This article was originally published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is reprinted with permission.
Iranian media is reporting that General Abolfazl Alijani, a senior commander with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), has been killed in Syria.
On August 23, the DEFA Press agency identified the commander as a “defender of the shrine,” a reference to Iranians who work on behalf of Iran in Syria or Iraq, without providing more details of the attack in which he was killed.
Alijani was a regional commander of the Revolutionary Guards’ ground forces in the central city of Isfahan.
According to Iran International, a news outlet associated with the country’s political opposition, Alijani was killed while serving as a “military adviser” in Syria.
Tehran has provided military support to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces since at least 2012 in the form of military advisers and volunteers, but it denies sending its own troops.
Even so, Iranian media have reported the death of a handful of Iranian commanders along with hundreds of Iranian fighters.
The IRGC is a powerful security and military organization that also controls an estimated 40 percent of the Iranian economy.
