Exclusive: Iranian general’s warning about Luna Al-Shibl resurfaces as evidence points to targeted killing, not accident.
A years-old warning from Iran’s most powerful commander is casting a long shadow over the mysterious death of Syrian presidential adviser Luna Al-Shibl, according to a new investigative report.
Al-Majalla magazine has published what it claims is a transcript of a late-2019 encounter where Iran’s Quds Force chief, General Qassem Soleimani, confronted Syrian security chief Ali Mamlouk about Al-Shibl. Spotting her leaving Mamlouk’s office, Soleimani dismissed her official title, insisting, “She is a spy,” and pointed to a suspicious disparity between her past and present salaries as proof.
This allegation is now being re-examined following Al-Shibl’s death in July 2024. Officially, she succumbed to injuries from a traffic accident. However, the report presents eyewitness accounts and photographic evidence suggesting a deliberate attack. Witnesses describe a vehicle ramming her car and an assailant striking her, contradicting the minor damage seen on her armored BMW.
The incident’s handling has raised further questions. Al-Shibl’s bodyguard was reportedly arrested at the hospital, and her funeral was notably sparse, absent President Assad himself. The sequence of events has fueled speculation that her death was an inside operation, potentially linked to the old suspicions voiced by Soleimani and others within the regime’s security apparatus.
