&imwidth=800&imheight=600&format=webp&quality=medium "Who was IRGC Air Force head Amir Ali Hajizadeh - Iran's missile mastermind who opposed nuclear deal and wanted to destroy Israel")
Israel launched a ‘preemptive strike’ on Iran on June 13, hitting its nuclear and military sites and killing top generals of the country. They included the country’s highest-ranking military official and Iran Revolutionary Guards Air Force head Amir Ali Hajizadeh, also known as the commander of the missiles programmes in Iran.
Read More | Full list of others who were 'eliminated' by IDF
Who is Iran Revolutionary Guards Air Force head Amir Ali Hajizadeh?
Amir Ali Hajizadeh led the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Air Force from 2009. He was also the key commander overseeing Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal.
Some Israeli security officials, analysts, and observers even called Hajizadeh the “new Qassem Soleimani”, as he was the mastermind behind Tehran’s growing drone capabilities, especially post-2021. It has been reported that it was Hajizadeh who presented the idea of developing a missile in Iran to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.
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Though Hajizadeh was born in Tehran in 1962, his parents originally came from Karaj, a satellite city 50km from the capital.
He was deployed as a sniper in a "special unit" in 1980 with the outbreak of the Iran-Iraq war.
Hajizadeh was also affiliated with the Guard’s artillery division and grew close to General Hassan Tehrani Moghaddam, known as the godfather of Iran’s missile programme.
Hajizadeh, an anti Hassan Rouhani figure, opposed the nuclear deal that Iran signed in 2015 with the United States, the United Kingdom, China, France, Germany, and Russia. Hajizadeh remained in Khamenei’s inner circle and criticised those inside Iran who had objected to missile tests. He was the mastermind of Iran's previous attack on Israel in April 2024 as well as the missile attack on a US base in Iraq in 2020.
