister warned that "Iran will hit Israel harder than Hizbullah did."

Addressing the Jewish state's threats to attack Iran's nuclear facilities, he said that experience shows Israel struck nuclear facilities twice in the past – in Iraq and in Syria. "Only after the target was hit, the facilities' purpose was revealed," Samahani stressed.

He added that there is a state of ambiguity in Israel regarding to its ability to strike, as well as in regards to the possibility to meet the goal and to the ramifications of a strike in Iran.

"Israel cannot do it on its own," he said, "even if it does receive American and regional backing. Experience shows they attack first and talk later. They don’t talk and then attack.

"Therefore, since they have spoken, they probably have a different goal. Although we are not ruling out any possibility, they talks have no effect," the general concluded.