The Islamic Republic of Iran has claimed that Hamas’s October 7 attacks were in revenge for a 2020 assassination of a top Iranian general.
The killing of Qasem Soleimani
The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) in 2020 called the US strike that killed Qasem Soleimani a ‘terrorist act‘.
On Wednesday, IRGC spokesman Ramazan Sharif directly tied Hamas’s October 7 killing spree to the US’ slaying of Soleimani and called it ‘one of the revenges’ Iran plans to carry out.
Soleimani a top military commander of Iran, was blown up by a US drone in a strike ordered by former President Donald Trump.
What Iran said about Qasem Soleimani
The attack provoked a furious response from Iran who called on the UN’s Security Council to take formal action against both the US and Israel – which it also accused of assisting in the assassination hit.
The killing was being planned from way back 2017, US officials later admitted, following Trump’s announcement to withdraw from the Iranian nuclear deal to impose sanctions on the pariah state.
Before his death, Soleimani led Iran’s military operations in the Middle East as head of the country’s elite Quds Force.
He joined the Revolutionary Guards – who have been declared a foreign terrorist organisation by the US – in 1979, taking over as head of the Quds Force in 1998.
Who was Qasem Soleimani?
The terror leader was considered to be one of the most powerful figures in the country, masterminding Iranian intelligence and military operations abroad.
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Hamas swiftly denied Iran’s claims and insisted the October 7 massacres were in response to the ongoing ‘occupation’ and ‘dangers threatening the Al-Aqsa Mosque,’ referring to the key Islamic site in Jerusalem.
The move comes as the IRGC Wednesday also addressed the killing of a high-ranking Iranian general in Damascus on Monday that they have accused Israel of carrying out.
The IRGC called the assassination an ‘act of terror’ and vowed their response ‘will be decisive at the right time and place’.
‘We will respond accordingly, directly or indirectly through the resistance axis,’ they added.
