TEHRAN- “There are men who struggle for a day and they are good. There are men who struggle for a year and they are better. There are men who struggle many years, and they are better still. But there are those who struggle all their lives: These are the indispensable ones.”

This quote by Bertolt Brecht is about fighting. Many people in the world are engaged in fighting, but what makes fighting valuable and respectable is first and foremost the goal, and then the method of fighting. Fighting, inherently cannot be valuable. Even criminals are engaged in fighting! The U.S. military, which invaded Southwest Asia after the September 11 attacks and killed hundreds of thousands of people, was also a fighter, and this fight was adorned with beautiful masks such as “fighting terrorism” and “spreading democracy”.

Iran's martyrs and their struggle are at the forefront of valuable and honorable struggles. Fighters who sacrificed their lives during the Pahlavi regime were seeking to liberate the country and the people from the grip of domestic tyranny and global domination. During the eight-year Iran-Iraq war, although Iran was invaded, the goal of Iranian soldiers was something beyond liberating occupied territories. They fought for higher goals and sacrificed their lives.

In recent years, hundreds of young Iranians have also sacrificed their lives in the fight against terrorism in countries of Iraq and Syria, with General Qassem Soleimani, the beloved hero of Iranians, at the forefront. He was a man who, in a letter he wrote to his daughter, says, "It's the first time I confess this sentence; I never wanted to become a military man." And talks about why he chose the path of :

“I did not choose this path to kill anybody, you know it. I can’t even hurt a fly. I have taken up arms to stand against murderers, not to kill people. Imilitarism see myself as a soldier for every Muslim in danger and I would like God give me the power to defend all the oppressed people in the world. I will not die for Islam, which is more precious than my life, not for the oppressed Shia, which I am not worth it, no, no… rather, I am fighting for that terrified and homeless child who has no shelter, for that woman holding her child tightly to her chest in fear, for those bleeding fugitives on the run.”

The secret of the enemy's hatred towards the martyrs and their path lies in this very point. They are the ones who are willing to stand up against the tyranny and arrogance of the world, even at the cost of their own lives, and nothing can stop them.

This is where they resort to distortion and introduce the martyrs as followers of the path of death and inexistence, while they are actually messengers of true life. And in order to distance the martyrs from the attention of the people, especially the younger generation, they create fake models and heroes and try to promote them with various complex and attractive methods.

Undoubtedly, one of the reasons for the deep and heartfelt respect of Imam Khomeini and his successor Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei for the martyrs and their families is their exceptional role and historic function.

Mohammad Sarfi is Editor-in-Chief Tehran Times