(Photo: ATTA KENARE/AFP via Getty Images)
Thousands of Iranians have flocked to the funerals of seven personnel of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) who were killed in a targeted strike at the Iranian consulate office in Damascus earlier this week.
It was previously reported that among the dead were two generals from the Quds Force, the Corps's foreign operations arm-Mohammad Hadi Haji Rahimi, and Mohammad Reza Zahedi.
According to the UK-based war monitoring group Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Gen. Zahedi, 63, was a Quds Force commander for the Palestinian territories, Syria, and Lebanon.
The general held a succession of commands in a career spanning more than 40 years and was the most important Iranian soldier killed since a United States missile strike at Baghdad airport in 2020 killed Quds Force chief, Gen. Qassem Soleimani.
In a speech to commemorate the seven fallen soldiers, IRGC chief General Hossein Salami vowed on Friday (Apr. 5) that Israel "cannot escape the consequences" of its alleged actions, both in the strike that killed the seven—which was immediately blamed on Israel—and in the war in Gaza against Hamas.
"The Zionist regime cannot escape the consequences of the harm it does," he said. "It is exposed and knows very well what is going to happen."
The general also denounced Washington in his funeral speech.
"The Zionist regime is alive and well today because of artificial support from the United States. When this is withdrawn it will collapse, and this is near," he added.
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei added that Israel "will be punished" for the killings.
Such rhetoric meant that both Israeli and US officials were on alert for Iranian retaliation due to the strike, the New York Times reported.
Israeli officials have not commented on the strike, but analysts see it as an escalation of the campaign against Iran and its regional proxies that runs the risk of triggering a wider war beyond one raging in Gaza, Agence France Presse reported.
The coffins of the seven were placed on the trailers of two trucks in one of the largest squares in Tehran, while mourners held Iranian, Palestinian, and Hezbollah flags while chanting "Death to Israel!" and "Death to America!"
According to the Fars news agency, Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Ziyad al-Nakhalah was among those present at the funeral. The Islamic Jihad has been fighting alongside Hamas in Gaza since October 7.
Local media also reported that Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and his predecessor Hassan Rouhani also attended the funeral.
Pictures of the dead men were displayed on the trucks where their coffins were placed, accompanied by the slogan "Martyrs on the road to Jerusalem."
Israel has long fought a shadow war of assassinations and sabotage against Iran and its armed allies, including Hezbollah and other militant groups, carrying out hundreds of strikes against targets in Syria, with the number of attacks increasing and intensifying since the war between Israel and Hamas began.
"It is quite clear that America has been one of the principal actors in the war continuing," Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said in a statement published on Friday.
After Friday's funeral ceremony in Tehran, Zahedi will be buried in his home city of Isfahan in central Iran.
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