Tag: Iran

“In the Footsteps of Husayn”: The Visual Legacy of General Qasim Soleimani

The targeted killing of the head of the Quds Force, the external operations arm of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (“Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution,” Sipah-e Pasdaran-e Inqilab-e Islami; IRGC) by the U.S. at the Baghdad International Airport has unleashed a debate and commentary storm about a range of issues from the most likely to possible fallout and results of the drone strike, whether or not Soleimani is replaceable, whether the assassinations were “legal” or not, what this means for U.S. interests in the Middle East and its forces there and in Afghanistan, among others.

Soleimani’s long career in the IRGC and the creation of his prominent media image, which was fed both by the Iranian state and external news media coverage and the commentariat including in the West, together with his network of interpersonal relationships with a range of non-state and quasi-state armed groups and political actors in the Middle East and wider Muslim-majority world is indisputable even if the results of his killing and the public acknowledgement of it by the U.S. government is still unclear. Soleimani was intimately involved in maintaining and strengthening the Iranian state’s regional network of allied and client groups including Lebanon’s Hizbullah, the Houthi movement (Ansarullah) in Yemen, a host of Iraqi and Syrian armed groups and political parties, and Afghan and Pakistani paramilitary units attached to the IRGC, the Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun and Lashkar-e Zaynabiyyun respectively. He oversaw Iran’s asymmetrical and covert warfare against the U.S., Israel, and the former’s regional allies including Saudi Arabia beginning in the years following the U.S. and British invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003. Though most frequently associated with Shi’i groups he also maintained ties with other groups including Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government including in its fight against Islamic State in 2014.

The late general also leaves behind a legacy in the visual culture and production of the Iranian state and its array of allied and client groups in the Middle East and farther abroad, which is, as is much of my academic research, the subject of this post.

COMMANDER HAJJ QASIM SOLEIMANI, THORN IN THE EYES OF THE ENEMIES:
“Among the Believers are men true to their covenant with God. Among them is the one who has fulfilled their vow [unto death] and among them is the one who awaits their opportunity, and they did not alter [their commitment] in any way.” [Qur’an 33:23]
Qasim Soleimani attends an event for the “Emigrant-Martyr-Defenders of the Holy Places” in the Iranian Shi’i shrine city of Mashhad in February 2018 along with Iraqi Shi’i Hashd militia commanders Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis and Qays al-Khaz’ali.
  • Soleimani in Syria with Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun cleric-“martyr” ‘Ali Tamam-Zadeh (Abu Hadi) and Murtaza ‘Ata’i (Abu ‘Ali).
  • Soleimani with Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun commander “martyr” Sayyid Ja’far Amiri in Syria.
  • Soleimani with Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun “martyr” Murtaza ‘Ata’i in Syria.
  • Soleimani with Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun “martyr” Murtaza ‘Ata’i in Syria.
  • Soleimani with slain Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun members Mustafa Sadr-Zadeh (Sayyid Ibrahim), Mahdi Saberi (Gholam-Hossein), & Nader Hamid in Syria.
Soleimani with the Afghan founder and Iran-Iraq War veteran ‘Ali-Reza Tavassoli, who was killed fighting for the IRGC in Syria in February 2015

  • Soleimani with Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun “martyr” Mustafa Sadr-Zadeh

Soleimani with IRGC major general Khayrullah Samadi, who was killed in 2017 during Iraqi and Iranian operations against Islamic State in and around Albu Kamal.
Soleimani, Iranian supreme leader of the Islamic Revolution (rahbar-e Inqilab-e Islami) ‘Ali Khamenei, and Lebanese Hizbullah secretary-general Hasan Nasrallah.
Poster for a memorial event for the 40-days following the death of Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun “martyr” Murtaza Hossein-pur Shalimani featuring Soleimani as a speaker.
Poster showing Soleimani alongside IRGC general Gholam-Reza Sama’i, who was killed in Syria in 2016.
  • Soleimani in Albu Kamal, Iraq in 2017.
  • “Thank you, Commander, for the morning (dawn) after Da’ish.”
  • Soleimani visits a martyrs’ graveyard in Iran.
  • “Thank you, commander.”
  • Soleimani with Iraqi forces during the 2015 Tikrit offensive against Islamic State.
  • Soleimani with Iraqi Shi’i Badr Organization chief Hadi al-‘Amiri during the 2015 Tikrit offensive against Islamic State.
  • Poster for a “Resistance Front” event featuring Soleimani.
  • Soleimani visits a wounded Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun fighter, Sayyid ‘Ali Asghar Hosseini, in the hospital in February 2018.
Cartoon poster showing Soleimani knocking out Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Photograph from the Iran-Iraq War showing Soleimani with other future IRGC officers including Brigadier General Hossein Hamedani, killed in Aleppo in an Islamic State attack in October 2015.
“Your victory is the victory of the downtrodden of the Earth.”
“The victory of the soldiers of Islam is blessed.”
“Israel will disappear.”
Soleimani at the shrine of Sayyida Zaynab in Damascus, Syria.
Lebanese pose at the country’s border with northern Israel with pictures of Soleimani.
Soleimani visits the grave of the late Iraqi President and Kurdish politician Jalal Talabani in October 2017.
“The distance (difference) between the Islamic Revolution and the Pahlavi regime.”
“General Soleimani, the Malik al-Ashtar of today,” referencing one of the chief supporters of Imam ‘Ali ibn Abi Talib and governor of Egypt who was assassinated on the orders of the Umayyad caliph Mu’awiya I.
Lashkar-e Fatimiyyun members send their Nowruz greetings from Syria in March 2018.
“We will have our revenge”: Poster with Soleimani commemorating the “martyred” IRGC soldiers killed in an Israeli airstrike on the Tiyas (T4) airbase in Homs, Syria in April 2018.
Poster showing Soleimani as a “martyr” being embraced by Imam Husayn.
  • “Just Retaliation-in-kind (Qisas ‘adil)”:

    Just retribution is the responsibility and duty of all resistance fighters and mujahidin throughout the world.” -Hizbullah secretary-general Hasan Nasrallah on Soleimani’s killing.
  • “We are the people of Imam Husayn” -Brigade of Qasim Soleimani
“We sacrifice ourselves for you, O’ (Sayyida) Zaynab!”
“We will avenge you”
Soleimani is greeted by the “martyrs” of the Iran-Iraq War in Janna.
Soleimani, who obeyed the command of Imam Husayn, greeted in Janna by, among others, Ayatullah Ruhollah Khumayni, Imam Husayn’s half-brother and standard-bearer at Karbala Abu Fadl (Fazl) al-‘Abbas, Hizbullah’s late military commander ‘Imad Mughniyya (assassinated in Damascus in February 2008), Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, IRGC brigadier general Ahmad Kazemi (killed in a plane crash in Jan. 2006), IRGC brigadier general Hasan Tehrani Moghaddam (killed in Nov. 2011), and IRGC lieutenant Mohsen Hojaji (executed by Islamic State after being captured near the Iraq-Syria border in Aug. 2017).

UPDATED JANUARY 27:

  • Soleimani alongside ‘Imad Mughniyya & Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis

Soleimani, Mohsen Hojaji, and other IRGC “martyrs” with Khumayni.
Soleimani pictured with other “martyrs” including Ayatullahs Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr, Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr, Muhammad Baqir al-Hakim, Murtaza Mutahhari, and Muhammad Beheshti, Hizbullah chief ‘Abbas al-Musawi and military commander ‘Imad Mughniyya, Musa al-Sadr, Houthi leader Husayn al-Huthi, and a host of IRGC commanders and officers. Also present is Afghan Northern Alliance chief Ahmad Shah Massoud.
“Come to jihad”
Re-purposing the iconic Iwo Jima image.
The Successor: General Isma’il Qaani.