"Death to America! " A mourning human tide accompanied the coffins of General Ghassem Soleimani, Iran’s most popular commander, and his comrades-in-arms killed in Iraq in a US drone attack on Monday, January 6 in Tehran. In the Iranian capital, the population offered the spectacle of a gathering of a scale never seen since the demonstrations and counter-demonstrations of the post-electoral contest of 2009 in Iran.
As in Ahvaz (southwest) and Machhad (northeast) the day before, the Iranians moved en masse to Tehran, on this declared holiday, to honor Ghassem Soleimani, a charismatic figure very popular in Iran, killed on Friday with his Iraqi lieutenant and eight others near Baghdad airport. The crowd gathered in the freezing cold was clearly much more varied than at the usual rallies at the call of power.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei could not hold his emotion by presiding a short prayer of the dead at the University of Tehran, in front of the coffins containing the remains of Soleimani, of Abu Mehdi Al-Mouhandis , number two of Hachd Al-Chaabi (Iraqi pro-Iran paramilitaries), and four Iranians. Soleimani is to be buried Tuesday in Kerman (southeast), his hometown.
Estimated at " few millions " by Iranian state television, the crowd alternates moments of meditation, sadness, and explosion of anger, with cries of "Death to America! ", "Death to Israel! ". American and Israeli flags are burned. Men and women cry or call for revenge for the one who was the head of the Al-Quds Forces, responsible for the external operations of the Revolutionary Guards; as such he was the architect of Iran’s Middle East strategy.
Many calls for "revenge"
Ghassem Soleimani’s daughter Zeinab and the head of the Palestinian Hamas political bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, electrified the crowd by speaking of the galvanizing effects that the general’s death will have on resistance to America and Israel. For its part, Iran has promised a "Military response", a "Hard revenge" who will strike "In the right place at the right time".
Despite calls to " de-escalation " and at the " detention " many capitals around the world, US President Donald Trump does nothing to allay concerns. If Iran does "Whatever it is, there will be major reprisals", he said on Sunday. These threats "Are not very helpful", regretted Berlin.
Trump also discussed the possibility of imposing sanctions "Very strong" in Baghdad after the Iraqi Parliament voted on Sunday for a resolution calling for the departure of US troops from Iraq.
The assassination of Soleimani came three days after an unprecedented attack on the US embassy in Baghdad by Hashd supporters to protest a deadly American bombing of a faction of these paramilitaries. The bombing, meanwhile, was a response to the firing, during the past two months, of dozens of rockets at installations in Iraq sheltering Americans, where an American subcontractor had perished at the end of December.
Nuclear deal in jeopardy, NATO meeting
Against this explosive backdrop, Iran announced on Sunday that it is breaking even further from the 2015 nuclear program deal, no longer imposing limits on uranium enrichment. If this announcement was expected, it coincides with the sharp escalation of tensions between Tehran and Washington.
But Tehran continues to voluntarily submit to the UN inspection program, particularly draconian, set up following the 2015 nuclear agreement concluded between Iran, China, the United States, France, Great Britain. Britain, Russia and Germany. The Islamic Republic could thus reverse its decision if the United States lifts its sanctions against it.
Indeed, since May, Iran has gradually freed itself from commitments to which it had subscribed by this agreement, in response to the unilateral withdrawal of the United States, which reinstated economic sanctions against Tehran. Paris, London and Berlin called "Iran to withdraw all (its) non-conforming measures" to the pact. European Foreign Minister Josep Borrell said Monday "Deeply regret" this advert.
Faced with the crisis between the United States and Iran, sworn enemies, and the risk of a real explosion, an extraordinary meeting of NATO is held during the day in Brussels, and the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, President Vladimir Putin meets in Moscow on Saturday.
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