An Iranian-born academic has warned that President Trump’s decision to kill a top Iranian general in an airstrike outside Baghdad on Thursday will “come back to haunt” him.
Mohammad Ali Shabani, a doctoral researcher at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, described Qassem Soleimani as a “national hero” and said his “assassination” could become a “rallying cry” for Shiites.
The killing of Soleimani, 62, was ordered by Trump after Iranian-backed militia surrounded the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad on New Year’s Eve.
“The U.S. has not merely killed an Iranian military commander but also a highly popular figure, viewed as a guardian of Iran even among secular-minded Iranians,” wrote Shabani.
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The leader of the Iraqi militia Popular Mobilization Forces, Mahdi al Muhandis, was also murdered during the strikes.
“And with the assassination of al Muhandis, the Trump administration has put itself in the position of having killed the operational commander of a large branch of the Iraqi armed forces,” Shabani said.
He added that the killing could well backfire: “Suleimani may have, with his death, already have achieved the greatest revenge of all, and without firing a single bullet: namely, his ultimate objective of ending the U.S. military presence in Iraq.”
Shabani concluded that Trump would rue the decision, arguing that Shiites would see the death of a “national icon” as a reason to continue warring with U.S. forces.
“For all his crowing about the decisive blow dealt to an insolent enemy, Trump may be about to discover that the problem with martyrs is that they live forever.”
