The Assassination of Qasem Soleimani

Mick West

Administrator
Staff member
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The assassination of Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Force unit, is a big deal. I monitor twelve news web sites at once, a diverse collection from around the world, and it's an exceedingly rare day when the same story headlines all twelve.

The event and its straightforward consequences are interesting (and concerning) by themselves, but with something of this magnitude, there's going to be a tidal wave of disinformation and conspiracy theories.

This is a "Current Event" thread, intended for monitoring and some brief discussion of conspiracy theories arising around this one event. Multiple topics are allowed in Current Event threads, but in-depth analysis of particular theories should be in new threads.
 
One interesting discussion came up on Twitter yesterday. A suggestion that the New York Times published a story to "warn" Soleimani

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With some commenters in the Twitter thread clearly being believers, with cries of "Treason," and people saying the NYT story was from before the assassination

The NYT story actually appear to be, although time zones make things confusing. The earliest version of the story archived is dated (in the story) was Jan 2,2020, 5:00 a.m. ET, and contains the quote:
https://web.archive.org/web/2020010...m/2020/01/02/opinion/hypersonic-missiles.html
What if the former commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, Qassem Soleimani, visits Baghdad for a meeting and you know the address?
Content from External Source
The time of the archive is Jan 2, 10:11:11 GMT (5:11 AM EST), 1:11PM in Iraq, or 1:41PM in Iran.
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When was the assassination? Earliest Twitter reports of the attack were from around Jan 2, 22:26 GMT, which is 12 hours after the NYT story

Source: https://twitter.com/thestevennabil/status/1212862803012247552

(Time in Twitter shows in your local time zone, the above shows as 2:26 PM PST, 10:26 PM GMT/UTC, or 1:26 AM Jan 3 in Iraq.

And this tweet is from 1:58 PM PST Jan 2, 12:15AM Jan 3 in Badgad, and almost certainly within an hour of the attacks.
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So it does look like the NYT story predates the attacks.
 
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another CT claim is that Trump was set up framed to act by US intel agency in the killing of Soleimani.

this from Russian site,, sorry i dont have link to its source ATM

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Well, it was actually an opinion piece about a weapon the US supposedly doesn't have yet...but it is certainly very coincidental if nothing else.
it's not that coincidental. the embassy attack was big news.

(and i'm guessing 95% of the types claiming 'traitors', are thinking 'f that' regarding the embassy, and know they would have added this guy in their list of targets for hypersonic missiles too. I would have)
 
At least nobody is claiming that he wasn't killed.
Yet. There are various things that I'm sure some people will find suspicious - like there being high definition photos of the scene on Twitter, including one of his hand with a distinctive ring.
 
Yet. There are various things that I'm sure some people will find suspicious - like there being high definition photos of the scene on Twitter, including one of his hand with a distinctive ring.

Yeah, and the ring in the photo is reportedly not a perfect match and might belong to the other guy who was with him.
 
and the ring in the photo is reportedly not a perfect match
not a perfect match to what? have pics of him at the airport been released? (I know it doesn't match the NYPost pic they used... but that's media for you).
I've found 3 big red rings on him so far that I can see the detail well. None match. But I didnt see any airport pics.
 
More claims of advance knowledge.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/four-...-severed-hand-the-killing-of-qassem-soleimani
Trump’s son Eric also appeared to have had advance knowledge, posting a tweet Tuesday that said “Bout to open a big ol’ can of whoop ass, #DontMessWithTheBest #USAUSAUSA,” before quickly deleting it.
Content from External Source

Source: https://twitter.com/imaginarybar/status/1213158550085746688
Content from External Source
Edit: Looks like he was responding to another tweet about US Marines arriving to the embassy.
https://polititweet.org/tweet?account=39349894&tweet=1212157612151771136
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Probably not totally related, but it's worth mentioning the change in tone in conspiracist circles. If it had been Bush or Obama who had Soleimani killed, it would have been condemned and they would have as well, and accused of doing the bidding of Israel to boot. Now they mostly cheered it on, and the ones who didn't at most only claimed Trump was duped into doing it.
 
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