Key points
- Iran’s attacks on Israel killed 28 people: Israel
- Israel’s air force struck over 900 targets during 12-day war
- Iran retaliated with missile barrages
- Iran’s missiles hit major Israeli military targets: Reuters
ISLAMABAD: Iran began a state funeral service Saturday for around 60 people, including its military commanders, killed in its war with Israel, after Tehran’s top diplomat condemned Donald Trump’s comments on supreme leader Ali Khamenei as “unacceptable”.
The proceedings in Tehran for the nuclear scientists and military commanders killed in Israeli strikes began at 8:00 am local time (0430 GMT).
“The ceremony to honour the martyrs has officially started,” state TV said, showing footage of people donning black clothes, waving Iranian flags and holding pictures of the slain military commanders.
Images showed coffins draped in Iranian flags and bearing portraits of the deceased commanders in uniform near Enghelab Square in central Tehran.
The caskets of Guard’s chief General Hossein Salami, the head of the Guard’s ballistic missile programme, General Amir Ali Hajizadeh and others were driven on trucks along the capital’s Azadi Street.
12-day war
Salami and Hajizadeh were both killed on the first day of the war, June 13, as Israel launched a war it said meant to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme, specifically targeting military commanders, scientists and nuclear facilities.
The United States had carried out strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites last weekend, joining its ally Israel’s bombardments of Iran’s nuclear programme in the 12-day conflict launched on June 13.
Both Israel and Iran claimed victory in the war that ended with a ceasefire, with Iranian leader Khamenei downplaying the US strikes as having done “nothing significant”.
Trump’s tirade
In a tirade on his Truth Social platform, Trump blasted Tehran Friday for claiming to have won the war.
He also claimed to have known “EXACTLY where he (Khamenei) was sheltered, and would not let Israel, or the U.S. Armed Forces… terminate his life”.
“I SAVED HIM FROM A VERY UGLY AND IGNOMINIOUS DEATH, and he does not have to say, ‘THANK YOU, PRESIDENT TRUMP!'” the US leader said.
Trump added he had been working in recent days on the possible removal of sanctions against Iran, one of Tehran’s main demands.
“But no, instead I get hit with a statement of anger, hatred, and disgust, and immediately dropped all work on sanction relief, and more,” Trump said.
“Disrespectful and unacceptable tone”
Hitting back at Trump Saturday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi condemned the Republican president’s comments on Khamenei.
“If President Trump is genuine about wanting a deal, he should put aside the disrespectful and unacceptable tone towards Iran’s Supreme Leader, Grand Ayatollah Khamenei,” Araghchi posted on social media platform X.
“The Great and Powerful Iranian People, who showed the world that the Israeli regime had NO CHOICE but to RUN to ‘Daddy’ to avoid being flattened by our Missiles, do not take kindly to Threats and Insults.”
The Israeli strikes on Iran killed at least 627 civilians, Tehran’s health ministry said. Iran’s attacks on Israel killed 28 people, according to Israeli figures.
“Historic” state funeral
The ceremony in Tehran “to honour the martyrs” will be followed by a funeral procession to Azadi Square, about 11 kilometres (seven miles) across the sprawling metropolis.
Mohsen Mahmoudi, head of Tehran’s Islamic Development Coordination Council, vowed it would be a “historic day for Islamic Iran and the revolution”.
Among the dead is Mohammad Bagheri, a major general in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and the second-in-command of the armed forces after the Iranian leader.
He will be buried alongside his wife and daughter, a journalist for a local media outlet, all killed in an Israeli attack.
Nuclear scientist Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi, also killed in the attacks, will be buried with his wife.
Revolutionary Guards commander Hossein Salami, who was killed on the first day of the war, will also be laid to rest after Saturday’s ceremony — which will also honour at least 30 other top commanders.
Of the 60 people who are to be laid to rest after the ceremony, four are children.
“Imminent threat”
During his first term in office, Trump pulled out in 2018 of a landmark nuclear deal — negotiated by former US president Barack Obama.
The deal that Trump had abandoned aimed to make it practically impossible for Iran to build an atomic bomb, while at the same time allowing it to pursue a civil nuclear programme.
Iran, which insists its nuclear programme is only for civilian purposes, stepped up its activities after Trump withdrew from the agreement.
After the US strikes, Trump said negotiations for a new deal were set to begin next week.
But Tehran denied a resumption, and leader Khamenei said Trump had “exaggerated events in unusual ways”, rejecting US claims Iran’s nuclear programme had been set back by decades.
