Top Iranian general acknowledges Assad regime’s fall was ‘very big blow’ to Tehran

In a speech last week, Iran’s top general in Syria said the Islamic Republic was “defeated very badly” by the fall of Syria’s Bashar Assad, despite the repeated public downplaying of its significance by Iranian leaders.

“I don’t consider losing Syria something to be proud of,” says Brig. Gen. Behrouz Esbati in a recording of the speech, according to the New York Times. “We were defeated, and defeated very badly, we took a very big blow and it’s been very difficult.”

Esbati also said ties with Assad had been strained prior to the Syrian regime’s collapse over his refusal to let Iran-backed militias to open a new front against Israel from Syria, and accused Russia of saying it was bombing rebel forces when it was in fact dropping munitions on open fields.

Despite Assad’s ouster, Esbati said Tehran will still look for ways to enlist fighters in Syria regardless of political developments there.

“We can activate all the networks we have worked with over the years,” he is quoted as saying. “We can activate the social layers that our guys lived among for years; we can be active in social media and we can form resistance cells.”

“Now we can operate there as we do in other international arenas, and we have already started.”