Iran will do “whatever it takes” to help Hamas in its war with Israel, Iran’s Quds Force commander Esmail Qaani said in a message to top Hamas commander Mohammed Deif, state media reported on Thursday.

“Your brothers in the resistance axis stand united with you and will not allow the enemy to reach its dirty goals in Gaza and Palestine,” Qaani said in a letter addressed to Deif, leader of the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas.

The “resistance axis” refers to a network of regional militant groups supported by Iran, including Hamas, Lebanon’s Hezbollah, various militias in Iraq and Syria, and the Houthi militia in Yemen.

“We stand by our fraternal pledge that unites us and we assure you that we will do whatever it takes in this historic battle,” Qaani added in the letter, shared by Iranian state news agency IRNA.

The Quds Force, headed by Qaani, is the foreign operations arm of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The publication of Qaani’s letter comes a day after a Reuters report that Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei told Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh earlier this month that Tehran would not go to war with Israel on behalf of the Palestinian group.

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