Iran Vows Revenge Over Deadly Bomb Attack at Soleimani Memorial

Iranian leaders vowed revenge Thursday for a pair of bombings that killed dozens of people a day earlier in the country’s southeast, but they stopped short of blaming domestic militants or Tehran’s chief external foe, Israel, for the biggest attack in decades.

Authorities in Iran are investigating the blasts, which took place in the city of Kerman near a public ceremony commemorating the death of Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ elite Quds Force, who was killed in January 2020 by a U.S. airstrike.

Soleimani’s successor, Esmail Qaani, prayed briefly at the site on Thursday, shrouded by supporters who called for revenge against the U.S. and Israel, which some Iranian officials have accused of backing the attacks without providing any evidence.

Other Iranian officials said the blasts were the work of terrorists, a term the government often uses to refer to Islamic State militants and groups from neighboring Pakistan’s Balochistan region, which have launched deadly attacks in the past.

U.S. officials said the U.S. had no involvement in the attack, and said they had no indication Israel was behind it. The bombings came a day after a senior Hamas leader was killed in Beirut in what Lebanese officials described as a suspected Israeli attack. The Israeli prime minister’s office and the Israeli military declined to comment on whether Israel was responsible for the attack in Iran. The Israeli military declined to comment on whether it was responsible for the attack in Beirut.

No one has claimed responsibility for the explosions. Authorities revised the death toll down to 84, after earlier reporting 95.

“The perpetrators of this terrorist attack will be caught by the powerful hand of our security and intelligence organizations and will receive a strong slap, both perpetrators and supporters,” Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi told state television.People familiar with Israeli operations say the country told allies that it wasn’t involved with the explosions. They said the style of the bombing doesn’t fit the pattern of alleged Israeli attacks, which have usually been more precise targeting of individuals or infrastructure connected to Iran’s security forces.

The characteristics of Wednesday’s attack in Iran, including the high number of civilian casualties, don’t match the pattern of previous Israeli targeted killings, which tend to avoid large-scale surrounding damage, said Shlomo Mofaz, a former senior official in Israeli military intelligence. 

He said that Iran’s response suggested it also didn’t believe Israel was behind the attack. “When the Iranians want to point a finger at Israel and know it is Israel it [the accusations] come in a different tone,” he said.

Mofaz said that the attack was likely committed by opposition elements such as Baloch militants, or by Islamic State.

IRNA, Iran’s state news agency, said the blasts were caused by a pair of remote-controlled explosive devices. They took place when the Middle East is on edge because of the war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas—an Islamist militant group that has moved closer to Iran in recent years, and increasing tensions between Israel and other Iranian-backed militant groups in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen.