After Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, was killed in U.S. and Israeli airstrikes, a red flag symbolizing revenge was hoisted over a representative mosque in Qom, a central Iranian religious city. It is seen as a symbolic move signaling a hard-line response inside Iran.
According to Iranian media on the 1st (local time), a red flag was raised atop the dome of the Jamkaran Mosque in Qom.
The mosque's red flag is known to symbolize revenge for the blood of martyrs and the imminence of fierce battle. Local outlets said it serves as a warning at home and abroad of a determination to exact harsh retaliation and judgment against enemies.
Iranian state-run Press TV said, "This red flag is a signal of revenge for the blood shed by the leader of the Islamic Revolution."
At the hoisting ceremony, mosque officials and clerics reportedly led the rite carrying a portrait of Khamenei.
A red flag was first flown over the Jamkaran Mosque in Jan. 2020, when Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), was killed in a U.S. airstrike. At that time, it was also used as a symbol foreshadowing retaliation.
The flag bears the phrase "Revenge for Imam Hussein." Imam Hussein, a central saint of Shia who was killed in battle against a Sunni dynasty in A.D. 680, is a symbolic figure of martyrdom and resistance for Shia Muslims.
The Jamkaran Mosque is famous for the "Well of Wishes," where the figure of the last of the 12 imams venerated by Shia, Imam Mahdi, is said to have appeared. It is one of the largest mosques in Qom, known as the "city of 1,000 mosques."
Meanwhile, Qom was also reportedly among the targets of the latest U.S.-Israeli airstrikes.