Expert member: With their slogan, they said Hashemi's death is our own business

A member of the Panel of Experts said that at the recent Qom rally, it was practically said, “What happened to Hashemi, we did.” At the same time, a group of IRGC commanders met with Makarem Shirazi and described the news of their members’ presence at the Qom rally as an attempt to “destroy” the IRGC.

Ayatollah Hashem Bathaei, a member of the Assembly of Experts of the Supreme Leader of Iran, said on Tuesday (June 21/August 21) in response to the slogan “O you who are negotiating, your slogan is / The Pool of Joy awaits you” at a gathering of students of the Qom Seminary last Thursday: “The recent gathering was regrettable that they came to chant such a slogan. In fact, that slogan is that if an unwanted trend accepts, if the president or anyone else does something, it will be affected by the Pool of Joy.”

According to Khabar Online, this Assembly of Experts member continued: "In other words, the meaning of this slogan is to indirectly say that what happened to Mr. Hashemi was done by us and if others act contrary to our opinion, they will suffer the same fate. Therefore, all religious authorities and elders, such as His Eminence Ayatollah Makarem, condemn this action."

Hashem Bathaei then, while approving “holding gatherings in support of the Supreme Leader, officials approved by him, and the policies of the regime,” emphasized the observance of “red lines” and opposed “destructive gatherings,” saying: “Destructive gatherings against the country’s officials are against the policy of the Islamic Republic and, incidentally, are an example of pouring grist to the enemy’s mill.”

At the same time, and in this regard, a number of IRGC commanders also visited Ayatollah Nasser Makarem Shirazi and in person denied the news about the presence of some members of this military organization in the recent Qom student rally. The IRGC had denied its involvement in the Qom rally in a statement yesterday and condemned “some of the slogans, handbills, and placards” of the rally.

The participants of the recent rally at the Feyziyeh School in Qom were “scholars, professors and students” and the theme was “demanding economic justice.” The slogans and placards of this gathering were accompanied by many fringes. Some of these slogans were related to opposition to the Rouhani government and his solutions to solving the country’s problems through negotiations. On one of the placards of the said rally, in an obvious allusion to the manner of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani’s death, it was written that “the pool of happiness awaits those who support negotiations.”

This slogan and the news of the presence of some members of the Revolutionary Guard Corps at the rally were met with many reactions. Among them, Ayatollah Makarem Shirazi, a Shia religious authority, was one of those who called the controversial rally a "disaster" and demanded an explanation from the seminary and the Revolutionary Guard Corps officials.

An action to “destroy the sacred institution of the IRGC”

The head of the Supreme Leader’s office in the Qom province IRGC, the commander of the Imam Sadeq Brigade, and a group of commanders of the Imam Ali Ibn Abi Talib IRGC were among the IRGC officials who visited Makarem Shirazi today. According to Mashreq, during the meeting, Hassan Akbari said about the photos that raised suspicions of IRGC members participating in the Qom gathering that these photos “were related to another ceremony.” The head of the Supreme Leader’s office in the Qom province IRGC described the publication of these photos in some media outlets as “a clumsy move aimed at destroying the sacred institution of the IRGC.”

Hossein Tayyebifar, commander of the Imam Sadeq Brigade, also said in describing the recent Qom rally: "In light of my emphasis, placards other than the Supreme Leader's speeches were collected and necessary precautions were taken against the occurrence of unfortunate incidents."

At the end of the meeting, the commanders of the Qom IRGC also presented a letter from Gholam Reza Ahmadi, commander of the Imam Ali ibn Abi Talib IRGC, to Makarem Shirazi. Ahmadi also wrote to the Shiite religious authority, noting that “the images published in some media outlets of the presence of IRGC members in this program were related to another ceremony,” and wrote: “With a little investigation, it becomes clear that the above ceremony was held in the Hussainiyah of the Faiziyah School, but these images are related to a gathering in the school yard and on a different date.”

Makarem's request for continued "support" from the IRGC

The IRGC commander wrote: “This action is definitely a move by hateful elements in line with the project of IRGC phobia and has no other goal than to destroy these dedicated soldiers of the sacred system of the Islamic Republic.” Finally, Gholamreza Ahmadi called on Makarem Shirazi to “support his revolutionary sons in the IRGC, as always, and thwart the infiltrating and malicious elements” in the current “dangerous circumstances.”

Finally, after the IRGC officials finished speaking, Makarem Shirazi criticized the "marginalization" of some people through "placards with insults and threats" and said: "We will soon announce that this issue has nothing to do with the IRGC."

The recent gathering of students at the Qom Seminary and their controversial placard have once again made the mysterious manner of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani’s death a hot topic on social media. Fatemeh Hashemi, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani’s daughter, wrote in a note, “This incident reinforces the doubts and ambiguities expressed by family members about my father’s suspicious death, which have remained unanswered so far.” Ali Motahari, the second vice-speaker of the Iranian parliament, also pointed out that the controversial slogan of the students in Qom could be a “clue” to the manner of Hashemi Rafsanjani’s death, and called for the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence to follow up on the matter.

Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the former head of the Expediency Discernment Council, drowned in a pool in the Saadabad complex on January 9, 2016. Apparently, the producers of the Qom rally placard mistakenly identified the Saadabad complex pool, which was built after the revolution, as the “Peace Pool.”

Referring to the widespread reactions to the aforementioned placard in cyberspace, the newspaper Jomhuri Eslami wrote: "Upon seeing this slogan, users said that this, in addition to being a threat against the president, is a kind of admission that some hands were active in the incident of Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani's death in the pool."

Source: DW