Iran Lobby

Exposing the Activities of the lobbies and appeasers of the Mullah's Dictatorship ruling Iran

Regime Change in Iran will Come from the People

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Regime Change in Iran will Come from the People

Regime Change in Iran will Come from the People

The passage of new economic sanctions against the Iranian regime and the signing of the legislation by President Donald Trump officially buried the Obama administration’s policies of trying to appease the mullahs in Tehran into trying to turn towards moderation.

The response from the Iran lobby was predictable with dire warnings of war and destruction being pedaled, but the reality is that the regime change being sought by the U.S. is not the regime change the Iran lobby is trying to portray.

One of the great misconceptions about the idea of regime change is that it must come about violently and it would be externally driven by outside forces such as the U.S. scheming to plot the overthrow of the mullahs by some armed insurrection or brutal invasion.

It serves the purposes of regime supporters such as Trita Parsi of the National Iranian American Council to push the narrative that President Trump is itching for a war with Iran.

The reality though is much different. The president campaigned strongly on the platform that the Iraq invasion by the Bush administration was a mistake and worse yet, not planning for its aftermath was blunder.

Most historians would not find fault with that appraisal and apparently not many American voters did either. It would be ironic then for a president—who campaigned against more wars in the Middle East—to start of his administration with seeking to instigate a war with the region’s largest army in Iran.

Then again, logic was never a strong suit for regime advocates such as Parsi, which is why we see his messages for what they are: diversions.

There are efforts to divert attention from the real concerns the mullahs have and are constantly battling against which is the potential for their rule to end because of the desire of the Iranian people to want change.

History has proven that all dictatorial regimes fail eventually. No government can stand against the entropy that occurs by suppressing basic human rights, using fear as a means of intimidation and control, and world events that reshape the region around a regime.

More recently, the Arab Spring protests toppled firmly established autocratic governments throughout the Mediterranean and reshaped the Middle East radically and it did so without the violence of bloody revolution that accompanied the Iranian revolution for example in 1979.

Even the more recent election demonstrations of 2009 showed the Iranian regime clearly that the Iranian people were more than capable of toppling their reign and it probably scared them to death and like any reactionary totalitarian regime, the mullahs did what came naturally for them: they cracked down even harder.

They rigged the election for Hassan Rouhani in 2013 by clearing the field of any other candidates. The did the same thing during parliamentary elections, keeping control with an overwhelming majority of loyalists.

They arrested journalists, stepped up attacks on dissidents, seized satellite dishes, banned social media, imprisoned students and artists and expanded the size and reach of “morality” police forces to enforce order.

Under Rouhani’s first time, the use of the death penalty skyrocketed to all-time highs as gallows and cranes were busy throughout public squares in Iran hanging Iranian men, women and even youngsters.

Even under this onslaught, protests still flourished in Iran with Rouhani’s re-election earlier this year in which he was greeted by masses of protesters at some campaign stops that turned ugly. Regime change in Iran won’t come at the point of an American invasion. It will come from the shouts and marches of millions of Iranians in city streets throughout the country.

Which is why the imposition of sanctions by the Trump administration is an opening step to making regime change possible; not through the threat of war as the Iran lobby would you believe, but rather in the reapplication of pressures that nearly forced the mullahs to lose control prior to the nuclear deal.

If we recall, the stage set prior to the nuclear negotiations showed the Iranian economy was groaning under the onslaught of an economy that had been drained of cash through rampant corruption and the funding of proxy wars and terrorist operations.

Ordinary Iranians were struggling to make ends meet and dealing with diminished expectations as career paths were blocked and opportunities shrank. Iranian small businesses struggled to stay afloat, while dual-national Iranians coming back to visit relatives or conduct business were increasingly being arrested and thrown in jail for no reason other than to be used as hostage pawns by the mullahs.

The level of discontent only needed a channel to express itself and that venue is increasingly becoming the Iranian resistance movement through groups such as the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) which has long been a thorn in the side of the mullahs.

Comprised of Iranians abroad and inside Iran, these dissidents and others, form the basis of the most viable option for Iranians looking for a change. Within Iran lies a strong core of supporters, even those Iranians who may not support the MEK specifically, but are more than willing to work towards regime change anyway.

A central platform to the Iranian dissident movement’s policies is a call for pluralistic and democratic change in a multi-party system. While the concept might seem perfectly ordinary to anyone living in a democratic society, it is anathema to the Iranian regime. The biggest threat to the mullahs is the very simple idea that the Iranian people might want a political choice other than the Islamic state created by the mullahs.

All of which leads us back to the original imposition of new sanctions by President Trump and the start of the process to designate the Revolutionary Guard Corps as a Foreign Terrorist Organization. These actions place the mullahs back in the crosshairs of international scrutiny, but most importantly attempt to recreate the environment back from 2009-13 when four years of tumultuous change was being demanded by the Iranian people.

It is time for the U.S. government to support and recognize the various Iranian dissident and opposition groups and empower them to begin the process of regime change; peacefully.

Michael Tomlinson

Hassan Rouhani Starts Second Term with False Threats

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Hassan Rouhani Starts Second Term with False Threats

Hassan Rouhani Starts Second Term with False Threats

Hassan Rouhani must be feeling like he’s stuck in the movie “Groundhog Day” as he was sworn in for a second term as the Iranian regime’s handpicked puppet president of Ali Khamenei and his fellow mullahs.

Four years ago, he was handpicked by his fellow clerics to be the “moderate” face of the regime and push for a lifting of economic sanctions that were crippling Iran through a nuclear agreement with the West.

With the help from the Iran lobby and a misguided Obama administration, he shepherded a deal through that saved him and his fellow mullahs from being tossed out on a wave of broad discontent among the Iranian people.

Now he begins a second term finding himself once again trying to promote a nuclear deal that is in danger of going the way of the dodo bird; only this time he finds a much different world stage he stands on in which the Iranian regime’s true colors have been on vivid display.

He finds President Donald Trump clearly skeptical of the regime’s intentions and efficacy of the nuclear deal.

He finds a U.S. Congress voting overwhelmingly to impose new economic sanctions because of Iran’s ballistic missile program.

He finds a Trump administration moving quickly to impose economic sanctions targeting Revolutionary Guard Corps leaders and companies involved in ballistic missile development.

Most worrisome, he finds a weakened Iran lobby machine that has lost much of its punch and influence with the transition of the Obama administration leaving many regime advocates cut off from the West Wing and cabinet agencies.

Rouhani attempted to offer up some tough-sounding rhetoric, but only ended up reminding watchers of his precarious position within the regime as his own brother was arrested on corruption charges.

“Today is the time for the mother of all negotiations, not the mother of all bombs,” Rouhani said, referring to the US dropping its largest non-nuclear bomb ever used in combat in Afghanistan in April. The Afghan president, Ashraf Ghani, was among those present at Rouhani’s inauguration.

“The US has showed a lack of commitment in its implementation of the nuclear deal because its policymakers are addicted to the illegal and futile policy of sanctions and humiliation,” Rouhani said. “This has proved the US to be an unreliable partner to the world and even to its longtime allies.”

Referring to Trump, he added: “We do not wish to engage with political novices … Those who want to tear up the nuclear deal should know that they will be ripping up their own political life by doing so and the world won’t forget their noncompliance.”

Tehran has complained the US is reneging on its obligations. Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Ali Larijani, said last week that Tehran had formally complained to the joint commission supervising implementation of the accord over the US senate’s new sanctions against Iranian entities, imposed over Tehran’s testing of missiles.

It is a curiously ironic stand for the regime to make since Iran was adamant during negotiations over the nuclear deal two years ago that “side issues” such as the regime’s ballistic missile program, sponsorship of terrorism and human rights abuses should not be part of the agreement.

When the Obama administration caved into those requests and took them out, the stage was unwittingly set for the Trump administration and Congress to act on those same “side issues” separately and apart from the nuclear deal and now the mullahs are crying foul like squealing babies whose milk bottle has been yanked from their mouths by a stern father.

The Iranian regime clearly wants a double standard on its conduct and now that it isn’t getting it, the mullahs cry foul and threaten to pack up and leave like petulant children.

It’s an appropriate metaphor given how Iranian parliament members acted when European Union policy chief Federica Mogherini showed up for the swearing in ceremony and was promptly surrounded by them in a rush of sophomoric selfies.

The scene was roundly criticized in Iranian state media and on social media for the “strange” behavior being exhibited.

The Fars news agency posted a photo which many social media users felt showed Mogherini unimpressed – and labelled the MPs’ behavior “strange”. One MP, Alireza Salimi, called the behavior “self-surrender to the West”, and said that a committee on the conduct of members may probe the incident – if other MPs complain that the selfies caused “contempt” for parliament.

One popular tweet compared the image to a scene from the film “Malena,” where crowds of men rush to light actress Monica Belluci’s cigarette.

Another made the same point using of an iconic image from Walt Disney’s “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.”

But the irony was not in the rush for selfies, but rather the fact that most Iranians are barred from using social media platforms such as Facebook, Snapchat and Twitter because of their widespread use by political opponents and dissidents.

It is also ironic to see Iranian MPs swarm a female politician when so many Iranian women are brutalized by misogyny laws passed by the same parliament permitting underage child marriages and restricting job opportunities and educational choices for women.

In fact, women are still prohibited from riding bicycles on public streets throughout Iran.

Now that is more compelling irony.

Laura Carnahan

Iran Regime on Twin Tracks of Aggression with Missiles and Human Rights

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The Iranian regime has invested heavily—much of it from funding derived by the lifting of economic sanctions by the nuclear deal—in its ballistic missile program. It has become as integral to the long-term plans of the mullahs as oil policy has been for economic planning.

Iran’s ballistic missile program gives it the ability to project force far beyond its borders. For most superpowers and nuclear-capable nations, force projection otherwise known as “over-the-horizon” capability distinguishes them from any other nation on Earth.

The U.S., Russia, China, France and Great Britain have long been the pillars of the ability to project force around the world. Historically speaking, Britannia ruled its empire because of its navy, while after World War II, the U.S. established supremacy with carrier battle groups and air power.

In today’s world though, ballistic missiles have become to the tool du jour of force projection for despotic regimes such as North Korea and Iran. They can—on the cheap—threaten neighbors and nations far away as a means of extorting concessions.

Missiles alone though cannot guarantee internal security for these regimes. Missiles are a tool of external terror, but for internal suppression of dissent, both North Korea and Iran rely heavily on cults of personality for their respective leaders and use execution, imprisonment and ample torture as means of population control.

It is striking how similar both regimes are in action and planning. Their respective ideologies, one devout atheist, the other devoutly sectarian, both focus absolute allegiance to the state.

Their use of hostages as negotiating pawns and crackdown of any open dissent makes them more sister-states than one might imagine. In fact, both earn heavy and regular condemnation by human rights groups.

In the case of Iran, Amnesty International has paid special attention to tracking the regime’s efforts to vilify human rights defenders as “enemies of the state” in putting out an updated report on Iran’s brutal human rights crackdown.

“It is a bitter irony that as the Iranian authorities boast about their increased engagement with the UN and the EU, particularly in the aftermath of the nuclear deal, human rights defenders who have made contact with these same institutions are being treated as criminals,” said Philip Luther, Amnesty International’s Research and Advocacy Director for the Middle East and North Africa.

“Rather than propagating the dangerous myth that human rights defenders pose a threat to national security, the Iranian authorities should focus on addressing the legitimate concerns they raise. These are people who have risked everything to build a more humane and just society – it is appalling that they are so viciously punished for their bravery,” he added.

The organization is calling on the EU, which announced plans to relaunch a bilateral human rights dialogue with Iran in 2016, to speak out in the strongest terms against the persecution of human rights defenders in the country.

“The international community, and in particular the EU, must not stay silent over the outrageous treatment of human rights defenders in Iran,” said Philip Luther.

“Instead of appeasing Iranian officials, the EU should forcefully call for the immediate and unconditional release of all those jailed for their peaceful human rights activism and for an end to the misuse of the justice system to silence activists.”

The timing of Amnesty International’s report is auspicious in light of new sanctions signed into law by President Donald Trump against Iran and North Korea’s ballistic missile program and a new diplomatic initiative aimed at the United Nations to curb Iran’s “destabilizing effect in the region.”

U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley, in a letter to the UN Security Council on August 2, said the launch of a missile carrying a satellite into space “represents a threatening and provocative step by Iran.”

Her letter, written on behalf of the United States, France, Germany, and Britain, called on the Council to “discuss appropriate responses” against Tehran for its “provocative action.”

U.S. officials said that type of technology is inherently designed to carry a nuclear payload, and the Pentagon said the technology can be used to develop intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM).

Predictably the Iran lobby’s chief advocate, the National Iranian American Council, condemned the sanctions move by the U.S. and warned of a march to war with these moves, but even the NIAC had to acknowledge the overwhelming bipartisan support sanctions against Iran have in Congress right now.

“The alarm bells should be ringing but instead of restraining Trump’s reckless inclinations on Iran, Congress appears to be actively encouraging him,” said the statement by Jamal Abdi, executive director for NIAC Action, the lobbying arm of the NIAC.

In the letter to the UN though, the four nations called on Iran “to immediately cease all activities related to ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons, including launches using such ballistic missile technology.” They said Iran’s “long-standing program to develop ballistic missiles continues to be inconsistent with” the UN resolution and has a destabilizing effect in the region, according to Bloomberg.

This new diplomatic effort represents a watershed moment of sorts because it unites the Western partners in the Iran nuclear deal into a unified front to stop Iran’s missile program before it becomes the kind of full-blown headache the world is now experiencing with North Korea.

In many ways, North Korea serves as the clearest warning sign of where Iran will inevitably reach in a short time and represents a defining moment in the close collaboration between the two regimes.

Finally, the world is waking up to the dual threats posed by them.

Laura Carnahan

Iran Lobby in Full Attack Mode Against Trump

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Iran Lobby in Full Attack Mode Against Trump

Iran Lobby in Full Attack Mode Against Trump

The Iran lobby is in full attack mode against President Donald Trump and it’s not a surprise. We predicted as early as last December that the Iran lobby would mobilize to block any moves made by the new Trump administration to curb Iranian regime excesses.

It did not matter what the administration did so long as it might be construed to make things more difficult for the mullahs in Tehran then it deserved fierce opposition from the Iran lobby.

To that end the Iran lobby’s chief architect, the National Iranian American Council, first turned its attention to the debate over immigration, since for the NIAC, it was a perfect opportunity to burnish its credentials as a progressive fighter for human rights. An ironic notion since it all but encourages Iran to abuse its own people by not voicing any opposition to the continued imprisonment, torture and execution of thousands of Iranians.

It then tried to attack the Trump administration over its escalation in Syria in the fight against ISIS and the Assad regime, but as they say in the Deep South, “that dog just wouldn’t hunt.”

The NIAC and its allies got little traction on that issue, especially in light of horrific scenes of chemical attacks by Assad forces on Syrian civilians and the increase of direct attacks on U.S.-backed forces by Iranian-backed Iraqi Shiite militias.

The handwriting was on the wall that trying to defend Iran in Syria was a no-winner for the NIAC.

It then shifted back to familiar ground by pushing the idea that the president was actively seeking a war with Iran and looking for excuses to start one.

It’s a stupid notion since the provocations for starting a conflict with Iran are already abundant and excessive:

  • Iranian regime has detained American sailors and repeatedly made attack runs at several U.S. warships in international waters warranting the firing of warning shots;
  • They have falsely arrested and detained several American citizens;
  • Iranian regime has supported the smuggling of weapons and insurgents to U.S. allies in Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait—home to important U.S. military bases—in an effort to de-stabilize and topple those governments;
  • Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders have consistently made threats of attacks on U.S. personnel in Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq and have used their Quds Force units to supply insurgents and militias with IEDs and weapons to target them;
  • Iranian regime has launched multiple missiles in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions with heavier payload capacity and extended ranges now long enough to strike throughout Europe, Africa and Asia;
  • Iran mullahs have used cash gained from the lifting of economic sanctions from the nuclear deal not for restarting a moribund economy, but rather to fund its wars in Syria and Yemen with the express purpose of destabilizing Saudi Arabia, the most important Arab ally the U.S. has in the region; and
  • Iranian regime has continued to escalate cyberattacks against U.S. financial institutions, commercial enterprises and infrastructure elements in a wide-ranging effort to de-stabilize the U.S.

Any of these actions, by themselves, would warrant a strong U.S. response and yet the NIAC and its cohorts in the “echo chamber” of Iranian regime support have always sought to portray the mullahs as some poor, defenseless lambs.

Take for example Mitchell Plitnick, a so-called policy analyst that has bounced around several progressive Jewish outfits and now finds a home as a frequent supporter of the Iranian regime.

He authored a recent editorial that appeared on the same day in noted Iran lobby mouthpiece, Lobelog, and +972 Magazine, that President Trump’s demand for more access for international inspectors to Iranian military bases for evidence of nuclear development work was a “red line” for the mullahs and would effectively kill the deal.

“Access to those sites was an Iranian red line during negotiations, and the agreement to omit that access from the deal was an important component in getting the deal done,” Plitnick writes.

It’s a stupid argument to make since he neglects to mention that Iran’s deep desire to keep its military bases off limits from inspection already created the high probability that Iran is cheating and conducting nuclear work in those safe zones.

Remember, in the ramp up of its nuclear program, which Iran always claimed never existed, the regime spread its development and research work across the vast deserts of Iran and buried them deep in fortified bunkers. The International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN watchdog, has never had a complete and thorough accounting of every potential nuclear site in Iran.

Also, Iran was allowed to scrub several sites clean with bulldozers in clearing tons of dirt and debris away before soil samples were taken by Iranians and handed over to the IAEA. Even then, particles of nuclear materials were still detected.

The position that Trita Parsi of the NIAC takes that the president is actively seeking to invalidate the nuclear agreement is false since the truth is that the nuclear agreement is largely being ignored by Iran already.

Also, he fails to note in his extensive press interviews this week that the president’s own State Department has certified Iran every 90 days even though it could have pulled the plug from the president’s swearing in.

All of which means, President Trump is not in a hurry to dump the nuclear deal as much as he is eager to find a plausible pathway for addressing all of the concerns he has with Iran including terrorism, human rights and ballistic missiles.

Parsi’s intense focus on the nuclear deal is yet another distraction to turn attention away from the most menacing aspects of Iran today which is its North Korean-like march to missile dominance.

That is the issue grabbing headlines and global attention and Parsi and his friends are desperate to turn the spotlight away.

Michael Tomlinson

Why Does the Iran Lobby Care About the Nuke Deal?

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Why Does the Iran Lobby Care About the Nuke Deal?

Why Does the Iran Lobby Care About the Nuke Deal?

The Iran lobby, including the National Iranian American Council and other groups, invested heavily in supporting the Iran nuclear deal. They lobbied for it, wrote editorials, sent out loads of press releases, made appearances on news programs, held meetings with elected officials and coordinated strategy with the Obama White House through countless meetings.

The Iran lobby ostensibly was doing all this in the name of peace and in support of a whole host of promised positives coming from its passage, including:

  • Bolstering moderate elements within the Iranian regime and aiding their cause in upcoming elections;
  • Shifting Iran back towards diplomacy and serving as a moderating force in a deeply destabilized Middle East;
  • Empower international inspectors to keep Iran under close scrutiny and push back its development of a nuclear weapon; and
  • Propel Iran’s re-entry in the community of nations and become a partner economically and politically with the world once again.

It was a nice idea and attractive to many in Congress. Unfortunately, like most good intentions, it fell flat on its face when confronted by the evil nature inherent within the ruling mullahs in Tehran.

The one thing everyone seemed to forget and the Iran lobby was careful to obscure was that the Iranian regime never really cared about a nuclear deal since the mullahs knew it would never halt their nuclear program, only postpone it slightly.

What they and their Iran lobbyist allies really cared about was the lifting of crippling sanctions that, more than anything else, was and still is the true goal of the regime and its allies.

Preserving the nuclear deal is not the real concern of the regime. It is the potential for the re-imposition of economic sanctions under a skeptical Trump administration and a reset back to 2012 in which the Iranian regime was on the verge of collapse and widespread dissatisfaction among the Iranian people still simmered from the violent crackdown on the 2009 democracy protests.

This is why the deal was crafted to preserve Iranian regime’s missile program and never take up the issues of human rights and terrorism since the mullahs had always planned to use the cash it received from the nuclear deal to jumpstart their ballistic missile program and keep the Assad regime afloat in Syria.

The mullahs and by extension the Iran lobby relied on the passiveness of the U.S. under Obama. As British politician Edmund Burke once famously said: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

In this, the Iran lobby sought to dissuade action against Iran by promising a changed regime, but since none of that has happened and the situation throughout the Middle East has clearly gotten worse under the expansion of several proxy wars by Iran, the Iran lobby has shifted its tone and tactics to a much darker and fear-based message.

It now relies on the banging of war fears in trying to keep the nuclear deal alive as evidenced by the mounting PR push by groups such as the NIAC which put out a policy memo outlining how the Trump administration could undermine the nuclear agreement.

It is typically long-winded and rests its logic on the notion that President Trump can kill the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) agreement by choosing not to certify the JCPOA or implementing “snap back” sanctions.

The NIAC memo then goes on to exhaustively explain the various steps the Congress would take in reviewing either action by the president.

What the NIAC does not discuss is the fact the Congress voted to pass new sanctions on Iran by stunningly huge bipartisan majorities that made clear no one actually believes in any of the promises made by the NIAC earlier.

Iranian regime has clearly become a threat not only to the U.S., but to the entire region as its ballistic missiles can now reach targets throughout Europe, Asia and Africa.

The NIAC briefing also glaringly misses the essential point of what is happening now which is the Iranian regime’s actions on human rights violations, sponsorship of terror and accelerating a missile program that will soon surpass North Korea is what is driving the debate about Iran; not the nuclear agreement.

But the NIAC hopes that focus on the JCPOA will deflect attention on these other areas where Iranian regime is so blatantly awful on right now. It is akin to pointing at the crack den and ignoring the building on fire right next to it.

You can see how the Iran lobby is trying to push issues such as terrorism and missiles off the front pages by talking about the nuclear deal, when the nuclear deal isn’t even the issue being debated by Congress and the Trump administration.

This is the “new” grand lie of the Iran lobby and its supporters. They hope that by focusing on the JCPOA and Iranian regime’s continued “compliance” with the agreement that mullahs’ regime in Iran is somehow still a good global citizen. The lobby never addresses the ballistic missile program or the threat it poses, especially with heightened concerns over North Korea. It also never deals with the horrific human rights violations Iranian regime and its IRGC has perpetuated in the Syrian conflict.

Unfortunately for the NIAC and other Iran lobby members, everyone has pretty much caught on to the lie and ignoring what they say which explains the overwhelming bipartisan push to target Iran.

For the NIAC, it quickly finds itself alone in Washington’s Beltway with few open supporters and even less leverage in trying to boost Iranian regime’s fortunes. It’s time for the NIAC to pack it in.

Michael Tomlinson

More Sanctions Levied on Iran for Missile ProgramMore Sanctions Levied on Iran for Missile Program

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More Sanctions Levied on Iran for Missile Program

More Sanctions Levied on Iran for Missile Program

Iran’s recent launch of a rocket carrying a satellite into space served more as a test for the regime’s accelerating ballistic missile program in terms of lofting heavier payloads over greater distances.

In many ways, the Iranian regime’s missile program has mirrored the development of the North Korean program which now threatens the continental U.S. with its own launch of a ballistic missile last Friday.

Intelligence agencies have long believed that Iran’s missile program was kickstarted by a technology licensing agreement between the two rogue regimes, but Iran’s larger industrial capacity and ample financial resources due to illicit sales of its embargoed oil supplies over the years have enabled Iran to leapfrog the pace of development by North Korea.

It also explains why the mullahs were so intent on ensuring that the nuclear deal had no explicit restrictions on their missile program; an omission by the Obama administration in the false hope of fanning the flames of moderation.

All of which means a mess has been left to the Trump administration to sift through and it has done so with an admirable degree of incremental steps designed to slowly isolate the regime and target the most problematic parts of the regime’s terror industry.

For every provocation by the Iranian regime, the Trump administration has responded in direct proportion to send an unmistakable message to the Tehran.

A joint statement on Friday from the United States, France, Germany and Britain said Iran’s launch was inconsistent with a U.N. Security Council resolution calling on Iran not to conduct such tests.

The U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control imposed new sanctions on six Iranian firms owned or controlled by the Shahid Hemmat Industrial Group. The move enables the U.S. government to block any company property under its jurisdiction and prevents U.S. citizens from doing business with the firms, according to Reuters.

“These sanctions … underscore the United States’ deep concerns with Iran’s continued development and testing of ballistic missiles and other provocative behavior,” Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said in a statement.

“The U.S. government will continue to aggressively counter Iran’s ballistic missile-related activity, whether it be a provocative space launch … or likely support to Yemeni Houthi missile attacks on Saudi Arabia such as occurred this past weekend,” Mnuchin said.

The six Shahid Hemmat units targeted by the U.S. sanctions manufacture missile components, missile airframes, liquid-propellant ballistic missile engines, liquid propellant, guidance and control systems. They also do missile-related research and maintenance.

The move comes on the heels of the Congress passing by overwhelming majorities legislation to impose new sanctions on Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as sanctions imposed last July 18 directed at 18 people and entities for supporting Iran’s missile program or—more importantly—the Revolutionary Guard Corps which directly supports terrorism.

The moves from the Trump administration are slowly rolling back all the moves made by the Obama administration, but smartly are being done in a manner not to give the Iranian regime an excuse to claim the U.S. is violating the nuclear deal.

That of course has not stopped Iran lobby members such as Trita Parsi of the National Iranian American Council from claiming that the U.S. was indeed trying to wreck the deal.

Parsi took to Lobelog, another well-worn Iran lobby booster blog, to bray away that President Trump was actively seeking a war with Iran in another pathetic attempt at trying to drum up war fears.

“The American public knows the Iraq playbook quite well. Trump’s own supporters remain enraged by the disastrous war with Iraq. They know how they got played. It’s difficult to imagine why they would allow themselves to get played again by a president who has left little doubt about his intent to deceive,” Parsi said.

Parsi tries to press home the point that President Trump is some crazed warmonger, but even he admits that his presidential campaign was propelled in part by America’s dissatisfaction with the war in Iraq and the pretext for it.

Parsi cannot have both sides of the argument. He either must believe the president is actively seeking a war with Iran and is thumbing his nose at the very voters who put him in office, or Parsi must acknowledge the truth; which is that President Trump isn’t seeking a war, but is repairing the damage done by the Obama administration in enabling the mullahs in Tehran to act with impunity.

The president certainly doesn’t want a war, but he must correct the course set by the previous administration by attempting to restrain the Iranian regime, begin the laborious process of rebuilding the international coalition against the regime, cut off the flow of money funding its missile program and either hold the regime strictly accountable to the nuclear deal or force a better deal to be crafted.

In essence, President Trump is trying to get a do-over from the fumble made by the Obama administration and reset the terms of engaging with Iran to place issues such as ballistic missiles, human rights and terrorism back at the top of the agenda where they belonged in the first place.

It is an argument that has been made for years now by the Iranian opposition movement which warned that Iran would take advantage of the nuclear deal to rebuild its armed forces and fund its proxy war efforts rather than invest it back into the economy for the benefit of the Iranian people.

In hindsight, opposition leaders such as Mrs. Maryam Rajavi of the National Council of Resistance of Iran look almost prescient now in light of how the regime has acted in the two years since the deal was crafted.

For the regime, it must seem like they are trying to hold off the inevitable with the ever-rising tide of sanctions now being imposed almost daily.

This ultimately gives the Trump administration significant leverage to force back an expansionist Iran; leverage that the Obama administration never sought to use much to the dismay of the peoples of Syria, Yemen, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Michael Tomlinson

Iran Remains Top Global Sponsor of Terrorism

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Iran Remains Top Global Sponsor of Terrorism

In this picture taken on Friday Feb. 14, 2014, Hezbollah fighters hold flags as they attend the memorial of their slain leader Sheik Abbas al-Mousawi, who was killed by an Israeli airstrike in 1992, in Tefahta village, south Lebanon. Hezbollah says Israel carried out an airstrike targeting its positions in Lebanon near the border with Syria earlier this week, claiming it caused damage but no casualties. Hezbollah said the attack was near the eastern Lebanese village of Janta. It vowed to retaliate but said it will “choose the appropriate time and place.” (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)

Unsurprisingly, the U.S. State Department once again listed the Iranian regime in its annual Country Reports on Terrorism; keeping it atop a dubious list of countries involved in the sponsorship and support of terrorism.

The report based the designation on the regime’s continued support for terrorist proxies such as Hezbollah and its overall efforts to destabilize the Middle East as a whole as evidenced by its spurring of the Houthi rebellion in Yemen and its long support for the Assad regime in Syria, as well as the rapid growth of Shiite militias in Iraq involved in new rounds of sectarian warfare with Sunni tribes.

Iranian regime has been designated as a state sponsor of terrorism by the U.S. since 1984, making it one of the longest-running state sponsors of terror in the world. Iranian regime sits alone only next to Sudan and Syria as officially designated state sponsors in the annual report.

The report cited a wide range of activities the Iranian regime has undertaken to foster the spread of terror and violence:

“Iran used the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps‑Quds Force (IRGC-QF) to implement foreign policy goals, provide cover for intelligence operations, and create instability in the Middle East. Iran has acknowledged the involvement of the IRGC-QF in the conflicts in Iraq and Syria and the IRGC-QF is Iran’s primary mechanism for cultivating and supporting terrorists abroad,” the report said.

“In 2016, Iran supported various Iraqi Shia terrorist groups, including Kata’ib Hezbollah, as part of an effort to fight ISIS in Iraq and bolster the Assad regime in Syria. Iran views the Assad regime in Syria as a crucial ally and Syria and Iraq as crucial routes to supply weapons to Hezbollah, Iran’s primary terrorist partner. Iran has facilitated and coerced, through financial or residency enticements, primarily Shia fighters from Afghanistan and Pakistan to participate in the Assad regime’s brutal crackdown in Syria. Iranian-supported Shia militias in Iraq have committed serious human rights abuses against primarily Sunni civilians and Iranian forces have directly backed militia operations in Syria with armored vehicles, artillery, and drones,” the State Department added.

In another nod to the Iranian regime expanding its actions to destabilize the Gulf states, the report also detailed how “Iran has provided weapons, funding, and training to Bahraini militant Shia groups that have conducted attacks on the Bahraini security forces. On January 6, 2016, Bahraini security officials dismantled a terrorist cell, linked to IRGC-QF, planning to carry out a series of bombings throughout the country.”

And contrary to the repeated denials of regime officials and the Iran lobby, Iran has “remained unwilling to bring to justice senior al-Qa’ida (AQ) members it continued to detain and has refused to publicly identify the members in its custody. Since at least 2009, Iran has allowed AQ facilitators to operate a core facilitation pipeline through the country, enabling AQ to move funds and fighters to South Asia and Syria.”

The facilitation of terrorism from within its own Quds Forces and through external terror groups directly under Iran’s control such as Hezbollah, as well as others it has shielded such as Al-Qaeda and helped facilitate such as ISIS, points out the consistent lies perpetuated by the Iran lobby and regime supporters in maintaining that Iran’s government was locked in a power struggle with “moderate” elements.

There are no moderate elements within the regime’s government.

Supporting terror is a tool of statecraft for the Iranian regime and an important lever the mullahs in Tehran use frequently to advance their foreign policy goals.

This is also the reason why the Iran nuclear deal was never going to work in the first place since it did nothing to change the behavior of the mullahs. They remain as intent as ever on spreading their extremism, known as “Shia sphere” of influence and using violence to achieve it, which is why the Trump administration has moved on imposing additional sanctions even as it certifies the regime in compliance with the nuclear agreement.

The Iran lobby, especially advocates such as Trita Parsi of the National Iranian American Council, have shouted to the rooftops that Iran mullahs are acting in a moderate and open manner with respect to the nuclear agreement, but refuse to acknowledge the near-homicidal behavior of mullahs regarding terrorism and war.

There can be no clear approach to Iranian regime without recognizing the linkages that exist between the regime’s behavior on terror and human rights, as well as its approach to nuclear weapons development. The great flaw in the Obama administration’s approach to Iran was to treat these issues as separate and apart.

It’s a silly notion since one can no more divorce a substance abuser from one drug than he starts using another. For the Iranian regime, violence is its narcotic of choice and it is addicted to it in all facets of its society.

This explains why the Iranian regime reacted so violently to the continued run of new sanctions by the Trump administration which led its leaders to make some outrageous boasts and demands this week.

Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani, said on Wednesday that Iran would stand up to the U.S. and hit back with its own sanctions.

Meanwhile his foreign minister, Javad Zarif, took to CBS News to warn that the sanctions could jeopardize the nuclear deal; a curious position to take since President Trump seems intent on scrapping it in the first place.

Also on Wednesday, Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafari, head of Iranian regime’s Revolutionary Guard, warned the U.S. against imposing sanctions on the paramilitary group. He said the Guard’s missile program is not negotiable and hinted that new sanctions could put U.S. military bases in the region in danger.

“If the U.S. intends to pursue sanctions on the Guard, it should first disassemble its military bases within 1,000 kilometers, or 620 miles,” Jafari was quoted as saying by state TV, apparently referring to the range of Iranian missiles.

It was a not-too subtle threat against U.S. bases in Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain all of which ties back to the original point made in the State Department’s annual report: the Iranian regime can never be trusted.

Michael Tomlinson

Iran Regime Begins Threatening with Ballistic Missiles

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Iran Regime Begins Threatening with Ballistic Missiles

Iran Regime Begins Threatening with Ballistic Missiles

Just as the world saw North Korea ramp up its production of ballistic missiles and begin launching them with greater regularity, we have seen a similar scenario begin to play out with the Iranian regime’s own missile fleet.

For the mullahs in Tehran, their ballistic missile fleet represents their ace in the hole; a weapon platform that can reach faraway enemies, threaten its neighbors and provide the ultimate leverage by carrying nuclear or chemical warheads.

You don’t build a weapon system unless you are prepared to use it and the mullahs are prepared.

What distinguishes the Iranian regime from North Korea is that Iran has fired its missiles in anger, unleashing a salvo of missiles at targets in Syria that it claimed were ISIS strongholds.

With one action, the mullahs served notice they were more than willing to push the proverbial red button; a disturbing thought when one considers the regime’s extensive list of enemies which seems to grow longer by the day.

Besides its nemesis in the U.S., the regime has added Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait and Pakistan to its list, not to mention anyone following the Sunni, Christian, Jewish and any other faith you can think of.

Add to that the increasing range of its missile fleet and you can see how Iran is able to drop missiles on virtually anyone it thinks is a threat to the regime.

According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Iran possesses the “largest and most diverse missile arsenal in the Middle East” with literally thousands of short- and medium-range missiles stockpiled on mobile launchers and underground bunkers.

Maps overlaid with the range of its missiles, shows that Iran can strike targets as far away as India, China and Russia to the east and most of Europe and North Africa to the west.

It’s Shahab-3 missile has a range of over 2,000 km with a payload capacity heavy enough to accommodate a nuclear or chemical warhead of over 2,000 lb.

The Iranian regime has used this weapon system to hint strongly at the U.S. that its military bases in the Middle East are subject to being destroyed by Iran’s missiles; a not too subtle threat that raises the level of tensions in the region despite the reassurances of the Iran lobby.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps Commander Major General Mohammad Ali Jafari demanded Wednesday the U.S. withdraw all its military bases within 1,000 kilometers of Iran’s borders, a distance that encompasses most of the U.S.’s operations in the Middle East and Afghanistan, including massive bases in Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait.

The U.S. bases in the Persian Gulf are especially problematic for the Iranian regime since they present a direct challenge to the regime’s authority in what it considers its territorial waters and has often acted to threaten and imped international shipping through the Gulf; recently culminating in the detention of two American navy patrol boats and their crews.

Jafari made his threats because he is worried, as are all the mullahs, that the Trump administration is incrementally acting on its campaign promises to get tough on the Iranian regime and actively encourage regime change.

While the Obama administration, with the not so subtle direction and guidance of the Iran lobby, sought to keep various issues separate from the nuclear deal it negotiated including Iran’s missile fleet, the Trump administration is acting aggressively on those other fronts much to the consternation of the mullahs.

By levying new sanctions on Iran this week, as well as openly contemplating designating the IRGC as a foreign terrorist organization, President Trump is setting up a slow, methodical and thorough constricting of the regime’s finances and ability to export its brand of terrorism.

Trump is resetting the playing board to the conditions prior to the nuclear deal negotiations in which sanctions had crippled Iran and threatened to topple its regime leadership. The president is undoubtedly taking a course of action that can only lead to one goal which is regime change.

It is logical to assume that the U.S. would react violently and unilaterally should the Iranian regime use any of its missiles against U.S. personnel directly, which makes much of the threats by Jafari and other regime leaders empty and hollow.

On the border between Syria and Iraq, the U.S. already flexed its muscle when Navy jets attacked a convoy of Iranian-backed Shiite militia that were approaching a Syrian rebel base occupied with U.S. advisors. We can only imagine what would happen if Jafari were to lob a Shahab missile at a U.S. base in Afghanistan for example.

The mullahs in Tehran are reactionary, bellicose and even blood thirsty, but they are not crazy. They understand that their options are shrinking and Trump is only a few steps away from not certifying Iran in compliance with the nuclear agreement and triggering the 60-day review period for open debate in a Congress that has already shown bipartisan hostility to the regime.

From that point, it’s only a proforma matter before President Trump nullifies the Boeing deal, cuts off Iran’s access to U.S. currency markets and begins to penalize foreign businesses for investing in Iran.

In short order, the mullahs could find themselves back in 2009 where the economy was in shambles and an unpopular president was being met with massive street protests that rocked Tehran for days.

The recipe for regime change is well known and the mullahs are doing everything they can to avoid a repeat which is why they are so eager—or desperate—to threaten everyone with a rain of ballistic missiles.

Michael Tomlinson

Two Years of Appeasing Iran Regime Officially Ends

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Two Years of Appeasing Iran Regime Officially Ends

Two Years of Appeasing Iran Regime Officially Ends

Two years have passed since the Iran nuclear deal was agreed to by the U.S. and other nations and during that time virtually every promise made by the Iran lobby and the Obama administration about moderating the Iranian regime and improving the stability of the Middle East have fallen faster than Twitter’s stock price lately.

The practice of trying to appease the Iranian regime by conceding just about anything the mullahs wanted bought neither stability nor moderation. In fact, the opposite has occurred and places the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as it is more formally known, on par with the Munich Agreement with Adolf Hitler or the Treaty of Versailles in terms of effectiveness.

History has demonstrated over again that rewarding tyranny only invites more tyranny and in the case of the Iranian regime, it has been a textbook case of that lesson.

Thankfully that period of appeasement is finally at an end with passage of a sanctions bill approved by a 97-2 margin targeting Iran, North Korea and Russia and headed to President Donald Trump’s desk for signature.

The U.S. House passed the sanctions package Tuesday in a 419-3 vote, sending the legislation to the Senate. The White House has not definitively said that President Trump will sign the bill, but the measure won a veto-proof majority in both the House and Senate, which makes his approval moot.

At its core is the imposition of economic sanctions on Iran for its ballistic missile program which violates a United Nations Security Council resolution, as well as the JCPOA which prohibited Iran’s development of a ballistic launch system with intercontinental range.

That fact was put on display with the announcement by the Iranian regime of its launching of a satellite into orbit on a ballistic missile.

Iranian state media confirmed the launch of a Simorgh rocket which the Trump administration considers a violation of the JCPOA.

State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said the launch appeared to be related to Iran’s attempts to develop ballistic missiles, which is not covered under the nuclear deal but is a subject of protest and sanctioning by the U.S.

“We would consider that a violation of UNSCR 2231,” Nauert said at a briefing with reporters when asked about the launch. “We consider that to be continued ballistic missile development. … We believe that what happened overnight, in the early morning hours here in Washington, is inconsistent with the Security Council resolutions.”

The Simorgh is a two-stage rocket first revealed in 2010. It is larger than an earlier model known as the Safir that Iran has used to launch satellites on previous occasions.

The U.S. National Air and Space Intelligence Center said in a report released last month that the Simorgh could act as a test bed for developing the technologies needed to produce an intercontinental ballistic missile, or ICBM.

“Tehran’s desire to have a strategic counter to the United States could drive it to field an ICBM. Progress in Iran’s space program could shorten a pathway to an ICBM because space launch vehicles (SLV) use inherently similar technologies,” the report said.

Iran’s satellite-launch program falls under the responsibility of the defense ministry, which has denied that the space program is a cover for weapons development, but such denials are silly on its surface since Iran has no civilian space agency.

Clearly the regime is using the guise of “scientific development” to advance its ballistic missile capability, especially now that the mullahs see their advantages disappear under an energized Congress and president intent on rolling back gains made by Iran.

For the mullahs, it is clearly a race now for the regime to develop additional technologies necessary to complete a nuclear delivery system such as heat shields and targeting systems designed to allow a payload to re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere to strike at targets thousands of miles away.

The table is now set for President Trump to walk away from the nuclear deal and news media have reported that he has instructed aides to closely re-examine the deal and evaluate against the regime’s actions over the past two years.

While the Iran lobby was nearly apoplectic over the news, it could not ignore the real possibility that all its hard work in securing the deal is about to be erased like tracks across sand dunes swept away by wind.

Trita Parsi of the National Iranian American Council issued a typically hysterical statement claiming that the president’s call for expanded inspections of Iran’s military installations for nuclear violations was a pretext to war.

“Clearly, facts don’t matter to the Trump administration – their desire to start a war trumps everything. Now, his team appears to be putting his desires into action,” Parsi said.

We advise Parsi to take a Xanax and calm down since his protestations have always been proven false in the past and this latest one is no different.

The fact that the JCPOA excluded large segments of Iran’s military-industrial complex allowed the regime ample room to hide its nuclear activities and the fact that international inspectors are restricted from accessing sites and many sites they were allowed to visit were scrubbed clean of any evidence months in advance shows how wrong Parsi is and how correct the president is in seeking additional inspections.

The Iranian regime predictably reacted with false anger and vitriol at the developments, but could not ignore the fact that the JCPOA is not a treaty and President Trump has wide latitude to simply walk away from the agreement.

Laura Carnahan

Threat of Iran Sanctions Drives Iran Lobby and Regime Crazy

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Threat of Iran Sanctions Drives Iran Lobby and Regime Crazy

Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) speaks with reporters about the withdrawn Republican health care bill on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., July 18, 2017. REUTERS/Aaron P. Bernstein

It’s all but a done deal. House and Senate negotiators reached agreement according to news reports on Wednesday to get sanctions legislation against Iran, Russia and North Korea through the Senate without further amendments; avoiding needing another House vote.

“Following very productive discussions with [House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy], I am glad to announce that we have reached an agreement that will allow us to send sanctions legislation to the president’s desk,” said Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “The Senate will move to approve the Iran and Russia sanctions it originally passed six weeks ago, as well as the North Korea sanctions developed by the House.”

Votes in both houses of Congress up to this point have been lopsided, bipartisan affairs as Democrats joined with Republicans in a rare show of unity on confronting the three nations in question.

Both sides agreed on the need to take further action against North Korea even as the rogue nation has ramped up launches of ballistic missiles with ranges reaching the continental U.S.

The speed with which the sanctions legislation is moving through Congress demonstrates sharply how the landscape has changed over the last two years since the Iran nuclear deal went into effect.

The Iranian regime’s provocative actions in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Pakistan, Bahrain and Kuwait have aptly shown the world how an unrestrained regime will act. It has also proven false the narrative used by the Iran lobby that by approving the nuclear deal, moderate elements in Iran would be empowered to take a leading role there.

Clearly, the truth has been shown that there are no moderate elements in Iran’s government.

But that hasn’t stopped the Iran lobby from trying to stop this speeding train from running over the mullahs in Tehran as evidenced by the latest editorial by Jamal Abdi of NIAC Action in The Hill.

Abdi tries to make the argument that in their rush to punish Russia, Democrats are allowing President Trump to dismantle the Iran nuclear deal.

“While Democrats may score a victory on Russia, they may be setting the stage for turning Trump into a wartime president. And if that happens, few will remember the Democrats as the party that sanctioned Russia. Instead they will remember when Democrats acquiesced to, and even encouraged, Trump’s push towards war with Iran,” Abdi said.

There is little doubt that Abdi’s words are not only ineffectual, but largely being ignored on Capitol Hill; demonstrating how far the Iran lobby has fallen in its effectiveness and ability to set the national debate.

Long gone are the days of the vaunted “echo chamber” banging the PR drum loudly in support of the mullahs; only replaced by vivid images of multiple missile launches, Iranian navy ships speeding at American warships, and wide swathes of destruction in Syria and Yemen at the hands of Iranian troops.

The inability of the Iran lobby to offer any policy whatsoever calling for any reform or restrictions to the Iranian regime’s behavior is fueling the belief that the Iran lobby can offer no more solutions.

The most recent hostage-taking by Iran of a Chinese-American researcher from Princeton University and the 10-year anniversary of the arrest of former FBI agent Robert Levinson who is still being held in Iran only reinforced the perception that the regime was lawless and recalcitrant.

The recent death of North Korean-hostage Otto Warmbier only reinforced the urgent necessity of getting American captives out of Iran and has become a focal point for President Trump as he demanded the release of several other Americans being held in Iran.

Typically, Reza Marashi of the National Iranian American Council, proposed another hostage swap, taking a page from the Obama administrations appeasement policies, and echoing demands from Iran’s leadership for the U.S. to release Iranians convicted of smuggling nuclear technology to Iran.

For President Trump, his ultimate leverage may be the very nuclear deal the Iran lobby is trying desperately to save. Even though the flawed deal served up all of the freebies and goodies for the Iranian regime in the beginning, it does represent the last fig leaf covering up the ugliness of the Iranian regime’s actions under the guise of “compliance.”

Without it, the regime would have no political cover and would become a pariah nation again so the president’s warnings in a recent interview with the Wall Street Journal that he may ultimately find the Iranian regime “noncompliant” with the deal could prove a key turning point for his administration.

The regime’s leadership responded with characteristic bravado as Hassan Rouhani vowed a “reciprocal” response should U.S. sanctions pass.

Rouhani said his country would “take any action that is necessary for the country’s expedience and interests” should the sanctions go into effect, according to The Associated Press.

“If the enemy breaches parts of the deal, we will breach parts of it,” the Iranian president added. “If they breach the entire deal, we will breach it in its entirety.”

The threats seem pointless at this time since whatever restrictive effects the deal purportedly had have been largely bypassed with Iran’s ability to keep its entire nuclear refining capacity and aggressive expansion of its ballistic missile program.

For the mullahs, they have already milked that deal dry and walking away from it would probably cause them little to no discomfort.