Iraq News Now

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard says it has recovered the body of a senior Quds Force general killed in a massive air strike in Beirut last month alongside Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.

Brigadier General Abbas Nilforoushan is understood to have flown from Tehran to Beirut for a meeting with Nasrallah on the same evening that both were killed in the Israeli strike on Hezbollah’s operations room in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital on 27 September.

In a statement late on Friday, reported by Iranian media, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said: “With hard work and efforts around the clock, the body of martyr Abbas Nilforoushan has been discovered.

“The time of transferring the body of martyr Nilforoushan to the Islamic homeland and the funeral and burial plans will be announced later.”

The IRGC’s statement comes with Iranian authorities facing continuing questions regarding the whereabouts of Esmail Qaani, the head of the Quds Force, who has not been seen in public since before the deaths of Nasrallah and Nilforoushan.

Qaani is understood to have been in Beirut at the time of another massive air strike on 4 October in which Nasrallah’s presumed successor, Hashem Safieddine, is widely believed to have been killed.

Amid rumours that Qaani had also been killed or injured, Middle East Eye reported on Thursday that he was alive but under guard and being questioned as part of an Iranian investigation into security breaches which enabled Israel to target Nasrallah.

Middle East Eye understands that the investigations surrounding Qaani and his team are focused on concerns of alleged negligence and mismanagement within his office which led to security breaches. None of MEE's sources suggested Qaani was involved.

Pressed about Qaani’s disappearance from public view on Wednesday, an IRGC advisor told the Iranian Tasnim news agency on Wednesday that he was “in perfect health” and would be awarded a medal by Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei “in the coming days”.