Qasem Soleimani International Airport — Ahvaz, Iran

Qasem Soleimani International Airport handles international and domestic traffic for Ahvaz, the capital of Iran's oil-rich Khuzestan Province in the country's southwest. The facility was renamed in 2020 in honor of the Iranian general killed in a U.S. drone strike earlier that year, a change that replaced its earlier designation as Ahvaz International Airport while the IATA code AWZ stayed the same. Ahvaz itself straddles the Karun River, Iran's longest waterway by volume, and regularly ranks among the hottest inhabited cities on Earth during summer months, with temperatures that can climb past 50 degrees Celsius. Despite carrying a large-airport classification, AWZ operates with a single runway, and ground elevation here is a modest 66 feet, matching the flat alluvial plain that defines this part of Khuzestan near the Iraqi border. Flights connect Ahvaz mainly to Tehran and other Iranian cities, supporting both the energy industry that dominates the regional economy and the movement of residents across a province that saw heavy fighting during the Iran-Iraq War.