Ruhollah Abdolmaleki, researcher in regional studies
During the days these lines are being written down, the world is witnessing an asymmetrical confrontation between two opposing sides, which has displayed the peak of brutality as well as desperation on one side and innocence along with heroic resistance on the other side. It would suffice to review the distant past years so that a completely different image forms in our minds. In those days, whenever Palestine and the Muslims living in it were mentioned, the atmosphere of innocence, being doomed to failure, and suffering under occupation prevailed in the background of phrases and sentences. In the same way, the words Zionist regime and occupation emanated a sense of undisputed power, security dominance, and military invincibility. Unlike that era, now the bubble of security dominance and military invincibility of the Zionist regime has burst, and the political intrigues, diplomatic tricks and media propaganda of the occupiers have disintegrated like a loose spider web. Operation Al-Aqsa Flood has destroyed the credibility of the Zionist regime in various aspects, and the resistance of the innocent Muslims of Gaza and their resilience against the huge and comprehensive volume of the round-the-clock bombardments have drawn the admiration and astonishment of world nations.
With a broader look at the years of
confrontation and conflict between Global Arrogance and its vassals in
West Asia on the one hand, and the Resistance Front and popular forces
on the other hand, there remains no doubt that the astonishing work by
Hamas and the residents of Gaza in Palestine are the domino effect of
successive defeats of the hegemons and global colonialism in the region.
The decline of Western colonialism, which was caused by the increasing
strength of the resistance and the weaknesses of the Arrogance Front,
smashed the expansionist plots and conspiracies that were planned so as
to dominate the West Asia region under titles such as the greater or the
new Middle East plan. In elucidating this point of view, one of the
major policies of the US government in the first decade of the current
century was the pursuit of the “New Middle East” plan, and the invasion
of Afghanistan and Iraq under the title of “War on Terror” created the
capacity to initiate the “New American Century” in line with the New
Middle East plan.
Although the Zionist regime and Lebanon’s Hezbollah
engaged in a confrontation in the Lebanon War and the United States did
not openly intervene militarily in it, the authorities of this country
interpreted the war as the formation of a New Middle East. In this
regard, Condoleezza Rice,
the US Secretary of State, said during the 33-day war in Lebanon in the
summer of 2006: “What we’re seeing here is, in a sense, the growing—the
birth pangs of a new Middle East, and whatever we do, we have to be
certain that we’re pushing forward to the new Middle East, not going
back to the old Middle East.” According to the Leader
of Iran, the West’s plan was to draw a new geopolitical map for a New
Middle East to secure the interests and needs of the US and the West. In
this geopolitical situation, for which a hypothetical map
was prepared by Ralph Peters, a retired United States Army lieutenant
colonel, dividing the Middle East into smaller countries and changing
the borders were considered fundamental solutions to the problems of the
current Middle East.
However, more than two decades of resilience and courage by the Resistance Front and the resistance of the Muslim nations in different countries, such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, and recently Palestine, showed that the New Middle East plan as well as securing the hegemonic interests of the US in West Asia and the Islamic geography of the region have failed. One of the most significant international figures who played a prominent and distinct role in imposing this defeat was martyr General Soleimani. Some of the failures of the Arrogance Front and the impact of martyr General Soleimani on them are mentioned below.
Palestine
The latest case of these defeats is the ongoing Gaza crisis, which was mentioned at the beginning of this article. While the United States and the Zionist regime have sought to pass the Palestinian issue into oblivion and isolate Hamas in Gaza in their long-term plan, the fact that the Palestinian issue has become the headline of many alternative and independent media outlets and even the mainstream media, which have had no choice but to report the regime’s oppression in Gaza — albeit in a very biased manner — demonstrates the failure of the conspiracy to pass the cause of Palestine into oblivion. An important factor in empowering the Palestinian resistance to confront the Zionist regime and the innovative and unannounced attack on the Israeli-occupied territories is the arming of this group with its needed weapons by the Islamic Republic of Iran, and the most central role in this regard relates to martyr General Soleimani. This arming of the Palestinian resistance has been mentioned by international political and military experts and analysts, the Supreme Leader of Iran, and even the Palestinian resistance officials. A few years before Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, the Supreme Leader of Iran highlighted the prominent role of General Soleimani in empowering Palestine and Gaza: “that man empowered the Palestinians. He did something to make a small region like the Gaza strip — which is a small strip of land — stand up to the Zionist regime despite all their extravagant claims. He created such a disastrous situation for them that they asked for ceasefire after just 48 hours!”
Syria
In the midst of the Islamic Awakening
uprisings in the Arab and Islamic countries of West Asia and North
Africa, the Western countries plotted instability and insecurity in
Syria in order to abuse the conditions of chaos and direct it to their
advantage. As soon as the internal situation in Syria turned toward
unrest, the US ambassador
went to the opposition and by his presence tried to provoke them and
turn a political dispute into a civil war. Then, with the escalation of
internal tensions, the United States and its allies provided political,
military, and logistical support to the Syrian opposition in order to
further escalate the conflict and intensify the civil war, and
conditioned any political solution on the removal of Bashar al-Assad from power. Of course, before the unrest in Syria, the United States had condemned
the government of this country on the pretext of supporting groups such
as Hamas, the Islamic Jihad of Palestine, and the Popular Front for the
Liberation of Palestine, as well as for providing logistical support to
the Lebanese Hezbollah. This was while the most dangerous terrorist
groups in the region, such as the DAESH, were created by the US
— as admitted by American authorities — to achieve their goals in the
region by fomenting terrorism and promoting terrorist acts.
The
interference of the United States and its allies in Syria changed the
situation in such a way that many analysts doubted the survival of the
legitimate government of Syria. It seemed that with the overthrow of the
Syrian government, the country should welcome permanent chaos.
Nevertheless, as the editor of Al-Masdar News writes,
this situation changed in early October when General Soleimani, along
with several IRGC officers, arrived at Bassel al-Assad International
Airport in Syria’s Latakia. General Soleimani’s role in the Syrian
crisis had many dimensions, which included a briefing and advisory
presence, formation of popular mobilization forces, reconstruction of
the Syrian army, strong presence on the battlefield, and leading
military operations against the DAESH in the Arab country. The Long War Journal
writes about the field presence and military leadership of General
Soleimani in Syria that the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps and foreign
Shia militias under the command of General Soleimani
played an important role along with the support of the Russian Air
Force in the siege of Aleppo during a 15-month operation and managed to
avert two major offensives by the Islamist-led coalitions. Therefore,
one of the effective factors in thwarting the project of overthrowing
the Syrian government and imposing permanent chaos in this country was
the actions of General Soleimani at various levels.
Iraq
In 2013, after conquering Ramadi,
Fallujah, Mosul, Tikrit, and some other areas in northern Iraq, the
DAESH entered into a full-scale war with the Iraqi government and
managed to capture more than 50,000 kilometers of Iraq and subjugate
more than 4 million of the country’s population. While the DAESH was
advancing in Iraq, the US
took advantage of the difficult situation in the Arab country and
pressured the then Iraqi government to resign. As a result, Nouri
al-Maliki had no other choice but to resign. The DAESH’s threats and
brutality, captivity of women and children, and mass killing of
opponents, as well as its strict laws not only painted an ugly, hateful
and completely false image of Islam, but also instilled fear in the
hearts of the Iraqi people and drove some opposition groups
to the Iraqi government. The Iraqi government asked General Soleimani
for help to save it from this predicament, and following his military
advice and managerial capability and initiative in mobilizing the people
and using Hashd al-Shaabi, the offensive path of the DAESH in Iraq was
stopped. General Soleimani’s skill in using the capacity of popular
mobilization in cases such as bringing together Kurdish and Shia forces
to fight the DAESH was pivotal, and his supervision of the joint
operations carried out by these two groups (Ostovar 227) was fruitful.
In addition to monitoring the situation, General Soleimani’s active
participation in popular operations was his other important feature that
uplifted the spirit of the Iraqi popular mobilization against the
DAESH. Former Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki announced
in an interview that Qassem Soleimani was present in all the operations
organized by Hashd al-Shaabi against the DAESH.
“In some of them, which
were carried out in Amerli, Tal Afar, and Tuz Khurmatu, we needed
drones to come to the aid of the Mujahideen. In some military
operations, we also needed artillery, and Haj Qassem provided all the
military facilities and weapons from the Islamic Republic of Iran to
Iraq.” During the DAESH incursion into Iraq, if it was not for General
Soleimani and his effective role at levels such as the transfer of
weapons from Iran to Iraq, the Arab country would not have been able to
resolve the problems and obstacles in the war with the terrorist group.
Nouri al-Maliki says
in this regard: “We used to buy weapons at that time, but the world
countries did not give us weapons when it was necessary. However,
[General] Soleimani helped us a lot because of his role in Iraq and his
permanent presence in this country.” Martyr General Soleimani’s
strategic view and management and organization capabilities showed
another level of his capabilities in pushing back the DAESH from the
occupied areas of Iraq. For example, the report of Britain’s Independent newspaper about the battle with the DAESH in Tikrit shows the capabilities of Martyr Soleimani
in organizing and operational planning as well as his vital influence
in recapturing the Iraqi city of Tikrit from the DAESH. This city, which
is located on the left bank of the Tigris River and is the largest and
most important city between Baghdad and Mosul, had great strategic value
for the DAESH, and its loss dealt a heavy blow to this group. In this
way, the DAESH was expelled from Iraq.
Therefore, General Soleimani, having the required skills to make use of various military capacities, was one of the most effective people who challenged Western expansionism in the Islamic countries of the region and brought projects such as the New Middle East to failure. In relation to the influence of this figure, the Foreign Policy magazine, in its annual 2019 report introducing the top 100 thinkers in various fields, placed General Soleimani at the top of the military and security figures and wrote about him: “Soleimani’s fingerprints are everywhere that Iran is active, from Yemen to Iraq to Syria.” As the Leader of the Islamic Revolution said, “In today’s world of Islam, whenever some people wish to resist in the face of arrogant bullying, their role model and their code word is Shahid Soleimani. … In fact, he taught the people how to use the resistance software and the fighting paradigm and he promoted them among nations.”
(The views expressed in this article are author’s own and do not necessarily reflect those of ABNA24.com.)
References:
Ostovar, Afshon. Vanguard of the Imam: Religion, Politics, and Iran's Revolutionary Guards. Oxford UP, 2016.
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