The killing of Iranian military leader Qasem Soleimani: What you need to readHere’s what you need to know to understand what this moment means in U.S.-Iran relations. What happened: President Trump ordered a drone strike near the Baghdad airport, killing Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, one of Iran’s top military figures and leader of its special-operations forces abroad. Who Soleimani was: As the leader of the Revolutionary Guard Corps’ elite Quds Force, Soleimani was key in training Iran’s allies across the region, especially in Iraq. How we got here: Tensions had been escalating between Iran and the United States since Trump pulled out of an Obama-era nuclear deal and spiked shortly before the airstrike. The strikes were carried out in response to the death of a U.S. contractor in a rocket attack against a military base in Kirkuk that the United States blamed on Kataib Hezbollah.

Source: Washington Post January 04, 2020 22:18 UTC