Thousands of Iraqi mourners have condemned the “American occupiers,” a year after a US drone strike killed the respected Iranian General Qassem Soleimani and Iraqi Defense Force Commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis.
The anniversary of their deaths in Baghdad, which brought the main enemies of the United States and Iran to the breaking point of the war, was also marked on Sunday in Iran and through supporters in Syria, Lebanon, Yemen and other parts of the Middle East. .
The streets leading to Tahrir Square in central Baghdad were packed with thousands of protesters who had converged on it since early Sunday morning.
The protesters held up photographs of Soleimani and al-Muhandis, as well as flags of Iraq, Hashd al-Shaabi or the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), of which al-Muhandis is the leader, and other Iraqi factions.
They also carried banners with slogans “It is not easy to withdraw US troops from Iraq” and chanted retaliation against those who carried out the assassination.
Iraqis gather near a photo of Soleimani and al-Muhandis in Baghdad [Khalid Al-Mousily / Reuters] Addressing the protesters, Hashd al-Shaabi’s leader, Faleh al-Fayyad, promised retaliation against those who committed the crime and asked US troops to leave Iraq.
Al Jazeera’s Charles Stratford, reporting from Baghdad’s Tahrir Square, said Iraqi protesters called for the prompt and swift withdrawal of all remaining US troops in Iraq.
“They also call for the kind of fiery rhetoric that we have heard in a few days around the anniversary of the assassination of the leader of the Revolutionary Guard, Qassem Soleimani, to continue. They are not an easy and promising revenge, ”he said.
Dorsa Jabbari, reporting from Tehran, said the temperament is similar in Iran, where the country’s chief justice, Ebrahim Raisi, as well as the head of the Revolutionary Guard, Major General Hossein Salami, said Tehran had not finished avenge the death of Soleimani.
“It will come in due time. This is what we heard from the Supreme Leader and the President last December, ”he said.
The harsh pro-Iranian paramilitary network Hashd al-Chaabi in Iraq under al-Muhandis led the darkness and the vigils for him and Soleimani, who headed the elite branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps foreign operations in Iraq. Iran.
The commemorations began Saturday night when thousands of black-clad mourners converged on the spot near Baghdad International Airport where the United States struck the two cars and killed Soleimani, al-Muhandis and eight other people. mens.
By candlelight, they worshiped their “martyrs” and condemned the “great American Satan” in the place where neighboring walls are still scarred by shrapnel.
“We tell the United States and the enemies of Islam that they can inflict the greatest sacrifices on us, but we will continue to do so despite the bloodshed,” said Batul Najjar, a Hashd supporter.
The Hashd, factions Washington has blamed for rocket attacks on its embassy and troops in Iraq, have challenged Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, whom it accuses of helping prepare for drone movements.
This has increased tensions in the war-torn and politically fragile country that the United States invaded in 2003, and which is grappling with an economic crisis amid low oil and a coronavirus pandemic.
Giant posters of Soleimani and al-Muhandis were hung over the square, which in late 2019 was the middle of major anti-government protests, from a deserted building known as the Turkish Restaurant.
Amid the tensions, Iraqis and many in the wider region are nervously watching any escalation before US President Donald Trump leaves the White House on January 20.
Trump faced Iran, a decades-long enemy, by withdrawing from his nuclear deal with global powers in 2018 and launching a “maximum pressure” crusade to punish and economically isolate the country.
Trump recently said on Twitter that the United States heard “rumors of new attacks on Americans in Iraq” and warned: “If they kill an American, I will hold Iran responsible. ” Reflect. “
In days, US B-52 bombers have flown over the region for the time being in less than a month but, in what some interpret as a de-escalation signal, Washington has also ordered its aircraft carrier Nimitz to leave the Gulf. Training
Iran and the United States, staunch enemies since the 1979 Iranian Islamic revolution and the hostage crisis at the US embassy in Tehran, have twice been at the breaking point of the war since June 2019, most recently after the killing of SoleimaniArray.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Thursday accused Trump of fabricating a “pretext for war” after the president accused Tehran of a December 20 rocket attack on the US embassy in Baghdad. .
In the war of words, Zarif claimed on Saturday that in Iraq, “Israeli agents provocateurs are planning attacks on Americans (to put) Trump in a bind with a false casus belli (to act to justify the war). “
Mourners organize a mock funeral procession on the road leading to the airport in the town where the January 3, 2020 strike took place.
Iran says the US show of force may raise tensions to an “alarming level” ahead of the anniversary of Qassem Soleimani’s assassination.
The accusations come amid emerging tensions when Iranian FM accuses President Trump of fabricating a “pretext of war. “