By Navid Felker
The Iranian Revolutionary Guards‘ Quds Force, Major General Qassem Soleimani and Kata’ib Hezbollah militia chief, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis are killed in a U.S strike in Iraq early Friday morning. Soleimani was the most influential Iranian military figure and representative of Iran regime’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei.
But who was really Qasem Soleimani?
Qasem Soleimani was born on March 11, 1957 in a village close to Raber county in Kerman, a province in southeast Iran. He left Raber when he was 13 years old and since 1975 he worked as a Contractor in Kerman Water Organization and in 1977 became acquainted with Islamic extremist thoughts.
Membership in the IRGC
After the 1979 revolution he became member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard of Kerman and very soon became one of the main cadres of this repressive force. He was one the first IRGC members to participate in the suppression of the Kurds in 1980 in Mahabad by Khomeini’s order. After his return from Mahabad he was named Head of Quds Force Corps in Kerman.
During Iran – Iraq War
Qasem Soleimani During Iran – Iraq War
At the start of the Iran-Iraq war, Soleimani trained and dispatched several troops of Kerman to war. He was later sent to Sousangerd as head of a military company. He became commander of the mechanized 41 brigade of Sarallah Division.
Soleimani’s Beliefs and Interests
Regime’s sources introduced Soleimani as a person that had no military academic knowledge and had learned military tactics by personal experience. He once claimed that the Iran – Iraq war was one the “cheapest” and that Israel is in the range of Iranian missiles.
Soleimani participated in almost all Iranian regime’s operations during Iran – Iraq war, the most important were “Valfajr 8”, “Conquest of Faw”, “Karbala 4”, “Karbala 5” and “Shalamcheh”.
After the war he returned to Kerman and commanded his brigade to suppress any people’s protests and uprising in the eastern side of the country. He also became the head of the IRGC forces in southern Iran.
Head of Quds Force
Iranian Regime’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Hassan Nasrallah Head of Lebanese Hezbollah and Qasem Soleimani
In 1998, Khamenei appointed Qasem Soleimani as the head of the terrorist Quds Force. From then, Soleimani was the key person in all regime’s terrorist activities, recruitments, export of Islamic extremism throughout the region, in Africa and even in the Europe and U.S. by the Quds Force. Soleimani was Khamenei’s adviser about events in these countries. Including in Afghanistan and Iraq. He advised Khamenei and had the last word in the National Security Council of the regime regarding events in these countries.
Soleimani was also responsible for the Iranian regime’s influential policies and plans in Lebanon, Syria and Palestine.
In 2011, he was promoted to Major General and has twice received a medal from Khamenei.
In a speech to Islamic Haghani school graduates in the holy city Qom on May 22, 2011, Soleimani said “Today, Iran’s defeat or victory is not handled in Mehran or Khoramshahr. Our borders are much more broader, we must witness the victory of Islamic Republic in Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria.”
In an article published on September 23, 2013 in The New Yorker, Dexter Filkins called Qasem Soleimani the “Shadow Commander”.
Filkins wrote: “Suleimani took command of the Quds Force fifteen years ago, and in that time he has sought to reshape the Middle East in Iran’s favor, working as a power broker and as a military force: assassinating rivals, arming allies, and, for most of a decade, directing a network of militant groups that killed hundreds of Americans in Iraq. The U.S. Department of the Treasury has sanctioned Suleimani for his role in supporting the Assad regime, and for abetting terrorism.”
A villager young boy, who barely studied until the fifth grade, became the Iranian regime’s top of the indicators. From a poor young peasant and construction worker in a deprived part of the country Soleimani became a cruel killer and executioner who used millions of dollars of possibilities of an oil based country to execute malicious plans of an extremists regime. Qasem Soleimani is someone that the world witnessed his massive crimes and bloodshed in the region.
Iran’s Opposition Call After Soleimani’s Death
Deputy Director of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) U.S. representative, Alireza Jafarzadeh said in his interview with Fox News that Soleimani’s death is “a game changer, speeding the wheels of change in Iran as well as Iraq.”
Here is my interview on @FoxNews with @ShannonBream about the killing of the notorious terror head of the Qods Force, Qassem Soleimani, its impact in Iraq, the region, and Iran. It is a game changer, speeding the wheels of change in Iran as well as Iraq. https://t.co/pb55ejIyyV
— Alireza Jafarzadeh (@A_Jafarzadeh) 3 januari 2020
President-elect of the NCRI, Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, described the elimination of Qassem Soleimani and Abu Mehdi Muhandes, the head of Iraq’s suppressive Bassij force, as an “irreparable blow to the clerical regime.”
In a statement issued on January 3, Mrs. Rajavi emphasized that “the time had come to evict the mullahs from the region, especially from Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, and expel the IRGC from these countries. In this way, Iraq, which had been delivered by the United States to the clerical regime on a silver platter, will be liberated from the yoke of the religious fascism ruling Iran.”
Qassem Soleimani was one of the most vicious criminals of Iran’s history. He was personally involved in the massacre of hundreds of thousands of people in the region and in driving millions of others from their homes. He was also the mastermind of the massacre of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK, Mujahedin-e Khalq) in Camp Ashraf in Iraq, and of many other terrorist operations against the Iranian Resistance in that country, in Iran, and in other countries. With his elimination, the process of overthrowing the mullahs will be greatly expedited.
Elimination of Qassem #Soleimani and head of Iraq’s suppressive Bassij force is irreparable blow to mullahs’ regime; Time to evict IRGC from the region #Iranhttps://t.co/V9Vl9NjMUT pic.twitter.com/Xpom5xZROl
— Maryam Rajavi (@Maryam_Rajavi) 3 januari 2020
Moreover, with the death of the criminal Abu Mehdi Muhandes, the head of Iranian regime’s proxy Bassij force in Iraq and a notorious murderer, whose crimes had been exposed by the Iranian Resistance since two decades ago, the time has come for the victory of the Iraqi people’s uprising and the liberation of Iraq from the Iranian regime’s occupation.
“While the prospects for the ruling theocracy’s overthrow is within reach, it is time for the regime’s armed forces to refrain from firing on the Iranian people, lay down their weapons and surrender. The armed forces’ patriotic personnel must join the people of Iran,” Mrs. Rajavi added.
Maryam Rajavi also recalled: “the martyrdom of at least 1,500 children of the Iranian people and endless arrests during the November 2019 uprising, Mrs. Rajavi underscored: The international community, especially the European Union, must end the policy of appeasement and recognize the right of the Iranian people to resist and rise for freedom to replace popular sovereignty in place of the mullahs’ rule.”
