Islamic State claims attack on Iranian Parliament, shrine
Islamic State claimed its first attack in Iran, as suicide bombers and gunmen struck at the heart of the country’s political and religious establishment on Wednesday.
Assailants entered the Parliament building in Tehran and the shrine of the Islamic Republic’s founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, to the south of the city.
Twelve people were killed and 42 injured in the simultaneous attacks, state-run Press TV said. Fars news agency said the two incidents, which lasted for several hours, were over. The Sunni extremist group Islamic State claimed both attacks using its Amaq News Agency, saying they were carried out by its fighters and were its first in Iran — the West Asian Shiite power.
The rare violence in the usually safe capital comes as Iranian security forces and allied militias are involved in offensives against the jihadist group and other militant groups in both Syria and Iraq. US-backed Syrian fighters on Tuesday launched an offensive to retake Islamic State’s selfdeclared capital of Raqqa, pushing the group further onto the defensive.
“The terrorists targeted the shrine of the founder of the regime and the beating heart of the people’s leadership,” Hesamodin Ashena, an adviser to President Hassan Rouhani, said on Twitter. Iran’s Interior Ministry will hold an emergency security meeting. Saudi Arabia denied any involvement. The assault further fuels boiling tensions between Iran and Saudi Arabia as they vie for control of the Gulf and influence in the wider Islamic world.
Four attackers entered parliament using the public entrance wearing women’s clothes, Tasnim cited Deputy Minister Hossein Zolfaghari as saying, and a firefight with security forces began immediately.