Iran has often been a prime target of ISIS. The double explosion which left at least 90 dead – according to a toll revised upwards on Friday – which occurred during the commemorations of the death of General Qassem Soleimani in Kerman on Wednesday, is no exception. If Iranian officials had pointed the finger at the United States and Israel, in a context of strong tensions fueled by the war between Israel and Hamas, the Islamic State (IS) ultimately claimed responsibility for the attack.
Two suicide bombers “activated their explosive belt” in the middle of “a large gathering of apostates, near the grave of their leader,” the group wrote in its statement of claim. The date and places were not chosen at random, and, according to Adel Bakawan, specialist in the Middle East and director of the French research center on Iraq, allowed Daesh to regain an international visibility eclipsed by the Israeli conflict. -Palestinian.
General Soleimani, a front-line enemy
If the Islamic State excels in anything other than sowing terror and death, that is the meaning of the symbol. This “new generation has a perfect mastery of new technologies, social networks and knows very well the importance of symbols”, explains Adel Bakawan to 20 minutes. So if no one could predict an attack on Wednesday, it is not surprising.
General Soleimani, killed in an American strike on January 3, 2020, was in fact “an actor engaged in the fight against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria”, recalls Carole André-Dessornes, geopolitologist, specialist in the balance of power at Middle East, associate researcher at the Foundation for Strategic Research (FRS), interviewed by 20 minutes.
Good knowledge of the field
The date of the commemoration of his death, as well as the location of his grave, thus promised, in addition to the strong symbol, a large number of people gathered, making it possible to cause the greatest number of victims possible. It was then a good knowledge of Iranian society and culture that made it possible to strike Iranian civilians in an effective and terrible manner on Wednesday January 3. If there are no real territorialized branches of Daesh in the region, there is definitely an Iranian core, mainly composed of Iranian Kurds, maintains Adel Bakawan.
It is precisely this core “who knew that a large gathering would be organized for this occasion, knew the flaws and gaps in security procedures and suspected that the Islamic Republic of Iran was at the moment too busy with what is happening in the Middle East,” explains the specialist in the region. “Daesh wanted to inflict the greatest number of victims on the tomb of the Iranian national hero to make it a greater symbol,” he adds.
Without forgetting that the Shiites, the majority Muslims in Iran, are, for the Islamic State, part of the “minorities to be destroyed, they are considered bad Muslims or even “imposters””, explains Carole André-Dessornes. The jihadist group “thus shows that Iran remains a target,” she continues.
Regain visibility
Furthermore, this attack allowed the jihadist group to regain some visibility on the Western media scene. Erased for several years by other dramatic news such as the war in Ukraine but especially the conflict between Hamas and Israel, it is a way “to come back in force”, says Adel Bakawan. “They were looking for the opportunity to make themselves visible to the West in particular, the objective was successful,” he adds. An analysis, however, nuanced by Carole André-Dessornes.
If Daesh is indeed an opportunistic group that can take advantage of regional chaos, “it has never really stopped its actions and is particularly very active in Afghanistan, an area which, perhaps, is of less interest to Western media at the moment,” she regrets. And to recall that “the Islamic State has never highlighted, in its communication, the Palestinian cause”.