Iran does not aim to escalate tensions in the region, but believes it must punish Israel to prevent further instability, a foreign ministry spokesman said yesterday, following the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran last week.
"Iran is trying to establish stability in the region, but it will only happen by punishing the aggressors and creating a deterrent against the adventurism of the Zionist regime (Israel), said Nasser Kanani, adding that Tehran's action is inevitable.
Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards are likely to play a central role if the country responds to the assassination of the leader of its close ally, Reuters writes.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Iran's dominant military force, has its own army, navy, air force and intelligence wing. It was established shortly after the Islamic Revolution in 1979 to protect the Shia Muslim clerical ruling system and provide a counterweight to the regular armed forces.
The IRGC answers to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The IRGC has an estimated 125.000-strong military, including ground troops, navy and air force. It also commands the Basij religious militia, a volunteer paramilitary force loyal to the clerical establishment often used to quell anti-government protests.
The Basij carried out "human wave" attacks on Iraqi troops during the 1980s war. In peacetime, they impose the Islamic social codes of Shiite Iran. Analysts say the Basij may have millions of volunteers, with more than a million active members.
The Quds Force is the foreign wing of the IRGC, which heavily influences affiliated militias across the Middle East, from Lebanon to Iraq, Yemen and Syria. Reuters states that the Quds Force manages Iran's relations with the "axis of resistance" made up of Iranian intermediaries in the Middle East - Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, the Houthis in Yemen and armed groups in Iraq.
Commanders from the Iranian Guard and Lebanon's Hezbollah are believed to have been on the ground in Yemen helping to direct and oversee Houthi attacks on shipping in the Red Sea following the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel that sparked the Gaza war.
The United States killed the top commander of the Guard, Major General Qasem Soleimani, in a drone strike in Iraq in 2020, sparking fears of a major conflict.
The IRGC oversees Iran's ballistic missile program, which experts consider the largest in the Middle East
The IRGC, designated a terrorist group by the US, has been trying to shape the Middle East to Iran's interests for years. In 1982, the Garda founded the armed Shiite political movement Hezbollah in Lebanon as an instrument to export Iran's Islamic revolution and fight against Israeli forces that invaded Lebanon that year.
The IRGC oversees Iran's ballistic missile program, which experts consider the largest in the Middle East.
The US, European powers and Saudi Arabia have blamed Iran for a 2019 missile and drone attack that disabled the world's largest oil refinery in Saudi Arabia, although Iran has denied any involvement.
Former US President Donald Trump pointed to Iran's missile program as one of the points not addressed in the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers and cited it as a reason to withdraw from the deal in 2018.
The Garda have extensive equipment and capabilities for conventional combat, as demonstrated by their involvement in the conflicts in Syria and Iraq.
Former Revolutionary Guard officers occupy key positions in the Iranian establishment, from the government to the parliament. Most of the members of former president Ebrahim Raisi's cabinet were former IRGC officers.
After the war with Iraq in the 1980s, the IRGC became heavily involved in the reconstruction of Iran. Since then, he has expanded his economic interests to include a wide network of billion-dollar enterprises, from construction and telecommunications to oil and gas projects.
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