Iran Lobby

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

Iranian Regime Delivers Nowruz Message of Hostility

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Iranian Regime Delivers Nowruz Message of Hostility

Iranian Regime Delivers Nowruz Message of Hostility

This weekend marks the start of Nowruz, the Persian New Year, which coincides with the spring equinox and includes many traditions such as a spring cleaning of one’s home, visiting with family and friends and feasting. It is regarded as the most important holiday in Iran and is always a prime opportunity for the Iranian regime to make a strategic and public point each year.

This year, top mullah Ali Khamenei did not disappoint in delivering a Nowruz message that could be considered an annual laundry list of grievances and perceived slights against the regime by the U.S. and was a reminder of just how ridiculous the Iran lobby’s contentions were of spurring a new “moderate” Iran after the nuclear deal.

Khamenei on Sunday said sanctions continue to bite the country’s economy, and again warned against trusting the U.S. — further indicating that the nuclear deal has not changed the mullah’s behavior towards West.

“They removed the sanctions in paper only,” Khamenei said in a televised address. “We don’t have any problem with the American people. What we are dealing with here is the politicians. They are the enemies.”

Khamenei’s remarks came after President Obama delivered his own Nowruz message to the Iranian people with his hopes for a more peaceful future. It obviously fell on the deaf ears of Khamenei.

“In Western countries and places which are under U.S. influence, our banking transactions and the repatriation of our funds from their banks face problems … because (banks) fear the Americans,” he said.

“The U.S. Treasury … acts in such a way that big corporations, big institutions and big banks do not dare to come and deal with Iran,” Khamenei added. The Central Bank of Iran has also said remaining U.S. sanctions have scared off European firms.

To drive the point home, the stage on which Khamenei sat carried a giant banner reading “the year of the Resistance Economy: Action and Implementation”, his chosen slogan for the Iranian year 1395 that began on Sunday. The banner was a not-too-subtle declaration of how the mullahs view the relationship the regime will have in the upcoming year with the rest of the world and it isn’t one of moderation.

“The candidates for the American presidency have competed to vilify Iran in their speeches, and this is a sign of hostility,” he added as he portrayed all of the candidates running for office as enemies of the regime.

Khamenei’s comments come also following an announcement that the regime’s Revolutionary Guard intends to build a statue commemorating the capture of ten U.S. sailors by the regime.

“There are very many photographs of the major incident of arresting US Marines in the Persian Gulf in the media and we intend to build a symbol out of them inside one of our naval monuments,” said Ali Fadavi, the head of the Guard’s naval forces in comments made to Iran’s Defense Press news agency.

It is expected the statue will built on Kharg, a small Iranian island in the Persian Gulf close to where the servicemen were captured, the Telegraph reported.

The regime never seems to miss an opportunity to publicly troll the U.S. and announce its antagonism and vitriol with almost child-like glee. It is a remarkable affirmation of how incredibly silly the Iran lobby’s positions on moderating Iran have been over the past several years.

Another example of that hypocrisy came in the form of an editorial published by the National Iranian American Council discussing Ahmed Shaheed, the UN special rapporteur for human rights in Iran, in which Shervin Vahedi lauded his most recent report criticizing the regime for brutal human rights abuses as somehow showing it was making clear progress towards improvements.

Vahedi bases those comments on a lone section discussing how the regime’s Supreme Court signaled it might take up the issue of executing citizens over drug-related offenses since the bulk of executions are said to be for similar offenses.

What Vahedi – and the most of the Iran lobby – ignore is how the regime uses trumped up drug offenses as a convenient means of executing and eliminating political dissidents, religious minorities and anyone else that opposes their rule.

Vahedi also reiterates much of what Shaheed has already cited in terms of the abuses and crackdowns aimed at journalists and artists, but does not make any comment condemning the abuses, nor calling for changes in Iran’s policies or in the regime’s leadership.

He only gives a limp and half-hearted endorsement from NIAC of continuing Shaheed’s mandate. You can almost imagine how difficult it was for the NIAC to utter even that small concession in the face of such overwhelming evidence.

For many languishing in the regime’s prisons, this is not a happy Nowruz for them or their families. The NIAC would do better to acknowledge their suffering and call for an end to it.

By Michael Tomlinson

Iranian Regime “Moderates” Get More Ballistic Missile Launches

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Iranian Regime “Moderates” Get More Ballistic Missile Launches

Iranian Regime “Moderates” Get More Ballistic Missile Launches

Fulfilling vows the mullahs made to continue developing its ballistic missile program despite threats of new sanctions, the Iranian regime test-fired several ballistic missiles on Tuesday aimed at showing the regime’s “deterrent power” and “all-out readiness to counter any threat,” according to the official Islamic Republic News Agency.

The launches were carried out by the Revolutionary Guard Corps with surface-to-surface missiles fired from silos in central Iran and hit targets 435 miles away, according to the semiofficial Fars news agency.

These were the first tests since the U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions in January on 11 Iranian entities with alleged links to Tehran’s ballistic missile program, citing the “significant threat” the weapons posed to regional and global security. Iran last tested its missiles in October and November, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The Obama administration was understandably low-key in its response, taking pains to reiterate how it did not see that the test launches violated the recently approved nuclear agreement, but might be in violation of existing United Nations Security Council resolutions banning the development of nuclear-capable ballistic missiles.

“To be very clear, such tests are not a violation of the JCPOA,” a senior Obama administration official said. “That said, there are strong indications that the test is inconsistent with U.N. Security Council Resolution 2231. If confirmed, we intend to raise the matter in the U.N. Security Council. We will also encourage a serious review of the incident and press for an appropriate response.”

Iranian regime officials have said its recent tests don’t violate international accords, and that the weapons are merely for defense. Hassan Rouhani ordered the missiles’ development to be expedited in December, amid the prospect of new U.S. sanctions and in clear defiance of existing prohibitions.

The absurdity of the nuclear deal into stark relief when we now see the folly of unlinking various issues such as ballistic missile development, proxy wars and human rights violations from the principle agreement, in which the regime is now freed of any potential leverage that could be used against it.

In a move that eerily imitates how North Korea ignored international agreements and sanctions, the Iranian regime threatened its willingness to walk away from the nuclear deal it so desperately sought now that is has secured a lifting of economic and gained access to $150 billion in frozen assets around the world.

“If our interests are not met under the nuclear deal, there will be no reason for us to continue,” Abbas Araqchi, Iran’s deputy foreign minister, warned during remarks delivered to a group of Iranian officials in Tehran.

“If other parties decide, they could easily violate the deal,” Araqchi was quoted as saying by Iran’s state-controlled media. “However, they know this will come with costs.”

Araqchi appeared to allude to the United States possibly leveling new economic sanctions as a result of the missile test, according to the Washington Free Beacon.

The reaction from Capitol Hill was swift and urgent.

“The administration’s response to Iran’s new salvo of threatening missile tests in violation of international law cannot once again be, it’s ‘not supposed to be doing that,’” Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.) said in a statement. “Now is the time for new crippling sanctions against Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Ministry of Defense, Aerospace Industries Organization, and other related entities driving the Iranian ballistic missile program.”

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.) warned that the nuclear agreement has done little to moderate the regime’s rogue behavior.

“Far from pushing Iran to a more moderate engagement with its neighbors, this nuclear deal is enabling Iran’s aggression and terrorist activities,” McCarthy said in a statement. “Sanctions relief is fueling Iran’s proxies from Yemen to Iraq to Syria to Lebanon. Meanwhile, Khamenei and the Iranian regime are acting with impunity because they know President Obama will not hold them accountable and risk the public destruction of his nuclear deal, the cornerstone of the president’s foreign policy legacy.”

McCarthy went on to demand that the Obama administration step forward with new sanctions as punishment for the missile test.

House Speaker Paul Ryan said on Tuesday that lawmakers would continue to press for new sanctions against Tehran “until the regime ends its violent, provocative behavior against the U.S. and our allies.”

In another sign that the regime has no interest in real moderation in the government, in spite of how the Iran lobby characterized the election results, top mullah Ali Khamenei appointed close ally Ebrahim Raeisi, the 55-year-old national prosecutor-general, as the new chairman of Astan Quds Razavi, the foundation that manages the shrine of Imam Reza in Mashhad.

Raeisi is a close ally of Khamenei, and his appointment will strengthen links between the leader’s office and the shrine, whose annual turnover – based on endowments, property and companies – is many billions of dollars slated for Khamenei’s private coffers.

Raeisi, who holds the clerical rank of hojjatoleslam, is a different character, according to a story by The Guardian. At last year’s 36th anniversary of the taking of the embassy hostages, which featured criticism of the Rouhani administration as well as denunciations of the United States as the “Great Satan”, Raeisi announced that the intelligence and security forces had “identified and cracked down on a network of penetration in media and cyberspace, and detained spies and writers hired by Americans.”

Raeisi, reportedly defended the amputation of the hands of thieves, also at the time of the 1988 executions of 3,000-5,000 political prisoners and dissidents ordered by then leader Khomenei, Raeisi was deputy prosecutor in Tehran, a role he had held since 1984-5 where he played a key role in the massacre.

These are the faces controlling Iran and it does not bode well for future prospects for peace.

By Michael Tomlinson

Being an Iranian Regime Friend Still Gets You Executed

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Being an Iranian Regime Friend Still Gets You Executed

Being an Iranian Regime Friend Still Gets You Executed

You have to say this about the mullahs’ justice system in Iran; it sure hands out the death penalty swiftly.

An Iranian court has sentenced a well-known tycoon to death for corruption linked to oil sales during the rule of former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a judiciary spokesman said Sunday.

Babak Zanjani and two of his associates were sentenced to death for “money laundering,” among other charges, Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejehi said in brief remarks broadcast on regime TV. He did not identify the two associates. Previous state media reports have said the three were charged with forgery and fraud.

“The court has recognized the three defendants as ‘corruptors on earth’ and sentenced them to death,” said Ejehi. “Corruptors on earth” is an Islamic term referring to crimes that are punishable by death because they have a major impact on society. The verdict, which came after a nearly five-month trial, can be appealed.

Zanjani is one of Iran’s wealthiest businessmen, with a fortune worth an estimated $14 billion, much of made from the illicit sale of petroleum in violation of economic sanctions imposed over Iran’s nuclear program, which ironically has been lifted because of the agreement reached last year.

Zanjani’s plight mirrors one of the peculiar aspects of the Iranian regime which is you are kept alive as long as you are useful to the regime and when your utility ceases, you often meet an ignominious end.

In Zanjani’s case, it was useful to the mullahs to have middlemen who could evade and skirt international sanctions to sell black market oil and steer the profits back into the regime’s coffers and the bank accounts of regime families and members of the Revolutionary Guard, but Zanjani also built a vast personal fortune from these acts and with the lifting of the economic sanctions and the opening of relations with the rest of the world, he ceased to be useful as a smuggler.

Now Zanjani and his associates can serve a more useful purpose by being examples of regime justice in combatting corruption that has been allowed to run rampant throughout all sectors of Iran’s economy and government. His sentencing permits Hassan Rouhani to project an image of justice and provides a convenient scapegoat as ordinary Iranians have chafed under severe economic hardship under mullahs.

Authorities said the death sentence could be reversed if Zanjani repays the pilfered proceeds. Zanjani’s lawyer has protested that a bank has refused to accept Zanjani’s offer of payments, according to reports from Tehran.

Zanjani has 20 days to appeal the sentence, authorities said.

Authorities here have prosecuted other instances of corruption, but death sentences in such cases are relatively rare.

The severity of the punishment suggests that the case is viewed in part as a warning to other entrepreneurs as Iran’s economy opens up in the post-sanctions era. Many investors here are anticipating a bonanza as international funds pour into the country.

Zanjani’s death sentence is stern reminder to eager entrepreneurs not to get out in front of the regime’s interests and remember the mullahs are very much still in charge.

It is also a harsh reminder that even though Western media lauded the “moderate” wins in Iran’s parliamentary elections, the apparatus of government, including the judiciary, is still firmly in control of the mullahs in dispensing medieval punishment.

“The political system in Iran’s a joke,” said U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), adding that the significance of the moderates’ sweep in Tehran and other apparent wins across the country counts for “zero, zip.”

“There are no moderates in Iran,” Graham added. “That’s a fiction I don’t buy.”

“As long as the Ayatollah Khamenei is in charge, it doesn’t matter, the elections,” said Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.), another vocal opponent of the nuclear deal.

“I wouldn’t call the people who swept ‘moderates,’” added Sen. James Risch (R-Idaho). “The election shows no change.”

Iran has hardly acted like a saint since the deal was signed last July. The pact’s opponents are quick to point to recent ballistic missile tests and the detention of U.S. soldiers as part of the deal’s legacy.

“In many ways, the list of regime-approved candidates told us more about Iran’s intentions than the election results,” said Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), who called himself “deeply skeptical” that the moderates’ wins would bring about any progress.

Those views were shared in a scathing editorial by the Boston Herald, which said:

“This is a mistake. There is nothing moderate or reforming about Rouhani — or his new troops.

“These terms do not apply to a man who vigorously backs the Islamic Republic created in the 1979 revolution. He does not oppose his country’s support for Syrian dictator Bashar Assad, both with Iranian troops and those of its client the Hezbollah terrorist group.

“Rouhani has done nothing to reform a regime that holds hundreds of political — and religious — prisoners. The death penalty can still be given to homosexuals and adulterers. Amnesty International said last year Iran executed 694 prisoners in the six months ending last August, a startling bloodthirstiness that makes the rate of executions, in proportion to population, about 200 times what it is in the United States (where executions have been generally declining for 16 years).

“The candidates Rouhani endorsed included two former intelligence officials who murdered dissidents and another who called for the execution of leaders of the 2009 protests against a rigged election, said Jonathan Tobin of Commentary magazine.”

The Herald has joined the growing chorus of news media growing skeptical of any real reform coming out of Iran’s elections and has grown wary of the false promises offered up by Iran lobby supporters such as the National Iranian American Council in defense of election results.

We can only hope that skepticism spreads to the remaining presidential candidates on both sides of the aisle.

By Michael Tomlinson

March to Iran Moderation Paved with Human Rights Cruelty

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March to Iran Moderation Paved with Human Rights Cruelty

March to Iran Moderation Paved with Human Rights Cruelty

In a short period of time, the Obama administration has boasted of diplomatic rapprochements with Russia, Cuba and now the Iranian regime in a dizzying display of gymnastic statecraft worthy of Olympic gold. In each case, totalitarian regimes that have historically been in the diplomatic doghouse as sponsors of terrorism and human rights violators are now on the receiving end of financial largess and formalized diplomatic relations.

It is an odd reversal that has been made all-the stranger with the rapturous media coverage of the just completed parliamentary elections in Iran in which the assertion has been repeatedly made that “moderates” and “reformists” marched to victory and have set the stage for a dramatic turnaround in the regime’s future.

That is about as likely as Donald Trump mellowing out on the presidential campaign trail.

Many are starting to puncture the balloon of moderation hopes flowing from these elections, such as Victoria Coates, author of “David’s Sling: A History of Democracy in Ten Works of Art” and the senior advisor for foreign policy to Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz. Writing in the Washington Times, she said:

“As much as I hate to be a skunk at the garden party, this election was no cause for celebration. The Council of Experts purged any real reformists from the rolls of candidates in January. About half the candidates for parliament were dropped, along with three-quarters for the Council, including all women. What remained were the candidates who are, each and every one of them, acceptable to the Ayatollah Khamenei. It is barely short of delusional, for example, to suggest that the election to the Council of former President Akbar Rafsanjani, who insisted just last July that Israel should be wiped off the map, or current President Hasan Rouhani, who has presided over the most brutal spike in executions in the world during his administration, will result in any sort of meaningful reform to Iran’s foreign or domestic policy.”

“We must not let our natural—and laudable—hopes for liberalization in Iran blind us to what is really happening. Have we already forgotten that just six weeks ago ten American sailors were on their knees with Iranian guns pointed at their heads? This election was nothing more or less than another carefully choreographed and controlled exercise in perpetuating the status quo in Iran, made all the more necessary by the prospect of a high-level transition of power,” Coates adds. “History teaches us the hard lesson that political freedom neither inevitable nor imperishable. But just because democracy isn’t really springing up in Tehran doesn’t mean there is no hope for it.”

Another voice of criticism comes from Iranian human rights lawyer and Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi, who fled Iran and now lives in exile in London, who spoke to Mother Jones magazine on the situation within the regime, especially the vetting process for candidates:

“The people are fed up with corruption and embezzlement. They object to censorship. The first thing that the people of Iran want is free elections. The government of Iran claims that every two years there are elections. But none of them are free. The competence of the people who have been nominated first has to be approved by the Guardian Council. It is a vetting process, and only then can Iranians elect these people. Yet the members of the Guardian Council are not elected by the people. They have been appointed by the leader [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei]. Any person who has the slightest criticism will not be approved. Over 40 percent of the people who have been nominated have not been approved,” she said.

Ebadi also took to task the regime’s policies in Syria and Yemen which have yielded two large proxy wars that have killed thousands and displaced millions of refugees.

“The role of Iran has been very destructive. As an Iranian, I apologize to the civilian people of Syria who have been killed as a result of the useless intervention of Iran in Syria. It was with the aid of government Iran that the Houthis in Yemen were able to capture Sana’a. It is totally unacceptable for a government to interfere in the internal affairs of another government and send aid, money, and weapons, to the people who are against a certain regime in another country,” she said.

Her and Coates’s words were echoed by Ilan Berman, vice president of the American Foreign Policy Council, writing in a column for USA Today.

“The ranks of those ultimately selected to populate the 290 seats of the majles and the 88 seats of the Assembly of Experts are filled with more than a few radicals. They include former Intelligence Ministers Ghorbanali Dorri-Najafabadi and Mohammad Reyshahri, both of whom are widely suspected of perpetrating murders and disappearances during their times in office, and Ali Razini, the chief prosecutor of Iran’s Revolutionary Court, which supervises all political executions in the Islamic Republic. A string of other, lesser known candidates nonetheless have similarly hardline pedigrees,” Berman writes.

“Their inclusion isn’t an accident. It is, rather, an inevitable function of the political horse-trading that took place ahead of the polls, as the various “lists” of candidates scrambled to put together a winning ticket after the mass exclusion of real progressives. As a result, many of Iran’s hardliners have just been given a new lease on political life, albeit under a different ideological moniker,” he adds.

Adam Kredo, writing in the Free Beacon, noted more of the so-called “moderates” elected who are in fact some of the worst violators of human rights in Iran, including:

  • Ali Movahedi-Kermani, a radical Iranian cleric, also received support from Iran’s moderate factions. He has threatened to “trample upon America,” as well as bombS. and Israeli interests;
  • Mohammed Emami-Kashani, another radical cleric who won a seat on the assembly with the backing of moderates, has blamed the U.S. and Israel for creating al Qaeda;
  • Other election winners backed by reformists include Ayatollah Yousef Tabatabaeenejad, a religious radical who has called on civilians to use violence in order to enforce strict dress codes for women.

Kredo noted that other so-called reformist winners also have a history of calling for the destruction of Israel and America and reportedly sponsored attacks on political dissidents; one of whom Kredo quoted from.

Maryam Rajavi, president-elect of the coalition National Council of Resistance of Iran, whose main group is the MEK (PMOI), said that candidates were carefully screened to ensure their allegiance to Khamenei’s hardline camp.

“A glance at the list of candidates presented by the regime’s various factions leaves no doubt that the choice was merely between different factions responsible for suppression, execution, exporting terrorism, warmongering, and plundering the Iranian people’s wealth,” Rajavi said in a statement following the election.

By Michael Tomlinson

Who Are These So-Called “Moderates” in Iran Elections?

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Who Are These So-Called “Moderates” in Iran Elections?

Who Are These So-Called “Moderates” in Iran Elections?

The New York Times, among other news outlets, trumpeted the election results from Iran with great fanfare announcing “strong” gains by moderates and reformists in this weekend’s parliamentary elections. Predictably, the spin revolved around the notion that this was a step in the right direction towards a more moderate future in Iran.

“Though hard-liners still control the most powerful positions and institutions of the state, two national elections last week appeared to build on the slow but unmistakable evolution toward a more moderate political landscape — now and into the future,” wrote Thomas Erdbrink in the Times. “While the hard-liners still remain firmly in control of the judiciary, the security forces and much of the economy, the success of the moderate, pragmatic and pro-government forces seemed to give Mr. Rouhani political currency to push a course of greater liberalization of the economy at home and accommodation abroad.”

What Erdbrink and most other Western journalists miss is the simple fact that the mullahs in control of the regime – virtually all of the important sectors of power as Erdbrink notes – have allowed a smattering of candidates to run that can appear “moderate” when compared to the more vocal conservatives in power, but in fact all share the same loyalty to the aims of the Islamic state.

Revolution and regime change are not coming anytime soon to Iran under these mullahs no matter what rosy picture some media wish to paint.

What is even more amusing is that all the celebration is focused on the election of a small minority dubbed “moderates” in the lower house parliament, but in the 88-member Assembly of Experts, over three-quarters of the original candidates seeking to run were swept off the ballot before voting even began, leaving only hardcore supporters of top mullah Ali Khamenei to win seats.

As to whom actually won, the Wall Street Journal editorial board took a closer look at the winners and found them less than “moderate” and downright unsavory.

  • Mostafa Kavakebian. The General Secretary of Iran’s Democratic Party, Mr. Kavakebian is projected to enter the Majlis as a member for Tehran. In a 2008 speech he said: “The people who currently reside in Israel aren’t humans, and this region is comprised of a group of soldiers and occupiers who openly wage war on the people.”
  • Another moderate is Kazem Jalali, who previously served as the spokesman for the National Security and Foreign Affairs Committee of the Majlis and is projected to have won a seat. In 2011 Mr. Jalali said his committee “demands the harshest punishment”—meaning the death penalty—for Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, the two leaders of the Green Movement that was bloodily suppressed after stolen elections in 2009. Those two leaders are still under house arrest.

According to the Journal, as for new Assembly of Experts, many of the “moderates” projected to have won seats were also listed on the hard-liners’ lists, since the ratio of candidates to seats was well below two, including:

  • Mohammad Reyshahry, a former Intelligence Minister believed to have helped spearhead the 1988 summary execution of thousands of leftists;
  • Ghorbanali Dorri-Najafabadi, another former Intelligence Minister believed to have directed the “chain murders” of the late 1990s; and
  • Ayatollah Yousef Tabatabainejad, a fierce opponent of women’s rights who has called Israel “a cancerous tumor.”

That seems like quite a slate of “moderate” new faces that got elected. Maybe Trita Parsi and Reza Marashi from the National Iranian American Council, can fly over and have lunch with these moderates, unless they are worried they might be arrested like their fellow Iran lobby supporter Siamak Namazi who now languishes in an regime prison.

“The political reality in Iran is that the Ayatollahs, backed by the Revolutionary Guards, remain firmly in control,” the Journal correctly points out.

The funny thing about the parade of optimistic and sunny news headlines is how they eerily echo the same notes of hope that came in the wake of the nuclear agreement only to be followed by grimmer headlines of illegal ballistic missile tests, detaining of American sailors, rocket launches at U.S. and French navy warships, recruiting Russia to fight in Syria and the largest refugee crisis since World War II.

Even as regime supporters laud these “moderate” wins, shocking news came of a village in southern Iran of a heinous incident announced by Shahindokht Molaverdi, the ironically named vice president for women and family affairs.

“We have a village in Sistan and Baluchestan province where every single man has been executed,” she said, without naming the place or clarifying whether the executions took place at the same time or over a longer period. “Their children are potential drug traffickers as they would want to seek revenge and provide money for their families. There is no support for these people.”

Maya Foa, from the anti-death penalty campaigning group Reprieve, said: “The apparent hanging of every man in one Iranian village demonstrates the astonishing scale of Iran’s execution spree. These executions — often based on juvenile arrests, torture, and unfair or nonexistent trials — show total contempt for the rule of law, and it is shameful that the UN and its funders are supporting the police forces responsible.”

Amnesty is particularly concerned about Iran’s execution of juveniles. In a report published in January, the group said Iran had carried out 73 executions of juvenile offenders between 2005 and 2015.

Sistan and Baluchestan, where the unnamed village is situated, “is arguably the most underdeveloped region in Iran, with the highest poverty, infant and child mortality rates, and lowest life expectancy and literacy rates in the country,” according to Ahmed Shaheed, the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran. “The province … experiences a high rate of executions for drug-related offences or crimes deemed to constitute ‘enmity against God’ in the absence of fair trials.”

Even as the Iran lobby celebrates these wins, an Iranian village has seen all the men in it killed indiscriminately by these same “moderates.”

By Laura Carnahan

Iranian Regime Use Boogeyman of Great Satan to Control Elections

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Iranian Regime Use Boogeyman of Great Satan to Control Elections

Iranian Regime Use Boogeyman of Great Satan to Control Elections

As parliamentary elections for the Iranian regime approaches, the regime continue their verbal drumbeat blaming the U.S., Great Britain and anyone else not named “Iran” for meddling in the elections. The latest verbal volley came from Hassan Firouzabadi, the chief of staff of the regime’s armed forces, who accused the U.S. and Great Britain of meddling by campaign for and against certain candidates.

“Such interference is [part of] aggressive strategies adopted by the US and Britain toward the Iranian nation, and the country’s officials should not underestimate it,” Firouzabadi said on Saturday.

He added that the “impudent” move by arrogant powers, including the U.S. and Britain, would provoke the wrath of the “revolutionary” Iranian nation.

Of course the good general neglected to mention any specific examples of meddling in his diatribe, but that is par for the course for the regime to hurl invective without any evidence, proof or backing. The truth is that there is no meddling going on or intrusive acts, especially from an Obama administration which seems intent on appeasing the mullahs in any way imaginable.

A compliant and friendly U.S. government though doesn’t fit the Islamic revolutionary beliefs held near and dear to the mullahs as their means of oppressing the Iranian people in what top mullah Ali Khamenei affectionately calls the “resistance economy;” an economy designed to keep Iranians struggling, impoverished and dependent on the regime for subsidized fuel, food and medicine.

It serves the regime’s purposes to keep blaming the U.S. and rest of the West for all the ills that have befallen Iran, especially during the time of economic sanctions, but since those have been lifted as part of the nuclear deal negotiated last summer, the mullahs are caught in the bind of having to explain to the Iranian people why things – like the economy – remain so bad under their stewardship.

For the mullahs, continued scapegoating of the U.S. is about the only excuse they have left to divert blame away from their own corruption, incompetence and mismanagement. It is also the strategy the Iran lobby follows in turning every issue into a blame game against the poor mullahs of Tehran.

All of which is a behavior that is only reinforced when the Obama administration fails to stand up aggressively to the regime’s misbehavior, thereby engendering even more egregious acts by the Iranian regime.

Case in point is the letter sent from Iranian general Mohsen Rezaei to Hassan Rouhani in which he detailed how to force even more concessions from the U.S. by aggressively building longer-range ballistic missiles.

The letter follows the capturing of U.S. sailors, the firing rockets near a U.S. carrier, and the flying of drones over U.S. and French carriers and it claims the U.S. only was willing to make a nuclear deal because Tehran aggressively pursued a renegade nuclear bomb program that violated UN sanctions.

“Just as Iran’s success in developing 20,000 centrifuges was a slap in the face of the United States and forced the Americans to come to the negotiating table and recognize our right to enrich uranium, I am hoping that with your support, the range of Iran’s missiles will exceed 5,000 kilometers [3,106 miles],” Rezaei wrote Rouhani.

The expanded reach of the missiles would threaten the U.S. and its allies by putting American military installations and Europe within range of an Iranian missile, which currently can only travel 2,000 kilometers.

If the regime were to develop a longer-range missile, no doubt using technology already developed and tested by North Korea, it would pose a significant threat to most of Europe and Asia. Not surprisingly, the Obama administration has been largely silent and the Iran lobby has been deaf and mute on these latest provocations.

North Korea is an interesting case study, since the efforts to rein in that rogue nation’s nuclear program through international monitoring – similar to the deal reached with the Iranian regime – has been an utter failure and has only allowed the North Koreans to assemble a small arsenal of nuclear warheads, but also develop intercontinental ballistic missile capability which it has been eager to sell to Iran for hard currency; of which the mullahs are swimming in $100 billion of it courtesy of the nuclear deal.

All of which is fueling a wild new arms race throughout the Middle East as the Iranian regime’s neighbors worry – and rightly so – about the mullahs intentions. Support of proxy wars in Syria, Yemen and Iraq has not bred much confidence in Iran’s neighbors, nor has an $8 billion shopping spree in Moscow for advanced weapons.

Escalating conflicts driving Middle Eastern nations to buy more weapons include conflicts in Libya, Yemen, Syria and Iraq, along with violence in Egypt and Turkey, says Ken Pollack, a senior fellow researching the Middle East at the Brookings Institution.

“We are seeing a region on fire,” Pollack says. “A lot of countries feel the need to increase their military capabilities to intervene in those conflicts or to fend off rivals.”

Pollack says the top rivalry in the region “consuming ammunition” is between Iran and Saudi Arabia and their allies, especially in Yemen where Tehran is backing the Houthi opposition to the Saudi-supported government. Iran is also supporting embattled Syrian President Bashar Assad while Saudi Arabia is sending weapons to groups opposing his government, but Pollack says the two nations appear to be vying for influence through other proxy wars in the region.

As long as the Iranian regime is allowed to continue the fantasy of blaming its ills on others such as the U.S., the longer the mullahs will feel safe in continuing on their path of destruction and oppression.

By Michael Tomlinson

Human Rights Remain Under Assault by Iranian Regime

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Human Rights Remain Under Assault by Iranian Regime

Human Rights Remain Under Assault by Iranian Regime

Next week the Iranian regime will conduct parliamentary elections that most news media and analysts have already called rigged because of the customary elimination of over two-thirds of the candidates seeking seats in the lower parliament and the more powerful Assembly of Experts.

The regime’s Guardian Council, with its handpicked members by top mullah Ali Khamenei, exercised their usual due diligence in removing any candidate that even had a hint of moderation or deviation from the Islamic revolutionary principles that guide the regime.

What is left are only those candidates that pledge religious, ideological and political fealty to the mullahs that run the regime and hold sway over virtually all facets of life in Iran.

This winnowing process empowers the mullahs and allows them the freedom and discretion to continue the unabated crackdown on human rights in advance of the elections with no cause for worry or recrimination from the international community, but there are news accounts that leak out depicting the brutality being visited on ordinary Iranians – often smuggled out by members of the dissident community at great personal risk.

One of those moving accounts was published in Quartz online in a photo essay by a photographer who spent four years researching women and girls being held in Iranian prisons, many awaiting death sentences.

“My main goal in this project was to understand how young girls could end up in jail in the first place,” the prizewinning photographer tells Quartz. “I spent time talking to them, they were nice and kind.”

In Iran, the death penalty can be applied to minors, and in 2014, a United Nations report estimated that at least 160 juvenile offenders were on death row in the country.

While according to a Jan. 25 report by Amnesty International, 73 juvenile offenders were executed in Iran between 2005 and 2015.

The compelling photos paint a grim portrait of a regime willing to kill young girls, often for crimes committed by male acquaintances who escape punishment, leaving it to the girls to pay the ultimate price in their stead.

It’s a situation that the Iran lobby has been virtually silent on. A careful perusal of the websites, blogs and social media feeds for regime supporters such as Trita Parsi, Reza Marashi and Tyler Cullis of the National Iranian American Council or Ali Gharib or Lobelog.com reveal hardly a word of criticism or protest over the heinous violations. What they have protested though has been the incarceration of Siamak Namazi, a dual U.S.-Iranian citizen who was detained by regime authorities and not part of the prisoner swap that occurred as part of the nuclear agreement.

It is ironic that Namazi’s case is the one that earns the attention of the Iran lobby because of the close relationship he has with Parsi and his role in helping launch the NIAC and as an outspoken advocate of the nuclear deal with the regime.

Now Namazi is experiencing the same denial of legal representation that was forced on other American hostages such as Christian pastor Saeed Abedini and Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian. We can only hope now that the shoe is on the other foot, these supporters of the regime would be more vocal in their criticisms, but we doubt it.

These elections though will provide a glimpse though of the lie that is Iranian regime democracy, which was discussed in an editorial in the New York Post who took to task the policy of appeasement exercised by the Obama administration:

“When it runs out of plausible excuses for its appeasement-plus policy on Iran, the Obama administration advances one argument as final line of defense: showing goodwill toward the Islamic Republic would help ‘moderates’ secure a greater share of power in Tehran with the hope of an eventual change of behavior by the ruling mullahs.”

“But who are the ‘moderates’ that Obama hopes to promote Tehran? A trio of mullahs consisting of former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, former Security Minister Dorri Najafabadi and current President Hassan Rouhani forms the core of the faction that Obama hopes would sail to victory next week,” the article writes. “The triumvirate has a history of masquerading as moderates.”

He recounts how these supposed moderates have often espoused political reforms, but never offered or implemented any political reforms while holding office.

“Rafsanjani and his hand-picked successor Khatami governed for 16 years, but never offered a single political reform let alone implementing any. Their successor Rouhani has had more than two years to show that he follows the same path. During his presidency Iran has become world leader in the number of executions and political prisoners,” he adds.

Rouhani is exercising the playbook that Rafsanjani and Khatami exercised in portraying himself as a moderate when he has no intention of supporting reforms and has openly talked about his admiration for the so-called “Chinese Model” which emphasizes economic development with control of the government firmly in the Communist Party’s hands. Rouhani envisions a similar situation with the lifting of economic sanctions bolstering the flow of money to regime coffers, but no loosening of political restrictions.

The Financial Times took note of the Iranian public’s distinct lack of enthusiasm for upcoming elections against the backdrop of a sputtering economy still stifled by mass corruption and a focus on diverting funds to supporting the proxy wars in Syria, Yemen and Iraq.

“The subdued seasonal shopping just one month before Norouz, the Iranian new year holiday, is adding to widespread gloom about a prolonged economic stagnation that has also dimmed public enthusiasm for the crucial upcoming elections,” the Financial Times writes. “Hassan Rouhani, the country’s centrist president, is now blamed by many for failing to deliver on his election campaign promises to help improve the economy with the nuclear agreement. Although inflation has shrunk — from a peak of about 40 per cent in 2013, when Mr. Rouhani took the reins, to about 13 per cent today, according to central bank figures — economic growth is next to zero and people are unwilling to purchase goods.”

While the election results may be a forgone conclusion, the hope remains that an oppressed Iranian people will someday soon see true regime change.

By Michael Tomlinson

Kickoff of Campaigning in Iran Hides Suppression of Human Rights

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Kickoff of Campaigning in Iran Hides Suppression of Human Rights

Kickoff of Campaigning in Iran Hides Suppression of Human Rights

The campaign season has kicked off and we’re not talking about the U.S. presidential campaign. In Iran the official campaign period for parliamentary elections for slates of candidates that passed ideological muster.

For most people living in democracies, the Iranian regime’s election system can be nothing short of baffling. It’s a system that begins and ends with a focus on ideological and religious purity and adherence to the Islamic revolutionary ideals it was founded on.

It is also a peculiar system in which the process of reviewing, vetting and examining candidates takes seven weeks to process, but the actual campaign season lasts just seven days.

Of the 12,000 candidates who were submitted for consideration to run for parliamentary seats and positions on the Assembly of Experts, nearly half of them were eliminated from the ballot by the Guardian Council, which is comprised of six mullahs and six law experts all appointed directly and indirectly by top mullah Ali Khamenei. The mere fact that the regime is empowered to eliminate any candidate it deems unfit to run virtually pre-ordains any election outcome in the regime’s favor.

In the case of the Assembly of Experts, of the 800 that applied, only 161 – all men – were approved by the Guardian Council; a miniscule 20 percent.

It’s also noteworthy that in Iran, there are over 250 registered political parties, but virtually none of them represent any true opposition groups such as the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MEK), a long-time resistance group which is outlawed and the regime vigorously pursues any of its members. The last two main reform-minded political parties were officially banned after the election fiasco of 2009 which resulted in massive protests that were violently put down.

Because of the complete control the regime has over political parties and the ballot, one would think that would be enough to guarantee any election, but in Iran, all ballots are also counted manually and subject to all kinds of shenanigans just in case any candidate who won a seat had a sudden change of heart and wished to oppose the mullahs.

The parliament often serves simply as a rubber stamp for Khamenei’s policies since it lacks the constitutional power to oppose foreign policy, military or other matters of state security. The approval of the nuclear deal is an example of that kind of blank check for Khamenei and his puppet, Hassan Rouhani.

According to Agence France-Presse, “the nuclear deal has partly ended Iran’s isolation but it has been followed by warnings from Khamenei that the military must guard against economic and cultural ‘infiltration’ by foreign actors who aim to damage the Islamic republic’s revolutionary principles.”

“Although parliamentarians backed Rouhani on the nuclear deal they did so less out of a sense of support for the president than because Khamenei made it clear he wanted sanctions lifted,” said AFP.

The closed nature of the regime electoral process allows the Iran lobby a certain flexibility to portray it in a more flattering light; not in the sense that’s at all fair, but rather in portraying certain candidates as “moderates” when in fact very few who pass vetting would be considered a true moderate, let alone a dissident reformist.

An example of that kind of PR spin control comes from the Iran lobby supporters such as the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) which has consistently pushed the idea that the elections would shine a light on growing moderate forces as a result of the nuclear deal.

But the crackdown on dissidents in advance of the elections, wiping off the ballot any conceivable opposition candidates, including the elimination of virtually all women candidates have forced even reliably supportive blogs such as Lobelog.com to print some guest columns describing the elections as “fixed.”

“In order to pass through the punishing vetting process and stand for election, Iranian citizens must comply with a huge set of restrictive criteria, including holding a masters’ degree, adhering to Islam, showing loyalty to the Constitution and the Supreme Leader, and having a spotless political (and mostly spotless criminal) record,” wrote Small Media, a London-based digital advocacy group, in a guest column.

“As evidenced by all the available data, these upcoming elections have been very tightly managed by Iran’s conservative establishment, with the Guardian Council weeding out more than half of the country’s hopeful parliamentary candidates during the vetting process,” Small Media added in what was the closest thing to a criticism of the Iranian regime Lobelog.com has published in a long time.

The fact that there is no real opposition to the mullahs allowed and the discussion of moderate elements within regime politics is mainly for international media consumption, it’s pretty obvious why there is so much concern in various capitals over what the mullahs plan on doing after elections when they will wave a so-called “election mandate” to continue their extremist policies.

This is why the results of the upcoming U.S. elections will likely have far more impact on what happens to the regime since the Obama administration has made clear its desire to appease the mullahs at every turn.

The latest example was the recent announcement of an $8 billion agreement by the Iranian regime to buy advanced military hardware from Russia, including the co-production of Su-30 fighter jets which now appear to be in violation of United Nations sanctions imposed as part of the nuclear deal banning the developing of nuclear-capable delivery systems such as bombers and missiles.

“The U.N. resolution to endorse the flawed Iran nuclear deal actually gives the United States and other members of the Security Council the power to review and legally block arms sales by Russia or other actors to Iran,” Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.), a critic of the nuclear accord, told the Washington Free Beacon. “But as Russia and Iran further escalate their use of indiscriminate military force in the Middle East, the administration appears wholly unwilling to use this power.”

According to the terms of the U.N. resolution governing the nuclear agreement, the U.S. and other Security Council members are provided with the power to approve “in advance on a case-by-case basis” most conventional arms sales to Iran.

The statute specifically applies to the “supply, sale, or transfer” to Iran of many conventional arms, including “battle tanks, armored combat vehicles, large-caliber artillery systems, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships, missiles, or missile systems,” according to the resolution.

It seems that not only are regime elections fixed, but it seems UN sanctions are rigged as well.

By Michael Tomlinson

Iran Lobby Ignores Upcoming Iran Election Shenanigans

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Iran Lobby Ignores Upcoming Iran Election Shenanigans

Iran Lobby Ignores Upcoming Iran Election Shenanigans

On February 26, Iran will hold its parliamentary elections and similar to almost every election held since the Islamic revolution in 1979, the results will be largely a forgone conclusion since the mullahs control who goes on the ballot in the first place and in the case of the top spot – currently occupied by Ali Khamenei – that is a position that doesn’t even get voted on by the public in a process that old-line Soviets would find reminiscent of the Politburo.

Michael J. Totten, writing in World Affairs, took to task some idiotic observations made by Max Fisher in Vox magazine in which Fisher waxes rapturously about how the Iranian election could be historic. It the same kind of nonsense first advocated by the Iran lobby, most notably bloggers Jim Lobe and Ali Gharib, the National Iranian American Council and other regime advocates such as Paul Pillar.

The notion that the nuclear deal has set the stage for a historic election in which moderates and dissidents will finally get a fair shake and opportunity to put their stamp on the Islamic state moving into the 21st century is about as realistic as Boko Haram suddenly deciding to endorse women’s rights.

The truth of the matter, as Totten rightly points out, “let’s leave aside the blatant vote-stealing in Iran’s 2009 presidential election, when Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was declared the winner in districts that opposed him as overwhelmingly as San Francisco opposes Dick Cheney. Nevermind that disgraceful episode.”

“Elections in Iran are rigged even when they aren’t rigged,” Totten said. “Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei hand-picks everybody who runs for president. Moderates are rejected routinely. Only the less-moderate of the moderates—the ones who won’t give Khamenei excessive heartburn if they win—are allowed to run at all. Liberal and leftist candidates are rejected categorically.”

In the case of the position of president of the regime, a position held by Hassan Rouhani, Totten points out that “he’s not quite a figurehead. He can tinker with a few things around the edges. But the country is run by the unelected Supreme Leader, the Guardian Council, and the Revolutionary Guard Corps, which is officially designated as a terrorist organization.”

NIAC hacks such as Trita Parsi and Reza Marashi have argued that “moderates” will be empowered in a resurgent Iran and that will be reflected in more moderates being elected to the upper legislative body, the Assembly of Experts which nominally selects the new Supreme Leader when Khamenei dies.

Nothing could be further from the truth. The Guardian Council dumped thousands of potential candidates, the overwhelming majority of them more moderate than the ruling mullahs in a similar political exorcism it conducted during Rouhani’s election when it cleared the field for him to run virtually unopposed.

Let’s also consider that a “moderate” in regime politics is like calling someone a moderate who opposes hanging a political dissident, but doesn’t mind locking up a political dissident; in much the same way as Rouhani was hailed as a moderate, but since his ascension he has presided over more executions in his first term than even Ahmadinejad carried out.

In another sign that the elections are going turn out in favor of Khamenei and his cronies no matter what the actual vote is, Khamenei’s office issued a press release through regime-controlled media warning of “enemy” efforts to undermine the elections.

The statement read in part: “Their plot for the February 26 elections is to undermine the Guardian Council and question its decisions,” Ayatollah Khamenei said, “describing the Council as one of the fundamental institutions of the Islamic Establishment, which the US has been strongly opposed to since the victory of the Islamic Revolution.”

“When the Guardian Council’s decisions are called into question, the elections would be perceived to be illegal, and, consequently, the elected parliament as well as the laws it ratifies would be deemed illegal, the Leader explained.”

The regime learned its lessons from the 2009 election debacles that resulted in violent street demonstrations that had to be put down with bloody consequences and is doing all it can to pre-ordain the results and impose order such that there would be no repeat of civil disobedience.

All of which has not gone unnoticed by an American public who’s opinion of the regime’s leadership has astonishingly remained virtually unchanged since the 1980s according to a new Gallup Poll released this week.

A stunningly low 14 percent of Americans have a favorable viewpoint of the regime in a benchmark for futility that has not budged in spite of all the public relations and social media posturing conducted by the Iran lobby. It’s nice to see that no matter how many tweets Trita Parsi puts out, Americans remain skeptical and wary of a regime that has put to the hangman’s noose over 2,300 people under Rouhani.

By Michael Tomlinson

 

 

 

Reasons To Be Thankful This Past Weekend

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Reasons To Be Thankful This Past Weekend

Reasons To Be Thankful This Past Weekend

This past weekend, across the U.S., families sat down together to celebrate family and give thanks for all what they have, including secularism in government, freedom of speech and the practice of religion, support for the rights of women and minorities, protection for a free and active press and the guarantee of due process and a presumption of innocence in criminal cases.

All those things and more have formed the bedrock of American civil society for 239 years, but are virtually non-existent in the one country that has steadily called for the destruction of the American way of life since 1979: the Iranian regime.

The past few months of 2015 have certainly caused significant concern and alarm among Americans and throughout most parts of the world. We have seen terror attacks spring up literally around the world, most recently in the horrific attacks in Paris – first with the Charlie Hebdo attacks and then the bombings – and in the wave of atrocities perpetuated by Al-Qaeda, Boko Haram, Hezbollah and Shiite militias.

Couple that with the spread of sectarian conflicts – most fueled by the Iranian regime – in Syria, Iraq and Yemen, and you begin to get a pretty good idea of how chaotic the year has become in spite of the promises made by the Iran lobby that things would settle down after a deal was struck with the mullahs in Tehran over a new nuclear deal.

How wrong people like Trita Parsi of the National Iranian American Council were.

But for most Americans, their Thanksgiving wishes and victories were much smaller and personal. For them, most Americans could be thankful that this past weekend:

  • No more Americans were arrested and held hostage in Iran, except for the five currently held captive by the Iranian regime;
  • No new terror attacks were launched against Americans at home or abroad; and
  • The Iranian regime didn’t launch any new ballistic missiles like it did last month violating United Nations arms embargoes.

But for the Iranian regime, this past weekend wasn’t nearly a peaceful or good one for the mullahs as setbacks continue to dog the regime and stymie each of its efforts to expand its vision for a greater Islamic sphere of influence controlled from Tehran.

Among the news coming from media sources this weekend include:

  • Reports that Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani was seriously injured in Syria while supervising Iranian regime forces fighting rebels on behalf of the Assad regime. This follows previous news of deaths of other top Iranian military commanders in Syria;
  • The Washington Post reported that findings by the International Atomic Energy Agency can be expected to spark another round of intense scrutiny over the Iran regime’s claims its previously undisclosed nuclear program did not have any military components to it;
  • In anticipation of the IAEA report, the regime denounced the ongoing investigation and warned that Iran would not follow through on the nuclear deal unless the IAEA closed its investigation no later than Dec. 15;
  • Kenyan security forces have arrested two Kenyan men with links to the Iranian regime’s Quds Forces on suspicion of planning attacks in the East African nation, the Interior Ministry said on Saturday. It said their targets included “hotels in Nairobi frequented by Western tourists and diplomats;”
  • A flurry of reports in the Iran regime’s official and semi­official news outlets that have flooded out about more combat deaths suffered by Iranian forces in Syria have surprised analysts who monitor the country’s tightly controlled media. The reports, they say, indicate that at least 67 Iranians have been killed in Syria since the beginning of October, in a move some have described as an attempt by the mullahs to grab headlines back from Russia in an effort to burnish the image of regime forces fighting in Syria.

And to top off the weekend, top mullah Ali Khamenei went on his usual Sunday rant denouncing the U.S. and promising to keep the regime’s policies aimed squarely at preserving the Islamic revolution and spreading it throughout the region.

As reported in the Washington Times, Khamenei’s message was the subject of an analysis in a report by the U.S. Army Foreign Military Studies Office at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

“To encourage perpetual revolution might mean to foment continuous crisis,” the report said. “This, in turn, suggests greater regional instability and Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps provocations toward U.S. forces and others.”

In other words, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the nuclear deal on which the Obama administration gambled for a more moderate Iran, has not tempered Khamenei’s fiery outcry.

“Khamenei’s endorsement of an expansive and perhaps even growing IRGC role confirms the group’s position as the chief obstacle to any political and economic reform in the Islamic Republic, and also suggests that the IRGC may win disproportionate advantage from any unfrozen assets or foreign direct investment entering the Iranian economy,” the report added.

All of which points out that while Americans celebrated values of family, peace, forgiveness and charity on Thanksgiving, the Iranian regime was busy deepening a conflict that has displaced half of Syria’s population, creating the largest refugee crisis in Europe since the end of World War II and spreading a radicalized form of extremist Islam manifesting itself in various terrorist groups around the world.

We can only hope the mullahs don’t get their holiday wishes granted next month.

By Michael Tomlinson