Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Sunday said that Israel would "soon go to hell" and called on the West to drop support for the Jewish state.

Open gallery view Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, flashes a V sign during a rally organized by Hezbollah in the southern border town of Bint Jbeil, Lebanon, on Thursday, Oct. 14, 2010 Credit: AP

"Grounds are being prepared for the Zionist regime [Israel] to go to hell soon and any country supporting this regime will join it on its trip to hell as well," Ahmadinejad said in a speech in Ardebil in north-western Iran, carried live by the news network Khabar.

The comments Sunday fall in line with a series of provocative statements by the Iranian leader about Israel several times in recent years, sparking international anger.

Among others, he advocated relocating Israel to Europe or North America, and questioned the dimensions of the Holocaust during World War Two.

The remarks by the Iranian president came in the wake of a recent and controversial visit to Lebanon, in which Ahmadinejad voiced his support of what he called Lebanon's resistance of Israeli aggression.

Speaking last week in the South Lebanon town of Bint Jbail, which became one of the symbols of the Second Lebanon War of 2006, Ahmadinejad called local residents "Lebanon's first line of defense"

"You are heroes, you are those who protect Lebanon's independence," he told the tens of thousands of Shi'ites who gathered at the same soccer stadium where Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah made his famous "spider web" speech two days after the Israel Defense Forces withdrew from southern Lebanon in May 2000

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Ahmadinejad promised that Iran would continue supporting the Lebanese people and its "resistance" against Israel. But he was careful to avoid expressions that could give the impression that Iran or Hezbollah would use Lebanese soil to attack Israel.

"The Zionists planned to destroy this community [Bint Jbail], but it stood strong against the occupiers," he declaimed. "The entire world should know that the Zionists are destined to disappear from the world, while Bint Jbail will remain alive. And the sons of Bint Jbail will know how to defeat the Zionist enemy."