Missions of Nejat Society

Iranian Mojahedin Khalq confuse toilet paper with sandpaper

From Mr. Muhammad Veliu’s writing in Gazeta Shqiptarja.com we learned that representatives of the group, organization, cult of Madam Rajavi, with its headquarters (camp, barracks) in Manza, are coming more and more under the spotlight of the most prestigious international media (TV, newspapers, news agencies etc.), and have decided to fight back. In their counter attack they dealt with me personally. In this writing they will have the preface of my answer.

Elderly folk, MEK, former terrorists, currently stateless (refugees) who are sheltered in Albania as persons protected for humanitarian reasons, I remind you with humility that attacking me with all kinds of slanders, tales and idiocies just reminded me of Communist Albania before 1990. You old men and women, presently stateless former criminals, I can say that by scratching at me in a false and fabricated way they have confused toilet paper with sandpaper!

To the public, I am explaining one of their idiosyncratic allegations, not only to reject it, but also to bring to life the paranoia of these criminalized “fossils”, still in circulation from a bygone era.

MEK! Do not be so stupid as to lie about the incident of March 22, 2018, when collaborators in the Albanian police ordered by you (and you have left traces, as ignorant as you are), detained two Iranian journalists. Within 3-4 hours they were released and received an apology (documented with audio recording in Albanian, English and with a phrase in Farsi). How is it possible that the Albanian police release terrorists and apologize?!?!? Are you living in a cave, oh you elderly stateless former criminals?!?!?!? These two Iranian “terrorists” came to Albania at the invitation of the Bektashi World Chief of Bektashis, Baba Mondi. Do you believe, you wretched people, that Baba Mondi is a collaborator with Iranian terrorists?!?!?! The two “terrorists” were detained during the celebrations of the Bektashi Celebration, Sultan Novruz, in the premises of the Headquarters in Tirana, some 30 km from the camp barracks, your residence in Manza. Did these terrorists, with their presence at this ceremony, want to commit terrorist acts against their host Baba Mondi or even the President of the Republic of Albania, who was a participant in this ceremony?!??!?! Two Iranian “terrorists” entered Albania with a regular visa issued by the Albanian Consulate General in Istanbul for free (gratis). It is a miserable day when our diplomats in Istanbul have become a conduit for Iranian terrorists?!?!?!?! Ask your unintelligent collaborators in the Albanian intelligence service, to read, for further information, my article at the link:

https://www.cna.al/2018/03/26/dy-terroristet-iraniane-aprofesionalizem-ulerites-apo-thjesht-false-flag-operation/

The MEK states that journalist and British citizen Arron Reza Merat is an infamous Iranian agent of the Iranian regime. I appeal to British diplomats in Tirana to urgently report to MI5 and MI6 that the MEK have discovered this dangerous Iranian spy in our Tirana. While we are here, the British diplomats in Tirana should urgently inform the British intelligence service that MEK of Manza have also discovered a dangerous Iranian spy (British citizen) named Anne Singleton, with whom I was a participant last November (not December as they have incorrectly and unintelligently informed our readers) in a public activity, a seminar, a workshop in Tirana, an activity featured in the electronic media, written media and with videos on You tube, and photos on my personal Facebook. Albanian readers are offered this link to the most recent article by Arron Merat (with associates), the Iranian “spy” for the most serious British newspaper “The Guardian”. link:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jun/30/rudy-giuliani-mek-iran-paris-rally

Elderly, stateless ex-terrorists, (without a homeland), I explained that I went to Manzas as a translator for the British journalist, not as co-author of his article. I remind the miserable MEK that their Albanian collaborators went to the Faculty of Philology in Tirana to verify that I really did graduate in English in 1988, inter alia to perform the role of a professional oral translator and in writing (interpreter & translator). I did not hide my identity because I presented to MEK a legal identification document, an international passport. I also had an identity card, a driving license, a journalist’s card and a permit to enter Durres Port. I gave my passport, the document contains more info and I had the suspicion that the training which they which they had 30 years ago from Saddam Hussein’s 9th Mukhabarat Directorate was shallow, deficient and very rudimentary. The MEK, in a very professional way, photographed and documented by my side, not just the passport page with my personal details on it, but also every passport page, where there were the exit and entry stamps for whenever I had travelled abroad since December 2010! I remind the MEK that neither they nor the Argon security employees and security guards, have the jurisdiction to check ID documents of Albanian or foreign nationals outside the fence of the camp, barracks, MEK refuge in Manza. I gave my documents and those of the person driving the car owned by my wife to test the professionalism of these former terrorists for the sake of the “Argon” company employees who are ordinary people who support their families with that job!

I did not come to your camp as a reporter but as a translator, however, since, according to your “spokesperson”: “He is part of the Albanian network working with the Iranian Embassy”, I will publicly expose your extreme paranoia. While I still have a very good, almost photographic memory, of being outdoors outside your camp, outside the gate, often in the public road asphalt, I am informing you publicly that I noticed, among other things, these things:

Works in your camp are being carried out by the “Victoria Invets” company owned by Mr. Fatmir Kuqin “. I have almost photographed in my mind, the types, brands and vehicle plates of this company, which entered and left the camp.

Among the subcontractors I noted three different firms. So you don’t think I’m bluffing I’ll mention one of them, company “Beton 5”.

I noted the types and Trademarks used by the “Argon” company’s employees, as well as the type and brand of their handsets (walkie talkies).

I noted the brand of hand radios used by two of the MEK, who were a bunch of commanders, one of whom, in 1991, as a tank driver with “Assad Babylon” [Saddam Hussein] stained the tracks of his tank with the blood of women, children, babies and Shiite tribal elders in the villages in the wetlands near Basra and up to the outskirts of the Iraqi Port Um-Qasser!

I promise you that I will carefully investigate and make public in detail the procedure for obtaining permission from the Albanian authorities for the installation of antennas for such radio transmitters!

I have photographed in my mind the types, brands and license plates of the transport which conveys Albanian employees into and out of the camp. Such details are important to understanding MEK-Albanian relations.

I also fixed in my memory such details as the type and brand of telescopic mirror, which was used to check the underneath of the car chassis entering and leaving the MEK residence. Congratulations, yours are better quality than the ones used by the Vehicle Inspection Guard at the entrance of the Prime Ministry (SIC!).

While on the subject of the Prime Minister, my brother Edwin, the famous leader: Wait, wait, you haven’t seen anything yet. I assure you, oh you wretched MEK, that in the second part of my answer you will be treated to such topics as: 1) Ashraf Camp 3 or George Orwell’s Animal Farm. 2) Edwin ‘the Believer’ hopes to use MEK as a master key to open the Oval Office door. 3) Details of how I will accompany other foreign journalists to the gate of Madam Rajavi’s “Animal Farm”. 4) The public outcry against the MEK and the rule of hearing two bells in journalism. 5) Albanians generally do not endure foreign boils and do not allow them to command in Albania. 6) From Ruskik Haza! Fuck off MEK, this is dialectical!

Oh you MEK, all this story about you started from my writing in this link here:

https://www.cna.al/2017/11/24/kryeministri-edvin-do-strehoje-ne-shqiperi-familjaret-e-terroristeve-te-isis-it/

MEK tomorrow! And tomorrow! / IMPACT GAZETTE

Gjergji Thanasi, Gazeta Impact, Translated by Iran Interlink

August 23, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Iran’s Long List of Grievances Against the United States

On May 8 President Donald Trump announced that the United States will be leaving the nuclear agreement that Iran signed in July 2015 with P5+1 – the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany – officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The President also announced that he will re-impose the economic sanctions against Iran that had been lifted by President Obama after the JCPOA had been signed. The first stage of the sanctions went into effect on August 6, with the second stage planned for November 6.

It is highly unusual for one administration to not abide by the provision of an international agreement signed by its predecessor. But, with the Trump administration pulling the United States out of so many international agreements and organizations, anything is possible. The U.S. has already left the Paris Agreement of climate change, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The US has withdrawn from UNSECO, the United Nations’ cultural organization, and from the UN’s Human Rights Council. Thus, leaving the JCPOA continues the patterns.

The US exit from the JCPOA is, however, illegal. When the JCPOA was signed in 2015, it was endorsed by the UN Security Council, which approved unanimously Resolution 2231 expressing its endorsement. The Resolution was filed in the framework of Chapter VII of UN Charter that deals with peace and stability in the world. According to the Charter, it is mandatory for all members of the UN to abide by the provisions of any Resolution filed under Chapter VII. Thus, not only has the US broken its promises to Iran and violated its commitment to the JCPOA, it is also in violation of its obligations toward the UN.

Then, on July 17 the International Court of Justice (ICJ) announced that Iran has initiated proceedings against the US, complaining that through its actions, and in particular imposition of the economic sanctions, the US has violated the Treaty of Amity, Economic Relations, and Consular Rights that it signed with Iran in Teheran on 15 August 1955 and went into effect on 16 June 1957. The Treaty was signed by the Dwight D. Eisenhower administration after the Central Intelligence Agency, together with Britain’s MI6, overthrew Iran’s democratically-elected government of Dr. Mohammad Mosaddegh, Iran’s national hero who is still revered in Iran, in August 1953. It was supposed to mend the relations between the US and the Iranian people. But, in reality the US supported the dictatorship of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi for 25 years, until it was toppled by the Iranian Revolution of February 1979.

In its formal complaint to the ICJ Iran charged that the US is in breach of its obligations to Iran under Articles IV (1), VII (1), VIII (1), VIII (2), IX (2) and X (1) of the Treaty. Article VI(1) states that, “Each High Contracting Party shall at all times accord fair and equitable treatment to nationals and companies of the other High Contracting Party, and to their property and enterprises; shall refrain from applying unreasonable or discriminatory measures that would impair their legally acquired rights and interests; and shall assure that their lawful contractual rights are afforded effective means of enforcement, in conformity with the applicable laws,” which are clearly violated by the re-imposition of the sanctions.

Article VII(1) of the Treaty stipulates that, “Neither High Contracting Party shall apply restrictions on the making of payments, remittances, and other transfers of funds to or from the territories of the other High Contracting Party, except (a) to the extent necessary to assure the availability of foreign exchange for payments for goods and services essential to the health and welfare of its people, or (b) in the case of a member of the International Monetary Fund, restrictions specifically approved by the Fund,” which is also violated by the US because it wants to cutoff Iran from the international banks and financial institutions, and did so during the Obama administration, before the JCPOA was signed.

According to Article VIII(1), “Each High Contracting Party shall accord to products of the other High Contracting Party, from whatever place and by whatever type of carrier arriving, and to products destined for exportation to the territories of such other High Contracting Party, by whatever route and by whatever type of carrier, treatment no less favorable than that accorded like products of or destined for exportation to any third country, in all matters relating to: (a) duties, other charges, regulations and formalities, on or in connection with importation and exportation; and (b) internal taxation, sale, distribution, storage and use. The same rule shall apply with respect, to the international transfer of payments for imports and exports.” Since the Trump administration has banned imports of any products from Iran, including rugs and pistachios, it is in violation of this Article.

Article VIII(2) explicitly prohibits imposition of sanctions by the two particles against one another, as it declares that, “Neither High Contracting Party shall impose restrictions or prohibitions on the importation of any product of the other High Contracting Party or on the exportation of any product to the territories of the other High Contracting Party, unless the importation of the like product of, or the exportation of the like product to, all third countries is similarly restricted or prohibited.” The same principle can be argued based on Article IX(2) that states that, “Nationals and companies of either High Contracting Party shall be accorded treatment no less favorable than that accorded nationals and companies of the other High Contracting Party, or of any third country, with respect to all matters relating to importation and exportation.” Finally, according to Article X(1), “Between the territories of the two High Contracting Parties there shall be freedom of commerce and navigation,” which the sanctions would be violating.

To be sure, this is not the only treaty with Iran that the US is violating. For years successive administrations have supported various opposition groups against Tehran. The George W. Bush administration, for example, devoted $75 million to support the opposition groups. In a recent speech in Southern California, where there is a large community of Iranian-Americans, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke about supporting the opposition groups. Rudy Giuliani, the President’s attorney, and John Bolton, Trump’s national security adviser, have both been paid lobbyists for the MEK, the exiled opposition group that is universally hated by the Iranian people for collaborating with the regime of Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq war; was listed up until 2011 by the State Department as a foreign terrorist organization, and assassinated several American advisers in Iran in the 1970s. Giuliani and Bolton have been fantasizing about “regime change” in Tehran, and installing the MEK as Iran’s new ruler.

All of these violate the Algiers Accord, the agreement between the US and Iran that ended the Hostage Crisis of 1979-1981. Point I, paragraph 1 of the Accord states, “Non-Intervention in Iranian Affairs – The United States pledges that it is and from now on will be the policy of the United States not to intervene, directly or indirectly, politically or militarily, in Iran’s internal affairs.”

But, Iran’s grievances do not end with violations of the two treaties, and imposition of the economic sanctions. In addition to supporting the dictatorship of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi the US sided with Saddam Hussein’s regime during its war with Iran. The US destroyed two of Iran’s offshore oil platforms in the Persian Gulf in 1987; it attacked the Iranian navyin the same year, and shoot down Iran’s passenger airliner over the Persian Gulf in July 1988, killing 290 people, including 63 children. Since 1995 the United States has prevented large-scale foreign investment in Iran’s oil and natural gas industries. The complete list of grievances is too long to be given here. As a UN member, the US is violating its obligations toward that organization and its charter by trying to topple Iran’s political system.

Ever since the 1979 Revolution, the image of Iran and its people that has been presented to the American public has been unreal and completely distorted. Iran’s population of 83 million is young, educated [Iran’s rate of literacy is 93 percent], and very well connected to the rest of the world. While Iranian people want democracy, respect for human rights, economic prosperity, and friendly relations with the rest of the world, which the Islamic Republic has failed to a large extent to deliver, they also reject outside intervention in their internal affairs. With the exception of Israel, among all the nations in the Middle East and North Africa Iranian people are the least hostile toward the US and many believe the friendliest.

So, next time when you read about Iran, remember what the US has done to that nation for the past 65 years.

Mohammad Sahimi,

Muhammad Sahimi is a professor at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. For the past two decades he has published extensively on Iran’s political developments and its nuclear program. He was a founding lead political analyst for the website PBS/Frontline: Tehran Bureau, and has also published extensively in major websites and print media. He is also the editor and publisher of Iran News and Middle East Reports and produces a weekly commentary for broadcasting that can be watched at http://www.ifttv.com/muhammad-sahimi.

August 15, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Russiagate Conceals Israeli Meddling and Coming War with Iran

Since taking office a year and a half ago, the allegations of ‘collusion’ between U.S. President Donald Trump’s election campaign and the Russian government have buried nearly all other substantive issues in regards to his administration. This hasn’t been limited to marginalizing reportage of destructive domestic legislation or the escalation of endless war abroad. It has successfully diverted attention away from other foreign governments shaping U.S. policy and elections. The media has even downplayed Trump’s sycophantic behavior towards other heads of state in favor of their pathological obsession with his perceived obsequiousness toward Russian President Vladimir Putin. This is largely because “Russiagate” is not based on facts or evidence, but a psychological operation conducted by the intelligence community through mass media disseminating suggestive and pre-selected disinformation about Trump and Russia. Not only has it enabled the national security state and political establishment to neutralize the anti-Trump “resistance”, it has become a smokescreen for the ‘collusion’ between Trump and the state of Israel which continues to guide his decision making.

One month after his shocking victory and before his inauguration, one of the top members of Trump’s transition team, National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, directly contacted members of the UN Security Council and urged them to block a draft resolution that condemned illegal Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territory. General Flynn corresponded with diplomats from several foreign governments (including Russia) to learn their stance on the resolution and tried to persuade them to vote against it. Flynn would later plead guilty to making false statements to the FBI about his discussions with the Russian Ambassador to the U.S., Sergey Kislyak. The Israeli government candidly admitted to seeking help from Trump’s transition team and it was his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who put Flynn up to the task. However, it is not unusual for foreign officials to communicate with an incoming administration and Flynn lobbied envoys from other nations in addition to Russia.

None of this prevented the media from neglecting the substance of Flynn’s guilty plea to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, which is that he likely gave the FBI incomplete information about his communication with Kislyak only because the Trump campaign was already under inquiry for ties to the Kremlin. In a mindless frenzy, the media have presumed this correspondence between Flynn and a Russian official was evidence of a diabolical plot between Trump and the Kremlin that occurred during the election. The fact that the transition team did collude with Israel or the actual content of his talks with the Russian Ambassador was reduced to a footnote. It is not that the double-dealing between Israel and Trump has been unreported, but rather it is normalized and deemed completely acceptable because relations with Israel are unquestionable.

If there is a foreign country which routinely interferes i n U.S. elections , it is the state of Israel through its immeasurably powerful lobbying groups. Its most influential organization is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which is not forced to register as a foreign agent as its tentacles permeate into all aspects of the democratic process. AIPAC closely monitors American elections at every level, blackmailing the support of the entire U.S. congress to deliberately ignore Israel’s reckless violation of international law, its ever-expanding illegal occupation of Palestine, and war crimes in Gaza and Lebanon. For the same reason, the media continues to whitewash the IDF’s ongoing massacres on the Gaza strip, while the mantra of “Putin kills journalists!” is chanted as Israeli snipers murder Palestinian journalists on camera wearing “PRESS” across their chests. In turn, the Zionist lobby manipulates the bias of major news outlets and infiltrates the rosters of the Washington elite think tank community. Israel disrupts U.S. elections and impacts the media far and away more than any other country, but even mentioning this fact can relegate a journalist to marginal publications or risk being publicly smeared as an anti-Semite.

Recently, it was revealed that Donald Trump Jr. and Blackwater founder Erik Prince had met with an Israeli private intelligence firm called PSY-Group offering social media manipulation services in August 2016. Most of the mainstream media coverage minimized the significance that the firm is an Israel-based company, whose ominous motto is to “Shape Reality.” Instead, coverage of the Mueller probe has focused exclusively on the Russian-based Internet Research Agency indicted by the U.S. Justice Department for “conspiracy to defraud the United States.” The premise that an internet marketing and clickbait scam company owned by a ex-hot dog salesman could have swayed the election of the most powerful country in human history simply by sharing memes and buying Facebook ads through phony social media accounts is beyond comprehension.

While blame for election interference has been squarely placed on Russia, Israel has managed to escape free from any scrutiny despite the disclosures about PSY-Group. Meanwhile the consulting firm Cambridge Analytica, founded by Breitbart CEO/White House Chief Strategist Stephen K. Bannon and pro-Trump billionaire Robert Mercer, became the center of controversy when it was exposed for illegally mining the data of millions of Facebook users as it worked for the Trump and Brexit campaigns. Yet according to a whistleblower, the firm had also employed the Israeli private security firm Black Cube to hack an election in Nigeria. Black Cube is the same agency formed by ex-Mossad agents implicated in the Harvey Weinstein scandal that sparked the #MeToo movement. Why has this revelation aroused little to no interest from the Mueller team or the media?

If an analysis were based on Trump’s actual policies, there would be no clearer front-runner for impact on his governance than Israel. It goes beyond his plans for a border wall being modeled after the West Bank and Egypt-Sinai barrier fences. As President, he has surpassed each of his predecessors in out-and-out support for the Jewish state and hostility towards the Palestinians. The controversial decision to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, approved by 90 out of 100 Senators, has irreparably damaged any remaining belief that the U.S. was ever a neutral peace broker in seventy years of Israeli-Palestinian relations. The move to recognize Jerusalem as the ‘undivided’ capital of Israel has been his most bipartisan measure — coastal elite liberals and the Bible Belt may like to appear worlds apart, but on fanatical support for Israel they too are ‘undivided.’ The Israel lobby has long held sway over both major parties and it was Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer who led the applause of Trump’s Jerusalem decision, the same fanatical Zionist who has sought to make boycotting of Israel a felony crime.

Peace with Russia and China, But More Wars in the Middle East? The Contradictions of Trump’s Foreign Policy

Israel has also determined much of Trump’s other foreign policy moves, especially those towards its sworn enemy — the Islamic Republic of Iran. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu adamantly opposed the nuclear deal framework even though spy cables revealed that his own intelligence agency contradicts his claims about their nuclear capabilities. The motive for Iran to agree to the nuclear deal was primarily to alleviate the damage done from decades of economic sanctions by the U.S. The crisis itself is engineered — in actuality Iran long ago ended its nuclear program but it’s wounded economy forced it into accepting the terms of the now abandoned Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). As if this weren’t enough, a recently leaked clip of Benjamin Netanyahu bragging about convincing Trump to withdraw from the Iran deal was made public but was buried in the headlines during the Helsinki summit with Putin. This collusion didn’t bother Democrats one bit as both parties just unanimously approved a $38-billion aid package to Israel for the next ten years.

It was Trump’s opponent in the 2016 election, Hillary Clinton, who as Secretary of State delisted the Mojahedin-e-Khalq (People’s Mujahideen of Iran) from the State Department’s list of terrorist organizations in 2012. The militant organization (abbreviated MEK, MKO or PMOI) is a cult-like group in exile which advocates the violent overthrow of the Iranian government and was officially designated a terror group for 15 years by the U.S. It was removed by the Obama administration after aggressive lobbying by its political wing based in France, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI). Two of Trump’s top associates — war hawk National Security Advisor John Bolton and his lawyer representing him in the Mueller probe, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani — have repeatedly met with the MEK in recent years giving highly paid speeches at their events advocating regime change in Iran.

Founded in 1965, the MEK committed terrorist attacks throughout the Shah’s reign which killed thousands of Iranians and also included several plots that took the lives of U.S. personnel. The group today claims the attacks which killed Americans were committed by a breakaway Marxist faction of the group during a period when the Shah imprisoned its founder, Massoud Rajavi, but the evidence of it’s violent past (and present) is overwhelming.

This is yet another instance of the U.S. re-branding terrorism when it suits its interests while simultaneously conducting a vaguely defined war against it. The decision to remove the group from the blacklist was a politicized move as the criminal activity of the MEK has never ceased. Another motive has been the group’s close ties with Israel, whose intelligence agency Mossad has trained MEK operatives in committing assassinations against Iranian nuclear scientists.

In 1979, the MEK participated in the Islamic Revolution which overthrew the U.S.-backed Shah. Persian royalty had been in power for more than 2,000 years, but the Pahlavi monarchy had been re-installed as a U.S. puppet following a CIA/MI6 coup d’etat in 1953 green-lighted by Winston Churchill and the Eisenhower administration. The illegal putsch ousted the first ever democratically-elected President of Iran, Mohammad Mosaddegh, who had nationalized the Iranian oil industry and thrown out foreign oil companies like the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, later known as British Petroleum (BP), recently known for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The Shah ruled brutally over Iran serving Western oil interests until the Islamic Revolution which was a huge loss for U.S. hegemony that it has sought to regain ever since. After the popular uprising, Ayatollah Khomeini consolidated power and pushed out the leftist participants, liberal elements and rival Islamists like the MEK. The group was then outlawed and went into exile after a failed insurrection.

During the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, Saddam Hussein (then supported by the U.S.) allowed the MEK to operate in Iraq, providing weapons and funding to carry out terrorist attacks against Tehran. When the U.S. invaded Baghdad in 2003, the remaining MEK and its nearly 3,000 Iranian exiles were given protection status by the Bush administration in U.S. military facilities. Massoud Rajavi disappeared during the U.S. invasion and to this day his whereabouts are still unknown. His wife, Maryam Rajavi, has led the group since and continued the cult of personality that existed around her husband’s leadership, purging critics and assassinating defectors while rebranding the terror cult as a ‘pro-democracy’ organization. The new Iraqi government began to develop close relations with Iran during the period which saw the rise of ISIS and the MEK were suddenly no longer welcome. Iraqi security forces raided their base in Camp Ashraf killing dozens of MEK members, a sign of waning U.S. influence in post-Saddam Iraq. The Rajavi cult have since been evicted and relocated to Albania and NATO-occupied Kosovo where the group has strong Islamist supporters. In Albania’s capitol Tirana, the exiled opposition group is currently based in a compound known as ‘Ashraf 3’.

The group is also known by the CIA to have aligned itself with ISIS against the Iranian-backed government in Iraq that expelled them. ISIS and MEK even likely coordinated terrorist attacks in June 2017 in Iran just as the Trump administration increased the economic sanctions. In addition to Ashraf 3, the MEK is allegedly being trained at the NATO military base in Kosovo, Camp Bondsteel, possibly for a regime change operation in Iran. Concurrently, Trump is reported to be preparing to strike Tehran as early as this month according to the Australian Geo-Spatial Intelligence Organization, just as he tweeted threats at Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. The decision to use Kosovo as a base of operations for the MEK is consistent with the protectorate’s history — it was established after seceding from Serbia when the Clinton administration supported another de-listed Islamist terror group, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), in NATO’s bombing campaign against Belgrade in 1999.

Trump rhetorically has been a harsh critic of NATO and the media has used this as further ‘evidence’ of his secret allegiance to the Kremlin, but an examination of his actual courses of action show the contrary. NATO has already expanded to include Montenegro in it’s membership and Trump is sending arms to Ukraine in its war against pro-Russian separatists. The National Security Council added an additional $200 million worth in support immediately following the Helsinki summit in a move the Obama administration had opted against. Even a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, a NATO-funded think tank, assessed that Trump has taken a very hard-line stance on Russia despite the photo opportunity with Putin. After all, the summit did not result in the lifting of sanctions or the recognition of Crimea as Russian territory as some predicted. Apart from his rhetoric, what policies has Trump enacted that appease Russian interests?

If his statements and policies diverge, what remains a mystery is the intention behind his dialogue with Russia. Many speculate it is an effort to realign Washington with Moscow to halt the ascent of China while driving a wedge between Iran and Russia. While Putin may have rebuilt the Russian economy, the claim that Moscow has become a rival ‘superpower’ is greatly exaggerated — Washington’s main geopolitical challenger is China. Obama’s “pivot to Asia” turned out to be a catastrophic failure, as did the attempt to oust Assad in Syria and desperation move to covertly back the failed Gülenist coup in Turkey. Regardless of whether Trump’s motive is to reset U.S. foreign policy or the unlikely possibility Putin would ever agree to an alliance against China, the imaginary Russian collusion narrative is subterfuge which benefits Israel. It is either inadvertently or purposefully concealing the principal guilty party in meddling in the U.S. election — Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel.

The 2016 election was a contest over how best to arrange the deck chairs of the Titanic — either way the empire has overplayed its hand and the ship was going down no matter the outcome. We are told that American voters, specifically the “white working class”, were too stupid to think for themselves. They did not follow orders from the “polls” predicting a 90% chance of a Clinton victory, which really were belittling instructions as to how to vote. We are led to believe they chose to elect a populist demagogue instead of Wall Street’s darling because they were brainwashed by ‘Russian interference’, not the collusion on the part of the DNC to rig the primaries in Clinton’s favor. Apparently, this same logic does not apply when Israel interrupts US elections — their interference doesn’t rob Americans of their agency in the voting process.

Israel is also directly supporting the ascendancy of the far right in the West that the same liberals have raised the alarm about while pointing the finger at Moscow. In the EU, Israel has close ties with Hungary’s anti-Semitic President Viktor Orban and the other nations of the Visegrád 4 Group in the grip of anti-immigrant hostility. It is even providing military aid to the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion in Ukraine fighting pro-Russian separatists. The links between the U.S. far right and Zionist organizations is also no secret, with Steve Bannon having spoken at ZOA galas despite being an alleged anti-Semite. Israel controversially just passed the “Jewish nation-state” law that mirrors Nazi Germany’s Nuremberg Race laws, inscribing ethno-nationalism and the complete exclusion of Arabs into its very definition as a state. At the same time, the definition of anti-Semitism has been conflated into being synonymous with criticism of Israel, which is the exact sentiment that is causing the media to disregard Trump’s collusion with Netanyahu in favor of Russiagate. It is also the same schizophrenic logic that enables Israel to align itself with the far right.

If history is any indicator, when an empire is in decline it will seek out scapegoats to place blame for its downfall. It is no coincidence that while the far right expresses hostility towards immigration and the demise of the nation state by globalism, the political establishment is inculpating the rising power of Russia for the end of America’s full spectrum dominance. When all is said and done, the Democratic Party will only have itself to blame for its utterly failed strategy of atomizing the working class on cultural issues while neglecting to address the collapsing global economy. We can only hope that its defeat will open new political space for those who wish to confront it.

Max Parry is an independent journalist and geopolitical analyst. His work has appeared in publications such as The Greanville Post, OffGuardian, CounterPunch and more. Read him onMedium. Max may be reached at maxrparry@live.com

By Max Parry

August 13, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Albanian Police No Match For MEK Commanders Trained By Saddam’s Mukhabarat

A family drama playing out in Albania has caught the attention of media and public opinion. But this is no ordinary drama. It is the story of Iranian born Mostafa and Mahboubeh Mohammadi, who are Canadian citizens and their twenty-one-year struggle to rescue their daughter from a dangerous terrorist cult.

In 1997, Somayeh and her brother Mohammad, were deceptively recruited into the violent extremist group, Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK). Somayeh was seventeen. They travelled to Iraq for a two week visit to the MEK training camp, and never returned home. Their parents were supporters of MEK and at first simply appealed directly to the group’s leaders for their children’s return to their studies and family. MEK ignored their requests.

It wasn’t until the fall of Saddam’s regime in 2003 that Mostafa was able to travel to Iraq independently of MEK and reach out to his children. He managed to rescue Mohammad and bring him back to Canada. But Somayeh was under constant supervision by MEK commanders who used coercive control to confuse and intimidate the girl. She was afraid to leave, even though she had written several times to the US Marines guarding the camp asking for help.

Her parents made repeated attempts to meet freely with Somayeh, so they could reassure her of her future with them in Canada. MEK closed all doors to them and in doing so, alienated a whole family which had been ardent supporters. Mostafa had even volunteered to take part in the MEK orchestrated self-immolations in 2003 to protest the arrest in Paris of MEK leader Maryam Rajavi. He was only saved when a friend snatched the lighter from his hand after Mostafa had doused himself in petrol. Now, instead of returning Somayeh to Canada and having a family of active supporters for their cause, MEK has destroyed the life of a young woman and broken the hearts of her family.

Somayeh was brought to Albania with another 3,000 MEK after Iraq expelled the terrorist group. From their first arrival in Tirana in 2013, MEK members frightened ordinary citizens with their intimidatory behaviour. Intense and forceful but somehow disengaged, MEK members swept through the capital like a plague. In place of a de-radicalization programme, the Americans in charge of them allowed them to retreat behind the closed walls of a purpose-built terrorist training camp in a rural town, Manez in the district of Durres. In spite of this, over four hundred have managed to escape the group and are willing to endure hardship rather than continue to associate with MEK. One recent escapee described conditions inside MEK as “slavery”.

In this context, Mostafa and Mahboubeh are now in Tirana making another attempt to meet their daughter. This time, without the presence of MEK minders. They have appealed to the Albanian authorities to help them. They refused.

https://dlb.nejatngo.org/Media/Report/Albania_Govt_Mohammadi.mp4

Instead, MEK has been allowed to go berserk, instigating a campaign of propaganda and intimidation that has created a real crisis for the country; for its citizens, its government and its security and law enforcement services.

Albanian media presents this as a family dispute. But there is no equivalence between the ordinary parents from Canada and the people who are surrounding Somayeh. These are people whose background reveals how dangerous they are. So that when the Albanian police are called to an incidence of public disorder, they are not expecting nor are they quipped through training or resources to deal with radicalised violent extremists trained by Saddam Hussein’s Republican Guards, many with blood on their hands. Yet this is what the government has imposed on them. Even the security and intelligence services of Albania are inadequately prepared to deal with the criminal unpredictability and unaccountability of MEK.

The MEK commanders and agents involved in delivering MEK’s version of Somayeh’s story are as follows:

The female commander, Jila Deyhim, was recruited as a student at Manchester University in the UK at the time of Iran’s 1979 Revolution. Her husband Ahmad Shadbakhti was killed in an armed clash with security forces in Tehran. Jila left their daughter in the UK to be raised by her brother Khosro Deyhim (aka Haji) in Newcastle Upon Tyne while she went to join MEK in Iraq.

Jila is the head of MEK Operations in Tirana. As well as being present when two MEK operatives publicly assaulted Mostafa in a street in Tirana, she organised for over 60 MEK to surround Police Station 4 in Tirana while two arrested MEK members were being questioned by police. Afterwards, JIla sent the 60 MEK to spread through the city to hunt down and intimidate and beat up ex-MEK members. (Local police officers, used to dealing with ordinary crimes and criminals, were so shocked by the MEK behaviour that they wrote to the Interior Ministry saying they are not equipped to deal with sixty potential suicide bombers and to ask that the security forces in charge of MEK make sure the police will not have to deal with these ‘guests of the state’ again.)

Historically, Jila served as a commander during the Kurdish massacres – Operation Morvarid (Pearl) in 1991 – as well as many other operations. Witnesses have given further testimony of her torturing and killing disaffected members in MEK/Saddam Hussein prisons in Camp Ashraf. Jila ‘graduated’ as a highly trained intelligence officer under Saddam Hussein’s security service. In addition, she undertook field training, tank driving, basic combat and SWAT command.

Homayoun Deyhim – in the pink shirt assaulting Mostafa Mohammadi – is a brother of Jila. He studied Electrical Engineering in Newcastle University in the UK just before the Revolution. During the Revolution he went to India to study for an MSC. In India he worked for MEK, but was later recruited by Jila to go to Iraq.

Homayoun never achieved any significant rank, working mostly in the technical and repair departments. But he is famous inside MEK for agreeing to do anything to get promoted. Hence, on many occasions he was involved in punitive beating and humiliating of other members in Camp Ashraf. Homayoun undertook basic military training and Republican Guards operations training.

In Police Station 4 in Tirana after his arrest for assaulting Mostafa, Jila instructed Homayoun to claim that Mostafa had attacked him. They did not know at that time that there was videoed evidence from the scene which shows what actually happened.

Behzad Saffari from Isfahan went to the UK to study dentistry He was recruited by MEK and sent to Iraq after Rajavi moved there. He was injured in operation Eternal Light (Forough Javidan) in 1988 and brought back to London to recover before being sent back to Iraq. Witnesses allege that Behzad was involved in beatings in MEK prisons. Behzad cheated his family out of their life savings – which he gave to MEK – by falsely claiming to have left the organisation. His father sent money to family members in Canada, but it ended up in MEK accounts in the UK.

Behzad was involved in liaising with the UNHCR during the transfer process from Iraq to Albania. Former members recount how the UNHCR gave each individual 100 USD for the journey and after their arrival. When the members arrived in Tirana airport, Behzad took the $100 from each one of them and gave them one hundred Albanian LEK as local currency (around one US dollar).

Behzad is currently involved with the teams harassing ex-members and journalists in Tirana. Behzad Saffari is liaising with the MEK lawyer and answers to Jila Deyhim.

Ahmad Taba (aka Akbar), was a student in UMIST (Manchester) at the time of the Iranian Revolution in 1979. He was recruited by MEK to work in London and was then transferred to Iraq after Massoud Rajavi went there.

Ahmad was trained as a helicopter pilot by the Iraqi Army. He graduated from training by Saddam’s Republican Guards, which included guerrilla war and SWAT tactics. He also underwent a 9-month course with Saddam’s Mukhabarat, from which he graduated as an Intelligence officer. He killed many civilians in the Kurdish attacks and there are witnesses connecting him to the torture of prisoners in Camp Ashraf.

Somayeh Mohammadi herself has not left the MEK camps in Iraq or Albania for twenty-one years. She has no idea about what is happening in the outside world. It is incomprehensible that a woman who claims to be freely pursuing a political struggle for violent regime change against Iran is incapable of meeting alone with her parents to tell them face to face of her decision. Her parents, who know her so well, say it is clear she is afraid and not acting freely when she speaks out against them. Surrounded by the above MEK characters, it is clear that she is under control and is unable to speak or act for herself in any meaningful way. This is not a family dispute, Somayeh is a hostage.

Under the pressure of coercive control, experts can easily recognise in Somayeh a victim who, in the hands of MEK, has been forced to the edge of a cliff over which she may be pushed or fall. If it is subsequently reported that she has disappeared, committed suicide, drowned in a reservoir or otherwise come to harm, there can be no doubt that the government of Albania must be held accountable. She cannot save herself from harm, yet the possibility of MEK harming her is very high. She is in great danger.

Albania may be a failed state, but it is not a rogue state like Saddam’s Iraq. It is a state with pretensions to joining the European Union. The government can and should be held accountable for whatever happens to Somayeh Mohammadi. The way to prevent such an outcome is to step in and separate her from her captors.

Iranian.com

August 11, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

An MKO-run government is a Khmer Rouge-like tyranny

Imagine a society in which people are not allowed to have any saying in choosing their own clothing, schooling, work, shopping and any other aspect of life. This society is a slavery in which people are forced to hard labor and deprived from sleep, rest and leisure time.

You may think that slavery is no more an issue of the contemporary man but modern slavery is still going on in the world as it was so general during the 1970s. The Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK) which is known as the Khmer Rouge, took control of Cambodia on April 17, 1975. The CPK created the state of Democratic Kampuchea in 1976 and ruled the country until January 1979. The Khmer Rouge began to implement their radical Maoist and Marxist-Leninist transformation program. They wanted to transform Cambodia into a rural, classless society in which there were no rich people, no poor people, and no exploitation. To accomplish this, they abolished money, free markets, normal schooling, private property, foreign clothing styles, religious practices, and traditional Khmer culture. Public schools, pagodas, mosques, churches, universities, shops and government buildings were shut or turned into prisons, stables, reeducation camps and granaries. There was no public or private transportation, no private property, and no non-revolutionary entertainment. Leisure activities were severely restricted. People throughout the country, including the leaders of the CPK, had to wear black costumes, which were their traditional revolutionary clothes. [1]

Today in 2018, the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi) is believed to be the next Khmer Rouge regime in case that it gains power in Iran. Former deputy assistant secretary of state for Iranian affair, John Limbert suggests that support for the MKO by the side of some US politicians including National Security Advisor John Bolton and his friends, “would end up backing MEK, a group hated by most Iranians and resembling a combination of the Jonestown cult and the Khmer Rouge.” [2]

Limbert’s interpretation on the MKO was first stated by the contributor to the New York Times magazine, Elizabeth Rubin in 2003 after she visited the MKO’s military headquarters in Iraq. “The Rajavis, given the chance, would have been the Pol Pot of Iran”, she concluded at the end of her investigated detailed report on the MKO. [3]

Pol Pot was the notorious leader of the Khmer Rouge. It is estimated that from 1975 to 1979, under the leadership of Pol Pot, the government caused the deaths of more than one million people from forced labour, starvation, disease, torture, or execution while carrying out a program of radical social and agricultural reforms. [4]

Cult-like practices of the MKO leaders is widely denounced by the international bodies and various journalists. “The MEK leaders in Iraq, husband and wife Masoud and Maryam Rajavi, ran the group through obsessive control over its member’s behavior – enforcing total sexual abstinence, making use of torture, and encouraging lethal violence against any perceived enemy, including members’ families,” reported Abawaba website.” According to a Human Rights Watch report, dissenters who criticized the Rajavis or expressed an intention to leave were subject to torture. Two of their members were tortured to death.” [5]

Albawaba correctly states that the MKO is not democratic as it claims. Maryam Rajavi retains tight control of their members’ lives in Albania as well, reportedly doling out minimal money to each of its members to allow them to buy rations of food. She continues to prevent them from speaking to their families or letting them to leave the cult. At the same time, she began effectively courting anti-Iran American politicians, selling herself as a democratic opposition-in-waiting to the Islamic Republic. As the article says the only evidence for Mayam Rajavi’s claim of being “democratic” comes from her “Ten Point Plan”, and her claim that if the MEK were to assume power in the event of regime change, they would ensure parliamentary elections within six months. “Her Ten Point Plan is not in itself objectionable”, it writes. “It outlines commitments to secularism, democracy, gender equality, human rights, a free-market economy, and a foreign policy based on “peaceful coexistence” – objectives that many Iranians likely share.” [6]

However, Albawaba proves that the group’s history is the best evidence to contradict the leader’s claim. “The problem is that Rajavi’s history shows her adopting whatever label is politically convenient at the time, usually without living up to it,” it says. “The 10 Point manifesto itself is quite an about-turn for a group that began as Islamist Marxists. And if the description of Rajavi as an autocratic “cult leader” is even somewhat justified, then taking her word that she will give up power after six months would be foolish indeed. Cult leaders crave power, and will invariably find a reason to cling on to it.” [7]

Ali Alfoneh, a visiting scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington D.C., told Al Bawaba, “Based on their past record, NCRI/MEK rule over Iran is more likely to resemble the Khmer Rouge’s rule in Cambodia. I can’t measure the level of their popularity within Iran, but if their level of popularity among émigré Iranians is any guidance, they probably do not enjoy significant popular support within Iran.” [8]

What is noteworthy is that the MEK’s notorious background is known to most scholars and analysts on Iran affairs. American advocates of the MKO in the US administration must keep in mind that the majority of Iranians would never embrace the MEK as a “democratic” alternative. Moreover, the MKO has all the potentials to turn into a Khmer Rouge-like regime under the leadership of Rajavi as the Pol Pot of Iran.

Mazda Parsi

References:

[1] Cambodia Tribunal Monitor Website

[2] Limbert, John, Pompeo and Iran: A Bizarre Mentality, Lobelog, July 24, 2018

[3] Rubin, Elizabeth, The Cult of Rajavi, The New York Times Magazine, July 13, 2003

[4] Cambodia Tribunal Monitor Website

[5] Al Bawaba, Attempts to Rebrand Iran’s MEK Are Far From Convincing, July 25th, 2018

[6] ibid

[7] ibid

[8] ibid

August 6, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Soleimani to Trump: Today you are so weak you have pinned hope on Mojahedin Khalq

Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Deputy Commander for Political Affairs Brigadier General Yadollah Javani underlined Iran’s special geopolitical situation, saying that security of all waterways in the region depend on the country’s presence and assistance.

“Iran’s geopolitical situation is in a way that establishment of security in the regional waterways is not possible without the Islamic Republic’s presence,” General Javani said on Saturday.

He blamed deployment of foreign and trans-regional forces for instability in the region, and said, “Today, the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz waterways enjoy good security to transfer energy and oil and many world experts stress the Islamic Republic’s unique role in the establishment of security in the region.”

General Javani referred to the US threats to prevent Iran’s oil exports, and said Tehran’s reciprocal threat is credible and well-founded.

In relevant remarks on Thursday, Commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps Quds Force Major General Qassem Soleimani blasted US President Donald Trump for his hollow threats against Iran, warning that the Quds Force alone is powerful enough to stand against Washington in any possible confrontation without any need to the other Iranian armed forces.

“We are closer to you than what you think. You should know that I am your foe. The Quds Force alone and not all the (Iranian) Armed Forces is enough to be your rival (in any confrontation). You are aware of Iran’s power in asymmetric war,” General Soleimani said, addressing a forum in the Western city of Hamedan.

He underlined that Trump’s recent remarks against Iran are not worth response by the Iranian president, and said, “I, as a soldier, respond to Trump. Mr. Trump! How do you dare to threaten us?”

General Soleimani said that the literature that Trump uses to speak with other countries is like the words uttered from the mouth of a person who runs a cabaret or a casino, calling on the US president to ask the country’s spy and security agencies about Washington’s failures against Iran.

“You did every thing you could against Iran in the past 20 years but victory belonged to the Iranian nation,” he underscored.

General Soleimani reminded Trump of the US failures in Afghanistan, Iraq and Yemen and the 33-day war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, and said the US attacked the Taliban with 110 thousand troops but after nearly two decades it is now begging the Taliban for negotiations.

“Ask the ex-commander of your forces in Iraq who he sent to me to ask me to open a window of opportunity by using my influence to stop attacks by Iraqi resistance forces (Mujahedin) on the US soldiers so that they could withdraw from Iraq? Have you forgotten that you had provided adult-size diapers for your battle tank crews? What is your saga and what is the historical background that you rely on for threatening us?”

“You should know that there is not even a single night that we don’t think of destroying you,” he said.

He named Trump as a gambler, and said, “We are so close to you in places that you might not even think of. Come to us! We are waiting for you. You know that this war (against Iran) means destruction of all of your possibilities. You may start the war, but we decide when it should end.”

“Do not threaten us with killing. We are thirsty for martyrdom and annihilation of arrogant powers,” he said.

General Soleimani reminded Trump of the US awe and military power in the past, and said they have become so weak today that they have resorted to Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO, also known as the MEK, PMOI and NCRI) terrorist group to hit a blow to Iran.

“There was a time when the US enjoyed some awe, when its naval fleet started a voyage, a state would collapse, “but today you have pinned hope on the MKO that has been buried in the wasteland of the history. Have you really pinned hope on a wandering woman that you take from one TV channel to another? Is that all your power,” he asked.

His remarks came after Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Hossein Baqeri in a statement on Tuesday repeated President Hassan Rouhani’s warning to the US and cautioned Donald Trump to avoid threatening Iran or wait for consequences impossible to imagine.

“As correctly stated in the remarks of our honorable president, the enemies, specially the US, whose deployment centers and interests are accessed by the Islamic Republic of Iran’s overt and covert defense power should not play with lion’s tail otherwise they will be given a strong, unimaginable and regretting response at a very vast extent in the region and the world,” General Baqeri said.

He, meantime, stressed that history has shown that the Iranian nation has always loved peace and never started any war against other countries, and said, “Iran, as the superior power in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, has always guaranteed security of shipping in the vital waterway and the global economy and enjoys the power to make any move (it desires) in this region.”

General Baqeri said that the US president who is childishly preparing for new economic and oil sanctions against Iran should know that in case of implementing such policies, the interests of the US and its affiliates will come under target by the Islamic Revolution’s friends in any parts of the world.

“Thanks God, the Iranian Armed Forces are at the peaks of preparedness and assure (the nation) that they will kill in the bud any plots against the Iranian nation and will give an unforgettable lesson to the enemies,” he concluded.

Trump and Rouhani traded hostile warnings last week, amid rising tensions between the two countries.

Trump tweeted that Iran “will suffer consequences the likes of which few throughout history have ever suffered before” if it threatened the US.

President Rouhani earlier warned his US counterpart against the unbearable costs and dire consequences of blocking Iran’s oil exports, saying belligerency against Iran would the “mother of wars”.

“The regional states are either afraid of the US or do not trust it. Anyone who understands politics a little bit would never say that he/she would prevent exports of Iran’s oil. We have many Straits. The Strait of Hormuz is just one of them,” President Rouhani said, addressing the Iranian ambassadors to foreign states in Tehran on Sunday, repeating his earlier tacit threat that Tehran would close off the Strait of Hormuz in response to any move by the US to zero its crude supplies.

He stressed that Iran has been the guarantor of security in the Strait of Hormuz all throughout the history, saying, “Mr. Trump! Do not twist the lion’s tail because you will regret. You are not able to provoke the Iranian nation against Iran’s security and interests.”

“The Americans should come to realize this point well that peace with Iran would be the mother of all peaces and war with Iran would be the mother of all wars. We do not quiver from threats and we have a deterrent power. Today our internal unity is more than before, threats make us more coherent and we will definitely beat the US,” Rouhani said, and added, “We would sustain costs, but will earn greater interests.”

President Rouhani underscored that the new conditions created after the US withdrawal from the 2015 nuclear deal is an opportunity for relations with the world, exports and home-made production, saying, “Today, talks with the US has no other meaning but surrendering and putting an end to the Iranian nation’s achievements. If we surrender to a liar bullying person like Trump, they will plunder Iran.”

August 4, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

American support for MEK in Albania alienates Iranian public opinion

Trump’s supposed policy of bullying Iran into begging for talks has stalled after his all-caps Twitter rant was batted back by General Qassem Soleimani’s kick-ass retort. Time for a re-think of the whole approach perhaps. Indeed, many of the tactics used by the US to bring Iran into line over the past forty years have actually enabled and strengthened the ruling establishment there. It’s not that Iran has got better, but the US has made avoidable blunders.

Not least of these is to threaten to bomb the country to destroy its (so-far peaceful) nuclear capabilities. Allied with cruel economic sanctions, the discriminatory Travel Ban and overt support for violent regime change, this aggressive approach only alienates Iranian people.

But while there is disagreement between the various organisations and factions who oppose the Iranian government on any number of issues, there is one thing which unites almost all Iranians and that is the unaccountable American support for the Mojahedin Khalq terrorist cult.

Since the 1980s, the MEK has been facilitated as a terrorist entity and propaganda outlet by the US establishment specifically because of its violent extremism and regime change agenda. These supporters have no illusions – MEK is unreliable and untrustworthy and has no support whatsoever among Iranians. However, intelligence agencies and the military are amoral institutions; they make no judgment about the ethical or moral value of an asset. So, as long as politicians find the ‘MEK threat’ useful to buttress their regime change agendas, the arrangements for MEK’s continued survival remain largely unchallenged.

Because of this complicity, US Secretary of State Pompeo’s claim that “the Trump administration dreams the same dreams for the people of Iran as you do” was met with derision among the Iranian diaspora. If the US at any time had wanted to help the Iranian people, it would have dismantled the MEK. For years, successive US administrations have squandered opportunities to remove MEK from the equation. This failure has contributed to the sterility of US policy toward Iran.

What looked like a genuine process to de-list, transfer and de-radicalize the MEK, initiated by Hillary Clinton in 2012, proved simply to be a pragmatic move which allowed continued US support for MEK in a third country after Iraq increased demands for its expulsion. A $9m deal struck with Albanian Prime Minister Berisha included American funding for a De-Radicalization Institute in Tirana. This was advertised to reassure the Albanian people; MEK members would be re-integrated into society and allowed to take up residence as ordinary citizens to live out their lives in peace and security.

Instead, the US facilitated the re-grouping of MEK in a closed terrorist training camp in rural Albania, where MEK leaders continue their horrible human rights abuses against the members. Apparently, neoconservatives find the group’s promise of regime changeirresistible, even in the face of such evidence. However, above all other considerations, the MEK members in Albania are living, breathing souls and it behoves us to pay attention to them as individuals.

The MEK is described as a destructive cult because it poses the greatest threat to its own members. Many hundreds have been killed and continue to be killed by the leaders. The latest example came only weeks ago with the unexplained death of MEK member Malek Sharaii. Sharaii’s family in Iran say that he had wanted to leave MEK but had incriminating information about the September 2013 massacre at Camp Ashraf which MEK didn’t want to be made public. The family allege that he was murdered because of his past. Due to MEK pressure, the police investigation was halted, Sharaii’s body was apparently ‘discovered’ after two weeks and buried without any post mortem because the MEK claimed this was against their religious practices. He joins a long list of disappeared and mysterious, unexplained deaths of MEK members.

Unsurprisingly then, over four hundred people have managed to escape the cultic clutches of MEK while they are in Albania. The latest escapee, Hassan Shahbazi, described his membership with MEK as “slavery”. There is no doubt, that MEK keeps all its members in a state of modern slavery. Former members confirm that many, many members would like to leave but are trapped and afraid. MEK has hired a private armed security group to keep members inside and everyone else, including the Albanian security services, out.

This enforced entrapment and isolation are compounded by the MEK’s refusal to allow families to be in contact with one another – this is as true for related people inside the camp as for the desperate families outside who, since 2003, have come searching for their loved ones in MEK, offering them help and succor.

One such family, Canadian citizens Mostafa and Mahboubeh Mohammadi, have recently come to Albania to try to rescue their 38-year-old daughter who is still unable to meet with her parents. MEK goons are experts in intimidation techniques including threats of physical and verbal violence, actual violence. More significantly, their claim to have CIA and MOSSAD backing has been enough to silence most Albanian media, who do not want their careers or businesses ruined for this group.

Since its arrival in the small Balkan country, MEK has caused nothing but controversy in Albania. Its citizens rightly fear them. Neither its politicians nor its police can control them. And families like the Mohammadi’s must bear the brunt of MEK violence.

So, while American politicians can feign ignorance, Iranians themselves know the truth. And they know that the Hardliners in Iran are the biggest benefactors of this situation. Not only was the terrorist MEK disarmed and imprisoned in Iraq for a decade at American expense, the group is still used as a bogeyman by Iran’s security services to quell protests and rebellion in the name of counter-terrorism. As a first principle, opposition activists in Iran are careful to distance themselves from MEK in every shape and form.

In this context, using the MEK name as lazy shorthand for ‘violent regime change’ can only be counter-productive; it is guaranteed to unite Iranians against you. If President Trump really seeks to change what his predecessors have done and to shake up politics, his most effective move would be to dismantle MEK. Such a move would be a radical departure from the sterile policies of the past. Trump would take the credit for something that should have been accomplished years ago.

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.

August 2, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Nejat Society Gilan office visit Hassanzadeh family

Reza Hassanzadeh was a war prisoner when he was recruited by the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi). He has not been allowed to contact his family for over 30 years.

Hassanzadehs went to Camp Ashraf, Iraq several times but they were not allowed to visit their loved one, Reza and even they were assaulted by the MKO agents at the gates of Camp Ashraf. Reza’s big brother Jaafar was wounded by the group agents.

Nejat Society’s representative at Gilan office explained for the Hassanzadehs that the MKO’s declining situation in recent years has made its leader Maryam Rajavi resort to the American warmongers pointing out the recent gathering of the group in Paris where a number of American paid speakers addressed the audience in favor of the group.

“The Villepinte show has just an internal feedback for the group in order to keep the miserable members as hostages in the cult-like structure of the group,” told Nejat official Pourahmad.

Jaafar Hassanzadeh called the MKO leaders’ claims for ruling Iran as ridiculous. “The Rajavis tell a lot of lies,” he said. “I traveled to Ashraf several times so I got to know them better. In response to my absolute right to visit my brother for only a few minutes, they threw rocks at me and broke my head.”

“A group with no democracy in its relations cannot bring democracy to Iran, they are just flattering for their American, Israeli and Saudi masters,” he added.

Nejat Society Gilan office look forward to the salvation of the hostages of the MKO.

July 31, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Khuzestan office explain the conditions inside the Cult of Rajavi

Nejat Society Khuzestan office received the brother of an MKO member on Sunday July 22^nd, 2018.

Adel Keshmiri

Adel Keshmiri whose brother Nader has been taken as a hostage by the Mujahedin Khalq cult was welcome by the officails of Nejat office in Ahvaz, Khuzestan.

Representatives at Ahvaz office described the latest situation of the MKO members in Tirana, Albania. They suggested that the increasing trend of defection from the group has made the group leaders impose more pressure on their hostages. They have enhanced the controlling and monitoring tactics in order to prevent defections.

Appreciating the efforts of Nejat society, Mr. Keshmiri said, “I’m sure that the members of the MKO are not interested in the group at all but they are so brainwashed that they cannot imagine any prospect for themselves outside the group.”

July 31, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Family of MEK’s hostage at Nejat Society, Zanjan office

Two brothers and a sister of Habibollah Qasemi visited Nejat Society representatives at Zanjan Province.

Habibollah Qasemi

Habibollah has been taken as a hostage in the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MEK/ MKO/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi) for years. His family has made efforts to meet him but they even have not been able to make a phone call to him.

Habibi’s older sister Roqayeh has recently died. The other siblings told Nejat Society how much the deceased sister had missed her brother on the late days of her life.

Nejat Society representatives at Zanjan explained the latest news on the situation of the MEK in Albania to the Qasemis.

The Qasemis asserted that they would never quit their efforts to help their brother release from the Cult of Rajavi.

July 31, 2018 0 comments

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