TEHRAN – Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said Monday they launched a missilestrike against a “terrorist” headquarters in Syria in retaliation for anattack that killed 24 people in the Iranian city of Ahvaz.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani had vowed a “crushing” response to lastmonth’s assault — claimed by the Islamic State jihadist group — on amilitary parade commemorating the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war.
“The headquarters of those responsible for the terrorist crime in Ahvaz wasattacked a few minutes ago east of the Euphrates by several ballisticmissiles fired by the aerospace branch of the Revolutionary Guards,” theGuards said on their website.
“Based on preliminary reports, many takfiri terrorists and the leadersresponsible for the terrorist crime in Ahvaz have been killed or wounded inthis missile attack,” they added. The term “takfiri” refers to Sunni Muslimextremists.
The Guards released pictures of what appeared to be missiles lighting upthe night sky, leaving trails of smoke as they soared above a desert regionwith a rugged mountain in the background.
Iran’s Fars news agency said the Guards fired “a number of medium-range”Zolfaghar and Qiam missiles, with a range of 750 kilometres and 800kilometres (465 and 500 miles), respectively.
The agency said the missiles hit the Syrian desert border town of AlbuKamal on the west of the Euphrates River, in the eastern province of DeirEzzor.
“On at least one of the missiles was written ‘death to America’, ‘death toIsrael’ and ‘death to Al Saud’,” it said, a reference to the ruling familyin Saudi Arabia, Iran’s regional rival.
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based warmonitor, “heavy explosions took place at dawn (Monday) in the last pocketunder IS control near Albu Kamal”.
Albu Kamal itself, located on the border with Iraq, is held by regimeforces and allied regional militiamen who seized it from IS in 2007.
– ‘Jihadist separatists’ –
Twenty-four people were shot dead in the attack by five gunmen on amilitary parade in the mainly ethnic Arab city of Ahvaz in southwesternIran on September 22.
Read Top Stories
Ahvaz is the provincial capital of Khuzestan, a border region which was amajor battleground of the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, and which also sawethnic unrest in 2005 and 2011.
Iranian officials initially blamed Arab separatists backed by Gulf Araballies of the United States for the attack.
But on Monday supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei appeared to link theperpetrators to jihadists operating in Iraq and Syria, where IS once hadmajor strongholds.
“This cowardly act was the work of those very individuals who are rescuedby the Americans whenever they are in trouble in Iraq and Syria and who arefunded by the Saudis and the (United) Arab Emirates,” Khamenei was quotedby his official website as saying.
The next day Iran’s intelligence ministry published photos of five men itsaid carried out the Ahvaz assault, identifying them as “jihadistseparatists”.
IS, a Sunni Muslim extremist group which Iran and its Damascus allies arefighting in Syria, has claimed responsibility for the attack and said allfive assailants were Iranian, including four from Ahvaz.
It also threatened to carry out new attacks in Iran.
IS had already claimed responsibility for twin attacks in June 2017 on theparliament and the tomb of revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeiniin Tehran that killed 17 people.
After that assault the Guards said they had fired missiles into Syria thathad successfully hit IS targets. – APP/AFP
