Tehran, Jan 18 (IANS): The commander of Irans Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy recently said that the ruling royal family members in Saudi Arabia were actually Jewish, and that their conflict with Iran harkens back to the seventh century battles between Muslim and Jewish tribes, Jerusalem Post reported.

The speech made on January was aired on Iran's Bushehr TV and translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).

"We cannot bear to see injustice in a Muslim country that is perpetrated by the Zionists and the seed of the Jews," the commander, General Alireza Tangsiri, could be heard saying in a video recording of the speech, the report said.

"[We cannot bear to see] that Muslims are being slaughtered by people who call themselves Christians but are not," he added, seeming to refer to the US' assassination of former IRGC Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani, the report said.

"These are the very same Jews -- and I'd better say Zionists -- whose hearts have never aligned with Islam, and even with the Prophet in his time," he said, probably in reference to Saudi Arabia, Jerusalem Post reported.

The Iranian leadership is Shia, as opposed to that of Saudi Arabia, which is Sunni, the report said.

Tangsiri then mentioned other battles in which early Muslims fought local Jewish tribes, who were only Muslim "by name".

"Are the Saud clan really Muslims? They are the same Jews who were in Arabia back then," he concluded.

The House of Saud is the ruling royal family of Saudi Arabia since 1744, comprising the descendants of Muhammad bin Saud and his brothers.

Iranian rhetoric against the US and Israel has been more fiery than usual in recent weeks due in part to the two-year anniversary of the January 3, 2020 killing of Soleimani by a US drone strike in Iraq.