TEHRAN — Demonstrators gathered outside the United States State Capitol Building on Saturday afternoon to oppose the U.S. economic warfare against Iran.

Hosted by several activist organizations in the Madison area, the rally was led by the Party for Socialism and Liberation.

Speakers at the event said, while relations between Iran and the U.S. have seemed to settle, the U.S. is still engaging in economic warfare with Iran. 

“It’s easy to see violence as being bombs and bullets but it’s harder to see it as people being unable to get certain kinds of food or medicine they need and that’s what the U.S. sanctions do,” said PSL representative Sawyer Johnson, Channel 3000 reported.

Protester and member of the activist street band Forward Marching Band said these types of actions make the Iranian people collateral damage.

“It’s always the poor in our country and in any country that suffer and have no justice,” she added. “War doesn’t produce justice it produces sorrow, and so that’s why we are here for this.”

About 50 people attended the rally, including Thomas Scheevel who said, “It just important to show that there’s not passive acceptance of war.”

This is the second “No War on Iran” protest held in Madison this month.

Earlier this month, a U.S. drone strike assassinated top general Qassem Soleimani, Iran’s top anti-terror commander, and his comrades-in-arms in an airstrike in Baghdad.

The U.S. airstrike also martyred Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy commander of the anti-terrorist Iraqi Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF).

Soleimani was recognized internationally as a legendary commander in the battle against terrorist groups, especially Daesh (ISIS). He commanded forces who resisted ISIS which was advancing toward the Iraqi Kurdistan and came close to Baghdad.  

Officials in Tehran and independent generals in the world have said the Soleimani assassination amounts to an act of war against Iran.

On January 8, Iran carried out the Shahid Soleimani Operation against an American airbase in Iraq with more than ten missiles.

Iran had vowed to take “tough revenge” for Soleimani’s blood.

In a statement, the IRGC warned the United States that any more aggression or movement will receive a more “painful and crushing” response.

MH/PA