2024-04-03 18:33:53
LONDON: Born on November 2, 1960 in Isfahan, central Iran, Mohammad Reza Zahedi was a close friend of Major General Qassem Soleimani, 62, commander of the Quds Force, who was killed in a strike U.S. drone strike in Baghdad, Iraq, January 3, 2020.
Mr. Soleimani enlisted in 1979, at the age of 22, in what was then the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps army, better known as the IRGC. Mr. Zahedi joined the IRGC the following year, at the age of 20, at the start of the Iran-Iraq war.
Both men rose to prominence in the ranks of the Quds special operations force during the eight years of conflict that followed.
Emergency and security personnel inspect rubble at the site of strikes that hit a building near the Iranian embassy in the Syrian capital Damascus. (AFP)
It was Qassem Soleimani who appointed Mohammad Zahedi commander of the Quds Force Corps in Lebanon in 1998, a position he held until 2002, and to which he was reappointed in 2008. He was responsible for organizing supporting the regime of President Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian civil war and overseeing Iranian arms shipments to Hezbollah via Syria.
Like Mr. Soleimani before him, Mr. Zahedi was killed Monday evening in a sudden and devastating missile attack, with no warning given of his imminent demise. He was 63 years old.
The IRGC says seven of its personnel, including Mohammad Zahedi and three other senior officers, died alongside six Syrians in Monday’s attack, which targeted a military building near the Iranian embassy in Damascus. .
The three officers are Said Izadi, head of the Palestinian division of the Quds Force in Beirut; Abdolreza Shahlai, commander of IRGC operations in Yemen and Abdolreza Mosjedzadeh, who oversaw Iran-backed militias in Iraq.
Israel has refused to comment on the strike, or even confirm its involvement. The Iranian embassy said F-35 jets fired six missiles at the building. Later, the New York Times, citing unnamed Israeli officials who confirmed that Israel had carried out the attack, described the incident as “a major escalation in what has long been a latent and undeclared war between Israel and Iran.
In photographs released by the Reuters news agency shortly following the attack, the Iranian embassy – where a large portrait of Qassem Soleimani can be seen – appears relatively intact. The neighboring building is nothing more than a pile of rubble.
Reaction to the attack was swift. Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad, who visited the scene shortly followingwards, said: “We strongly condemn this atrocious terrorist attack which killed a number of innocent people.”
The Iranian mission to the UN condemns this attack which it describes as “a flagrant violation of the Charter of the United Nations, international law and the fundamental principle of the inviolability of diplomatic and consular premises”, affirming that Tehran reserved the right “to retaliate resolutely”.
Hossein Akbari, Iran’s ambassador to Syria, escaped the attack unscathed. He told Iranian state television that seven people, including diplomats, had been killed and that Tehran’s response would be “firm.”
Hezbollah, Iran’s proxy in Lebanon, also vowed to retaliate, saying “this crime will not go unpunished.”
Attacks on embassies by enemies have a long history, but these attacks typically affect crowds and involve terrorist groups. In 1983, for example, sixty-four people lost their lives in a suicide bombing perpetrated by a pro-Iranian group once morest the United States Embassy in Beirut and, in 1998, two hundred and twenty-three people. died in simultaneous truck bomb attacks by al-Qaeda on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.
However, it is highly unusual for a state to attack the diplomatic personnel or premises of another country. Thus, this strike was, unsurprisingly, denounced by countries like Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar and Russia.
The United States did not directly condemn the attack, but a State Department spokesperson said Washington was “concerned regarding anything that might lead to escalation or exacerbate conflict in the region.”
Iranians take part in an anti-Israeli demonstration on Palestine Square in Tehran. (AFP)
US officials were also quick to issue a statement saying: “The United States was not involved in this strike and we were not informed of it in advance,” while emphasizing that they “had direct knowledge of it.” Iran.
The Tehran regime, however, does not seem convinced. On Tuesday, Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said a Swiss diplomat representing US interests had been summoned by Tehran.
“An important message has been sent to the American government, as a supporter of the Zionist regime,” Mr. Amir-Abdollahian wrote in a message published on X. “The United States owes us answers.”
In the followingmath of the attack, Israeli media quoted Hezi Simantov, a well-known Israeli correspondent and commentator on Arab affairs, who predicted that Iran was now “preparing the ground to attack Israeli diplomatic representations around the world – in countries Arabs, in Europe, in the United States or in South America.
The death of Mohammad Zahedi, he adds, “is a hard blow to the Iranian regime. The Iranians should therefore be more inclined to take revenge on Israel. We have already eliminated several of their senior officials since October 7 on Syrian soil. This is the period in which Iran wants to show that it is at the head of the axis of resistance.”
A commander of Russian forces visits the governor of Damascus on Monday. (X)
On Tuesday, Iranian state television reported that the country’s Supreme National Security Council, led by President Ebrahim Raisi, had decided on a “necessary” response to the Israeli strike. No further details were given.
Mohammad Zahedi is the third senior IRGC leader killed since the start of the Gaza war. His death marks the biggest loss suffered by the Quds Force since the assassination of Qassem Soleimani four years ago and, before that, Hossein Hamedani in October 2015.
At the time of his death in an attack by Daesh in Aleppo, Hamedani was the highest-ranking Iranian officer killed abroad since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
In December, Sayyed Razi Mousavi, head of logistics for the IRGC in Syria, responsible for coordinating the Syria-Iran military alliance, was killed in a suspected Israeli missile strike on the outskirts of Damascus .
In January, Hujatollah Amidvar, an IRGC intelligence agent in Syria, was killed by an airstrike on a compound west of Damascus.
According to the Iranian Mehr news agency, Mr. Zahedi held a series of important positions within the IRGC. During the Iran-Iraq War, from 1983 to 1988, he commanded the 44th Qamar Bani Hashim Brigade, before leading the 14th Imam Hussein Division between 1988 and 1991.
In 2005, he became head of the IRGC’s ground forces, a position he held until 2008, and from 2007 to 2015 he was commander of the Syrian and Lebanese branch of the Quds Force, operating in Lebanon under the pseudonyms of Hassan Mahdavi and Reza Mahdavi.
Hezbollah fighters carry the coffin of Commander Ahmed Shehimi, killed during an Israeli raid in Syria on March 29, during his funeral procession in south Beirut. (AFP)
Mohammad Zahedi became the target of U.S. sanctions in 2010, when the Treasury Department added his name to a list of four senior IRGC and Quds Force officials sanctioned “for their roles in supporting the IRGC and the forces Al-Quds to terrorism.
Described in an August 3, 2010 Treasury statement as “the commander of the IRGC and the Quds Force in Lebanon,” Mr. Zahedi was accused of playing “a decisive role in Iran’s support for Hezbollah.” He also “acted as a liaison between Hezbollah and Syrian intelligence services and was reportedly responsible for guaranteeing arms deliveries to Hezbollah.”
The Quds Force has been active in Syria since 2011, when officers were deployed in an advisory role to support the regime of Bashar al-Assad, an ally of Iran, following protests and uprisings of the Arab Spring in the region.
But, as the Council on Foreign Relations later reported, “as discontent escalated into civil war, members of the Quds Force not only served as military advisors, but also “also found on the front lines, fighting alongside Syrian regime forces, Lebanese Hezbollah militants and Afghan refugees in the militias acting on behalf of the IRGC.”
Emergency and security personnel inspect rubble at the site of strikes that hit a building near the Iranian embassy in the Syrian capital Damascus. (AFP)
It must be established with certainty whether Iran or its Quds Force were involved in the October 7, 2023 attacks carried out by Hamas once morest Israel. IRGC officials “may have directly agreed to the Hamas attack and aided in its planning, although Hamas and the IRGC insisted that the Palestinian group acted independently,” says the Council on Foreign Relations.
The Council on Foreign Relations adds that Tehran “likely knew of an imminent attack that it had facilitated through decades of support for Palestinian fighters.”
Regardless, the organization adds, “in the ensuing conflict between Israel and Hamas, the IRGC provided weapons and other aid to its partners in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Syria.” Yemen to attack Israeli targets in solidarity with Hamas.
This text is the translation of an article published on Arabnews.com
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