Iran’s top security official and the head of the Revolutionary Guard’s Basij militia were both killed in overnight strikes in a blow to the country’s leadership, Israel’s defence minister said Tuesday, while Tehran defiantly fired new salvos of missiles and drones at its Gulf Arab neighbours and Israel.
Both security official Ali Larijani and Gen. Gholam Reza Soleimani were “eliminated last night,” Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said in a statement.
Iran’s 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei died in an airstrike February 28, the first day of the war launched by the United States and Israel, and other top leaders from the Iranian theocracy have been killed since then.
Iranian state media did not immediately confirm either death. However, it said a message from Larijani’s office would be published shortly.
The announcement came after the Israeli military had earlier said it had carried out a “wide-scale wave of strikes” across Iran’s capital and stepped up strikes on Iran-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon.
Israel also reported two incoming salvos before dawn from Iran at Tel Aviv and elsewhere, and said Hezbollah targeted Israel’s north.
Incoming Iranian missiles on the United Arab Emirates prompted Dubai, a major transit hub for international travel, to briefly shut its airspace and a man was killed by the debris of a missile intercepted over Abu Dhabi.
Israel says it has killed two top Iranian officials
Larijani hails from one of Iran’s most famous political families. A former parliamentary speaker and senior policy adviser, he was appointed to advise the late Khamenei on strategy in nuclear talks with the Trump administration.
He also served as the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, its top security body.
Soleimani, meantime, was the head of the Basij militia forces, which Israel’s military called an “armed apparatus of the Iranian terror regime.”
“During internal protests in Iran, particularly in recent periods as demonstrations intensified, Basij forces under Soleimani’s command led the main repression operations, employing severe violence, widespread arrests and the use of force against civilian demonstrators,” Israel’s military said in a statement.
The US Treasury lists Soleimani as having been born in 1965. He has been sanctioned by the US, the European Union and other nations over his role in helping suppress dissent for years through the Basij.
Killing Soleimani would likely further strain the command and control of the Basij, which would be crucial in putting down any uprising against the theocracy.
The Basij and other internal security forces have been a target of attack by both the Americans and the Israelis so far.