Major General Hossein Salami made the remarks while addressing a gathering of Basij commanders on Monday in reaction to recent threats by US officials to kill more Iranian commanders after Lt. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the late commander of the IRGC’s Quds Force, and his companions were assassinated on direct order of US President Donald Trump in Iraq on January 3.
In an interview with the Saudi-owned newspaper Asharq al-Awsat on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland, US special representative for Iran Brian Hook threatened the Islamic Republic with yet another act of state terrorism, saying Washington will assassinate the successor of the late IRGC commander as well if he follows in the path of the martyred general.
“If (Esmail) Qaani follows the same path of killing Americans then he will meet the same fate,” said Brian Hook, referring to the new commander of the anti-terror Quds Force.
The US special representative for Iran says the successor to the IRGC Quds Force Commander Lieutenant General Soleimani, who was assassinated in a US drone strike, will face the same fate if he follows in the same path.
On January 3, the United States assassinated Lieutenant General Soleimani, among others, in an air raid on an airport in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad. The strike also led to the martyrdom of second-in-command of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis along with eight other Iranians and Iraqis.
Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has targeted US airbases in Iraq.
“If they stay alive, those who have threatened to assassinate our commanders will certainly regret what they have said,” General Salami said, warning the Americans, Zionists, and others that if they threatened Iranian commanders, “none of their commanders would find a safe haven.”
“I mean, if they threaten our commanders with [an act of] terror or implement their threat, the lives of none of their commanders would be safe,” the top IRGC commander pointed out.
The top commander further stated that Iran’s enemies have already faced part of the “painful consequences” of Soleimani’s assassination and understood that they will receive “crushing and continuous” blows if they repeat such actions.
Warning enemies against anti-Iran measures, Salami added, “If they continue this game, our responses will be totally different from [those in] the past, and their scale will also be different. They (enemies) will face new conditions, which they will not be able to manage and control.”
The IRGC’s chief commander noted that the enemies of Iran have always used terrorism and assassination as a weapon against the Islamic Republic, adding, “Another reason why they threaten [us] with terrorism is about the nature of such regimes.”
“The American regime, the Zionist regime and those regimes that are their allies and depend on them, are basically terrorist regimes and they are now clearly demonstrating this reality,” Salami said.
Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs Abbas Araqchi on Saturday lashed out at some White House “hawks” for still insisting on its failed maximum pressure campaign against Iran, saying Washington’s assassination of Iranian “heroes” through state terrorism will end the US’s presence in the region.
A senior Iranian diplomat says the US assassination of Iranian heroes through state terrorism will end its presence in the region.
“Assassination of our heroes through US state terrorism started the end of US presence in the region,” the senior Iranian diplomat said in a post on his Twitter account.
Read more:
- Iran: US will fail to undercut our influence through terror acts like Soleimani’s assassination
- US officially publicizing state terrorism by threatening new Quds Force chief: Iran
- Russia condemns US “unacceptable” threats to assassinate new Quds Force commander
Press TV is a 24-hour English language news and documentary network, affiliated with Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB).
IRIB is state-owned but independent of the Iranian government in its management and is the only legal TV and radio broadcaster inside Iran. IRIB’s head is appointed directly by the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and is considered to be close to the country’s conservative political faction. Press TV is headquartered in Tehran with offices and bureaus around the world; including London, Beirut, Damascus, Kabul, and the Gaza Strip.
*All posts on behalf of PressTV are made by Jim W. Dean
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