Iran has denied that it attacked an Israeli owned cargo ship in the Gulf of Oman. The Iranian ambassador to the United Nations on Tuesday circulated a letter that said Israel is “playing the victim to distract attention away from all its destabilizing acts and malign practices across the region.” The letter also called the February 26 incident that blew holes in the hull of the MV Helios Ray a “complicated false flag operation.”
A video released Sunday by Lebanon’s al-Mayadeen news network, featuring video recorded by Iranian drones, show that the holes were created from inside the ship. The holes “were not created by an external attack, but some individuals inside the ship created the holes in order to indicate that the ship was attacked,” the news network reported.
It was not the first time that the ship had entered the Persian Gulf, the report also noted. It also quoted an Iranian official as saying it would be illogical to attack an Israeli ship in the run-up to Israel’s national elections.
Amb. Majid Takht Ravanchi said in the letter to the UN Security Council Tuesday that Israel must be held accountable for all of its “crimes, brutalities and threats… in particular its occupation of Palestine and parts of other countries, as well as its persistent military adventurism in such a volatile region as the Middle East.”