Book claims slain Iranian IRGC Commander Soleimani ordered killing of Yemen’s Saleh

Slain Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) commander Qassem Soleimani had ordered the killing of former Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh, according to a recently published book on Soleimani.

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The book, titled “The Shadow Commander; Soleimani, the US, and Iran’s Global Ambitions,” is a biography of Soleimani by US-based Iranian journalist Arash Azizi.

In the book, Azizi wrote that Soleimani directly ordered the killing of Yemen’s slain ex-president Saleh, who was killed in 2017 by the Iran-backed Houthi militia after he turned against it.

“Two members of the Quds Force involved in setting Iran’s Yemen policy told me this separately. Additionally, a source in the Houthi leadership said this was a request from Soleimani, which had been agreed to by the Houthis themselves,” Azizi said in an interview on his book with Beirut-based think tank the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center.

“The circumstances described by them led me to believe the information was credible. It also sat right with what I knew about Soleimani and his decision-making style,” Azizi added.

Soleimani, who headed the Quds Force, the overseas arms IRGC, was killed in a US airstrike at Baghdad’s international airport on January 3. He was considered the second most powerful figure in the Iranian regime after Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

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