Free Republic

LONDON: A post on Saturday by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio ignited a social media firestorm with the announcement that two women with ties to the Iranian regime were in the custody of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, awaiting deportation. The State Department later confirmed that Hamideh Soleimani Afshar, 47, and Sarinasadat Hosseiny, 25 — the niece and grandniece of slain Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Qassem Soleimani — had lost their lawful permanent resident status and faced arrest. Rubio’s post on X described the pair as “green card holders living lavishly” in the US, a characterization quickly reinforced...

The stunned Los Angeles renter of the property owned by the niece of Iranian terror mastermind Gen. Qasem Soleimani said he now realizes the mom and her daughter had been on ICE’s radar for some time before agents swooped on the quiet Tujunga home and hauled the pair away. Hamideh Soleimani Afshar, 47, and her daughter, Sarinasadat Hosseiny, 25, were arrested by ICE Friday and had their green cards revoked for ties to the Iranian regime. Afshar had celebrated attacks on US soldiers and military facilities, praised Iran’s Supreme Leader, called America the “Great Satan,” and voiced support for the...

The leader of Lebanon’s Hezbollah group said on Wednesday he was pleased about “the humiliating downfall” of US President Donald Trump, but urged regional allies to be on alert for any American or Israeli “folly” during the rest of his term in office. Hassan Nasrallah, in a televised speech, described Trump’s administration as “among the worst, if not the worst” in the United States, but said the new president would not alter Washington’s pro-Israel policy in the Middle East. Describing the US election as a travesty of democracy, he accused Trump of having no restraints and said his administration’s “arrogance...

The Israeli killing of Ali Larijani marks another blow to the Islamic Republic’s capacity for coordination, weakening an already fragmented system and raising the risk of miscalculation under pressure. Iran confirmed on Tuesday that Larijani—Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council and one of the regime’s central security coordinators— was killed in a morning strike on Tehran. The strike inevitably recalls the killing of Qassem Soleimani in 2020: another precise removal of a figure who linked diplomacy, intelligence and military power. Soleimani’s death did more than eliminate a commander. It weakened the regime’s ability to calibrate risk. Radical in purpose,...

Video of statue being set alight. Protesters in Iran on Thursday set fire to a statue of former Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani, footage obtained by Iran International shows. The website reported that the incident took place in the city of Lali in Khuzestan, located in southwestern Iran. It comes on the eve of the anniversary of the elimination of Soleimani in a US drone attack in Iraq, on January 3, 2020. Earlier on Thursday, Iranian media reported that the ongoing clashes and riots in Iran, which started as part of a broader wave of...

The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is seeking Majid Dastjani Farahani, a 41-year-old Iranian national and intelligence agent, accused of orchestrating assassination plots against US officials. "Majid Dastjani Farahani, an Iranian intelligence officer, is wanted for questioning in connection with the recruitment of individuals for various operations in the United States, to include lethal targeting of current and former United States Government officials as revenge for the killing of IRGC-QF Commander Qasem Soleimani," it said in a report on March 5. Soleimani was killed in 2020 in Baghdad by an American airstrike. He was commander of the Islamic Revolutionary...

“America can’t do a damn thing against us,” Ayatollah Khomeini bragged while holding our hostages. The Carter administration had undermined the Shah’s government in favor of the Islamists who seized power and then prevented the embassy’s Marine guards from defending the facility and the people inside against the Muslim ‘student’ groups who claimed to be coming in peace. The “peaceful” student activists took over our embassy and held our people hostage. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei taunted President Trump with the same slogan in June after being asked to give up Iran’s nuclear weapons program. “Our response to the US nonsense...

For 40 years, Iran’s relentless hostility toward the U.S. has fueled proxy wars, terror attacks, and nuclear ambitions. Now, after diplomatic overtures were rejected, America’s decisive strike on Iran’s nuclear sites signals a historic turning point in the Middle East power struggle. For 40 years, Iran has reverberated with the menacing chant of “Death to America” and “Death to Israel,” a rallying cry born from the 1979 Islamic Revolution under Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Last night, Saturday, June 21, 2025, that decades-long hostility faced a decisive response when President Donald Trump authorized a U.S. military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities at...

Beirut / Baghdad -- One of the most powerful men in Iraq isn't an Iraqi government official, a militia leader, a senior cleric or a top U.S. military commander or diplomat. He's an Iranian general, and at times he's more influential than all of them. Brig. Gen. Qassem Suleimani (51) ( pictured) commands the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' Quds Force, an elite paramilitary and espionage organization whose mission is to expand Iran's influence in the Middle East . As Tehran's point man on Iraq , he funnels military and financial support to various Iraqi factions, frustrating U.S. attempts to...

Astonishing news out of Israel today and confirmed by at least one Israeli TV network that Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Gen. Esmail Qaani, commander of the crack Quds Force, is in Jerusalem after being identified as an Israeli intelligence asset.There's no doubt that Qaani was under suspicion. On Sept. 27, 2024, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, one of the most well-guarded people in the world, was killed when at least 80 bombs were dropped on a bunker in Beirut, where Nasrallah was meeting with top aides. Qaani was placed under house arrest and interrogated, according to Middle East sources. Qaani...

Donald Trump has a name for everything and everyone, from Crooked Hillary to Little Rocket Man, who for a time became his best friend. Will he call the next region-wide conflagration in the Middle East, when it breaks out, Obama’s War? If he hasn’t thought of that already, he should start considering it now. Because the catastrophic policies of our former president have emboldened the Islamic state of Iran and enabled it to threaten the United States and our allies militarily in ways never before possible. When Obama took office in January 2009, he inherited a strong U.S. military and...

As a radical Islamic army marches across Iraq, America is making a deal with the devil. Qassem Suleymani, the head of Iran’s secretive Quds Force, is allied with us in Baghdad — but he’s plotted to kill Americans elsewhere. As Kenneth R. Timmerman reveals in his new book, “Dark Forces,” Suleymani was even the shadowy figure behind the killing of Ambassador Christopher Stevens in Benghazi, Libya. He’s the Wizard of Oz of Iranian terror, the most dreaded and most effective terrorist alive. He is Qassem Suleymani, the head of the Quds Force, an organization that acts as a combination CIA...

Iranian general Qassem Soleymani was a master terrorist who orchestrated atrocities around the world that claimed thousands of lives, including hundreds if not thousands of Americans. That was the default position after President Trump took out Soleymani last week. The Democrats’ furious reaction overlooked realities about the Iranian regime in general and Soleymani in particular. Israel had also targeted the Quds Force commander, but according to the Kuwaiti Al-Jarida, the Obama administration tipped off the Tehran regime. Soleymani emerged unscathed and continued to spearhead the Islamic regime’s military and terrorist operations. Those were funded by criminal activity, and on that...

Israeli soldiers raised the Jewish state’s flag in Lebanon as part of its ongoing assault on Hezbollah terrorists.A trio of Israel Defense Forces members were seen planting the flag on top of rubble in Maroun El Ras in southern Lebanon on Tuesday, a video shared by KANN News shows.Maroun El Ras is less than 1 kilometer from the northern Israeli border. The IDF has “occupied” the village and destroyed houses from which Hezbollah was believed to have launched missiles at northern Israel, according to Israeli Energy Minister Eli Cohen.תיעוד: רגעי הנפת דגל ישראל במארון א-ראס שבלבנון@ItayBlumental(צילום: צוות אביר 91 ביחידת...

An Iranian legislator on Tuesday offered a US$3m reward to “anyone who kills” US President Donald Trump to avenge the assassination of top general Qassem Soleimani. American disarmament ambassador Robert Wood dismissed the reward as “ridiculous”, telling reporters in Geneva it showed the “terrorist underpinnings” of Iran’s establishment. Ahmad Hamzeh, a little-known member of parliament, offered the bounty on behalf of the people of Kerman, the hometown and final resting place of the revered Soleimani, who was killed in an American drone strike in neighbouring Iraq on January 3. “We will give three million dollars to anyone who kills Trump,”...

Last week’s bombing near the grave of the Quds Force general that killed 84 is the latest episode in ISIS’s war on Shiite Muslims.. In the immediate aftermath of the January 3 blast that killed at least 84 people near the grave of general Qassem Soleimani in the Iranian city of Kerman, some low-level Iranian officials hinted at a possible Israeli involvement. Iran’s deputy parliament speaker claimed it had the signs of an Israeli assault — even though it showed radically different features from Israel’s alleged operations in enemy territory, which usually involve precision killings of key enemy figures. The...

Various world leaders and institutions have raised their concerns that the presumed Israeli strike in a suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, that killed a top Hamas leader could escalate and expand the conflicts in the region. Deputy leader Saleh al Arouri — who was allegedly responsible for leading multiple attacks on Israel and had ushered in a closer relationship between Hamas and Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militia in Lebanon — was one of a handful of people killed in the Tuesday night strike. His killing marked a possibly pivotal moment in the powder keg that is the Middle East. Israeli leaders have...

More than 100 people were killed at an event honoring former Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani on Wednesday in what local authorities are calling a “terrorist” attack. Thousands of Iranians had gathered at Soleimani’s gravesite in Kerman to mark the fourth anniversary of his death — carrying photos of the former head of the Revolutionary Guard’s elite Quds Force when authorities say two bombs went off. The first explosion occurred just 700 meters from Soleimani’s grave, while the second was a kilometer away, Iranian national media reports. Graphic video shared online later showed the crowds running away as emergency crews responded...

Multiple Explosions in Iran during a ceremony held to mark the 2020 killing of Qassem Soleimani At least 20 dead

In a shocking incident, at least 20 people in Iran lost their lives, with several others injured, as two explosions rocked areas near the cemetery where the late IRGC-QF Chief Qassem Soleimani is buried. Iran’s state TV reported the grim news, leaving the nation in mourning. The cause of the explosions remains uncertain, with conflicting reports suggesting it might be a terrorist attack or a gas cylinder explosion. A provincial security official admitted the lack of clarity surrounding the nature of the incident.