Crowds in Iran Chant ‘Death to Israel’

The Fellowship  |  February 1, 2019

Thousands of Iranians have gathered at the tomb of Ayatollah Khomenei in order to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Iranian Revolution. However, The Times of Israel reports, the throngs are also there to threaten the Jewish state and the freedom of the West:

Iran on Friday started celebrating the 40th anniversary of the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution that toppled the US-backed shah, overturned 2,500 years of monarchical rule and brought hard-line Shiite clerics to power.

The climactic events that year in Iran — where footage of revolutionaries in the streets gave way to black-and-white images of blindfolded American hostages in the US Embassy hostage crisis months later — not only changed Iran’s history but also helped shape today’s Middle East…

Across Iran, sirens rang out from trains and boats and church bells chimed at 9:33 a.m. Friday — the exact time Khomeini’s chartered Air France Boeing 747 touched down 40 years ago at Tehran’s Mehrabad International Airport…

As an army band played revolutionary anthems, the huge hall of the mausoleum was filled with people from all walks of life, amid schoolchildren dressed in the red, white and green of the Iranian flag.

Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, head of the influential experts assembly which appoints the supreme leader of the Islamic Republic, delivered a keynote speech rebuking factions seeking better ties with Washington.

“Curses on the wrong school of thought that thinks we can’t run the country unless America helps us,” he said, shaking a raised left hand.

“America’s power is on the decline, we should not be afraid of America,” Jannati said as the crowd shouted slogans such as “Death to America” and “Death to Israel…”