According to Iranian state media, at least 56 people were killed and more than 200 injured in a stampede on Tuesday that broke out during a funeral procession for terrorist Qassem Soleimani.
The incident occurred in Gen. Qassem Soleimani’s hometown of Kerman, in southeastern Iran, according to Iran’s state media. Pirhossein Koulivand, the head of Iran’s emergency medical services, gave the latest casualty toll in an interview with state TV. Earlier he confirmed the stampede without providing any figures.
Initially, reports said 32 people had died and another 190 were injured but was later updated by the media to 56 dead and more than 200 injured.
“Unfortunately as a result of the stampede, some of our compatriots have been injured and some have been killed during the funeral processions,” Koulivand said. Videos posted online showed people lying lifeless on a road, others shouting and trying to give help them.
The incident draws comparison to the 1989 Tehran funeral procession of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini – whose half-naked remains toppled out of an open coffin live on state television. Mourners blocked the path of a truck carrying the deceased leader of the Iranian revolution and tore at his burial shroud, knocking his body to the ground. The broadcast was cut short and his body airlifted by military helicopter away from the crowd until his remains could be rewrapped in the traditional Muslim burial attire and placed in a metal casket for burial, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Iran has promised retaliation on American interests in the Middle East after an airstrike Thursday at Baghdad International Airport killed the leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ elite Quds Force along with Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy commander of Iran-backed militias known as the Popular Mobilization Forces, and five other people.
A procession in Tehran on Monday drew over 1 million people in the Iranian capital for the man viewed as a national hero. The funeral continued into Iran’s holy city of Qom, where another massive crowd turned out, before Soleimani’s remains and those of the others killed in the airstrike were brought to a central square in Kerman, where the general was set to be buried Tuesday.
Speaking in Kerman, Hossein Salami, leader of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, threatened to “set ablaze” places supported by the United States over the killing of a top Iranian general in a U.S. airstrike last week, sparking cries from the crowd of supporters of “Death to Israel!”
Source: Fox News
