Top Iran commander among casualties in Beirut strike; Khamenei moved to ‘safety’

West Asia on the boil as Israel kills Hezbollah chief

Iran announced on Saturday that a prominent general in its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard sanctioned by the US also died in the airstrike that killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut.

Abbas Nilforushan, 58, was killed on Friday in Lebanon, Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency reported. The US Treasury had identified Nilforushan as the deputy commander for operations in the Guard. It had sanctioned him in 2022 and said he had led an organisation “directly in charge of protest suppression, which has played a critical role in arresting protest leaders during previous protests”.

Those sanctions came amid months-long protests over the death of Mahsa Amini after her arrest for allegedly not wearing her headscarf, or hijab, to the liking of police.

Nilforushan also served in Syria, backing President Bashar Assad in his country’s decades-long war that grew out of the 2011 Arab Spring that swept the wider Middle East. He served in the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s like many of his colleagues.

In 2020, Iranian state television called him “comrade” of Gen Qassem Soleimani, the head of its expeditionary Quds Force who was killed in 2020 US drone attack in Baghdad. In 2021, Nilforushan told state TV that Israel was not in a capacity to pose a threat against Iran over what he described as Israel’s weakness. Meanwhile, two regional officials briefed by Tehran said Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had been transferred to a secure location inside the country, with heightened security measures in place. The sources said Iran was in constant contact with Lebanon’s Hezbollah and other regional proxy groups to determine the next step after Nasrallah’s killing.

Khamenei on Saturday called on Muslims “to stand by the people of Lebanon and the proud Hezbollah with whatever means they have and assist them in confronting the…wicked regime (of Israel)”. In a statement, Khamenei said: “The fate of this region will be determined by the forces of resistance, with Hezbollah at the forefront.” Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani vowed in a post on X that Nasrallah’s “path will be continued and his holy goal will be realised in the liberation of Jerusalem”.

Meanwhile, Iran Air cancelled all flights to Beirut until further notice, the airline’s spokesman told local media, including the Tasnim news agency, on Saturday.