Khamenei says Assad's fall will not weaken Iran

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Wednesday the weakening of the anti-Israel "resistance" after the ouster of Bashar al-Assad in Syria would not diminish Tehran's power.

Some, "unaware of the meaning of resistance, imagine that when the resistance becomes weak, Islamic Iran will also become weak... Iran is strong and powerful and will become even more powerful," Khamenei said in his first speech after Assad's fall.

Syrian rebels' lightning push to Damascus from their strongholds in the northwest ended the decades-long rule of Assad's family, once an ally of Tehran.

Assad had long played a strategic role in Iran's anti-Israel "axis of resistance", particularly in facilitating the supply of weapons to Tehran's ally Hezbollah in neighbouring Lebanon.

The axis of resistance includes Hezbollah, as well as Hamas in Gaza, Huthi rebels in Yemen and smaller Shia militia groups in Iraq.

All of the groups are united in their opposition to Israel and its main backer the United States.

The Iranian supreme leader, who has the final say in his country's affairs, accused the United States and "the Zionist regime", Israel, of plotting against Assad.

"No one should doubt that what has taken place in Syria is the product of a joint US-Israeli plot," he said.

He also blamed another "neighbouring state of Syria" for its "obvious role" in the recent developments, without naming the country.

Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey all share borders with Syria.

Of those neighbours, Turkey has long supported the ouster of Assad.