Tehran Calls Using 9/11 to Justify War on Iran ‘Utterly Absurd’

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei has rejected US attempts to use the anniversary of the September 11 attacks to justify what he called a “reckless and unlawful war” against Iran.

In a post on X on Saturday, Baghaei criticized US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth’s comments about terrorism and Iran.

“The narrative advanced by the US Secretary of War on the anniversary of 9/11 is riddled with fundamental contradictions,” he said.

Baghaei argued that the United States could not claim to fight terrorism while carrying out military attacks, assassinations and actions that cause civilian deaths.

“The perpetrators of 9/11 were not Iranians; they were the very same people whom the US itself had armed, organized, or otherwise cultivated in the preceding decades,” he said.

He also criticized the US-led “war on terror,” saying the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq resulted in years of conflict, occupation, civilian deaths and destruction.

“Against this backdrop, invoking the anniversary of 9/11 to justify a reckless and unlawful war against Iran is utterly absurd,” Baghaei said.

He rejected the use of counterterrorism arguments to defend the US war against Iran, saying the conflict involved the killing of officials of a sovereign state and attacks on civilians, including women and children.

“A criminal war that has involved the assassination of officials of a sovereign state and the targeting of civilians, including women and children, cannot be made morally coherent simply by wrapping it in the language of counterterrorism,” he said.

The US invasion of Afghanistan began on October 7, 2001, less than a month after the September 11 attacks, which killed 2,977 people in the United States.

Washington described the invasion as the beginning of its so-called “war on terror.” After 20 years of military occupation, the war caused major human suffering and destruction, while the US-led coalition failed to achieve a lasting political settlement.