Speaking in the Iranian parliament on Tuesday, lawmaker Ahmad Hamzeh offered a $3 million cash reward “on behalf of the people of Kerman province” to anyone who kills U.S. President Donald Trump.
Kerman, which Hamzeh represents, is the hometown of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the top Iranian terrorist mastermind eliminated by a U.S. airstrike in December.
Hamzeh reportedly said all the people of Kerman are “soldiers of Haj Qasem and we all have no fear of being martyred.” Haj is a title that indicates Soleimani completed the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca at least once during his life.
“You’ll taste this reality that Martyr Qasem Soleimani is more dangerous than Haj Qasem Soleimani,” he vowed, threatening more terrorist attacks against Americans in retaliation for Soleimani’s death.
“Will your embassies in the region be safe? If your embassies are plotting to kill our innocent people, are we allowed to destroy them?” Hamzeh asked of the United States, obliquely referring to the unsuccessful siege of the U.S. embassy in Baghdad orchestrated by Soleimani.
“Are your military bases and centers in the region for benevolence or to harm nations? Are we allowed to destroy all your bases in a preventive attack?” he railed.
Reuters reported that Hamzeh also urged the regime in Tehran to “put the production of long-range missiles capable of carrying unconventional warheads on our agenda,” although some other outlets said that was a different politician speaking at the same legislative session. Iran has threatened to withdraw from both the remnants of former President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal and the Cold War-era Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty if France, Germany, and the U.K. follow through with a complaint about Iranian nuclear deal violations to the U.N. Security Council.
U.S. disarmament ambassador Robert Wood dismissed Hamzeh’s threats as “ridiculous,” adding they reveal “a sense of the terrorist underpinnings of that regime and that regime needs to change its behavior.”
Wood added that if Iran makes good on its threat to withdraw from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, it would send a “very, very negative message.”
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