 Michael Ledeen, the expert who sparked the rumors about Khamenei being in a coma (which then turned into rumors about him being dead due to follow-up reports from AntiMullah.com), now says that Khamenei is out of his coma. Some will laugh at Ledeen for sticking to the story he was given, but I’d caution against such mockery. As I wrote myself, I supported Ledeen in concluding that something bad had happened to Khamenei’s already poor health.
Nothing else can explain his absense from sight, particularly after the massive Jundullah bombing that killed senior Revolutionary Guards officials. Ledeen confirmed that Khamenei met with Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan “at the very last minute” at his home (where the doctors remain), on October 28.
That is an absence of 22 days, and if Ledeen’s timeline is correct, a state of comatose for about 16 days. It should also be mentioned how odd it is that the Erdogan-Khamenei meeting happened so late. Ledeen writes: “This suggests to me that the doctors worked very hard to prepare Khamenei for his appearance, which would otherwise have taken place much earlier.” One more important note: I’ve been receiving reports from Iranians about big plans for November 4, as reported on WorldThreats.com, which is the anniversery of the taking of American hostages at the embassy in 1979.
Ledeen says he’s also receiving the reports, but adds that Russian experts have been hired by the Iranians to jam the Internet and other transmissions. Source: World Threats 
 The regime is denying that Khamenei is dead or in a coma, but is failing to prove he is alive. He didn’t show himself at Friday prayers or any other event. One of my sources in Iran tell me that there are rumors spreading that Khamenei has died, but he had no way of confirming anything. The Iranian people are gearing up for major protests on November 4—if we don’t hear Khamenei react to them, then I think it’s safe to assume he is dead or in a coma. To try to prove that Khamenei is alive, the regime released photos of an alleged meeting he and Ahmadinejad had with the president of Senegal.
But Michael Ledeen observes that the photos are of a previous meeting. In addition, the regime never previously said that Khamenei would attend the meeting, so that also casts doubt on the regime’s claims that the meeting occurred.
This shows, at the least, that the regime is worried about these rumors and for whatever reason, can’t or won’t prove that Khamenei is alive, a very easy thing to do. Ledeen also notes that he didn’t break the story about Khamenei’s possible status, and that a left-wing Iranian site did. We cannot prove that they have different sources though. AntiMullah.com, though, claims that their source was indeed different from Ledeen’s and they ran with the story at about the same time, so there were at least two sources reporting it at about the same time originally. The Examiner also reports: Al Arabiya notes that Khamenei’s website, as well as the websites of Iranian television and radio, have been shut down.
Al Arabiya continues: “President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is reported to have met with Mojtaba Khamenei, a hard-line cleric and son of Khamenei, to discuss potential successors and speculate on who the Assembly of Experts, the body in charge of electing the Supreme Leader, would choose.” Anti-Mullah.com reports that Ahmadinejad held a secret, high-level meeting at his Tehran palace last night between 9 and 11 PM, which included 7 members of the Assembly of Experts that decides who replaces Khamenei.
The site claims that reports from Khamenei’s physicians were reviewed and the succession process was discussed after all non-leadership personnel were escorted out of the building. Source: World Threats
 On September 18, millions of protesters turned the tide in Iran. U.S. media ignored it, and Obama gave zero support to the revolutionaries.By Michael Ledeen Marx would have delighted in the events of the 18th, all over Iran. Groucho, that is, for on the 18th the supreme leader and all his co-conspirators were transformed from figures of awe to objects of ridicule. As Machiavelli likes to remind us, the most dangerous thing for any leader is to earn the contempt of his followers, and the Iranian people made it luminously clear that they would no longer be intimidated. The regime had launched a vicious repression following the challenges to the “election results” of June 12th. For a hundred days they had killed, raped, tortured and threatened. In the runup to the 18th, the stern face of the leader of the Revolutionary Guards had appeared on television and his confident voice had been heard on the radio, warning that anyone who dared wear green, or carry protest signs, or chant criticism of the Islamic Republic, would be treated “very harshly.” His words were like so much spittle in a storm; among the many chants in the streets that day, you could hear “rape, murder and torture will not silence us.” Read more ... Source: PJM
 By Michael Ledeen The showdown set for Friday is becoming increasingly dramatic. While the regime has still not moved against the actual opposition leaders, they are rounding up close associates and relatives, apparently hoping this will silence Mousavi and Karroubi, and they are threatening Rafsanjani to keep him ambiguously in line. Thus, they have arrested three grandchildren of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri, who called upon all clerics to come out and fight the regime (more below), along with the brother of Mrs. Mousavi, and relatives of leading clerics in Qom. The New York Times reports on this today: This tactic will not work against Mousavi and Karroubi, who are firmly convinced that they are in the right (they are both deeply religious) and that their cause will win, even if they are killed in the process. And they seem prepared for this (remember that Karroubi provoked the security thugs who came to his office a few days ago: “Why don’t you arrest me now, it would be an honor”). Indeed, just yesterday Karroubi had a meeting with Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani, who attempted to convince him to be ‘reasonable,’ promising gradual reforms, etc. Karroubi came out and issued an open letter, detailing the evidence of rape and torture in the prisons that he had presented to government investigators. I don’t think anyone outside a very restricted circle in Iran imagined that Karroubi was capable of the courage he has shown in the past three months. But there you have it; he’s been heroic. Read more ...Source: PJM
 The civil unrest in Iran is being directed by a secret cabal of intellectuals in the United States, or so the Islamic regime would like the world to believe. Defendants in the show trials under way in Tehran are being given the third degree over their links to foreign masterminds. The chief prosecutor is asking defendants questions such as, "Were you sent by Michael Ledeen? What did Michael Ledeen tell you to do?" Another was told flat out, "You are an agent of Michael Ledeen!" The universal response has been, "Michael who?" "You have to understand - these are crazy people," Mr. Ledeen told The Washington Times yesterday. He is the Freedom Scholar at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and a former consultant to the National Security Council, the State Department and the Defense Department. He has published widely on Iranian matters, and his tag line "faster, please" -- referring to the need to accelerate the pace of change in Iran -- is well-known among those who follow the issue closely. Mr. Ledeen is one of three public intellectuals implicated by the Iranians, the others being Ambassador Mark Palmer and political science professor Abbas Milani at Stanford University. Why these three? "I have no idea," Mr. Ledeen said. "We mostly agree on the issues, but we've never worked as a group." Read more ...Source: The Washington TimesH/T: J.R.
 By Michael Ledeen By now, most people know that the Iranian regime treats its dissidents with unrestrained barbarity. Even the leading dead tree media have reported anecdotally on the torture of prisoners and the bashing, beating, axing and stabbing of protestors in the streets of the major cities. But it is not easy to get a clear picture of the dimensions of the savagery. It’s hard to get the real numbers on the bloody repression the mullahs have unleashed on their people, and one reason–perhaps the most important one–is that the regime is doing everything in its power to conceal the facts, typically using the same cruel methods that filled the prisons in the first place. Officially, the regime claims only 37 dead since the demonstrations began on the 12th of June, but about 1800 persons remain unaccounted for. The real figure is very close to five hundred known dead. And, according to reliable sources, the morgues still have a stockpiles of about 400 corpses. Each day three to four corpses are released to relatives. The release of the cadavers follows a singularly macabre procedure. Close relatives, such as mothers, are ordered to report to a particular prison. Upon arrival they are immediately – and totally unexpectedly – jailed for two days. After these two days they are told that they can be released but that they first have to sign a secrecy pledge about their treatment and a declaration that their loved one had died of “innocent causes,” such as a car crash. The regime uses several other non-torture related death causes, such as brain injury, heart surgery, etc. After signing the papers the relative can receive the corpse. Upon receipt of the corpse of the [mainly young] man or woman, the real cause of death–brutal torture–becomes obvious. They see their loved one totally beaten up, nails pulled out, evidence of rape, bodies covered with so many burns that it is difficult to recognize the dead person, and the like. Read more ...Source: PJM
 By Michael Ledeen The show trials now on display in Tehran have several purposes. First, to purge the regime’s ranks of those who have shown tolerance or enthusiasm for the dissidents who are now calling for “death to the dictator.” Second, to intimidate anyone contemplating action against the regime. Third, to gauge the attitude and resolve of the West, in order to calculate just how far the regime can go without a potentially damaging reaction. That is why Saturday’s procession of “spies and traitors” included French and British citizens or employees. The reaction must have been encouraging to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, his son, and his band of loyalists: thus far, the Brits and the French have limited themselves to diplomatic tongue clicking, with nary a whisper of serious sanctions, and no sign of active support for the millions of Iranians who pray, and fight, for freedom. As the distinguished scholar and analyst Afshin Ellian tells us nearby, the regime has already prepared arrest warrants for the leaders of the national uprising, and an elite unit of the Revolutionary Guards has been charged with carrying out the arrests. Such a move is fraught with peril for the regime. The arrest of the dissident leader, Mir Hossein Mousavi, would surely throw the country into convulsion, and, if it lasted long enough, might convince some Western leaders to finally defend its own ideals, and thus the Iranian people. Read more ...Source: PJM
 By Michael Ledeen I studied fascism primarily because I wanted - desperately - to understand how so many people could have appeased it. Did they - and by “they” I mean the European victims of the Holocaust and the European and American targets of the Axis - not see the evil? Did they not hear the words of the tyrants who constantly called for the destruction of the Western democracies, the enslavement of the inferior races, and the imposition of a new order? Did they not see the armies on the march, the concentration camps being built, and the ruthless campaigns against the racially unworthy, from the Jews to the gays, the gypsies and the mentally challenged? Why did it take Pearl Harbor to bomb us into action? Why did the Soviet and European Communists–intended victims of Nazism–make a Grand Bargain with the Fuhrer? Why did the Jews, with rare exceptions, go quietly onto the cattle cars? Nearly fifty years later, I think I understand at least part of it, and, alas, that understanding applies to the current appeasers as well. You’ll find it discussed at length in my forthcoming book, Accomplice to Evil, which identifies many sources of the willful blindness that has long been a central part of the foreign policies of the Western democracies. Read more ...Source: PJM
 Iranian-Americans and supporters march in Los Angeles
Sunday to protest what they say are crimes against
humanity and democracy committed by the government
of Iran after the disputed June 12 Iranian presidential
election results in Los Angeles, California.By Jim Meyers Foreign policy expert and author Michael Ledeen tells Newsmax that President Barack Obama "hasn't done anything" to help the Iranian people as resistance to the country's repressive regime continues. Ledeen also says that the talks Obama seeks with the current regime will go nowhere, charges that Iranians "have been killing Americans all over the world," and warns that as soon as the Islamic Republic acquires a nuclear weapon, it will "test" it on Israel. But he also believes the current regime is unlikely to survive. Israel will certainly attack Iran if the West fails to stop the ayatollahs from completing a nuclear weapon, Ledeen said. "They've said as soon as they get a nuclear weapon they're going to test it on Israel, so that's a pretty big threat," Ledeen said, adding, "I expect the Israelis to eventually attack the Iranian nuclear facilities if the rest of the world doesn't find some other way to do it. Whether they will bomb it or not, I can't tell. There are a lot of ways to do it." More ...Source: NewsMax
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Michael Ledeen, the expert who sparked the rumors about Khamenei being in a coma (which then turned into rumors about him being dead due to follow-up reports from AntiMullah.com), now says that Khamenei is out of his coma.
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