Iranians flood social media with photos of cultural sites in response to Trump

Iranians have been sharing photos of their country's cultural and historical sites as a response to US President Donald Trump's implication that the US would target 52 previously-determined sites that are "at a very high level & important to Iran & the Iranian culture" if the latter were to retaliate for the killing of Revolutionary Guard commander Qasem Soleimani by the US. Shared with the tag #IranianCulturalSites, some of the places & monuments being shared on social media are also on the UNESCO World Heritage List.

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Iranians are sharing photos of their country's cultural sites on social media in response to United States President Donald Trump's implication that the U.S. would target cultural sites in Iran if the latter retaliated for the killing of the Revolutionary Guard commander Qasem Soleimani.

Soleimani was killed in a U.S. drone attack on Jan. 3, resulting in an escalation of the decades-long conflict between the two countries. The 62-year-old general was regarded as the second most powerful figure in Iran after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

News of Soleimani's death shocked us, Erdoğan saysNews of Soleimani's death shocked us, Erdoğan says

Following the assassination, President Trump tweeted a series of statements about the consequences of potential military retaliation from Iran, implying that the U.S. had selected 52 targets that were crucial to Iran and Iranian culture, and that those targets would be "hit very fast and very hard."

Despite U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's efforts on Fox News to change the narrative to say "Trump didn't say he'd go after a cultural site," Iranians took to social media to share photos of sites in Iran.

The photos are tagged with the words "#IranianCulturalSites" and depict works that are also on the UNESCO World Heritage List.