A strategic U.S. airstrike on a convoy leaving Baghdad International Airport early Friday killed Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force, a U.S.-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization, and the man the U.S. State Department says is ultimately responsible for the deaths of 17 percent of U.S. soldiers killed during the Iraq War. The strike also took out top Iraqi paramilitary commander Abu Mahdi al-Mohandes, who headed the Iranian-linked Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF). More details about the strike and footage of its aftermath have emerged.
Sources told The Associated Press that the strike occurred just as Muhandis was greeting the Iranian general at the airport. The general had reportedly just arrived from either Syria or Lebanon. Soleimani’s body was reportedly identified by his ring.
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