Tangsiri was appointed as the commander of the Navy in 2018, having previously served as deputy commander since 2010. In 2019, he was sanctioned by the US Treasury along with other IRGC commanders after Iran shot down a US surveillance drone near the strait.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described Tangsiri as an individual with “a great deal of blood on his hands” and said his assassination was “yet another example of the co-operation between us and our friend, the United States, toward the common goal of achieving the objectives of the war”.
US Central Command said in a statement Tangsiri’s death “makes the region safer” and that the IRGC’s navy “is on an irreversible decline”. It also called on serving members of the IRGC to abandon their posts and return home “to avoid further risk of unnecessary injury or death”.
Israel’s military said in a statement posted on X that the head of the IRGC Navy’s intelligence directorate, Behnam Rezaei, was also “eliminated”.
Additional reporting by Ghoncheh Habibiazad