DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The head of the Revolutionary Guard and other top commanders and nuclear experts slain during a 12-day war with Israel were buried Saturday in downtown Tehran, as hundreds of thousands of mourners lined the streets.
As the masses yelled “Death to America” and “Death to Israel,” the caskets of the Guard’s chief, Gen. Hossein Salami, the head of the Guard’s ballistic missile program, Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, and others were driven on trucks along Azadi Street in the capital.
Both Salami and Hajizadeh were murdered on June 13, the first day of the conflict, when Israel declared it was going to destroy Iran’s nuclear program, focusing on military leaders, scientists, and nuclear installations.
It was impossible to independently verify the state media’s claim that over a million people attended the funeral procession, but the large number of people packed the main Tehran highway for the full 4.5-kilometer (almost 3-mile) length.
The state broadcast of the burial did not immediately feature Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader. In previous funerals, Khamenei, who hasn’t been seen in public since before the war started, said prayers for the deceased commanders over their coffins prior to the public ceremonies, which were then broadcast on state television.
Top officials are among the mourners
Iranian international Minister Abbas Araghchi was present, and according to state media, among the mourning were Gen. Ali Shamkhani and Gen. Esmail Qaani, who leads the Quds Force, the Revolutionary Guard’s international arm.
An image posted on state television’s Telegram channel featured Shamkhani, Khamenei’s adviser who was injured in the initial wave of Israel’s attack and taken to the hospital, leaning on a cane and wearing a civilian suit.
Following the Islamic Revolution in 1979, Iran established the Revolutionary Guard. From its inception as a paramilitary domestic security organization, it has developed into a transnational force that has aided Tehran’s friends throughout the Middle East, ranging from Syria and Lebanon to Iraq. It functions alongside the nation’s current military and is in charge of Iran’s ballistic missile stockpile, which it has twice used to strike Israel in the Gaza Strip during the Israel-Hamas conflict.
Israel said it killed some 30 Iranian commanders and 11 nuclear scientists, as well as struck eight nuclear-related facilities and more than 720 military infrastructure locations, more than 12 days before a ceasefire was announced on Tuesday. The Human Rights Activists group, based in Washington, said that at least 417 civilians were among the more than 1,000 persons murdered.
Iran launched about 550 ballistic missiles against Israel; the majority were intercepted, but the ones that did make it through killed 28 people and damaged other locations.
Iranian state media said that the rituals on Saturday were the first public burial for top commanders since the truce and that there were 60 victims in total, including four women and four children.
Crowd expresses feelings of anger and defiance
To enable public employees to attend the ceremonies, authorities closed government buildings.
Many people in the throng were angry and defiant.
Waving an Iranian flag, Ahmad Mousapoor, 43, stated, “This is just a pause, not a ceasefire.” We will undoubtedly respond with crushing force, regardless of what they do.
The army chief of staff, Gen. Mohammad Bagheri, who was slain on the first day of the battle, was to be buried next to his brother, a Guards commander who was killed during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, according to pictures released by state media of an open grave space at Tehran’s expansive Behesht-e-Zahra cemetery.
Their hometowns were to be the final resting place for many of the others.
The head prosecutor of the infamous Evin prison was murdered in an Israeli strike on Monday, according to confirmation from the Iranian judiciary’s Mizan news agency.
It stated that a shrine in Qom would be the final resting place for Ali Ghanaatkar, whose persecution of dissidents, including Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi, drew harsh criticism from human rights organizations.
Iran has consistently maintained that its nuclear program is solely for peaceful ends. However, Israel argued its military campaign was required to stop Iran from developing an atomic weapon because it sees it as an existential threat.
Two days prior to the start of hostilities with Israel, on June 11, Khamenei met with Iranian lawmakers in his final public appearance.
However, in his first statement since the war’s conclusion, he broadcast a pre-recorded video on Thursday that was full of threats and warnings aimed at the Islamic Republic’s longstanding enemies, Israel and the United States.
The 86-year-old asserted triumph over Israel and dismissed American strikes on three Iranian nuclear installations as having accomplished nothing noteworthy.
Questions remain over possible talks
According to Rafael Grossi, the chief of the United Nations nuclear inspection organization, American bunker-buster bombs caused “very, very, very considerable” damage to Iran’s Fordo nuclear site, which was carved out of a mountain.
White House officials have stated they intend to resume discussions with Iran shortly, though no dates have been set. U.S. President Donald Trump has stated that he wants Iran to open itself to international inspection to ensure it doesn’t restart its nuclear program.
The Iranian parliament decided to temporarily halt cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency of Grossi.
Araghchi suggested that Iran would be amenable to negotiations in a post on X on Saturday, but he also took issue with Trump’s comments from Friday, in which the president mocked Khamenei’s warning against more U.S. attacks, claiming that Iran was “beat to hell.”
Araghchi said that if President Trump truly wants a deal, he should stop hurting his millions of devoted supporters and cease using such an offensive and inappropriate tone toward Iran’s Supreme Leader, Grand Ayatollah Khamenei.
