Tehran, Feb 11 (IANS): Hundreds of thousands of Iranians participated in nationwide rallies on Tuesday to mark the 41st anniversary of the Islamic Revolution.

In different cities, people took to the streets, chanting anti-US and anti-Israeli slogans, reports Xinhua news agency.

In Tehran, the demonstrators burned US and Israeli flags.

The participants also carried images of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the late founder of the Islamic Republic, and his successor and the incumbent supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as well as Qasem Soleimani, the Iranian Major General who was killed in the January 3 American drone strike in Baghadad.

Khamenei and President Hassan Rouhani had called for a mass turnout to mark the anniversary of the revolution and condemn the "hostile" moves of the US against Iran.

The 1979 Revolution in Iran toppled the US-backed Shah regime of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and brought the country under the leadership of Khomeini, an event seen as a turning point in Iran's history.