Earlier this month the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the creation of the Iran Action Group (IAG), whose stated goal is to”change the Iranian regime’s behaviour”. In response, Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran’s foreign minister, said that any US effort to overthrow the Islamic Republic of Iran was bound to fail, just days after the announcement. [1]
Zarif made the comments in a Twitter post on Sunday, on the anniversary of a US-backed coup that toppled Iran’s first democratically elected government in 1953. [2]
“65 years ago today, the US overthrew the popularly elected democratic government of Dr. Mossadegh, restoring the dictatorship and subjugating Iranians for the next 25 years,”Zarif said.”Now an ‘Action Group’ dreams of doing the same through pressure, misinformation &demagoguery. Never again.”[3]
In fact, several high profiles in the US administration have close ties with the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi) and so determined to the overthrow of the Iranian Government. Caitlin Johnstone of the medium writes about John Bolton’s aggressive advocacy for the MKO, “One year ago, the actual, literal psychopath who would soon be named Trump’s National Security Advisor appeared at an MEK rally and declared that the cult was a “a viable opposition to the rule of the ayatollahs.” [4]
“I had said for over 10 years since coming to these events, that the declared policy of the United States of America should be the overthrow of the mullahs’ regime in Tehran,” Bolton proclaimed. “The behavior and the objectives of the regime are not going to change, and therefore the only solution is to change the regime itself. And that’s why, before 2019, we here will celebrate in Tehran!” [5]
Johnstone states that Bolton’s sentiments were echoed with remarkable similarity by Trump’s lawyer Rudolph Giuliani at the MKO’s annual gathering in July. “The mullahs must go, the ayatollah must go, and they must be replaced by a democratic government which Madam Rajavi represents,” Giuliani said in reference to MEK cult leader Maryam Rajavi, adding, “Freedom is right around the corner … Next year I want to have this convention in Tehran!” [6]
Thus, it seems that Javad Zarif is right. The US behavior has not changed since the 1953 coup. At the time, the CIA tried to get mobsters hired and paid them good money. Shaban Jafari aka “Brainless” was a violent street thug who became a trusted henchman of the Shah. He was one of the leading mobsters who got his share of money for street actions and slogans against Mossadegh. [7]
Today, Maryam Rajavi sounds to be the modern version of Shaban Jafary and his gang. Moreover, the MKO has absolutely more potentials to instigate riots and violence that Shaban jafari did.
The MKO’s record of violent acts includes the entire range of violence from street clashes using knives, brass knuckles, and different weapons including bullets and tanks to suppress people.Listing the numerous terrorist acts of the MKO, the freelance journalist, Ivan Kesic asserts that the MKO is worse than ISIS and it has had more victims than the ISIS has. His recent article on the American Herald Tribune recounts the MKO’s role in the genocide of Iraqi Kurds, the group’s campaign of bombing against the Iranian civilians and government officials as well as the assassination of the US nationals working in Iran during the 1970s. [8]
However, the most investigated part of his article describes the MKO’s simultaneous attacks against the Iranian diplomatic interests in 13 countries in 1992. The move indicates the MKO’s motivation and potential to bully whenever it wants. Ivan Kesic writes:
“In April 1992, they invaded Iranian diplomatic missions in thirteen Northern American and Western European countries, seizing hostages and wrecking offices in a wave of coordinated attacks. In New York, five men armed with knives invaded the Iranian Mission to the United Nations, took three hostages, smashed furniture and computers in a two-hour rampage behind chained doors. Two of the hostages escaped when the police broke through a back door, and the third was released unharmed when the intruders surrendered to police negotiators. In Ottawa, Iran’s Embassy was attacked and pillaged by about 35people armed with sticks and hammers. And in Europe, the MEK members stormed Iranian embassies and consulates in Bonn, Hamburg, The Hague, Oslo, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Bern, Paris and London. Scores of demonstrators were arrested, and many of the Iranian missions were extensively damaged, some by firebombs. There were many injuries in clashes that erupted, but luckily no deaths.
“In Germany, several police officers were hurt as the authorities struggled to arrest about 50 members who occupied the seven-story Iranian Embassy in Bonn for two hours. The angry mob hurled official papers and furniture from the windows during the rampage. The Iranian Consulate in Hamburg also was besieged with demonstrators hurling rocks and firebombs. About 20 protesters were arrested, and four people were treated for smoke inhalation and shock. They also broke into Iran’s Embassy in The Hague after a car rammed through the compound’s gate. Protesters armed with metal bars and sticks rushed through, entered the building and caused extensive damage. In Stockholm, 50 MEK members set two Iranian Embassy buildings and six cars on fire. The Ambassador’s wife and two children were treated for shock, and one embassy employee suffered burns. One embassy employee was injured as invaders ransacked the Iranian Embassy in Oslo, and several others in the embassy in Copenhagen where MEK members smashed windows. They also hurled rocks, smashed windows and tore down the Iranian flag at the embassy in London, and a firebomb was later thrown at the London offices of Iran Air, causing damage but no injuries. Later in the 1990s, Iranian diplomats were also attacked in Denmark, Austria, and Italy. Western diplomats were also targeted; in August 2003 MEK bombed the United Nations compound in Iraq, prompting UN withdrawal from the country.” [9]
Maryam Rajavi was once Saddam’s operative tool to suppress Iraqi uprisings. Her notorious command at the time –“Take the Kurds under your tanks, and save your bullets for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.”—has been widely recalled by defectors of the group. And, regarding the role of the MKO agents in the assassination of the Iranian nuclear scientists under the command of the Israeli Mossad, their leader is definitely capable of being a much more aggressive and violent CIA agent than Shaban Jafary was.
Mazda Parsi
References:
[1] Aljazeera, ‘Never again’: Zarif calls US group coup attempt bound to fail, August 19, 2018
[2] ibid
[3] ibid
[4] Johnstone, Caitlin, That Time Hillary Clinton Removed John Bolton’s Favorite Terror Cult from the Terrorist List, The Medium, July 3, 2018
[5] ibid
[6] ibid
[7]Keyoush, Banafsheh, Saudi Arabian and Iran: Friends or foes?, New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016, p. 69.
[8] Kesic, Ivan, Worse than ISIL: The Dark Past of Mujahedin-e Khalq Terrorist Group, The American Herald Tribune, June 30, 2018
[9] ibid