Four Iranian citizens have been arrested in Shahreza, Isfahan province, on charges of “insulting Qassem Soleimani”on social media platforms, a local news agency reported on Monday.
The state-run Sina news agency quoted the prosecutor general and revolutionary of the city of Shahreza, as saying that four people have been arrested for “insulting Qassem Soleimani.”
Amir Hossein Razaz Zadeh said insulting the recently killed commander of the Qods Forces Qassem Soleimani is tantamount to “propaganda against the system” and “blasphemy” and that the defendants will be dealt with.
“Publishing content that insults the personality of martyrs is tantamount to the crime of spreading propaganda against the state,” he said.
“In terms of the sanctity of martyrdom, it is considered blasphemy and will end in arrest and detention,” Razaz Zadeh added.
He warned other internet users in Iran to be careful about their comments on social media.
Qassem Soleimani, the regime’s top military commander, was killed on January 3, 2020, along with several Iraqi paramilitary commanders in an airstrike carried out by the U.S. forces in Baghdad, Iraq.
As the commander of the Iranian regime’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) Quds Force, Soleimani was involved in many crimes in Iran an all across the region.
The IRGC’s mandate has been to expand the fundamentalist ideology of the mullahs through killings, terrorist acts, and hostage-taking, and the Quds Force was tasked with orchestrating the regime’s meddling in countries of the Middle East region, from Iraq to Syria and Yemen, and as far as the African continent.
The funeral ceremonies planned for Soleimani will take place in several locations in Iraq and Iran.
Meanwhile, millions of Iranians are angry that while the regime banned funerals for those killed by security forces during the recent protests, even going as far as violently arresting mourners or the families of fallen protesters, regime elites were encouraged and organized to mourn the death of Soleimani.