Saudi Arabia Hosting Iranian President after 11 Years

By Staff, Agencies

Ebrahim Raisi, who traveled to Riyadh on Saturday for an extraordinary summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation [OIC] about the Gaza tragedy, became the first Iranian president to visit Saudi Arabia in 11 years.

The Iranian president and his entourage departed Tehran for Riyadh on Saturday morning.

The OIC summit on Gaza is being held under the auspices of Saudi Arabia, the rotating president of the OIC.

The Iranian president will join the heads of Muslim states to weigh plans to stop the Zionist regime’s crimes against Palestinians, lift the blockade of Gaza, and send humanitarian supplies to people in the besieged enclave.

On Thursday, high-ranking officials held a meeting in Riyadh in preparation for the upcoming extraordinary summit.

During the preparatory meeting, the delegations representing the OIC members discussed the draft final communiqué that will be submitted to the preparatory Foreign Ministers’ Meeting for consideration and subsequently to the Summit for adoption.

In a meeting with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the sidelines of an ECO summit in Uzbekistan on Thursday, Raisi stressed the need for the Islamic world’s coordinated action in support of Palestine, warning that if the forthcoming emergency meeting of the OIC in Saudi Arabia fails to save the Palestinians, the scope of regional clashes will expand, because the regional nations will perceive that the Islamic governments are incapable of assisting Gaza and the people of Palestine.

More than 11,000 Palestinians have been killed in “Israeli” attacks on Gaza since October 7, when Hamas fighters launched Operation Al-Aqsa Flood against the “Israeli” entity.

The apartheid “Israeli” regime says 100,000 Palestinians have moved southwards in Gaza in the last two days. Many Palestinians say they remain trapped amid continued fighting.