By SAM MEDNICK
TEl AVIV, Israel (AP) — Iranian state television confirmed the head of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard was killed in Israel’s strikes Friday morning.
Gen. Hossein Salami was the chief of one of the country’s most powerful centers, and his death was a tough blow to Iran’s embattled leadership, which has had a series of setbacks in the past 20 months of Middle Eastern war and unrest.
Salami rose to power six years ago and had a history of threatening the U.S. and Israel.
Here’s a closer look.
Powerful arsenal of missiles
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard was created after its 1979 Islamic Revolution. Since it was established, it’s evolved from a paramilitary, domestic security force to a transnational force that has come to the aid of Tehran’s allies in the Mideast, from Syria and Lebanon to Iraq.
It operates in parallel to the country’s existing armed forces and controls Iran’s arsenal of ballistic missiles, which it has used to attack Israel twice during the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.
Salami, 65, was appointed as head of the guard in 2019 by the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The appointment followed U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision during his first term to withdraw the U.S. from the international nuclear deal with Iran and restore crippling sanctions. It also followed Trump’s designation of the Guard as a terrorist organization.
Salami joined the guard at the outbreak of the bloody 1980s Iran-Iraq war. He later rose to head its air forces and was serving as a deputy commander in the guard when he was appointed.
Harsh rhetoric
Like other guard leaders, Salami routinely delivered speeches with harsh rhetoric towards Israel. In a 2016 speech he said there was “fertile ground” for the “annihilation, the wiping out, and the collapse of the Zionist regime”.
He also threatened the United States.
After the U.S. killed the powerful head of the guard’s Quds Force, Qassem Soleimani, in a drone strike outside Baghdad’s airport in 2020, Salami threatened to retaliate against American and Israeli commanders. The Quds, or Jerusalem, Force is an elite wing of the Guard that oversees foreign operations.
Five days later, Iran launched ballistic missiles at two bases in Iraq housing American troops, causing injuries but no fatalities among soldiers there.
After Soleimani was killed, Salami said that both the U.S. and Israel should know that “if they threaten our commanders, none of their commanders will find a safe place” to live.
Emerging from the shadow war
Israel and Iran have run a shadow war for years, but last year the two attacked each other directly.
When an Israeli strike killed seven guard members, including two Iranian generals at an Iranian diplomatic compound in Syria, Salami vowed to retaliate.
Weeks later, Salami ordered an operation that launched more than 300 drones, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles in an unprecedented revenge mission that pushed the Middle East closer to a regionwide war.
Israel said that 99% were intercepted with several ballistic missiles reaching Israeli territory, causing minor damage to an air base.
In October Israel pounded Iran with a series of airstrikes in response to missile attacks into Israel from Iran earlier in the month.
Israel’s military said it targeted “missile manufacturing facilities used to produce the missiles that Iran fired at the state of Israel over the last year.” Israel also weakened the country’s air defenses, which helped clear the way for Friday’s attacks.
