Who was Mohammad Bagheri, chief of Iran’s military killed by Israel?

Israel connected Friday greeting struck aggregate Iranian subject and atomic facilities, arsenic good arsenic residential homes successful Tehran known to location elder information officials, pulling the portion to the brink of a full-fledged warfare betwixt the rivals.

The attacks killed aggregate elder members of Iran’s military. They included General Mohammad Bagheri, the main of unit of Iran’s equipped forces and the country’s highest-ranking subject official.

Who was Bagheri?

Bagheri was calved Mohammad Hossein Afshordi successful the 1960s. In his existent role, helium oversaw some the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and the remainder of the country’s military, besides ensuring coordination betwixt those antithetic arms of the country’s information apparatus.

He reportedly had a distinguished subject vocation with the IRGC; however, small is known astir him extracurricular of his grounds of service, world achievements and aggregate sanctions imposed by assorted planetary bodies.

“A batch [of] higher-ranked quality and subject officials successful Iran thin to beryllium much connected the secretive side,” Reza H Akbari, Middle East and North Africa programme manager astatine the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, told Al Jazeera.

Bagheri joined the IRGC successful 1980, a twelvemonth aft the Iranian gyration and the aforesaid twelvemonth the Iran-Iraq warfare began. That struggle lasted 8 years and saw hundreds of thousands of radical killed connected some sides, with Iran enduring the greater losses.

One of those killed was Bagheri’s older brother, Hassan, who had reportedly founded the IRGC’s subject quality subdivision successful 1980 and who, aged 27, led a division.

Bagheri fought successful the Iran-Iraq war, according to a United States legislature probe report, which described him arsenic “an aboriginal IRGC enlistee who fought against a post-revolution Kurdish uprising and successful the Iran-Iraq War”.

According to Iranian media, Bagheri became the caput of the IRGC’s quality operations successful 1983, aft the decease of his brother. After the war, helium besides served arsenic lawman caput of quality and operations, and arsenic the caput of the equipped forces’ communal affairs.

He played a “special role” successful a 1997 cognition successful Iraq against Kurdish forces, according to Rokna, an Iranian state-affiliated quality agency. In 2016, helium replaced Major-General Seyyed Hassan Firoozabadi arsenic the main of unit of the IRGC.

A presumption of a country pursuing an onslaught successful the Iranian capital, Tehran, connected June 13, 2025. Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz has announced that Israel conducted strikes connected Iran [Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu]

He was affiliated with an “elite unit wrong the IRGC,” according to Akbari, tasked with “carrying retired the astir delicate missions, particularly those related to the aerial unit unit”.

Bagheri was sanctioned by the US successful 2019, erstwhile the archetypal Trump medication levelled sanctions against what they called the “inner circle” of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

The European Union, meanwhile, reportedly sanctioned Bagheri for supplying Russia with drones, portion helium was further sanctioned by the US, Canada and the United Kingdom for his relation successful the crackdown connected the 2022 protests successful Iran pursuing the sidesplitting of Mahsa Amini.

Following Bagheri’s assassination, Iran appointed Ahmad Vahidi, a erstwhile defence and interior minister, arsenic his interim replacement.

An injured idiosyncratic sits connected a roadside successful the aftermath of Israeli strikes, successful Tehran, Iran, June 13, 2025. [Majid Asgaripour/West Asia News Agency via Reuters]

In summation to Bagheri, Israel besides assassinated Hossein Salami, commandant successful main of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, and Gholamali Rashid, lawman commander-in-chief of the equipped forces.

They besides killed aggregate atomic scientists successful the Friday greeting attacks.

The attacks came arsenic the US and Iran were preparing for their adjacent circular of atomic talks connected Sunday successful Muscat. Rhetoric implicit a imaginable onslaught from Israel and the US had intensified successful caller days and US embassy unit had been enactment connected alert successful galore locations, portion Iran had responded with its ain warnings of imaginable retaliation if struck.

The attacks were condemned by galore successful the planetary community, including galore Gulf states, specified arsenic Saudi Arabia, Oman and Qatar, who called it a “flagrant violation” of planetary law.

US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff said connected Friday greeting that helium inactive expected talks to proceed connected Sunday.

But Akbari of the Institute for War and Peace Reporting said helium saw small likelihood of the US-Iran negotiations continuing. “I find the plausibility of talks continuing arsenic slim to none,” helium said.

Firefighters enactment extracurricular a gathering that was deed by Israeli aerial strikes northbound of Tehran, Iran, connected June 13, 2025 [Abedin Taherkenareh/EPA-EFE]