Iranian Media Is Revealing That Scores of the Country’s Fighters Are Dying in Syria
An increasing number of Iranian soldiers and militiamen appear to be dying in Syria’s civil war, and observers credit media from an unexpected country for revealing the trend:
Iran.
A flurry of reports in Iran’s official and semiofficial news outlets about the deaths — including funerals and even a eulogy to a fallen general by Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei — have surprised analysts who monitor the country’s tightly controlled media. The reports, they say, indicate that at least 67 Iranians have been killed in Syria since the beginning of October.
Just a few months ago, Iranian media said little about the country’s military intervention in Syria to shore up the government. But as Iranian fighters participate in a new Russian-led offensive against Syrian rebels, Iran’s leaders might have a reason to offer more details of their country’s involvement, said Ali Alfoneh, an Iran expert at the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
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