Iran Says It Reserves Right To Respond To IRGC Commander’s Assassination

Nasser Kanaani

TEHRAN, Jan 2 (NNN-IRNA) – Iran said yesterday, it would reserve the right to respond to the recent assassination of a veteran Iranian commander in Syria “at the appropriate place and time.”

Iran’s Foreign Ministry Spokesman, Nasser Kanaani, at a weekly press conference in the capital Tehran, condemned Israel for attacking a commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), who was in Damascus to fight terrorism, at the request of the Syrian government.

Kanaani’s remarks came, a week after Seyyed Razi Mousavi, who served as a “military adviser” in Syria, was killed by a missile attack in Damascus on Dec 25, 2023.

Kanaani said, Israeli attacks against Iranian advisers in Syria were “a clear violation of the Arab state’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, as an independent state and a UN member and an adventurism, aimed at challenging peace and security in the region.”

Mousavi was a comrade of the late Iranian commander, Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in a U.S. drone strike near Baghdad airport in Jan, 2020.

Earlier in Dec, 2023, the IRGC said, two of its members were killed by Israeli forces “while conducting an advisory mission in Syria’s Islamic resistance front.”

Iran says, it has an advisory role in Syria at the invitation of Damascus. Israel has repeatedly targeted what it says are Iran-linked positions in Syria.