Iran has threatened jihad on the United States after an airstrike killed Revolutionary Guard General Qassem Soleimani, head of the elite Quds Force, at Baghdad International Airport.
Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei lamented the killing of the country’s highest-ranking general who was travelling with an entourage of Iraqi Shia militia early Friday.
He said: “All friends – & enemies – know that Jihad of Resistance will continue with more motivation & definite victory awaits the fighters on this blessed path.
“The loss of our dear General is bitter. The continuing fight & ultimate victory will be more bitter for the murderers & criminals”.
Lebanon’s Tehran-backed Hezbollah has also made a similar vow to retaliate death of Soleimani, the man in charge of Iranian foreign policy throughout the Middle East.
Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah stated: “We will carry a flag on all battlefields and all fronts and we will step up the victories of the axis of resistance with the blessing of his pureblood.”
The strike also killed Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy commander of the Iran-backed militias in Iraq known as the Popular Mobilization Forces, which recently stormed the US embassy in Baghdad.
Iraqi prime minister, Adil Abdul-Mahdi, in his reaction, said the rocket strike would “spark a devastating war in Iraq”.
He declared that the assault by the US was “a brazen violation of Iraq’s sovereignty and blatant attack on the nation’s dignity”.
A Pentagon statement issued to DailyMail.com said: “At the direction of the President, the U.S. military has taken decisive action to protect U.S. personnel abroad by killing Quasem Soleimani”.
After the strike, Trump simply tweeted an image of an American flag and made no comment.
