Iran on Saturday celebrated the 1979 U.S. Embassy takeover and hostage crisis by displaying a surface-to-air missile at the site of the former embassy in Tehran.
Thousands of Iranians gathered for the annual celebration, where they engaged in anti-U.S. and anti-Israel chants and burned an effigy of U.S. President Donald Trump.
Iran's semiofficial Tasnim news agency reported the missile on display at the former embassy was a Qadr-F model, which has a range of about 2,000 kilometers.
The former embassy now serves as a cultural center and a de facto symbol for anti-U.S. sentiment.
Following the Islamic Revolution in 1979, hundreds of students stormed the embassy, where they took 52 Americans hostage for more than a year because the U.S. refused to hand over Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. He was in the United States, purportedly for cancer treatment, and Iran wanted him back to stand trial for crimes he was accused of committing during his rule.
The protest Saturday came amid heightened tensions between the two countries after Trump refused to recertify Iran's compliance with a 2015 deal between Iran and world powers to limit the country's nuclear ambitions.
In refusing to recertify the deal, Trump forced the U.S. Congress to decide what to do about the deal moving forward.
