50+ Killed, 200+ Injured in Stampede at Funeral of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani

By: Politicized News

· Global Affairs

On January 7th, 2020, over 50 people were killed and over 200 injured in a stampede occuring at the funeral of Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani. The burial of the General’s body was postponed due to the public disorder. According to the Associated Press, tens “of thousands of people had gathered in … the city of Kerman to pay tribute” to the General who was killed in the U.S. drone strike on Friday, January 4th. Before arriving in Kerman, the General’s body was toured across Iraqi and Iranian cities, finding at each location crowds of people chanting “Death to America” and weeping with emotion.

Before the stampede, General Hossein Salami, new head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), said to the crowds: “We will take revenge, a hard and definitive revenge.” Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani stated that 13 “revenge scenarios” were being considered, the weakest option proving “a historic nightmare for the Americans.”

Major General Soleimani was commander of the IRGC’s Quds Force. The IRGC is the branch of the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran concerned with defending Iran’s political borders, domestic order, and protecting the Islamic Republic’s political system. The Quds Force is a branch of the IRGC concerned with special operations and military intelligence, similar to the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency or Joint Special Operations Command.

U.S. General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stated that the threats from General Soleimani were imminent, and that they “would have been culpably negligent to the American People had [they] not made the decision we made.” U.S. Army Staff Sergeant David Bellavia, the only living Iraq War Veteran to receive the Medal of Honor, said in a statement, the U.S. Military has “been honed into a machine of lethal moving parts that you would be wise to avoid if you know what’s good for you. We will not be intimidated. We will not back down. We’ve seen war. We don’t want war. But if you want war with the United States of America, there’s one thing I can promise you, so help me God: Someone else will raise your sons and daughters.”