Iran's Cultural Attaché in Lebanon Abbas Khameh-Yar hailed the role of Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani in preserving the unity of the region, adding that the late anti-terror commander managed to foil many plots of the US in the Middle East. RNA - In a special ceremony in the Lebanese Southern city of Sour held for marking the 41st anniversary of the victory of the Islamic Revolution and the martyrdom of General Soleimani, Khameh-Yar said that General Soleimani and his companions managed to prevent division of Arab and other Islamic countries.
General Soleimani prevented the implementation of the Sykes–Picot Agreement which was aimed at splitting up Middle Eastern nations.
The Sykes–Picot Agreement was a 1916 secret treaty between the United Kingdom and France, with assent from the Russian Empire and Italy, to define their mutually agreed spheres of influence and control in an eventual partition of the Ottoman Empire.
Martyr General Soleimani managed to withstand the implementation of the project by the Americans and Zionists and one of the reasons behind US oppressive sanctions against Iran was resistance of martyred commander which was a major obstacle in the way of Zionists expansionism.
Iranian nation's resistance against the US has defeated the US' plans and brought victory for Iran, he said.
Reiterating oppressed peoples' undisputable rights for defending their identity, Khameh-Yar said that the nations everywhere in world, particularly resistance movement in Palestine, Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq and Syria are entitled to celebrate victory of the Islamic Revolution, as Iran is the only country that has been standing alongside them in the face of the US and Zionists.
Lieutenant General Soleimani was assassinated in a US drone strike on Baghdad International Airport in Iraq on January 3.
The airstrike also martyred Deputy Commander of Iraq's Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis. The two were martyred in an American airstrike that targeted their vehicle on the road to the airport.
Five Iranian and five Iraqi militaries were martyred by missiles fired by the US drone at Baghdad International Airport.
On January 8, the IRGC Aerospace Force started heavy ballistic missile attacks on US Ein Al-Assad airbase in Southwestern Iraq near the border with Syria and a US operated airbase in Erbil in retaliation for the US assassination of General Soleimani.
Ein Al-Assad is an airbase with a 4km runway at 188m altitude from sea levels, which is the main and the largest US airbase in Iraq. Early reports said the radar systems and missile defense shields in Ein Al-Assad failed to operate and intercept the Iranian missiles. Unofficial reports said the US army's central radar systems at Ein Al-Assad had been jammed by electronic warfare.
According to Fars News Agency, the second IRGC reprisal attack targeted a US military base near Erbil airport in Iraqi Kurdistan Region in the second leg of "Martyr Soleimani" reprisal operation.
Iraq said the attacks had not taken any toll from its army men stationed at these two bases. The US army had blocked entrance into Ein Al-Assad to everyone, including the Iraqi army.
It was the first direct attack on the US army ever since world war two.
The IRGC officials said none of the missiles had been intercepted.
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