TEHRAN - On Thursday, Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi said that if the youth's faith is not strong, the enemies' plots are to blame.

Speaking in front of Basij forces and Ansare Hizbollah members gathered to commemorate the martyrdom of Navab Safavi, Makarem added that today the foreign enemies have sent their internal agents in a cultural assault to weaken Islamic values.

The ayatollah added that he knows people who, despite living in Western countries for many years, have kept their faith and instilled it in their children.

Makarem suggested that people's hearts could not be influenced by money and the promise of wealth but only through ethics and said that the Ansare Hizbollah and the Basijis should be the model of Islamic ethics.

Nowadays, he said, in universities and schools anti-Islamic values are passed on to students, and the press, TV and radios are used improperly to the same end.

Ayatollah Makarem referred to Navab Safavi as a person who lived in an era of darkness in which ignorance, crime and suppression prevailed, yet he shone like a source of light and with his blood he defended Islam and the Prophet's (S) household.