IRGC Strategist Hassan Abbasi Praises Iranians Who Handed Over Their Own Children for Execution for Opposing the Regime, Says: 2,300 Iranians Were Killed in Syria War

IRGC strategist Hassan Abbasi said in a February 6, 2019 interview on Ofogh TV (Iran) that guarding the Islamic Republic is a top priority, even if he disagrees with some of the laws or if the law would require him to be sentenced to death. Abbasi and the interviewer praised people who handed their own children over to be executed for opposing the Iranian regime. Abbasi also said that Iran's pinnacle of achievement is raising and educating valiant young men to the level that they are willing to martyr themselves for the regime.

Following are excerpts:

Hassan Abbasi: I have been jailed in the Islamic Republic several times, but we consider the guarding of the Islamic Republic to be our top duty. The Islamic Republic has laws. Even if you and I do not agree with the law, we still must follow it. Even if, according to the laws of the Islamic Republic – laws that we might consider to be defective or limiting… Even if, according to the law, someone like me is sentenced to death… [Even if this were to happen,] as far as I am concerned, guarding the Islamic Republic is my top-most duty. Guarding the regime of the Islamic Republic, guarding the legislative branch, guarding the executive branch, guarding the judicial branch, guarding the different bodies, the public, the country, its territorial integrity… All these things are considered to be the pillars of guarding the regime.

Interviewer: You said: “Even if I am executed” – I’d like to say that it is inconceivable [that this would happen to you].  This sentence is a bit exaggerated…

Hassan Abbasi: I said: “Even if.”

Interviewer: I recall that since the beginning of the Revolution, some of the great people in this regime… With their own hands… Some people have executed their own children. Yes. They handed their own children over to the firing squad – this is incredible!

Hassan Abbasi: There were mothers whose children were being executed for opposing the regime, and they would come and stand before the gallows [to watch the execution].

[…]

As long as the Islamic Republic can raise and educate valiant young men, 2,300 of whom went to Syria and they have been martyred in recent years, and before that, 220,000 in the Iran-Iraq war… Educating people to that level is the pinnacle of the Islamic Republic’s achievements.