Quds Force deputy is Iran’s missile man in Lebanon

Hejazi led IRGC forces in Lebanon and worked with Hezbollah to improve precision guidance

Mohammed Hejazi, the new deputy commander of Iran’s IRGC Quds Force, has been a key figure in Hezbollah’s precision missile project. The high-ranking IRGC commander was previously a suppressor of protests in Iran, and was under Qasem Soleimani’s command as the central figure in Iran’s operations in Lebanon.

According to a public IDF report released in August 2019, Hejazi was involved in Hezbollah’s precision-guided missile project in Lebanon. The report identified him as an IRGC operative in charge of Iranian personnel in Lebanon, and the commander of Iran’s precision-guided missile project in Lebanon. He has been in Lebanon for years, according to Iranian media sources and reports online at various regional media.

Prior to going to Lebanon for the IRGC, he was involved in research and logistics, making him keenly aware of how Iran moves its missiles to groups like Hezbollah. Ynet reported he was also linked to the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires.

Hejazi, whose name is sometimes spelled as Seyyed Mohammad Hosseinzadeh Hejazi or Muhammad Hussein-Zada Hejazi, was born in 1956 in Isfahan. He fought in the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, and played a key role suppressing Kurds. Later he became a commander of the Basij militia in Iran and then rose through IRGC ranks to become a deputy commander and one of its most senior officers. He was sanctioned by the US in 2007 and the EU in 2011 for his role in human rights violations. He helped suppress protests for president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009.

He faded from public view in 2014, and seems to have been in Lebanon during that time, helping Hezbollah stockpile and improve its estimated 150,000 missiles. Al-Ain Media reports that he was Hezbollah’s key man linking them to the IRGC. He likely grew into this role after the 2008 assassination of Imad Mughniyeh. Hejazi helped supply arms to Hezbollah and helped it with its precision-guided missile programs.

These programs have been spotlighted as a key threat to the region and Israel. Hezbollah wants to create local manufacturing bases for the precision guidance that would make its arsenal more dangerous. In March 2019, Israel said Hezbollah was seeking to set up an advanced missile plant in the Bekaa Valley. In August, Israel warned about the precision guidance. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has also reportedly warned Lebanon about allowing Hezbollah to build precision-guidance missile factories.

Hejazi’s key role in Lebanon and his new role as deputy of the IRGC Quds Force shows that Iran has plans to strike abroad. Radio Farda reports that in the post-Soleimani era, Hejazi’s new role is “a huge promotion because of [Ayatollah] Khamenei’s now openly expressed strategy of keeping the war with the United States and Israel outside Iranian borders.”