Iranian state-aligned media is pushing back against US claims that Iran's leadership has retreated underground following recent massive airstrikes. The IRGC News Channel cited images from Middle East Eye to mock the US Defense Secretary's assertions.
In the aftermath of the unprecedented US and Israeli airstrikes between March 9 and 13 that heavily targeted Iranian military and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) infrastructure, a narrative dispute has emerged regarding the whereabouts of Iran's newly appointed leadership.
کانال اخبار سپاه پاسداران 🏴, a Telegram channel with a staunch pro-military and state-aligned editorial stance, pushed back against statements made by the United States government. According to the IRGC channel, the news outlet Middle East Eye published images that "mocked the claim of the US Secretary of Defense regarding Iranian officials hiding underground."This narrative, aiming to counter the US Defense Secretary's assertions of a leadership in hiding, was widely circulated within the Iranian media ecosystem. In addition to the IRGC News Channel, the report was also broadcast by the prominent Iranian news outlet آخرین خبر (Akharin Khabar), accumulating over 6,000 combined views across the platforms on March 15.
The source messages rely on a reference to an external publication (Middle East Eye) to validate the IRGC channel's narrative. The specific images referenced in the text were not provided in the raw data, only the descriptive caption.