The American journalist, Michael Rubin warns about the US strategy to support the Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK/ MKO/ Cult of Rajavi). He discusses three Iran strategies taken by the US that are guaranteed to fail. One is supporting the MEK which according to him at best is a creepy cult; at worst, it is a terrorist group.
Rubin who is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a contributor to the Washington Examiner and Commentary Magazine, is a critic of the Iranian government but he is also an opponent to any policy based on embracing the MEK and ethnic separatist groups. He has already written several articles to warn western politicians about the MEK’s cult-like terrorist background. In his recent article on the Washington Examiner, on August 4th, 2022, Rubin asserts about the MEK, “What it is not and has never been is popular or democratic.”
Leaked photo of MEK’s Albanian headquarters
On the MEK’s alleged part to expose the Iranian nuclear program Rubin writes, “That the group sometimes reveals intelligence is no metric of its influence or infiltration within the Iranian system. First, its intelligence is often wrong. Second, even when right, it simply represents how the Israelis, Saudis, or perhaps even the CIA use the group to launder information to the public so that the real fingerprints of those who gathered it are not exposed.”
About a year ago, Rubin condemned the American politicians who spoke in Maryam Rajavi’s annual gathering. He titled his article by this statement: “The Mujahedin-e-Khalq has become a barometer of Washington corruption.” He denounced a number of American retired authorities who advocate the MEK in exchange for “Five and six-figure honoraria and speakers’ fees.”
He accurately argued that corruption of the MEK’s paid speakers is obvious because “In reality, its leaders Masoud and Maryam Rajavi rule with an iron fist. It runs as a cult with its rank-and-file cut off from their families and the broader society.”
“Claims about high support inside Iran are fiction”, Rubin emphasized. “Many resent the MKO’s terrorism that as often killed innocent Iranians as the regime officials they targeted. More despise the group for siding with Iraq during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War.”