February 2, 2024
Israel killed six more Pasdar generals serving in Syria duing December and January, with Iran swearing vengeance as it always does, but nothing has so far been done except the very unvengeful act of pulling its senior officers out of Syria.
The Reuters news agency reported that five sources had told it February 1 that Iran would bring home “senior” Pasdar officers now operating in Syria. The sources didn’t say if the Pasdar would bring all of them home or just some. The sources claimed the reason for the recall was to prevent Iran from being dragged into a broad regional war.
The announcement came after Israeli air raids had killed six Pasdar generals in two months and just days after US news reports said President Biden had decided to bomb installations in Syria where Iranian military personnel are stationed as retaliation for the killing of three US Army enlisted personnel in Jordan.
Two of the generals were killed at a base that was bombed December 2 by the Israeli air force, which bombs some site in Syria an average of more than every other day. The third general was killed in another Israeli attack December 25. He was described by some as the most-senior Iranian general ever killed in Syria and the government seemed to endorse that by making far more of an event of his funeral than for any other general previously killed abroad.
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenehi personally led the funeral service for the general.
On January 20, an Israeli air raid south of Damascus killed five Pasdar officers. The Pasdaran did not give their ranks but used an honorific for three of the men that has been reserved in the past for generals.
In November 2016, the Pasdaran announced that more than 1,000 Iranians had been killed in Syria, mostly in battles with rebels opposed to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, whom the Pasdaran are defending and trying to keep in power. It has not given an updated number since then.
Although Tehran says it has officers in Syria only in an advisory, non-combat role, the large number killed suggests they are doing their advising from much closer to the fighting than US military advisers generally do.
Iran spoke of the third dead general being “assassinated,” as if Israel had attacked just to get him, rather than his death resulting from his being at an Israeli target site at the wrong time. There was no way to be certain if that was true. Most Pasdaran who have died in Syria have been killed at the battlefront or when serving at a natural target for an Israeli attack, like a headquarters or a storage site for weapons.
Most news accounts said the third general was killed at the Pasdar HQ in Syria near the Sayyidah Zeinab Shrine, south of Damascus, a frequent target, which would suggest he was not the target of the Israelis. The Iran Times saw one report, however, that said he was killed at a farm outside Damascus, which might suggest he was the target.
Israel has intensified its bombing of Syria since October 7, when Hamas attacked Israeli villages near Gaza. At one point, Israel so heavily bombed the Damascus airport that it was closed for weeks. Then, hours after it was announced the airport had reopened in November, Israel bombed it again, forcing its shutdown again.
The dead generals were identified as Mohammad-Ali Atai-Shorcheh and Panah Taqizadeh, who were killed December 2, and Reza Musavi, who died December 25. He was described as a close friend of the late Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleymani and as the Pasdar officer in charge of getting weapons into the hands of Hezbollah and the combat groups that Iran has formed to fight in Syria.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry said Iran would retaliate. “No anti-Iranian action by the enemies will go unanswered,” the ministry said, a standard threat that just draws a yawn these days.
In a decade of air raids on Syria, Israel is known to have lost only a single aircraft.
Meanhwhile, the Pasdaran said one of its colonels, Hossain-Ali Javadanfar, was assassinated in Sistan va Baluchestan province as he was returning to his base. He is one of only a few Pasdar officers murdered inside Iran.