The commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) says the elite military force’s large-scale military exercises in Iran’s southern areas this week sent "very clear and obvious" messages to the Zionist regime, warning the Israeli authorities to watch their acts vis-à-vis the Islamic Republic.
"The message of this drills is a serious, real and field warning to the threats of the Zionist regime officials to be aware of their mistakes and blunders," Major General Hossein Salami said on Friday.
"We will cut off their hands if they make a wrong move," he added.
Salami emphasized that the distance between actual operations and the IRGC's missile maneuvers is "only a change in the angles of launching the missiles" and said, "Therefore, enemies must beware of their words."
The IRGC's five-day massive drills, dubbed Great Prophet 17, ended on Friday. The maneuvers were held in the Persian Gulf region, the Strait of Hormuz, as well as the coastal areas of the southern province of Hormuzgan, Bushehr, and Khuzestan. The exercises were part of major military drills Iran holds regularly to improve its combat readiness.
They intended to showcase the maneuverability of solid-fuel missiles to cross enemy shields and to improve the combat readiness of the IRGC forces.
Elsewhere in his remarks, Salami said testing accurate and up-to-date missile systems of the IRGC Aerospace and simultaneous launch of missiles from multiple points towards a single simulated target were among other objectives of the exercise.
"This exercise was a combination of combat drones and pinpoint ballistic missiles," the IRGC commander said.
On the final day of the Great Prophet 17 maneuver, the IRGC Aerospace Force simultaneously launched 16 ballistic missiles of different classes, saying the drills carried a stark warning to Israel.
The ballistic missiles used in the exercise were Emad, Ghadr, Sejjil, Zelzal, and Zolfaqar, which hit and destroyed the intended targets with an accuracy of one hundred percent.
At the same time, 10 of the Aerospace Force’s offensive drones also launched a simultaneous operation and destroyed the intended targets.
Iranian military experts and technicians have in recent years made great progress in developing and manufacturing a broad range of domestically-manufactured equipment, making the armed forces self-sufficient in this regard.
Iranian officials have repeatedly underscored that the Islamic Republic will not hesitate to build up its defense capabilities, emphasizing such abilities are entirely meant for the purpose of defense and will be never subject to negotiations.