Six Lies of Qassem Soleimani Regarding the Islamic Republic's Military Intervention in the Region

After about five years of military intervention by the Islamic Republic in Syria, Qassem Soleimani has opened his mouth to justify this war and defend the presence of the Quds Force and Afghan and Pakistani forces dispatched by the IRGC in this country (ILNA, March 14, 2016). The Islamic Republic completely denied any military presence in Syria during the first two years, and today even some semi-official media in Iran criticize this concealment. After that, the Islamic Republic claimed advisory presence, while from time to time, Basij and IRGC forces, who could not have been in an advisory role, are buried in various cities in Iran. Only from Tehran province, 123 Iranians have been killed in Syria. Only 40 students have been killed in Syria. The number of Afghan and Pakistani casualties reaches hundreds. In Soleimani's justifying remarks about the war in Syria, there are six clear lies that I will address one by one, discussing both the essence of the statement and the aspect of its falsehood: "Takfir is a fire in the house of Sunni brothers." This statement is a distortion of reality and is consciously made. Takfir has been a common term used by the officials of the Islamic Republic since the day it was established, applied to secular opponents, Western governments, the people of Western countries, and even Islamist Muslims opposing the Islamic Republic both inside and outside the country. This behavior is so prevalent that Soleimani, in one speech, denies the takfir by the Islamic Republic while simultaneously contradicting himself by committing it. He continues this speech by takfiring those who are critics of the government and the Velayat-e Faqih but are Muslims: "If a person is not committed to defending the Islamic Republic and the revolution, they are not committed to the principles of religion." (Same source) Takfir has become so common in the language of officials that when they commit it, they do not even realize they have done so. "Islamic Iran defends the lives and property of Muslims." What the Islamic Republic does in Syria is to defend the regime of Bashar al-Assad and keep him in power, not to defend the lives and property of Muslims. Between 250,000 to 450,000 Muslims have been killed in Syria (according to various statistics), and the Islamic Republic is complicit in the massacre of this population with the regime of Bashar al-Assad, which is responsible for protecting the lives and property of Syrian citizens. Islamic Republic officials, like the propaganda apparatus of the Syrian regime, focus solely on the crimes of ISIS to distract the audience from the crimes of Bashar al-Assad and his allies. "Islamic Iran has been peace-seeking and has always acted with moderation and patience." This statement contradicts all the behaviors of the Islamic Republic over the past 37 years. Throughout its existence, the Islamic Republic has first sought to export the revolution to Muslim countries in the region and overthrow their governments, and then to expand its sphere of influence through military presence in critical and tense areas and also by sending weapons to rebel groups. Such statements have been repeated thousands of times by religious, political, and military officials of the regime. These kinds of statements and behaviors have included Iraq, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, and Morocco. On the other hand, the Islamic Republic's anti-security activities in Iraq and Afghanistan and later in Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and North Africa to destabilize these countries have been recorded both by some countries (such as sending weapons to Nigeria) and in the judicial processes of these countries (such as Kuwait). Soleimani says: "Throughout history, Islamic Iran has never adventured against the Saudis despite their illegitimacy and the fact that the people have no role in their dominance and government, and in fact, this government is under the control of a family." The falsehood of this statement can easily be demonstrated with three counterexamples. The first example is the bombing of the pilgrims' plane in 1986, which was confirmed by officials of the Islamic Republic (the memoirs of Hossein Ali Montazeri). The second example is the explosion at the Khobar Towers, which American and Saudi institutions reported. The third example is the attack by forces loyal to Khamenei and the party of the military to the Saudi embassy in Tehran and its consulate in Mashhad. "In no country have we sought to convert Sunni brothers to Shia." This statement contradicts observations and newspaper articles on this issue, at least regarding Iran. In the early years of the Islamic Republic, the author himself witnessed the dispatch of some of the Construction Jihad forces from Fars province to Sistan and Baluchestan province with the aim of converting the Sunnis in this region to Shia. Some of these conversions have been recorded in widely circulated newspapers during that period. Besides, the significant transfer of Shia populations from Yazd and Kerman to Sistan and Baluchestan during the years of the Islamic Republic's existence was solely aimed at disrupting the demographic composition of this region and turning the Shia minority in these areas into a Shia majority or at least on par with the Sunnis. The Islamic Republic has made serious efforts to convert Palestinians to Shia. The sectarian policy of the Islamic Republic in the region can be observed in the type of allies this regime has. The only organization close to the Islamic Republic that is Sunni was Hamas, which distanced itself from the Islamic Republic after the war in Syria. Hamas cut off its last connections with the Islamic Republic by closing the office of the Baqiyat al-Salihat organization in the Gaza Strip. First, Soleimani should have used the term "Islamic Republic" instead of "Iran" in this statement because Iran is not equivalent to the ruling regime. Secondly, if military presence and financial, logistical, and military assistance to a dying regime, sending roadside bombs to Iraq and Afghanistan to kill American soldiers, advancing a nuclear program with two decades of lying and concealment, conducting terrorist operations against Iranian citizens inside and outside the country, forming terrorist cells that IRGC commanders have always referred to as threats to foreign governments, dropping bombs near an American warship, creating a model of an American aircraft carrier and destroying it, writing the destruction of Israel on long-range missiles launched, and sending weapons to Gaza and Africa (all of which have been reported with substantial evidence by international organizations and media, and even officials of the Islamic Republic) is not adventurism, then what is adventurism?