Thread by @ejmalrai

#Iran #Iraq #USA
Exactly a year ago, at 17 minutes past midnight (12:17), an Airbus A350 belonging to Ajnihat al-Sham flight arriving from Damascus landed at Baghdad airport with 5 Iranian commanders onboard, including Sardar Qassem Soleimani A #US SOF team was waiting close by.+

#Iran #IRGC brigadier general booked his flight under a different name. He was the first to leave the plane followed by his close companions. Abu Mahdi, along with two of his close aid-de-champ and his security trusted man (Sayyed al-Jaberi) were waiting on the runway.+

As the two cars drove away, at 12:37 (past midnight) two US MQ-9 Reaper drones fired 230 mph laser-guided Hellfire missiles, incinerating the bodies of Soleimani, al-Muhandes and all their Iranian and Iraqi companions.

A team of #US SOF guided the drones and later collected samples from the scene and took close pictures. During that day, on the 2d of January 2020, the US took unusual measures around the embassy and had more flights in the sky than agreed with the Iraqi government.

The 31st of December 2019, Pr. @realDonaldTrump called #Iraq PM Adel Abdel Mahdi and asked him to intervene with #Iran to de-escalate following the US killing of 28 Iraqi security forces at al-Qaem and the reaction of their companions in arms against the US embassy in Baghdad..

remember the sequence of events because MSM tent to remind you only of the attack against the embassy, disregarding two essential events:
1. The #US allowed #Israel to bomb Hashd al-Shaabi HQs and killing of a commander by an Israeli drone
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2. #US Secretary of Defence Mark Esper informed (did not ask permission) PM Adel Abdel Mahdi that he will bomb Hashd al-Shaabi positions. The Iraqi Prime Minister warned him of the consequences. The US unlawfully attacked an Iraqi HQ at the borders with #Syria, monitoring #ISIS.

#US killed soldiers and officers of the Iraqi army, the Federal Police and Hashd al-Shaabi in a clear violation of their role in #Iraq, the international law and with no accountability. Hashd, Army and FP reacted against the US embassy in Baghdad, angry about the US killing.

Prime Minister Abdel Mahdi promised @realdonaldtrump to do talk to #Iran and asked his office to contact Sardar Soleimani inviting him to #Baghdad.
Soleimani travelled to Lebanon, slept a night in #Damascus and arrived to #Baghdad to the request of the Prime Minister.

This is why #Iran considers it is up to #Iraq to respond to the unlawful cowardly assassination of an envoy. Because @realDonaldTrump and his team have no principles and no respect to an official envoy, Soleimani, Iraq is responsible to answer and this is why Iraq is the stage.

Correction: Airbus A320 (not A350).