The MEK as crisis mongers

Madam Rajavi and Public Protest

The scenes from Paris showing protesters marching down the Champs-Elysees, the grandest avenue in the city, hurling projectiles at police and being tear-gassed in return, has recently been widespread in the main stream media. “The broken glass and empty tear gas canisters have been swept away and the graffiti scrubbed off the major monuments, among them the Arc de Triumph, after a weekend of violent protests in the capital by a grass-roots movement that calls itself the Yellow Vests,” reported the New York Times.

Casualties and damages have been massive. According to the NY Times, The cost of repairing just the Arc de Triomphe — apart from the graffiti, there was damage to artifacts kept inside — could reach one million euros (about $1.15 million), according to the Center for National Monuments. On Monday, merchants and government officials were still assessing the total property damage. [1]
More than 260 people were wounded nationwide, and at least three died outside Paris on the margins of the protests over the last three weekends. More than 400 people were arrested in Paris. [2]
Meanwhile in Iran, Labor protests continued in Ahwaz and Shush (Khuzestan province) as of Wednesday, November 28. Sugar cane workers demanding back pay reportedly staged an anti-government march in Shush; protesters also clashed with police in Ahwaz during related protests. Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency is reporting that the country’s authorities have detained four workers protesting not having been paid their salaries for months in the southwestern province of Khuzestan. [3]
It seems almost natural that the propaganda media of the Mujahedin Khalq (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi) do not give a shit to the France protests but they exaggerate the workers protests in Khuzestan, Iran, because the group’s leader Maryam Rajavi is sheltered in France and launches her anti-Iran campaign from France territory. However, she should be asked what about the protests inside her group’s camp in Durres, Albania.

The MKO, as a large populated entity –from 5000 members back in Iraq to over 2000 people in Albania—has always enjoyed a camp in which it has concentrated its forces. The group’s camp in Iraq was even called “Ashraf City”, as it was very well equipped with all facilities of a city such as hospital, factory, pool and park.

After the group’s relocation in Albania, despite the increasing process of defection from the group, the authorities of the MKO set off for building another city in Manez, Durres naming it “Ashraf 3”.
Here’s the question: In the entire history of the Mujahedin Khalq, has there ever been any public protest against the ruling system of the camps or everything was democratically managed by the group leaders?
The answer is NO. No public protest has been reported from inside the MKO camps but this does not mean that the group’s camps have been ruled democratically and everyone inside the group has been satisfied.
Evidences from inside the MKO indicates that dissent is immediately suppressed by the authorities of the MKO. Numerous documented testimonies of former members of the MKO reveal the very undemocratic and even inhumane attitude of the group leaders against any question, let alone conflicting ideas.
According to the Human Rights Watch report “NO EXIT”, human rights abuses carried out by MKO leaders against dissident members ranged from prolonged incommunicado and solitary confinement to beatings, verbal and psychological abuse, coerced confessions, threats of execution, and torture that in two cases led to death. [4]

The testimonies of the former MKO members indicate that the organization used three types of detention facilities inside its camps in Iraq. The interviewees described one type as small residential units, referred to as guesthouses (mihmansara), inside the camps. The MKO members who requested to leave the organization were held in these units during much of the time they were kept incommunicado. They were not allowed to leave the premises of their unit, to meet or talk with anyone else in the camp, or to contact their relatives and friends in the outside world. [5]

Human Rights Watch interviewed at least seven former members of the group to develop its report in 2005. A few years later, the RAND Corporation published another investigated report on what is going inside the MKO. RAND is a research organization that develops solutions to public policy challenges to help make communities throughout the world safer and more secure, healthier and more prosperous.
According to the RAND report, Physical Abuse, Imprisonment, and Lack of Exit Options were the tools of the MKO leaders to keep members inside the cult-like structure of the group and eventually to suppress dissent and departure. “Former MeK members claim that punishment was frequently meted out for such offenses as expressing or fomenting disagreement with the political/military strategy,” the report reads. Asking to leave the group is an unforgivable sin. “Recent accounts recall that punishment for disagreeing with MeK policies ranged from forced written confessions of disloyalty to incarceration in special facilities at Camp Ashraf. Former members report torture and long periods of solitary confinement as punishment for disloyalty.” [6]
Although, the above-mentioned reports are the most significant and official ones on the human rights abuses in the MKO, there are a lot more testimonies of those who have recently left the group’s camps in Albania. Most defectors of the group publish their firsthand account of enduring human right violations in the MKO just because they expressed their willingness to leave the group or in some cases because they dared to express their opposition to the group’s attitudes.
Gholamreza Shokri spent 27 years of his life in the MKO. He was only 20 years old and willing to find a good job in Europe when he was recruited by the MKO in Iraq. The MKO agents promised to help him get the European visa only if he stayed in their camp for a few months. As soon as he entered the organization, they confiscated his ID documents and never gave him back.” whenever I asked for my ID, they would say that they had no idea where it was.” [7]
Thus, Shokri had no way out of the MKO camp but he frequently used to ask the leaders when he could leave the cult. This question was considered a sin by the leaders. Departure from the MKO was forbidden and showing your willingness for leaving the group would be faced with suppression, imprisonment and torture. So he was imprisoned in solitary confinement. [8]

Shokri said that they had closed their eyes and took him to a clandestine jail. “They insulted me calling me spy of the Mullah’s regime,” he recounts. “They beat me in my legs so badly that I could not walk; they were bleeding. They tied my hands with hand coughs for a week. After a week my hands had no sense; I put the fire of a cigarette on them but I didn’t feel it burn. Then they forced me to stand up for one more week. Each time that I fell down out of fatigue, they would beat me so hard that I had to stand up again.” [9]

Besides Shokri, the testimonies of a large number of defectors of the MKO are available on the Net. All have one thing in common: You have no right to protest in the MKO.
While people of all societies have the chance to express their demands, dissatisfactions and even their anger, more or less, members of the MKO are not even able to express their freewill to choose for their future. They are deprived from the most basic human rights.
Maryam Rajavi’s so-called support for the Iranian workers contradicts what is really going on in her destructive cult of personality.
Mazda Parsi

References:
[1]J Rubin, Alissa, France’s Yellow Vest Protests: The Movement That Has Put Paris on Edge, The New York Times, December 3rd, 2018.
[2] ibid
[3] The Associated Press, Report: Iran arrests 4 workers protesting unpaid salaries, November18, 2018.
[4] No Exit
[5] ibid
[6] RAND
[7] https://www.nejatngo.org/en/posts/8960
[8] ibid
[9] ibid

December 15, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

The Trump Administration Rattles the Saber at Iran

A Q&A with Dr. Trita Parsi, author of Losing an Enemy: Obama, Iran, and the Triumph of Diplomacy.

In a recent speech to the International Institute for Strategic Studies Manama Dialogue in Bahrain, US Secretary of Defense James Mattis went on the (rhetorical) offensive against Iran. Said Mattis:

Like-minded nations here today do not seek war or conflict, yet, we cannot ignore the malign influence and destabilizing behavior pursued by violent extremist organizations and by Iran’s “outlaw regime”…The Iranian regime does not speak for the Iranian people, who have a right to live and prosper in a safe, secure and peaceful region…. An Iranian regime that ignores the needs of citizens feels free to escalate and initiate costly conflicts that serve no one’s interests.

Mattis also claimed that “Nothing is more emblematic of Iran’s malign activities in the Middle East than its support for Assad’s murderous regime,” a line of thinking that was seconded by US Presidential Envoy for the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS Brett McGurk.

In Manama, McGurk seemed to be signaling the Trump administration’s willingness to confront Iranian fighters in Syria. According to McGurk, “No one wants them there. We even hear from the Russians that they shouldn’t be there. We’ve taken that and said for a stable Syria these forces must leave.” Still more, according to McGurk, “We will not help reconstruct any of the areas that were retaken by the Assad regime with the help of the Iranians and the Russians.”

Worryingly, these comments by Mattis and McGurk echo all too clearly the regime-change rhetoric employed by successive US administrations dating at least as far back as the late George H.W. Bush, whereby American politicians attempt to conceal their true intentions (regime change) in the soft language of human rights. In the lead-up to any of the seven regime change wars initiated by the United States over the past 25 years, one can find instances of high US government officials repeating, as though a mantra, the claim that America’s quarrel is not with the people of (insert name of about-to-be-invaded-country), it is with the government of (insert name of about-to-be-invaded-country).

To help make sense of the current round of saber rattling by the Trump administration, I spoke with Dr. Trita Parsi, author of Losing an Enemy: Obama, Iran, and the Triumph of Diplomacy.

James Carden: I was struck by how closely Mattis’s bill of indictment against Iran in Manama echoed the rationale used by previous administrations to sell regime-change wars. Is the Trump administration setting the stage for an actual military conflict with Tehran, or is this more bluff and bluster from a strategically and intellectually shallow administration?

Dr. Trita Parsi: I think the way to understand this is that Trump, his administration and the entities pushing him on this—from Sheldon Adelson, to Saudi Arabia to Netanyahu—ultimately agree that the goal is to weaken Iran and shift the balance of power away from Iran and towards Israel and Saudi Arabia. The paths to that goal can vary; from crippling sanctions, to regime change, to regime collapse, to war or a combination of these policies.

But they have different preferences. Donald Trump, I believe, neither wants war nor regime change. Not out of humanitarian concerns, but because he knows that both war and regime change are very costly. So I suspect they will gravitate towards the one option that is the least costly but yet achieves their goal of shifting the balance of power in the region: regime collapse.

Unlike regime change, a policy of regime collapse is less costly, because you don’t take responsibility for setting up the next government in Iran. In fact, you don’t want a new government. You want chaos and even civil war. In that scenario, Iran’s power would be consumed internally and it would no longer have the ability to project power in the region. Consequently, the balance of power would shift away from Iran and towards Israel and Saudi Arabia—but without the cost of war or regime change.

Of course, this would destabilize much of the region and send massive refugee flows towards Europe. But that appears not to be much of a concern for either Trump or the rulers in Tel Aviv and Riyadh.

JC: I want to ask about Syria. When US Envoy Brett McGurk said the US will not help with Syrian reconstruction in areas freed from the terrorists by Russia and Iran and, further, that the Iranian-backed forces “must leave,” what is he signaling here? Is he giving an advance preview of the administration’s justification for a wider war in Syria if Iran doesn’t “get out”?

TP: I think Syria scholar Joshua Landis has explained this best: Trump’s Syria policy is not to win, but to deny Russia, Iran, and Assad their victory. To achieve that objective, the United States will do everything it can to prevent the reconstruction of Syria. Rather than signaling justification for war with Iran in Syria, I think this is reflective of the policy of keeping the civil war going as long as possible and ensuring that neither Assad, Russia nor Iran can have a true victory, even if this comes at the expense of the destruction of the entire country.

JC: Picking up on the theme of regime collapse. Such a policy—as opposed to regime change—would seem to imply that Trump would prefer not to effectuate a change in Tehran through direct military action but rather to try and destabilize the country from within. If so, it would seem that anti-regime elements such as the terror-cult MeK would have a role to play. You’ve written about MeK, notably in an essay in The New York Review of Books. For readers unfamiliar with them, could you explain, broadly, who they are and how they came to acquire such a powerful US domestic lobby?

TP: Yes, my assessment is that Trump prefers to achieve his objectives without taking military action because of the cost. Note, not because of any particular humanitarian concerns. And that will drive him towards regime collapse instead of war or regime change, because regime change too is costly.

Whereas the MeK is of little use if the objective is regime change, due to their immense unpopularity in Iran, the Trump administration seems to believe that they can be helpful for regime collapse and a potential Civil War, mindful of this terrorist organization’s extensive experience in sabotage, terrorism, assassinations, and even regular warfare.

The MeK is a violent terrorist cult that first started killing Americans and officials of the Shah’s regime back in the 1960s and ’70s. They were in support of the Islamic revolution but had a fallout with Ayatollah Khomeini and ended up seeking refuge with Saddam Hussein during the Iraq-Iran War. They ended up siding with Iraq during the war, which cost them almost all of their support inside of Iran.

Once the war ended, Saddam started using them as his personal ethnic-cleansing army against Shia in the south of Iraq and Kurds in the north.

While fighting for Saddam, the MeK began establishing a very strong lobbying presence on Capitol Hill by giving extensive campaign funds to Democratic and Republican members of Congress alike. Flush with financing from Saudi Arabia, they of course pushed an open door because their meagre was that the regime in Iran is bad and needs to be overthrown. Despite betting on the US terrorist list, they were still free to engage in this extensive lobbying effort which culminated in them lobbying to get off the terror lost in 2012.

JC: Another pillar of the regime-collapse strategy is clearly sanctions. The neocon operative who now serves are the US special representative for Iran, Brian Hook, recently said, “Our goal remains getting countries to zero imports of Iranian oil.” Meanwhile, the administration’s decision to reimpose nuclear-related sanctions in October has prompted an outcry from the Europeans, who are taking specific action (via the “special-purpose vehicle”) to circumvent US efforts to completely isolate Tehran from the global financial system. Seems the effort to re-isolate Iran is going to be trickier this time around, what do you think accounts for that?

TP: The effort has essentially failed. Trump was forced to issue eight waivers because oil prices would shoot up if he didn’t. The effort to get the Saudis to replace Iranian oil failed. Oil demand may come down next year, which may enable trump to get a bit more oil of of the Iranian market, but he’s neither going to reach zero or a small enough amount of Iranian exhorts to cause the collapse of the Iranian economy.

This failure has also caused Trump to lose the psychological war. Had he succeeded, the calculation was that it would instill panic in the Iranian population and cause them to lose faith in the government’s capacity to weather the same storm. That in turn would have led to a critical mass of people taking to the streets and pushing for the regime’s collapse, the calculation was.

By failing to live up to his promise of eliminating Iranian oil exports, Trump also failed to instill panic and cause the population to lose faith in the government’s capacity to handle the sanctions for the thanks to years.

That said, this does not mean that he’s not hurting the Iranian economy. On the contrary, it is extremely painful and the population is hurting immensely due to the sanctions. But pain alone is not going to cause the collapse of the economy or the regime.

JC: Expectations are that probably 20 or so Democrats will enter the 2020 presidential primaries. As the author of a book, Losing an Enemy, that gave the inside story of the Obama administration’s efforts to secure the JCPOA, what advice would you give the next Democratic president in order to get back on the right diplomatic track with Iran and, importantly, the other signatories of the JCPOA, whom Trump gone out of his way to offend?

TP: If the JCPOA survives for the next two years and Trump loses in 2020, then the next administration must seek to reenter the agreement. There needs to be strong support for this in Congress, in fact, this should be part of the Democratic Party platform.

Any renewed engagement with Iran will be tricky. The Iranians will have reasons not to trust the commitments of the US. But it can still be fruitful, but only if the US approaches it with realistic goals and a diplomatic strategy that is centered on both incentives and disincentives rather than being solely focused on coercion.

James Carden with Dr. Trita Parsi, The Nation

December 8, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

A Tiny Group on a Compound in Albania are Being Groomed to Destabilize Iran

U.S. President Donald Trump does not like Iran and he has increasingly surrounded himself by people who feel the same way. Understood to be the ghoul siphoning off U.S. power in the Middle East, members of the Trump team have been open about their desire neutralize growing Iranian power.

“We ask all nations to isolate Iran’s regime as long as its aggression continues,” Trump said during his speech to the United Nations’ General Assembly on Sept 25.

“And we ask all nations to support Iran’s people as they struggle to reclaim their religious and righteous destiny,” he added.

White House national security advisor John Bolton promised to bring regime change to Iran by 2019 before stepping back the remarks in a press conference on Sept 24 on the US sanctioning in Iran. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in the same conference regarding the reimposition of sanctions that Iran needs ‘enormous change’ before the U.S. reconsiders its stance. Trump’s lawyer and loyal ally, Rudy Giuliani, said that he hoped the sanctions would bring a “successful revolution” to the nascent country.

Destabilizing the Ayatollah’s regime in Iran is a Herculean task, not least because domestic opposition to it is disorganized and have largely localized, economic concerns.

But the Trump team are convinced that they have an effective tool to antagonize Iran: the Mujahideen al-Khalq (MEK). The MEK claims itself to be Iran’s main opposition group. Bolton, Giuliani and Pompeo have all received thousands of dollars from the MEK to speak on their behalf, championing them as the saviors to the rogue nation.

In reality, the MEK boasts a membership of about 3,000 aging Iranian exiles and former members. Analysts claim the MEK is a cult that shames, tortures and controls everyone inside the group. They live in a military compound in Tirana, Albania, a full 2,130 miles away from Tehran and are only allowed out once a year to attend their annual gathering in Paris. They have virtually no support in Iran.

So how are they the linchpin to the U.S.’ plan for Iran?

The MEK has billed itself to provide two services for those who wish to see a destabilized Iran: a network of spies to provide intelligence and a well-oiled propaganda machine that throws dirt on the regime.

The group’s supposedly deep network of spies inside Iran was given credit for helping to expose the country’s secret nuclear facilities in the early 2000s. In 2002, the MEK’s political wing, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), made a theatrical claim that it had discovered a secret nuclear facility in Natanz, Iran. The claim made the MEK seem like a credible source of insider knowledge into Iran’s clandestine nuclear weapons development scheme, but as it turns out, much of it was just for show.

The international body in charge of monitoring nuclear sites, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) already knew about the Natanz site, making the information less than groundbreaking.

In 2015, the NCRI repeated its style of staging a theatrical reveal when it claimed that Iran was developing a secret ‘underground centrifuge facility’ on the outskirts of Tehran, just before the Iran nuclear deal was signed into effect. Some of the details the NCRI discussed about the site, including “3 by 3 meter radiation proof doors that are 40 centimeters thick and weigh about 8 tons … to prevent radiation leak,” are evidently unnecessary for a uranium-enrichment facility, and the images it ‘released’ were ripped from an Iranian company’s website.

A U.S. State Department spokesperson said “Well, we don’t have any information at this time to support the conclusion of the [NCRI’s] report.”

The ‘reveal’ was fake.

What little actual new information it had produced regarding Iran’s nuclear sites were reportedly fed to them by the Mossad, Israel’s secret intelligence, who wanted to reveal the information but needed an element of plausible deniability. The MEK then, was used as an easy middleman.

The other use of the MEK has been as a kind of anti-Iranian regime propaganda machine.

The MEK hosts a lavish annual conference, bringing together its members with some of the world’s top politicians, all united against the Ayatollah regime. The MEK’s leader, Maryam Rajavi, speaks of bringing equality and liberal democracy to Iran in each year’s headline speech. Its official news outlets on its website and the MEK-backed Iran News Wire, produce daily stories on unrest inside Iran to convey to the world that the people of Iran are turning against the regime.

Nevermind that no one is protesting in Iran for the MEK to take over.

Much of Iran News Wire’s story revolve around an ongoing labor strike of Iranian truck drivers; an issue that has no apparent link to the MEK.

It was recently revealed that many of the MEK members in the Tirana base have been operating a troll factory intended to create the false impression that there are untold masses of Iranians who wish for the MEK to overthrow Ayatollah Khamenei and his clerical government.

The MEK operates thousands of social media accounts that posts pro-regime change messages and fights with the MEK’s detractors.

“The majority of it is abusive, libelous, ad hominem and intended to silence,” Azadeh Moaveni, a fellow at New America said of the posts in an interview with an Al Jazeera team investigating the troll factory.

The posts are often made strategically to create trending hashtags, giving the false impression of a populist insurgency against the regime. To be sure, Iran is experiencing unrests across the country: protests have sporadically broken out over the past year due to the country’s economic woes. Double digit inflation and funding expensive military campaigns in Syria, Iraq and Yemen have hampered the country’s budget, choking off its middle class. The U.S.’ re-imposition of sanctions has only added to that volatility.

While these protests may open the window of opportunity on opposition groups, the MEK is universally reviled in Iran for its role in the Iran-Iraq war and is not a player in the country’s political landscape.

This matters little for those U.S. and European policymakers however, who see a further use in the group. Not as a proxy group or intelligence asset, but a source of money.

The MEK’s Other Use

The MEK, with its generous funding sources, has funnelled millions of dollars to politicians since 2003, giving John Bolton at least $180,000 in one year alone, the man now in charge of forming Trump’s foreign policy doctrine. They pay politicians as much as $50,000 to speak at its conferences, and give to both Democrats and Republicans; anyone who will publicly support them in exchange for donations.

Among their beneficiaries are former presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama, the late John McCain who received at least seven installments of MEK funds according to Joanne Stocker, an editor at Defense Post. They’ve also given money to former CIA heads, other national security advisors and heads of homeland security.

From this strategy of all-out spending, the MEK has amassed a veritable army of D.C. insiders and kingmakers who speak on the group’s behalf, convincing their colleagues that the group is paving the way towards a free Iran.

In return as well, the MEK has received tens of millions from the U.S. to build and maintain its current facility in Tirana via a donation to the U.N. Refugee Agency, and likely continues to enjoy support from Saudi Arabia.

What this means in practical terms is that Trump’s foreign policy stance towards Iran will likely always include the MEK

“Anything to needle Iran,” Ervand Abrahamian said of the support for the MEK from countries like Saudi Arabia. Abrahamian is a historian at the City University of New York who wrote a book on the group, called “The Iranian Mojahedin.”

The group, which has a history of being funded by Saudi Arabia, continues to enjoy the support of the country: Prince Turki bin Faisal al-Saud, who used to leave Saudi’s intelligence, spoke at the MEK’s 2016 conference in Paris to make his backing of the group public.

According to Abrahamian, the cost of Saudi’s support for the group is a mere “pittance,” compared to the consequences of regime destabilization. Trita Parsi, a prominent critic of the MEK and founder of the National Iranian American Council, told Al Bawaba that the MEK continues to serve a useful role in egging on regime collapse in Iran.

“If your objective is regime collapse… then the MEK is almost a perfect fit,” said Trita Parsi to Al Bawaba in an interview. The MEK, Parsi argued, is a capable force to effect regime collapse due to their years of fighting both inside and outside of Iran and their ability to conduct espionage operations.

The group, in other words, is not still around to help inspire a democratic upheaval in Iran, but to dismember the country, taking its government and its people with them.

That such destabilization may cause war, an uncontrollable humanitarian catastrophe and more resentment against Western meddling in regional affairs does not seem important to those hoping to see a disempowered Iran.

By Ty Joplin, Albawaba.com

October 1, 2018 0 comments

Maryam Rajavi

Kastriot Myftaraj: Maryam Rajavi calls for uprising, should be arrested

In the latest issue of “Moscow Speaking” in Ora News, Kastriot Myftaraj commented on the recent threat of war that Iranian Mojahedin dictator Maryam Rajavi has made against Iran.

Kastriot Myftaraj comments on the recent call by Maryam Rajavi for an uprising in Iran that was made from the Mojahedin camp in Manzas, citing the Criminal Code of the Republic of Albania to denounce Rajavi’s terrorist demand.

Article 221 of the Criminal Code of Albania imposes imprisonment for 15 to 25 years, while the head of the insurgency can be sentenced to life imprisonment for such demands.

Article 211 carries a sentence of imprisonment for not less than 15 years for incitement to commit war, in this case by the Iranian Mojahedin leader.

Myftaraj notes that calls by Maryam Rajavi and the Iranian jihadists in Manzas for war against Iran provokes the latter to attack Albania with its missile system.

For this reason, Myftaraj denounces these calls for war and uprising by the Iranian jihadists sheltered in Manzas.

September 29, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Traitors to the homeland

When Iranians rose up against the tyrannical rule of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi in 1979, they had a picture of what they wanted in its place. It took them a short while, however, to translate that picture into a functioning government that would, among the other things expected of it, establish security.

For nearly a year, a number of outfits openly engaged in armed activity against the new government inside the capital and other cities.

One group was particularly notorious: the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO), known to most other countries by another acronym, the MEK, which espoused a twisted ideology of Marxism and terror combined.

MKO had its roots in a formerly Islamic, student movement against Mohammad Reza Shah, but it had dropped Islam and adopted Marxism along the way, purging those of its members who had refused to acquiesce.

In its metamorphosized form, and after the Islamic Republic was established, MKO would bomb government buildings, conduct targeted killings of prominent political and religious figures, and most grotesquely, carry out routine blind assassinations of ordinary Iranians out on the streets in an attempt to create a sense of instability, insecurity, and fear.

Fear, it thought, would ultimately lead to popular dissatisfaction with the new regime.

It was wrong. And it failed.

Soon, and as the republic gradually solidified, putting into order its security apparatuses, MKO was subdued. Many of its members were either taken into custody or taken out in well-planned security operations. Others either gradually came to their senses and defected, or fled the country.

Dead men (and women) walking

The killing sprees of MKO were finished. But the group itself wasn’t.

In September 1980, a little over a year and a half after the revolution, the then-regime of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein invaded Iran, wishing to topple the nascent republic and overtake territory.

That invasion started after Hussein won the blessing of the United States, via the then-National Security Advisor Zbigniew Berzinski, according to Sasan Fayazmanesh, in his book “The United States and Iran: Sanctions, wars and the policy of dual containment.” (Routledge, 2008)

For MKO, the war had an inherent irony. It both threw the group’s surviving members a lifeline and lay bare their most treasonous colors, hastening their effective death:

They joined the Iraqi invasion of their own fatherland, as rank and file — cannon fodder, really. The Iraqi dictator — who was himself overthrown in 2003 by his initial American backers — gave MKO military training and hardware, and a camp near the Iranian border.

Hussein, who eventually agreed to a truce in 1988, nevertheless mobilized MKO members in a relatively large-scale offensive against Iran days after the truce agreement. MKO declared it would be marching to Tehran in a matter of “48 hours.”

Again, it failed.

In a counter-offensive code-named “Operation Mersad,” Iranian armed forces not only thwarted MKO but also almost decimated the group. Bodies of helmeted, indoctrinated young men and women were strewn across the roads or stuck in the mangled wreckage of tanks and other armored vehicles, along Iran’s western borders after the operation.

An image from the archives of the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) shows Iranian soldiers walking past the dead bodies of MKO members and the wreckage of their military vehicles in western Iran in 1988.

When Saddam was toppled in 2003 and a new government took over, the group felt endangered. (It had been designated a terrorist organization by the US since 1997.) So, it was crucial that MKO now got another lease on life.

In the period between the end of the Iran-Iraq War and the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, political winds had already begun to shift, in a way that would somehow benefit MKO:

After he failed to overtake Iranian territory, Hussein invaded and annexed the fellow-Arab state of Kuwait, angering the very similarly fellow-Arab states that had funded his war machine against Iran just years earlier. He faced solid opposition, by a coalition of military forces, with the US at its head, which pushed him back to within Iraqi borders but stopped short of an invasion.

Training assassins and taking them off the terror list

But, no more an obedient friend of the Arab states of the Persian Gulf and America, Hussein was bound to be taken out, a fate that met him in 2003.

What had remained intact of MKO in the ruins of Iraq, however, could still be exploited. At least, so thought Iran’s adversaries.

Saudi funding began to pour in. And “generously-compensated” legions of American lobbyists joined. To no one’s surprise, the group was taken off the State Department’s list of designated terrorist organizations in 2012.

In the lobbying campaign that was launched, “[m]any of the American supporters, though not all, accepted fees of $15,000 to $30,000 to give speeches to the group, as well as travel expenses to attend M.E.K. rallies in Paris,” The New York Times reported that same year.

Furthermore, American journalist Seymour Hersh, a Pulitzer Prize winner who has written for The New Yorker, reported in 2012 that a number of MKO members were secretly trained by the United States Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) at the Department of Energy’s Nevada National Security Site, a secretive training facility northwest of Las Vegas, in a program that began in 2005 and purportedly ended “sometime before President Obama took office.”

“The M.E.K.’s ties with Western intelligence [had already] deepened after the fall of the Iraqi regime in 2003,” Hersh wrote.

He also cited an NBC report — itself citing “two senior Obama Administration officials” — that said MKO “units… financed and trained by Mossad, the Israeli secret service” had been involved in the assassination of four Iranian nuclear scientists and an attempted attack on another one after 2007.

Funding ‘regime change’

But Iranian counterintelligence stopped any more such activity.

By 2016, MKO’s hands were increasingly tied. It had to fully leave its last camp in Iraq for the Albanian capital, Tirana. Yet, it was now being more openly embraced by Iran’s Western and Arab adversaries.

In 2016 and 2017, Saudi Arabia’s former spy chief, Prince Turki bin Faisal Al Saud, attended MKO meetings in Paris. “Advance with God’s blessings,” bin Faisal said in a speech in the 2016 meeting, wishing the terrorists success in attempting “regime change” in Iran.

In 2018, another meeting in Paris attracted Rudy Giuliani, personal attorney to US President Donald Trump, and Stephen Harper, a former prime minister of Canada. Both of them, too, gave speeches advocating “regime change” in Iran.

In September came a revelation of how the group received funding for its “regime change” agenda all along the way: through Saudi smuggling networks and Saudi-linked black market sales.

Former MKO member Massoud Khodabandeh, “who personally oversaw the transfers,” told Jordanian newspaper Albawaba that “Saudi officials operating within the security apparatus of Turki bin Faisal al Saud, the head of Saudi intelligence at the time, and the late king Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, gave the MEK three tons of solid gold, at least four suitcases of custom Rolex watches and fabric covering the Kaaba, the most holy site in Islam. The transfers were worth hundreds of millions of dollars.”

“Gold and other valuable commodities were be shipped from Saudi Arabia to Baghdad. Then, they would be sold in black markets in Amman, Jordan[,] via Saudi-linked businessmen; the money would go to offshore accounts linked to the MEK, funding their operations.”

“Fraud and money laundering” were other source of revenue.

“From Washington D.C., to Tampa, Dallas, Los Angeles and even London, Stockholm and Paris, the MEK operated ‘cells’ that took part in fraud schemes and fake charities,” according to Albawaba, which cited an FBI investigation of the activities.

Online bugs

But, despite the showbiz and the speakers beckoned by the specter of Saudi money, MKO grew increasingly irrelevant in actual space in later years. That was when it took to the virtual.

In an article titled “Faking the online debate on Iran,” Al Jazeera looked at MKO’s latest anti-Iran activities, online.

Late last year, when short-lived protests erupted in some Iranian cities, MKO saw a virtual opening.

Hassan Shahbaz, another former MKO member, said, “Our orders would tell us the hashtags to use in our tweets in order to make them more active. It was our job to provide coverage of these protests by seeking out, tweeting and re-tweeting videos while adding our own comments,” according to Al Jazeera.

Hassan Heyrani, also a former member, said “several thousand accounts” were being run “by about 1,000-1,500” MKO members to turn anti-Iranian hashtags into top trends.

And bots came in handy, too. Lots of them.

Marc Owen Jones, a keen observer of online political propaganda by Saudi Arabia, told the Qatar-based news channel, “If you want to use bots to be effective, you need a lot of accounts, which means you might create a lot of accounts on a specific day or week or month. The majority of the accounts tweeting on the #FreeIran and #Iran_Regime_Change hashtag from late December [2017] up to May, were created within about a four-month window. What that would suggest is that a lot of the activity on those hashtags came from bots.”

The MKO online propagandists may be aided by Saudi companies that, according to an earlier investigation by BBC, offer “automated ‘bot’ accounts” for as little as 200 dollars “to artificially boost the popularity of hashtags to make them trend on Twitter – in contravention of the social media network’s rules.”

(Although not exactly well-liked by his cousin rulers, Saudi Prince Waleed bin Talal — a Twitter shareholder — may be pulling a few strings of his own, may he not?!)

All of that while Twitter recently closed — in the words of Foreign Minister Javad Zarif — the accounts of real Iranians while ignoring MKO’s anti-Iran propaganda activities.

Hello @Jack. Twitter has shuttered accounts of real Iranians, incl TV presenters & students, for supposedly being part of an ‘influence op’. How about looking at actual bots in Tirana used to prop up ‘regime change’ propaganda spewed out of DC? #YouAreBots https://t.co/dTs0diYrM4

— Javad Zarif (@JZarif) September 16, 2018

Khodabandeh, the former MKO member, told Al Jazeera that the group had “changed from a terrorist military organisation to an intelligence-based propaganda machine.”

He is wrong. MKO continues to be the terrorist organization that it has always been. The only difference now is that, facing Iranian power like never before, the group and its sponsors can only attempt online subversion against Iran. Like Saddam Hussein of Iraq, MKO and the House of Saud will have their expiration dates for the US. And until that day arrives, they can wiggle only as much.

By Hossein Jelveh,

(The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of Press TV.)

September 26, 2018 0 comments

Iran

Iran: How about looking at actual bots in Albania

Iran Says Twitter Shut Legitimate Accounts, but Not Anti-Government Ones

DUBAI — Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Sunday accused Twitter of closing accounts of “real” Iranians, while allowing anti-government ones backed by the United States.

In August, Facebook Inc, Twitter Inc and Alphabet Inc collectively removed hundreds of accounts tied to an alleged Iranian propaganda operation.

“Hello @Jack. Twitter has shuttered accounts of real Iranians, (including) TV presenters & students, for supposedly being part of an ‘influence op’,” Zarif said in a tweet, addressing Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey.

“How about looking at actual bots in (the Albanian capital of) Tirana used to prop up ‘regime change’ propaganda spewed out of (Washington) DC? #YouAreBots,” Zarif said.

Twitter declined to comment when contacted by Reuters in the United States.

Iranian media have accused Israel, Saudi Arabia, and exiled opposition groups, including the Mujahideen Khalq which has some members based in Albania, of being behind social media campaigns calling for the overthrow of the Islamic government

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei accused the United States and Israel this month of waging a media war to discourage Iranians, as the country faces economic hardship after the reimposition of U.S. sanctions.

(Reporting by Dubai newsroom; Editing by Mark Potter)

September 25, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

MEK, a tool for fomenting chaos rather than an alternative for IR

The protests of some Iranian citizens during the past week show that protesters have gone well beyond strictly economic grievances to challenge their government. “Across Iran’s heartland, from the sweltering heat of its southern cities to the bustling capital, protesters have taken to the streets with increasing intensity in recent months, much to the satisfaction of the Trump administration, which is hoping the civil unrest will put pressure on Iranian leaders,” writes Thomas Erdbrink of New York Times.

The NY Times correspondent tries to give a detailed account of the protests in Iran interviewing different people with different political point of views. What is clearly indicated in the report is that protesters’ aspirations have nothing to do with the MKO. If in some cases they chant slogans in favor of Reza Shah–who is described as “an authoritarian who industrialized Iran at the beginning of the century, with a very firm hand” by the NY times—in no one calls on Rajavi as an alternative to the Islamic Republic. [1]

Although the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi) have made efforts to lobby the US administration which is not clear if it yielded any results, and whether it has been successful or not, Trump’s new sanctions against Iran has cheered it up despite the lack of popularity inside Iran.

A few days after the group’s annual gathering in Paris last month, Damien McElroy of the National stated that although the MKO has thus sustained a high profile as an opposition voice to the Iranian regime, its efforts to co-opt successive internal protest movements within Iran have not been taken seriously. [2]

A month later, Babak Taghvaee, the journalist historian and defense analyst, explains the answer to “Why is MEK Group So Unpopular Among Iranians?”.

“Despite all the efforts, the exiled Iranian political-militant organization Mojahedin-e Khalq’s (MEK) remains unpopular among ordinary Iranians, Iranian dissidents, and opposition figures in the United States,” Taghvaee states. “While MEK seems to be popular among some U.S. politicians after the group was delisted from terrorist lists, MEK remains unpopular among Iranians and in particular with the Kurds.” [3]

The MKO’s acts of violence violent acts listed by the author can simply justify the hatred of the Iranians towards the group. “The assassination of ordinary citizens, playing a key role in the 1979 Islamic Revolution, taking part in U.S. embassy hostage crisis, and providing security services for Iraq’s dictator Saddam Hussein all contributed to the group being Iran’s most hated political organization,” he writes. [4]

However, Taghvaee describes the history of the group’s Saddam backed military operations against Iran in details. One example of the mujahedin’s treasonous acts against their country fellow-men is recounted as this: “Militants of three MEK battalions disguised themselves as Iranian army soldiers, which helped them to break Iran’s defensive line by killing and capturing dozens of their soldiers.”[5]

In his opinion what helped the MKO survive after the Coalition invasion of to Iraq in 2003 is “the generous financial support of Saudi Arabia” that eventually aided the group to pay for advocacy of the U.S., U.K., Canada, and other countries to be taken off terrorist lists.

About the MKO’s multi-million-dollar campaign in the West, he suggests: “MEK spends millions to hold annual rallies in Paris during which they pay Western politicians to give speeches and rent crowds of refugees and foreign students to play the role of Iranians. MEK also pays western journalists and news agencies to publish articles in support of the group to raise its popularity in the west. Despite these efforts, the Trump administration refuses to take MEK seriously and consider them a popular opposition group.” [6]

Now, one may ask what can the US administration benefit from the MKO the use of the MKO is for the US administration. Interviewed by Persia Digest, Trita Parsi, the president of the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) argued that the MKO’s violent past is so cooperative for the US warmongers that they can simply ignore the fact that it has once been designated as a terrorist group by the US State Department. “The support for the MEK is partly because the terrorist organization has bought itself into the American political system through massive donations,” he said.“ But it is also because some favor neither war nor regime change, but rather regime collapse. That is, rather than replacing the government in Iran with another regime, the aim is to replace it with chaos. That would lead to massive instability in Iran and potentially a civil war. Under such circumstances, Iran’s energy will be consumed internally and it will be disabled from power externally or to pose a challenge to US allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia. For this scenario, the MEK can be useful precisely because of its expertise in terrorism.” [7]

Mazda Parsi

[1] Erdbrink,Thomas, Protests Pop Up Across Iran, Fueled by Daily Dissatisfaction, New York Times , Aug.4, 2018

[2] McElroy, Damien, Iran opposition hated at home wins big name government backers ,The National,July 3, 2018

[3] Taghvaee Babak, , Why is MEK Group So Unpopular Among Iranians?, The Global Post, August 03,2018

[4]ibid

[5]ibid

[6]ibid

[7] IRNA, Talks with Trump can break up US coalition against Iran: Analyst, August 6,2018

August 9, 2018 0 comments

Albania

Trump Administration exploits Albania as a failed state, Rama is silent

Since receiving EU candidate status in 2014, Albania has muddled along keeping up the pretence that, with whichever government is in power, it is capable of completing the internal reforms needed for EU membership. After troubled elections in June 2017, governing Prime Minister Edi Rama and opposition party leader Lulzim Basha pledged to work for the benefit of Albania. Ordinary Albanians, however, concerned about unemployment and low wages, alongside other domestic problems, are still leaving the country rather than wait for better times. But Albania’s problems are much bigger than this.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in Albania’s relationship with the Trump administration in its current manifestation. A speech last week by Trump’s legal advisor Rudy Giuliani in Washington demonstrates fully that he, John Bolton, John McCain and the Trump administration hawks are able, without reservation, to exploit Albania as a failed nation state.

Yes, Albania is a failed state. How else is it possible for it to host a terrorist organisation – the Mojahedin Khalq (MEK) – which calls for violent regime change against Iran and has brought the enmity between Israel and Iran to Tirana, yet its government has failed object or even take any position on this scandal?

In November 2013, Prime Minister Edi Rama rejected the US’s request to allow chemical weapons from Syria to be destroyed on Albanian territory due to popular protests. But after the Americans dumped 3000 terrorists and subsequently reneged on their agreement to establish a de-radicalisation institute to rehabilitate them, Prime Minister Rama has remained mute. Perhaps due to the MEK’s ability to manipulate the Albanian media; paying outlets to publish article portraying the group as victims.

There should be no doubt in anybody’s mind. The MEK is a terrorist group. Albania cannot host a terrorist group without consequences. This is not Afghanistan or Iraq or Syria in which groups hide in the chaos and violence. This is a peaceful, democratic country which wishes to join the European Union.

Rudy Giuliani says “they are building a beautiful city right on the outskirts of Tirana” from which they will launch a campaign for regime change in Iran. The MEK’s Camp Ashraf Three is a closed and isolated military training camp, not a “beautiful city”. The MEK is a cult and just over 2,000 members live there in a state of modern slavery, not “freedom”. Giuliani does let slip, however, why this mercenary group is useful to America when he enthuses over “how much information they can get for us”. Essentially, MEK is a spy organisation.

Giuliani is not alone in his claims that supporting the MEK has “speeded up dramatically our ability to bring freedom to Iran”. Donald Trump’s recent appointment of John Bolton was controversial exactly because he also supports this group and has spent much of the past decade advocating bombing Iran and calling on the US government to help overthrow the Iranian government and install the MEK as a puppet regime instead.

The US (and Israeli) position toward Iran is known. Hatred toward Iran is endemic and institutionalised throughout the US political establishment. But what has this got to do with Albania? Before the MEK were foisted on the country by then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Albania’s relations with Iran were friendly and peaceful, focused on close cultural and traditional ties rather than scant economic or political benefits.

Now, suddenly, due to the complete apathy of Prime Minister Rama and his ‘head in the sand’ approach to the European Union accession process, Albania has been plunged into a war footing with Iran.

Giuliani did not take MEK leader Maryam Rajavi to Washington to make his announcement because he and his cohort of warmongers know the consequences. They don’t even trust her enough to arrange a two-day visit to London, Washington or Tel Aviv because she would claim asylum there. They want the toxic effect of the MEK but not in their own land.

That toxic effect was revealed in a round table debate in the European Parliament last month. Experts gathered with political representatives to give evidence about the MEK’s unwanted influence on parliamentary relations in whichever country they are based. Delegates agreed that the fundamental problem with the MEK is that the group is not accountable to anybody, not even its American supporters. Consequently, it acts with impunity in Albania as though it were above the law.

When Federica Mogherini, the EU’s foreign policy chief, and Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn next consider Albania’s status as an EU candidate country, will they see evidence of reforms and progress or the sad reality that Albania has become a failed state exploited by America, Israel and the MEK for warmongering against Iran.

ANNE KHODABANDEH

Anne Khodabandeh, is an expert in anti-terrorist activities and a long-standing activist in the field of deradicalization of extremists. She has written several articles and books on this subject, along with her husband, who is of Iranian origin.

Balkans Post,

May 10, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

MEK’s Role Is To Toxify Political Debate On Iran

Politicians and experts gathered in the European Parliament last week to discuss the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) threat to Albania.

Albania, a small NATO country in the Balkans, has found itself increasingly coerced against its own political will into taking positions alien to its national interests.

That coercion has come indirectly from the Americans through the agency of the discredited Mojahedin Khalq terrorist organisation (MEK) also known as the Rajavi Cult. The MEK has been present in Albania since 2013 when they were transferred from Iraq under a secret agreement between the American and Albanian governments and MEK leaders. Under this deal, the UNHCR agreed to move them while the MEK agreed to ‘behave’ and pay their own expenses. The Americans said they would establish a De-Radicalization Institute – a prelude to bringing more ‘terrorists’ in future. The budget languishes unspent with the American embassy in Tirana. Instead, by the end of 2016, there were 2,745 radicalized MEK in Albania who have re-grouped in a closed, isolated paramilitary training camp they named Camp Ashraf Three, to resume their anti-Iran activities unhindered.

Calling for regime change against another country is a criminal offence in Albania. But this has not stopped the MEK from doing exactly this. They have even drafted in several American supporters – John Bolton, John McCain, Rudi Giuliani – to come and add ‘veracity’ to their claim to be ready to overthrow the Iranian government from Albania. This is a problem not least because Albania is a peaceful country which, after its emergence from the controls of Soviet Russia, is proud of its religious tolerance and freedom of speech. Albania has also enjoyed a long history of shared traditional and cultural links with Iran. In the febrile atmosphere of US-Russia tensions, provoking enmity against Iran is not in Albania’s national interests at all.

In this context, experts on the MEK and political representatives from Albania gathered in the European Parliament on Tuesday 10th April, as MEPs Ana Gomes and Patricia Lalonde hosted a round-table meeting titled ‘Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) threat in Albania’ to discuss the problem.

Ms Gomes had called for an open debate but had to inform delegates that over thirty of her colleagues had signed an MEK instigated letter demanding the meeting should not go ahead. Ms Gomes denounced this approach saying that with the JCPOA in place and with an eye to the human rights situation in Iran, it is vital for the European Parliament to engage in dialogue with and about the Islamic Republic of Iran, even though it is obvious both sides will have very different opinions and views. The MEK are profoundly undemocratic and certainly do not believe in freedom of speech. That they are able to influence political behaviour in the EUP to try to silence MEPs is totally unacceptable.

https://dlb.nejatngo.org/Media/Interview/EUReporter-Gomes.mp4

Above: Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) Threat in Albania – Ana Gomes MEP

Indeed, none of the MEK’s lobbyists turned up for the debate. MEP Gérard Deprez, Chair of the Friends of a Free Iran in the European Parliament (affiliated to the MEK), who claims to have gathered over 200 signatures from fellow MEPs in favour of the MEK, was unable or unwilling to join the debate. When asked by MEPs to give the names of the signatories, he refused to do so.

Nicola Pedde, director of the Rome based Institute for Global Studies, described a similar situation in Italy. “When the MEK and Maryam Rajavi had free access to the Italian parliament, invited by various government agencies, they gathered signatures from around 70% of MPs. But after interviewing these members it was found that most MPs did not remember signing or what they signed for. Only five members deliberately supported the MEK. There was misuse of members’ ignorance on Iran issues. Such letters were used to increase the MEK’s infiltration inside institutions where they could toxify the bilateral relations and debate between the Italian Republic and the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

The MEK are replicating these methods in Albania; approaching MPs, media and opinion makers and influencing them with information which is “produced in a way to derail the interests of the country toward the Iranian government”. What Pedde calls “the toxification of political debate on Iran”.

But the problems for Albania are not limited to politics. According to an Albanian police report “…Iranian asylum seekers from [MEK]… could pose implications to our internal security, as these individuals are deeply indoctrinated, have been part of military structures, and have participated in fighting a war and in acts of terror.” Historian Olsi Jazexhi pointed out, “the MEK calls for jihad against a foreign country. According to the Albanian penal code, the MEK is unequivocally a terrorist organisation in my country.”

A fundamental difficulty in dealing with the MEK is that they are unaccountable. “We don’t know who they are or exactly how many there are”, said Anne Khodabandeh, a UK De-Radicalization consultant. “In 2003, the US army detained 3,800 MEK in Iraq. The UNHCR brought 2,901 to Albania. A now outdated report by the Albanian police accounts for 2,465 members. Since then, more have left or died. Yet their American lobbyist Senator Robert Torricelli claims there are 4,000 of them in Camp Ashraf Three. Where did the extras come from?”

According to Albanian lawyer, Migena Balla who helps former MEK members, the MEK do not have UN refugee status either from Iraq or in Albania. The Albanian state does not give them right to residence or work permits. They are, in effect, stateless. Even the International Organisation for Migration will not take responsibility for them. This picture is hugely complicated because when the UNHCR registered individuals in Iraq prior to transfer, the MEK deliberately used false names and identities – using borrowed and faked passports. We really don’t actually know who they are.

The MEK not only fake information, but identities too. This means the MEK can move members around without detection. The larger amorphous group also provides cover for around fifty highly radicalized members who are ‘deeply indoctrinated’, trained and willing to kill and die to order in pursuit of the MEK’s regime change agenda.

In a country notorious for corruption and with serious security and economic problems, the unaccountability of the MEK allows them unprecedented influence. This group, whether in Albania or Europe, is a danger to political debate, to civil society and to its own members. Olsi Jazexhi told delegates in the debate, “Europe is pluralistic and democratic and strong. We Albanians have come to ask for your help in dealing with the MEK”. But, if the MEK is not accountable to anybody, and nobody will take responsibility for the MEK, how will Europe answer?

Massoud Khodabandeh, Iranian.com,

April 19, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Time for reflection on unrest in Iran

It was after midnight on December 31 and I was checking the latest news about protests in Iran on twitter when one post attracted my attention. It claimed the “Iranian regime lost control of the central city of Kashan” –my hometown– and that “people have taken control of police stations and military installations in the city”. The writer of that post, who is the political editor of a very popular tabloid in Germany, further speculated in another post that this could be the beginning of “syrification of the conflict” in Iran!

By the time that gentleman decided to do some fact checking and deleted the fake news from his page, it was already retweeted nearly 600 times, allowing falsehood to proliferate in public discussion.

This was just one small example of distortion of reality regarding the unrest in Iran. But now that the dust of the protests has settled, it is time for some serious reflection on what happened.

The demonstrations began on December 28 in Iran’s second largest city, Mashhad, over alleged corruption, economic hardships and high unemployment and swept to other cities and towns. The number of people that were arrested in days of protests remains disputed. Iran’s judiciary spokesperson said “a total of 400 people were detained and 25 killed”. Other less official sources have given a higher number.

Post truth, information, and emotion

The news about the protests quickly spread on social media and in turn was picked up by foreign-based satellite channels. On the same outlets exiled journalists and activists living in their own bubble, urged people inside Iran to engage in civil disobedience with absurd actions which drew ridicule from many inside Iran.

In the midst of turmoil, the striking point was the coverage of major foreign media outlets from the U.S. to France and Germany seeking to hype the situation by disseminating sensational information, and assertions under the guise of news reporting. Their coverage was for most part one-sided comprising reports and interviews with foreign observers, exiled journalists and activists who were repeating the same old, emotional and gibberish narrative against the Iranian government.

This setting is a central part of the “post-truth” world which Oxford Dictionary defined as “circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief”.

The “post-truth” concept is not a new phenomenon and has been around for a while. But its usage spiked in 2016 both with the populist Brexit movement, resulting in the UK’s vote to quit the European Union, and Trump’s rise to the presidency.

Author Ralph Keyes in his book, The Post-Truth Era: Dishonesty and Deception in Contemporary Life, defines post-truth era as a time when “borders blur between truth and lies, honesty and dishonesty, fiction and nonfiction. Deceiving others becomes a challenge, a game, and ultimately a habit.”

Of course trying to mislead the public is nothing new but in the case of Iran one can hardly think of any other country where the outbreak of protests leads observers to reach for their revolutionary theory and hyperbole and “the fall of regime”.

What was different this time?

The latest demonstrations in Iran were different from most protests that have previously roiled the country since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Firstly, despite the geographical scale, the number of demonstrators was small and limited. While mostly ordinary working class people with contradictory slogans were taking part in the protests, middle class in large population centers stayed at home because they were not sure about the outcome. Moreover, this was not an authentic civic movement for change because it lacked clear goals and leadership that naturally turned chaotic in several provinces and towns when thugs and mobs set fire to state-owned buildings and damaged public properties.

Secondly, let’s not forget, just seven months ago more than 41 million people turned out in the presidential election with over 57 percent of them voted to continue Hassan Rouhan’s government of “hope and prudence”. That’s why it was highly unlikely that such overwhelming show of support and hope suddenly disappear.

What comes after is important

The unrest was a convenient pretext for anti-Iran opposition warmongers in the U.S. and elsewhere to exploit it for their own purpose of promoting regime change and substitute Iranian exiles as representatives of people who were protesting in the streets. Foreign media outlets gave some coverage to the remnants of the old monarchist Pahlavi regime but it was the notorious Mojahedin-e Khalq terrorist Organization (MKO) that received the most coverage on Fox News, Voice of America and other outlets.

Just as a side note, during a week of turmoil, the Voice of America Persian service “set an all-time traffic record with their coverage of the Iran protests with 5.5 million Facebook video views & nearly 3 million site visits,” Amanda Bennett, the head of VOA, wrote in a tweet on January 2.

Other major outlets misleadingly used propaganda pictures of rallies organized by MKO in the United States and Europe to distort perception of protests in Iran. MKO fought alongside the Iraqi army in Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. The group also carried out numerous bombings and assassinations after the Islamic revolution in 1979. The group was until 2012 on the U.S. terrorism list and now is pushing for sanctions against Iran. That’s why the group has no support among Iranians.

It is important to note that people of Iran are political savvy and while many may want a more liberal and Western like society, they hate U.S. antagonism and have reasons to distrust the United States. They have also seen the outcome of U.S. regime change policies in places such as Syria and Libya. Therefore, no sensible and intellectually honest Iranian takes MKO, monarchists, or other opposition groups and activists outside Iran as viable alternative to the current government.

Blindness to evidence

Gradual changes are taking place from Iran’s political development, social freedoms, human and minority rights, government accountability and transparency to even people’s style of living. One might argue for those changes in the merits but the truth is that foreign meddling in Iran has always adversely affected these developments.

Some people may not like history but they should be reminded that in 1953, the democratically-elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh was overthrown in a coup orchestrated by the CIA and British intelligence service. The U.S. and Britain backed Saddam Hussein in the war against Iran and over the past decades, Washington has imposed punishing economic sanctions on Iran, threatened it with war and funded anti-government opposition groups.

When Iran signed a landmark nuclear deal with six world powers in 2015, many Iranians had expectations that their economic situation would improve. Even part of Rouhani’s electoral appeal stemmed from expectations that the accord would bring foreign investment and jobs. Iran’s economy has recovered since, but because of U.S. sanctions such recovery was not enough to match the expectations or alleviate growing inequality.

Under President Donald Trump, the U.S. has stepped up efforts to isolate Iran — adding the country’s handling of protests to its list of reasons. The Trump administration’s support for unrest, regime change and encouraging social unrest including political statements of condemnation and biased media coverage to undermine the legitimacy of the government is definitely an obstacle to Iran’s democratic progress.

Post-truth era is characterized by “willful blindness to evidence and appeal to emotionally based argument,” and when it comes to covering Iran, misrepresentation of facts can really be harmful.

Mohammad Hashemi,

January 22, 2018 0 comments

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