Two British publications released footage that they claim shows the moment that a U.S. Reaper drone killed Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force, which is a designated terrorist organization.
President Donald Trump authorized the strike last week after receiving credible information from the U.S. intelligence community that Soleimani was planning imminent terrorist attacks on U.S. forces and interests throughout the Middle East.
The Guardian and Sky News published the footage that they say they obtained from Iraq CCTV.
WATCH:
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told Fox News last week, “There was an attack that was imminent that could have killed dozens or hundreds of Americans. We found an opportunity, and we delivered.”
“He was traveling the region when he landed in Baghdad. The travels before that put him in places all around the region which were aimed solely at building out what they were referring to as ‘the big attack.’ They were aiming to take down significant amounts of Americans,” Pompeo continued. “It would have undoubtedly killed locals, too, Iraqis, Lebanese, Syrians, perhaps, people all throughout the region. This was an attack that would have been to some scale. We can’t talk much about the details, but suffice [it] to say, the American people can know that the decision that President Trump made to take Qasem Soleimani down saved American lives.”
Following the strike, the U.S. Department of Defense said in a statement:
At the direction of the president, the U.S. military has taken decisive defensive action to protect U.S. personnel abroad by killing Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force, a U.S.-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization.
General Soleimani was actively developing plans to attack American diplomats and service members in Iraq and throughout the region. General Soleimani and his Quds Force were responsible for the deaths of hundreds of American and coalition service members and the wounding of thousands more. He had orchestrated attacks on coalition bases in Iraq over the last several months – including the attack on December 27th – culminating in the death and wounding of additional American and Iraqi personnel. General Soleimani also approved the attacks on the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad that took place this week.
This strike was aimed at deterring future Iranian attack plans. The United States will continue to take all necessary action to protect our people and our interests wherever they are around the world.
The U.S. State Department released the following fact-sheet on Qasem Soleimani:
Since 1998, Qassem Soleimani commanded Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Qods Force (IRGC-QF), the terror arm of the Iranian regime. The IRGC-QF is tasked with planning and executing terror and military operations outside Iran’s borders. Under Soleimani’s command, the IRGC-QF has fueled destabilizing sectarian conflicts throughout the Middle East for decades.
The IRGC-QF continues to wage an illegal campaign of terrorism, assassinations, and violence. At Soleimani’s direction and with his oversight and guidance, the IRGC-QF has planned and conducted terrorist attacks across six continents and inside the United States.
The United States designated IRGC-QF a Foreign Terrorist Organization for its activities, and the United States designated Soleimani as a Specially-Designated Global Terrorist.
As the leader of the IRGC-QF, Qassem Soleimani was directly responsible for arming, funding, and training proxy groups in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Bahrain, Yemen, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. Operations carried out by these proxy groups have led to the death and suffering of tens of thousands, including many hundreds of Americans. These proxies routinely target and kill civilians, intensify sectarian conflicts, and prolong the suffering of innocent men, women, and children.
Soleimani personally directed and provided arms to militias in Iraq for more than a decade. These militias undermine the sovereignty of the Iraqi state, threaten the legitimacy of Iraq’s security forces, and target American citizens and forces. With Soleimani’s support and lethal assistance, proxies of the IRGC-QF targeted and killed over 600 Americans between 2003 and 2011.
We can confirm that in the past several days, General Soleimani had been traveling in the Middle East coordinating further imminent large-scale attacks against U.S. diplomats and service members. These threats were highly credible and the intelligence is sound. General Soleimani’s travel also violated the ban imposed by the United Nations Security Council.
Recent orders given by General Soleimani dramatically escalated Iran’s campaign of violence and terrorism against Americans and American interests in the Middle East. He orchestrated a series of attacks against American forces in Iraq in the past several months, culminating in the rocket attack on December 27, 2019, which resulted in the death of an American citizen, wounded four American service members, and threatened the lives of many more American personnel. General Soleimani also ordered the assault on the American Embassy in Baghdad. General Soleimani continued to command Iranian supported proxies in Iraq, which posed an escalating threat to the lives of Americans.
For his actions, Soleimani had been designated and sanctioned by the United Nations, European Union, and United States and is banned from international travel by United Nations Security Council Resolution 2231. In defiance of United Nations Security Council resolutions, however, Soleimani continued to travel to Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon directing and coordinating lethal actions that pose a threat to regional peace and security.