Martyr Lt. Gen. Qassem Soleimani: the real shatterer of ISIS

As the coronavirus death toll in the US approaches 100,000, the US president, while taking a much-needed golf break from his arduous duties defending the American republic against all enemies external and internal, took to Twitter to claim “it was me who shattered 100% of the ISIS Caliphate.” This startling statement was in the midst of a prolonged presidential proclamation in defense of his golf outing “to get outside and perhaps, even a little exercise,” following the former reality TV show star’s pathetic performance in coping with the Covid-19 pandemic in America.  

This delusionary denizen in the Oval Office boasted incredulously of receiving “Great reviews on our handling of COVID 19,” while complaining that “we made a lot of Governors look very good - And got no credit for so doing.” Bishop Talbert Swain of the predominantly African American Church of God in Christ, in response to the sickening, self-congratulatory post by POTUS, poignantly pointed out that “100,000 people couldn’t give reviews because.....they’re DEAD.”   Here, as in the case of the ridiculous rant about shattering ISIS, the truth is 180 degrees out of phase with Trump’s Twitter post. The US has in fact proven itself to be exceptional in that the country has become the epicenter of the worldwide coronavirus pandemic, lagging far behind other nations in testing and response. 

Contrary to the Mar-a-Lago marauder’s swaggering about shattering the ISIS caliphate, General Qassem Soleimani played a key role in the defeat of the Takfiri terrorist organization in both Syria and Iraq.  As Gil Barndollar, a senior fellow at Catholic University of America’s Center for Studies of Statesmanship and Defense Priorities put it, “The inconvenient truth is Iran and its proxy forces played a critical role in defeating ISIS in both Iraq and Syria.” Furthermore, General Soleimani was the chief architect of Iran’s most successful mix of diplomatic and military strategies, which have successfully transformed the Islamic Republic from beyond a mere regional power into a force to be reckoned with on the world stage. 

Hailing from a small village in Kerman Province, General Qassem Soleimani joined the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) after its founding in April of 1979. Upon completing basic training, the young Soleimani was immediately made a training instructor and subsequently rose through the ranks to become the leader of the prestigious 41st Division of the IRGC, whose sobriquet is Thar Allah (Vengeance of Allah), which is also a nickname of Imam Hussein (as).  He served as a commander on the front lines during the Sacred Defense, the 8-year-long war imposed upon Iran by the US-backed dictator Saddam of Iraq, and by March of 1998, he had assumed command of the elite Qods Force. 

Following the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on the New York World Trade Center and the Pentagon, General Soleimani was responsible for helping the Americans defeat the Taliban by sharing intelligence and supporting the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. For a brief moment, it seemed as though a genuine breakthrough had been facilitated between the Islamic Republic and the US, only to have all progress toward a thawing of relations sabotaged by the duplicitous, backstabbing Americans when president George W. Bush called out Iran as a member of the “Axis of Evil” in his January 2002 State of the Union Address. 

Martyr Soleimani was also the military genius who shattered the Israeli image of invincibility during the 33-day-long War of Tammuz in 2006 between the Lebanese Resistance Movement, Hezbollah, and the Zionist entity.  The war was part of George W. Bush’s broad plan to destroy the resistance in Palestine and Lebanon, and topple the government in Syria after having invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, thereby isolating and encircling Iran. It was General Qassem Soleimani that went to Beirut in the early days of the Israeli attack on Lebanon to organize the resistance forces and coordinate combat operations. He stayed in Lebanon for the entire duration of the conflict alongside Hezbollah Commander Imad Moughniyeh (Martyred in 2008) except for a brief trip back to Iran one week into the war when he returned for one day to give a briefing to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei. 

The petty US president has long had it in for General Soleimani. In a July 22, 2018 post to Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani, Trump threatened, “NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED STATES AGAIN OR YOU WILL SUFFER CONSEQUENCES THE LIKES OF WHICH FEW THROUGHOUT HISTORY HAVE EVER SUFFERED BEFORE.” In response to this aggressive, adolescent assertion, General Soleimani declared, “It is beneath the dignity of the president of the great Islamic country of Iran to respond, so I will respond, as a soldier of our nation.” Martyr Soleimani correctly observed that Trump’s rhetoric “is still that of a casino, of a bar. He talks to the world in the style of a bartender or a casino manager.” Addressing the rogue Republican American leader, the late Commander warned, “We are near you in places that you can't even imagine. We are a nation of martyrdom. We are the nation of Imam Hussein (as).” Furthermore, the Martyred former Qods Force Commander predicted, “You may start the war, but we will be the ones to determine its end.” 

Some of the more clear-eyed US officials have acknowledged the stupidity of Trump’s cowardly assassination of General Soleimani. Douglas London, a recently retired CIA Senior Operations Officer and Chief of Counterterrorism for South and Southwest Asia, noted that as the IRGC Qods Force continues to expand its scope of operations following the martyrdom of General Soleimani, “the greater the chances that American vulnerabilities will be exposed, which would raise the cost for the Trump administration in many respects.” Political analyst at Persis Media Maysam Behravesh writes, “Indeed, the Islamic Republic’s unconventional alliance network reaches far and wide, and its workings have only intensified since the Soleimani killing.” Given the US president’s psychotic behavior and the coronavirus pandemic, those manifold American vulnerabilities are becoming obvious to the entire world.

“The killing of General Soleimani, a top-ranking military official of a nation-state, who enjoyed the full support of the leadership of Iran, is nothing but a crime,” wrote Archit Shukla, a law student at the National University of Study and Research in Law in Ranchi, India. “The stupid American leaders assumed that they can defeat the axis of resistance by assassinating General Soleimani,” wrote Mohammad Ghaderi, editor-in-chief of Tehran Times International Daily. The stupid American leaders should know that Martyr Qassem Soleimani is the real shatterer of ISIS, not some poorly rated reality TV show actor currently cringing in the White House.

First Time Published in Tehran Times.