 By: Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury Just for criticizing the undemocratic activities of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iranian reformist journalist Bahman Ahmadi Amoui was sentenced to over seven years imprisonment and 34 lashes by Tehran Revolutionary Court on January 4, 2010. Amoui was an editor for the prominent economic newspaper Sarmayeh, which was closed by the government in November, and had been in prison since 20 June 2009.The same day, 36 parliamentarians supportive of Ahmadinejad drafted a bill that would require the execution of government critics detained as "Mohareb" [enemies of God] within five days of their arrest. The bill also calls for the period of time allotted for appeals in cases of public order disturbances or "Moharebeh" [war against God] to be brought down from 25 days to five days. It is no strange that Iranian Mullah’s are putting Ahmadinejad into the position of ‘God’ by passing this notorious bill. I don’t know how the Arab ‘brethrens’ of Iran as well other Muslim nations will now react when Iranian Mullahs are already putting their President into the position of ‘God’ and onwards critics of Ahmadinejad will be treated as ‘enemies of God’. Meanwhile, Iran's Intelligence ministry has prepared a list of 60 foreign organizations and news outlets that would be banned from the country for alleged involvement in rioting or incitement. The list included Voice of America, BBC, Human Rights Watch, National Endowment for Democracy, National Republican Institute, Stanford University's Hoover Institution, Search For Common Ground Organization, New American Foundation, British Center for Democratic Studies, East European Democratic Center, YALE, Ford Foundation, Foundation for Democracy in Iran, MEMRI, U.S. National Defense University, The Smith Richardson Foundation, Wilton Park, and Brookings Institute. Any Iranian in contact with a news outlet on the list could be arrested. Iranian missions abroad are already warned not to have minimal contacts with any of the organizations and media outlets, which are already in the list. A prominent Tehran-based professor of law, Mahmud Akhundi, told Radio Farda that the Intelligence Ministry’s list and warning have no legal basis. "It is in clear contradiction with human rights principles and with international principles of law. It doesn’t even have any Sharia-based justification,” Akhundi said. Nobody has the right “to define an action that has not been defined previously as a crime, as being criminal,” he added. Activists and opposition supporters say Iranian authorities have been intensifying efforts to limit the free flow of information in and out of Iran in the wake of mass protests against June's disputed presidential election. In late November, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Iran was facing a "soft war" with its enemies abroad, who were fomenting the street protests that hit the country following the disputed June 12 vote. "Iran’s Intelligence Ministry has always been trying to prevent contacts between Iranians inside the country and international organizations,” says Faraj Sarkuhi, a prominent Iranian exiled writer and journalist. “In the past they accused the publication 'Adineh,' of which I was the chief editor, of espionage over contacts with International PEN [writers' organization] and said it is illegal.” According to media reports, Iran has become the country with the largest number of imprisoned journalists following the sentencing of two journalists to prison terms of at least six years each, bringing the total number of journalists currently detained in the Islamic republic to 42. The 2009 winner of the World Association of Newspapers' Golden Pen of Freedom Award, Ahmad Zeydabadi was also sentenced to five years banishment in Gonabad, a remote northeastern town over 600 miles [1000 kilometers] from Teheran, to be served following his prison term. He was also banned for life from political activity and is currently held in solitary confinement in the infamous Evin prison, under pressure from Iranian authorities to issue a public confession. Paris-based organization Reporters Sans Frontiers [Reporters Without Borders] says Iran has earned the dubious distinction of being the number-one assailant of press freedoms in the world, after several sentences were handed down. RSF termed Iran as the ‘biggest prison in the world for journalists’. In a statement, Reporters Sans Frontiers said, “We are very disturbed by the calls repeatedly made by the most senior officials for Iran to impose the ‘supreme punishment’ on detainees, including journalists. The danger is imminent. The regime hardliners are capable of having the crackdown’s witnesses executed. There is an urgent need for international bodies to take action before a tragedy takes place, before political prisoners begin being executed. An intelligence ministry representative said at a news conference on 4 January: “Several agents from foreign countries have been arrested with cameras and video cameras.” The ministry also released a list of 60 NGOs and news media regarded as having incited and participated in rioting. “The intelligence ministry and Revolutionary Guards began rounding up government opponents and journalists again after further opposition demonstrations on 27 December. Around 20 people have been arrested in the latest wave, including a dozen or so journalists and cyber-dissidents. The relatives of the detained journalists are still lining up outside Evin prison in an attempt to get news of those believed to be held there.” Vienna based International Press Institute [IPI]’s press freedom manager Anthony Mills said, it is unacceptable that the Iranian authorities are responding to criticism in the media by arresting journalists and handing down prison sentences. The crackdown on the media must end immediately and the journalists imprisoned simply for doing their job must be freed. IPI has repeatedly condemned the intensified crackdown by the Iranian authorities on journalists. New York based Committee to Protect Journalists [CPJ] in a statement said; “Iranian authorities have arrested at least three more journalists in their ongoing campaign to suppress critical reporting and commentary, according to news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the arrests and calls on the government to release all imprisoned journalists, who number more than 30. “Behrang Tonkaboni, editor-in-chief of the monthly magazine Farhang va Ahang, and Kayyvan Farzin, a reporter for the publication, were arrested at their office on Monday, according to local news reports. Police searched Tonkaboni’s home, confiscating his computer and documents belonging to his mother, the prominent author Lili Farhadpour, news reports said. Authorities also seized Farzin’s computer hard drive. “Parisa Kakaee, a journalist for the Committee of Human Rights Reporters, was arrested Sunday after being summoned by the Ministry of Information, the reformist news Web site Kalame reported. Kakaee writes regularly about political and human rights issues on her two blogs. Since the disputed presidential elections in June, Iranian authorities have launched a relentless assault on opposition and independent media. CPJ has documented numerous cases in which authorities have shut down newspapers, blocked Web sites, arrested and sentenced journalists to lengthy prison sentences. Mohamed Abdel Dayem, CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa program coordinator said, Iranian authorities have apparently decided to arrest as many independent and opposition journalists as they possibly can. We call on the Iranian authorities to reverse this regrettable course and release all detained journalists.
 WELL into a January 3 New York Times report on the US administration's increasingly worried internal discussions about Iran, there came a couple of paragraphs that warranted closer scrutiny: "[Barack] Obama's top advisers say they no longer believe the key finding of a much disputed National Intelligence Estimate about Iran, published a year before resident George W. Bush left office, which said that Iranian scientists ended all work on designing a nuclear warhead in late 2003. "After reviewing new documents that have leaked out of Iran and debriefing defectors lured to the West, Mr Obama's advisers say they believe the work on weapons design is continuing on a smaller scale - the same assessment reached by Britain, France, Germany and Israel." Leaving to one side the alarming possibility that any of Obama's people ever did believe the preposterous arguments of that National Intelligence Estimate, one must wonder what sort of scale is implied by "smaller". That ostensibly reassuring usage might, in fact, be accurate. The new documents alluded to in the article were published in The Times of London last December, and have been extensively reviewed by numerous authorities, none of whom has chosen to challenge their authenticity. And the documents do, in point of fact, throw light on something smaller scale.
To be precise, they show the internal memoranda of the dictatorship as they bear on the crucial question of a neutron initiator. Small as this device may be, it is the technical expression used for the trigger mechanism of a workable nuclear weapon.
The critical element of the trigger is uranium deuteride or UD3. And uranium deuteride has no other purpose. To quote David Albright, the president of the Institute for Science and International Security in Washington: "Although Iran might claim that this work is for civil purposes, there is no civil application. This is a very strong indicator of weapons work." Remember the other long-concealed enrichment site at Natanz and also the heavy-water plant at Arak. And remember, too, that this is not information that derives from possibly self-interested defectors or bickering intelligence services - even the most cautious spokesmen from the International Atomic Energy Agency have been confident enough to make public criticisms of Iran's self-evident duplicity. The signature of the Ahmadinejad-Khamenei despotism on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, as well as its supposed adherence to a whole thesaurus of agreements with the UN and the European Union, has long been shown to be as cynical and worthless as its claims to have held a free election.
The regime's Revolutionary Guards, now engaged in still another bloody battle with unarmed Iranian civilians, are emerging as the proprietors of the secret nuclear arsenal. The enemy is in plain view. I encourage you to view the Iranian documents for yourselves: The Times of London subjected them to considerable expertise before publishing them and is confident of their provenance. I quote here from an excellent summary by the newspaper's diplomatic correspondent Catherine Philp: "UD3, when used in a neutron initiator, emits a stream of neutrons that ignite the core of a bomb, either weapons-grade uranium or plutonium. The stream of neutrons is released using high explosives to compress a core of solid UD3, creating fusion." But this in turn presents a difficulty for the surreptitious bomb-makers, because the testing of such a trigger could not be explained away as a detonation of a conventional high-explosive weapon. In other words, it would allow monitors to detect the traces of UD3. The whole interest of the newly leaked documents lies precisely in the way in which a further level of cheating is therefore so carefully discussed. A smaller scale of test, according to the regime's scientists, could be attempted using titanium deuteride instead. By this means, a useful flow of neutrons could still be produced but without the incriminating trace elements. The apparent idea, according to one quoted expert, was "to test the match without burning it". The chance that this is not a militaristic and messianic design intended to harden the carapace of the dictatorship and help extend its powers of regional blackmail seem ridiculously close to zero. Iran has had numberless offers from the West to help it acquire the faculties of peaceful nuclear energy and reduce its wasteful use of oil and gas. If it would permit the most elementary transparency, it could also be enabled to purchase uranium at far less cost on the open market, as other nations do. But the mullahs prefer to risk isolation and sanctions in order to construct off-the-record sites and to conduct deception operations that would be almost pathetically crude if they were not so self-evidently sinister. (It also disdains to hide its real intentions from its clients and surrogates: at a Hezbollah rally in Beirut last year, I was impressed to see that the brand new poster of the Party of God is a mushroom cloud; officials from the Iranian embassy were openly on the podium at this uplifting event.) How fascinating it is to sit at home and watch while this menace is permitted to reach the point of no return. Almost as gripping, in fact, as following the jaunty itineraries of suicide-murderers as they calmly buy their one-way tickets, in cash, on airplanes bound for our cities.
The similarity between these two passive experiences is quite riveting as well: in both instances, we lavish billions of dollars on intelligence agencies that cannot make sense of elementary forensic evidence; that coddle and excuse our enemies and treat us like criminals when we ourselves try to travel; that meanwhile leave us unprotected under open skies; and that run a full-employment bureaucracy from which it seems nobody can be, or ever has been, fired. Christopher Hitchens is a columnist for Vanity Fair and the online Slate magazine, where this column originally appeared. He is the Roger S. Mertz media fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford, California. The Australian 
 Analysis. We should take it a priori that anything that Syria does to destabilize Iraq leads right back to the mullahs in Iran.The mullahs are aware that a strong and unified Iraq is the only thing that stands between Iran and the first leg of the empire of Darius and Cyrus. The ancient capital of the Persian Empire, Ctseiphon, is not far from Baghdad. Beyond that, the major shrines of Shiite Islam are in Iraq southwest of Baghdad. It may well be that the mullahs see themselves as the new military geniuses of a resurgent Persian Empire. There is no way that we cannot understand that Iran can keep Iraq destabilized long after the United States pulls out. Iran is insuring that we know that.
Syria may well be behind the Saddam channel. If Syria were removed from the picture the channel would be reestablished in the Bekaa Valley in Lebanon. Hezbollah would run it. What would be different is that Lebanon has no contiguous border with Iraq. That would cut down a lot on the smuggling of people and explosives into Iraq. Beyond that it is a direct challenge to the United States. The mullahs are well aware that as long as they can close the Straits of Hormuz the United States, and therefore the rest of the World, will not act to strike them. Israel is the only country that can perform the deep strike mission required to do any serious damage to their nuclear facilities other than the United States. As it stands now, that attack must come through Saudi airspace. Once the first airplane crosses into Iranian airspace, the regional war is on. It appears to be the theory now that it is best to postpone this conflict as long as possible. it has always been my theory that if you know to pretty much a metaphysical certainty that there will be war, it is perhaps better to fight the war when you are ready and your opponent isn’t. World Threats
 This article by Peter Berkowitz in the Weekly Standard brings us up to date on the situation in Lebanon, where an election was held in June, but a new government is only now being formed. In the election, a moderate, pro-Western, pro-democracy coalition -- led by Saad Hariri, son of the linfluential anti-Syria eader whose death by car bombing in 2005 sparked the "Cedar Revolution" -- exceeded expectations and obtained a small parliamentary majority. The overriding issue, according to Peter, was "whether Lebanon would submit to Hezbollah and the political authority of Syria and Iran, or build a free and democratic state." Although the voters opted for the latter alternative, the winning coalition was unable to form a government for five months because Hezbollah blocked it -- formally, by means of the powers it obtained through the Doha Agreement (a deal reached after Hezbollah forces took over Beirut in 2008), and informally, through threats and intimidation. But the stalemate has finally been broken, at least for now, by the formation of a "national unity government" in which 2 of the 30 ministerial portfolios will go to Hezbollah politicians. Conventional wisdom holds that Israel is the key to undermining Hezbollah's influence. The idea is that if the Israelis would only abandon the small strip of land they control in Southern Lebanon (Shebaa Farms) and negotiate the creation of a Palestinian state, Hezbollah would lose its status as the heroic resistance. It's a convenient analysis inasmuch as it relieves the Lebanese of responsibility for their own fate, but Peter rejects it. In his view, "resistance does not refer merely to armed struggle against Israel's occupation of this or that piece of land, or even the battle against Israel's very existence, but a fight to the death against the claims of liberty and democracy in Lebanon and throughout the region in the name of Islamic law as dictated by the Iranian mullahs." What should the United States do?
First, the Obama administration can stop encouraging the widespread view, rooted in decades of pan-Arab rhetoric, that the key to Middle East peace is solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Peace between Israel and the Palestinians should be assiduously pursued, but to suppose that the absence of a final agreement between them is what stands in the way of security and stability in the Middle East is to play into the hands of Arab governments that cynically use the conflict to shift their people's attention from their own countries' internal failings and destabilizing ambitions. Second, the United States can expand programs to support civil society in Lebanon, particularly K-12 education, and also economic development, particularly in the south, since one way to loosen Hezbollah's grip is to enable the Lebanese government to better provide the social services and financial support that, thanks to Iranian financing, Hezbollah now delivers. Third, the administration can redouble efforts to degrade Iran's ability to deliver cash and transfer funds electronically to Hezbollah. Fourth, it can place at the heart of engagement with Syria an insistence on cutting off the enormous flow of ammunition, machine guns, bombs, rockets, and missiles that Iran pumps through Damascus to southern Lebanon.
But ultimately, the future of Lebanon depends "most of all on crafting strategies to thwart Tehran's export of Islamic revolution" which, in the near term "depends most of all on thwarting Iran's drive to acquire nuclear weapons." Powerline
 Unlike anything encountered in recent memory, the formidably complex and unique situation present in today’s Iran poses an enormous challenge. It defies any conventional solution, and simply resorting to civil disobedience is the equivalent of fighting off a pack of hungry and blood-thirsty wolves with tooth-picks! The incredibly ruthless, deceptive, and cunning nature of the present regime, bundled together with an Islamic modus operandi, creates an enigma and a number of paradoxes. It goes without saying that learning about peaceful movements and bloodless revolutions is intrinsically valuable and can help the people. But, regretfully, that alone does not work in Iran.
A Gandhi or Martin Luther King type of resistance may indeed be useful tactics, but that by itself does not work in a totalitarian state of Islamofascism. Not when Khamenei is getting his orders from “Allah.” Quran 8:60: “Prepare against them whatever arms and cavalry you can muster that you may strike terror in the enemies of Allah, and others besides them not known to you.” Ali Khamenei and his handpicked agent of “Saheb-ul-Zaman” (the lord of the age, Mahdi), Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, are sworn enemies of Iran and its culture. Have no doubt about it, they have no trouble killing millions of unarmed Iranians before they start running and hiding in a hole, like Saddam Hussein. The Western leaders and, in particular, President Obama, must know that Ahmadinejad and his ilk are not interested in any negotiation, any compromise or live-and-let-live policy. You cannot negotiate co-existence with Islamofascists any more than the Clinton administration succeeded with its compact with North Korea. Before the ink dried on the Clinton-North Korea agreement, the North Koreans embarked on cheating. Now, we are faced with a suicidal-genocidal adversary with nuclear weapons headed by a megalomaniac playboy. The ruthless mullahs of Iran are plenty evil without the bomb. With the bomb, the end is truly at hand. Some influential pundits pontificate that we can live with a nuclear Islamists in Iran, if it comes to that. They argue that the Islamists would never use the bomb.
Because the mullahs, the fanatic zanies as they may be, are not going to risk Iran becoming a radioactive parking lot by the massive U.S. retaliation. Wrong. The civilized people cherish and celebrate life. The Islamists relish death as stated in their ideology and practiced daily. Read more here,,,, Source: Amil Imani
John Lyons | August 06IRANIANS play politics hard.When the Shah of Iran died in exile in Egypt in 1980, the Islamic regime announced the news on radio with words that, it's fair to say, showed something of a bias: "The bloodsucker of the century is dead."Today, Iranians are playing it just as hard, except this time it's the Islamic regime of the ayatollahs that is facing wrath from within its ranks. Iran is unravelling; the regime is splitting open. The present course -- with the regime clinging to power by using its security apparatus to crush gatherings in the streets while foreign capital flees -- is unsustainable.
Even the most carefully scripted set-pieces are starting to go wrong. The awkwardness was clear this week as Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei congratulated President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on his second term. Compared with the same event four years ago -- when Ahmadinejad kissed his leader's hand and Khamenei hugged him -- this time neither man seemed to want to show too much affection. Both men are fighting for survival and may need to cut the other loose very shortly. The obvious discomfort comes amid a titanic struggle at the top of Iran's regime. Iran appears to be moving inexorably towards another crisis. The ayatollahs appear to be doomed: the broad support for people who want to choose their government rather than have a fundamentalist regime imposed on them is compelling. And when cemeteries become venues for protest, you know a regime is in trouble. A few days ago, hundreds gathered at the graveside of Neda Agha Soltan, who was captured on video dying, blood spilling from her nose and mouth, after being shot from a nearby building on June 20. At the cemetery there were reportedly chants of "Neda is alive, Ahmadinejad is dead!" as police tried to disperse the crowd. Given the regime's policy of using live ammunition at protests, those seeking change are using events such as services at graveyards to avoid mass shootings. After the June election the government succeeded in blasting the middle class off the street.
However, the regime appears fatally wounded: there are now too many influential people trying to bring it down from the inside. Read more here.... Source: The Australian
 By Robert F. Worth DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Some prisoners say they watched fellow detainees being beaten to death by guards in overcrowded, stinking holding pens. Others say they had their fingernails ripped off or were forced to lick filthy toilet bowls. The accounts of prison abuse in Iran’s postelection crackdown — relayed by relatives and on opposition Web sites — have set off growing outrage among Iranians, including some prominent conservatives. More bruised corpses have been returned to families in recent days, and some hospital officials have told human rights workers that they have seen evidence that well over 100 protesters have died since the vote. On Tuesday, the government released 140 prisoners in one of several conciliatory gestures aimed at deflecting further criticism. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad issued a letter urging the head of the judiciary to show “Islamic mercy” to the detainees, and on Monday Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, personally intervened and closed an especially notorious detention center. But there are signs that widespread public anger persists, and that it is not confined to those who took to the streets crying fraud after Mr. Ahmadinejad’s landslide victory last month. Several conservatives have said the abuse suggests a troubling lack of accountability, and they have hinted at a link with Mr. Ahmadinejad’s recent willingness to defy even the venerated Ayatollah Khamenei. Read more ...Source: NYT
By Middle East correspondent Anne Barker | July 03 Iran's hardline leaders have called for legal action to be taken against opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi over the post-election protests that have rocked the country. Iranian authorities blame Mr Mousavi for the wave of violence that has killed at least 20 people since the disputed election on June 12. Hardline parliamentarians and lawyers are now planning to write to judicial authorities complaining about the opposition leader's actions in encouraging the protests. They want him taken to court. A student branch of the pro-government Basij militia, which helped suppress the protests, has supported the move. Mr Mousavi rejects claims that he is to blame for the violence. He still insists the election was rigged, and says the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is now illegitimate. Source: ABC Australia
By John R. Bolton | July 2
With Iran's hard-line mullahs and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps unmistakably back in control, Israel's decision of whether to use military force against Tehran's nuclear weapons program is more urgent than ever. Iran's nuclear threat was never in doubt during its presidential campaign, but the post-election resistance raised the possibility of some sort of regime change. That prospect seems lost for the near future or for at least as long as it will take Iran to finalize a deliverable nuclear weapons capability. Accordingly, with no other timely option, the already compelling logic for an Israeli strike is nearly inexorable. Israel is undoubtedly ratcheting forward its decision-making process. President Obama is almost certainly not. He still wants "engagement" (a particularly evocative term now) with Iran's current regime. Last Thursday, the State Department confirmed that Secretary Hillary Clinton spoke to her Russian and Chinese counterparts about "getting Iran back to negotiating on some of these concerns that the international community has." This is precisely the view of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, reflected in the Group of Eight communique the next day. Sen. John Kerry thinks the recent election unpleasantness in Tehran will delay negotiations for only a few weeks. Obama administration sources have opined (anonymously) that Iran will be more eager to negotiate than it was before its election in order to find "acceptance" by the "international community." Some leaks indicated that negotiations had to produce results by the U.N. General Assembly's opening in late September, while others projected that they had until the end of 2009 to show progress. These gauzy scenarios assume that the Tehran regime cares about "acceptance" or is somehow embarrassed by eliminating its enemies. Both propositions are dubious. Obama will nonetheless attempt to jump-start bilateral negotiations with Iran, though time is running out even under the timetables leaked to the media. There are two problems with this approach. First, Tehran isn't going to negotiate in good faith. It hasn't for the past six years with the European Union as our surrogates, and it won't start now. As Clinton said on Tuesday, Iran has "a huge credibility gap" because of its electoral fraud. Second, given Iran's nuclear progress, even if the stronger sanctions Obama has threatened could be agreed upon, they would not prevent Iran from fabricating weapons and delivery systems when it chooses, as it has been striving to do for the past 20 years. Time is too short, and sanctions failed long ago. Only those most theologically committed to negotiation still believe Iran will fully renounce its nuclear program. Unfortunately, the Obama administration has a "Plan B," which would allow Iran to have a "peaceful" civil nuclear power program while publicly "renouncing" the objective of nuclear weapons. Obama would define such an outcome as "success," even though in reality it would hardly be different from what Iran is doing and saying now. A "peaceful" uranium enrichment program, "peaceful" reactors such as Bushehr and "peaceful" heavy-water projects like that under construction at Arak leave Iran with an enormous breakout capability to produce nuclear weapons in very short order. And anyone who believes the Revolutionary Guard Corps will abandon its weaponization and ballistic missile programs probably believes that there was no fraud in Iran's June 12 election. See "huge credibility gap," supra. In short, the stolen election and its tumultuous aftermath have dramatically highlighted the strategic and tactical flaws in Obama's game plan. With regime change off the table for the coming critical period in Iran's nuclear program, Israel's decision on using force is both easier and more urgent. Since there is no likelihood that diplomacy will start or finish in time, or even progress far enough to make any real difference, there is no point waiting for negotiations to play out. In fact, given the near certainty of Obama changing his definition of "success," negotiations represent an even more dangerous trap for Israel. Those who oppose Iran acquiring nuclear weapons are left in the near term with only the option of targeted military force against its weapons facilities. Significantly, the uprising in Iran also makes it more likely that an effective public diplomacy campaign could be waged in the country to explain to Iranians that such an attack is directed against the regime, not against the Iranian people. This was always true, but it has become even more important to make this case emphatically, when the gulf between the Islamic revolution of 1979 and the citizens of Iran has never been clearer or wider. Military action against Iran's nuclear program and the ultimate goal of regime change can be worked together consistently. Otherwise, be prepared for an Iran with nuclear weapons, which some, including Obama advisers, believe could be contained and deterred. That is not a hypothesis we should seek to test in the real world. The cost of error could be fatal. The writer, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, was U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from August 2005 to December 2006 and is the author of "Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations and Abroad." Source: Washington Post
Britain has reportedly Frozen $1.6B assets of Mojtaba Khamenei, son of Iran's supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei [*]
06/23/09 Payvand.com - Unsourced reports are circulating that British banks have frozen $1.6 billion in funds belonging to Mojtaba Khamenei, son of the supreme leader. This supposed affront is cited as another reason for displeasure with Britain in high places in Iran. "The total assets frozen in the UK under the EU (European Union) and UN sanctions against Iran are approximately 976,110,000 pounds," Ian Pearson, Britain's Economic Secretary to the Treasury said in a written statement to parliament on Thursday. The statement did not give any further details. Mojtaba Khamenei has emerged as one of the driving forces behind the government's crackdown, diplomats and observers said, as reported in a Guardian article published on June 22nd. Also, according to some Iran analysts, Khamenei, 70, is maneuvering to position his son as his successor. Related Articles Mojtaba Khamenei: gatekeeper to Iran's supreme leader
Guardian - Iran's supreme leader's second son, Mojtaba Khamenei, has emerged as one of the driving forces behind the government's crackdown, diplomats and observers said . Britain has frozen $1.6 billion in Iranian assets
LONDON (Reuters) - Iranian assets of nearly one billion pounds' ($1.64 billion) are frozen in Britain under international sanctions imposed over Tehran's nuclear program, the British government said on Thursday. Allegations from Tehran straining already rocky relations with the West
Irish Times - A seemingly orchestrated campaign to blame Iran's troubles on the West is in full swing, writes Simon Tisdall. Source: http://www.payvand.com/news/09/jun/1247.html
H/T: http://scettico72.blogspot.com [*] Khamenei's Son supposed to inherit his Father's "Kingdom": http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran-khamenei-son25-2009jun25,0,6876741.story
ISLAMIC FINANCE Foreign bank accounts of those Iranian leaders
Monday, June 29, 2009 Oh, those pious mullahs! So righteous! Is this what they mean by sharia finance? I guess this is their idea of a "green revolution". And you have to love those little Swiss piggies. Neutral? Yes, just like during World War II. Neutral for Nazis. Neutral on the bloody backs of millions.
This century's Nazis................... 1) Ali Khamenei - Sparkasse Bank (Frankfurt/Germany) Acct.# 234075617: DM 112.1 Millions - Corner Bank (Geneve/CH) Acct. # 217824: US$ 97 Millions - Banque Cantonale (Lausanne/CH) Acct. # 71713: US$ 73.2 Millions
2) Ali Akbar Hashemi Rasfandjani - Union Bank Suisse (Geneve/CH) Acct.# 223870390: SF 532.5 Millions Societe Generale (Zurich/CH) Acct.# 30064183: DM 477.2 Millions - Sparkasse (Ciborg/Germany) Acct. # 2957132: DM 238.2 Millions
3) Mohammad Ali Tasskhiri - Societe Generale (Geneve/Ch) Acct.# 500032654: DM 280.7 Millions - Midland Bank (London/UK) Acct.# 832-150270: BP 12.2 Millions - Dressdner bank (Dusserdolf/Germany) Acct.# 8354783: DM 48.3 Millions
4 ) Mohammad Golpayegani - Credit Bank Suisse (Geneve/CH) Acct.# CEO7680: SF 85.7 Millions
5) Bijan Namdar Z angene - Union Bank Suisse (Geneve/CH) Acct.# 314380320: US$ 141.7 Millions
6) Habibollah Asgar Aladi - Corner Bank (Geneve/CH) Acct. # 3983BHK: US$ 180 Millions
7) Ahmad Jannati - Midland Bank (London/UK) Acct.# 92114016: BP 54.2 Millions
8) Abdollah Nategh Nouri - Union Banque Suisse (Geneve/CH) Acct.# 2102120321ND: USD 123.9 Millions - Deutsh bank (Hamburg/Germany) Acct.# 03223486: DM 64.1 Millions
9) Mohsen Rafighdoost - Union Banque Suisse (Geneve/CH) Acct.# 2183130687: USD 122.7 Millions
10) Mohsen Hashemi Bahremani - Deutsh bank (Munchen 3/Germany) Acct.# 1732736: DM 370.7 Millions - Credit Bank (Geneve/CH) Acct.# 928530FC: USD 178.2 Millions
11) Abbas Vaez-Tabassi - Corner Bank (Geneve/CH) Acct.# FAH7272: SF 97.2 Millions - Sparkasse (Hamburg/Germany) Acct #. DFH72251660: USD 216.7 Millions
12) Hossein Shariatmadari - Midland Bank (London/UK) Acct.# 34414011: BP 37.8 Millions
13) Mohsen Rezai - Union Banque Suisse (Geneve/CH) Acct.# 442760430: USD 78.2 Millions - Credit Bank (Geneve/CH) Acct.# FAH7967: SF 52.7 Millions
14) Massood Movahedian - Commerz Bank (Koln/Germany) Acct.# 3528817: DM 287.8 Millions
15) Kamal Kharrazi - Corner Bank (Geneve/CH) Acct.# AMF4567: USD 18.2 Millions
16) Ali-Reza Mo-ayeri - Societe Generale (Geneve/CH) Acct.# 50024814: USD12.6 Millions
17) Hossein Kordi - Corner Bank (Geneve/CH) Acct.#14710025: USD 14.7 Millions
18) Abbas-Ali Forooghi - Corner Bank (Geneve/CH) Acct.# 12930034: USD 10.7 Millions Source: http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2009/06/islamic-finance-foreign-bank-accounts-of-those-iranian-leaders.html
H/T: http://scetticol72.blogspot.com
 The best part of the crisis in Iran, is that extremists and fundamentalists everywhere are panicking. They thought that the Iranian regime would remain in place for years, perhaps decades to come. Tehran has been supporting them - think of Hizbullah, Hamas but also dozens of other fundamentalist and extremist* organizations, newspapers, groups, etc. - since the very start of the Iranian Islamic Revolution back in 1979. They rely heavily on the Mullah’s for spiritual and material support. If Khamenei is removed from power, and replaced by a group of reform-minded clerics and politicians, they have a major problem.
And they know it. Which is why both Hamas and Hizbullah sent fighters to Iran a week ago or so. Reports say that Iranians are aware of this, and even talk to Basij militia members before they beat them up, to find out whether they speak Farsi or Arabic. If it is the latter, they can count on no mercy whatsoever. And rightly so. The Jerusalem Post published an incredibly fascinating article about this matter. From it: "Iran spends billions of dollars in different regions for various causes. Iran is the second-largest source of funds in the world, exceeded only by Saudi Arabia, for Islamic causes. From Somalia to Lebanon’s Hizbullah, from Hamas to the Egyptian Shiite movement, Iranian support - whether through direct funding or military and training - will be jeopardized if the theocrats are unseated. So would Iran’s support as a major donor to various proactive Muslim organizations in Europe, North America, and South America. The Iranian government’s role in supporting, training and facilitating the Sudanese Holocaust in Darfur is significant, with only the Chinese playing a larger role." And that’s exactly why people such as Abdel Bari Atwan, editor of the London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi, a pan-Arab newspaper, writes article after article in which he defends the regime, and criticizes the protesters. He fears they will rid themselves of their oppressors, because them doing so would weaken the entire fundamentalist and extremist movement considerably. "It is certain that those groups and organizations that might expect their funding to be in danger would start lobbying various governments to turn a blind eye to events in Iran. Whether Western politicians have any stomach for this type of lobbying at this point is another topic of discussion. Indeed the global Muslim theocracy movement is in danger at the hands of the Iranian people not only financially, but also in terms of the legitimacy of theocracy as a political system. It is too early to say what the long-term impact will be, but it is certain that there has been at least a negative psychological impact on the legitimacy of theocracy as a result of the Iranian protests. There may be those who will try to spin the story and claim that the people of Iran still support theocracy and their beef is only with the election and Ahmadinejad. One can say with certainty that for the first few days the Iranian people tried to manage this evolution leaving some wiggle room for the supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei. But as of last Friday the gloves were off. With Ayatollah Khamenei showing no restraint, people started chanting “death to Khamenei”, a sign of the realization that they could even go further and let the world know what they really want: the abolition of theocracy in Iran. Whether the brave people of Iran are successful in their aspirations to live without theocratic rule is unknown. However, it can be said with certainty that their efforts have changed the face of the theocracy movement not only within Iran, but also globally." To me, that’s the most significant effect of the crisis in Iran.
The Mullahs have proved that their ideology is not merely radical, but also weak and opposed by the majority of Iranians. They rule by the point of a gun, as every extremist group has to. They don’t have support. When push comes to shove, they stand alone. And that is how it will always be. That’s a major setback for fundamentalists everywhere, and that’s also why it’s so important that world news organizations and blogs show this truth - that the Mullahs have failed because their ideology is both wicked and weak - to everyone out there. *Fundamentalist and extremist are not per definition the same. Extremists do not merely wish to live according to a fundamentalist interpretation of their religion, they also want others to do so, and are even willing to use violence to reach their goal. Source: PoliGazette
Obama gives the mullahs cover for their "legitimate" atom-lust, claiming 30 years of U.S. policy may be to blame.By Ben Johnson Although candidate Obama declared a nuclear Iran would be “a game-changer,” his interview with the BBC has given Tehran the time and plausible deniability necessary to achieve its genocidal intentions. Continuing the failed policies of Bush’s second term, he added another dynamic: his interview implied Iran’s defiance may be the fault of the United States. Speaking on the eve of his trip to Cairo to deliver a “personal commitment to engagement,” Barack H. Obama unveiled his silver bullet for Iranian tensions: “I think the key here is to initiate a process that is meaningful, that is rigorous…[continuing] discussions in a way that is constructive.” Even the therapeutic psychobabble echoed the 1970s – more alarmingly, so did the president’s subservience and moral equivalence. Read more ... Source: FrontPage Magazine
 Amil Imani | International Analyist Network | 26 Feb 2009 The cult of death, Islam, is marching forward under its battle cry: “ We love death, the infidels love life,” says Hassan Nasrullah, leader of Lebanon Hizbollah. There is no limit to the Shi’a mullahs’ obsession with all matters dealing with death. On one front, the mullahs are working overtime to obtain the ultimate death weapon—the nuclear bomb—the most efficient and economical way of inflicting death on the masses of the infidels. A perfect example is this week’s test firing at the Bushehr nuclear plant. The duplicitous Russians are just too pleased to help them out in exchange for petrodollars. On another front, the ever-conniving mullahs are gradually transforming Iran’s universities, cradles of knowledge about life, to mausoleums. Instead of adorning the landscape with statues of great scientists and scholars to inspire the young to life achievement, the mullahs bring corpses of their victims and bury them there, victims who had been hoodwinked by the fascist Islamists and had lost their lives in the process of horrific schemes and crimes against humanity in the name of Allah The charlatan mullahs sanitize their wicked deeds that have caused the death of their victims by calling them martyrs and affording them an honorable burial place. It is the mullah’s devious way of hopefully attracting new recruits from the ranks of the young. According to a report by Rasmus Christian Elling, the fascination of burying martyrs inside Tehran’s universities has a little history in itself. When the crown “buffoon” of the Islamic Republic, Ahmadinejad, was Tehran’s mayor, he brought up the subject numerous times. However, pro-freedom and courageous Iranian students have strongly protested against any plans to bury decaying remains of ancient human bones next to their classrooms. They look at it as an instrument for the regime’s oppressive policy. Based on this horrific ideology of death, the Muslims have visited death on untold numbers of both Muslims as well as non-Muslims. The Khomeinist regime of the IRI sent tens of thousands of its own children to their death to clear minefields in its holy war with Iraq’s Saddam Hussein. Not limiting itself to this horrific act, the Khomeinists massacred tens of thousands of political dissenters without the least due process. Islam wins, either when you kill or you get killed. That’s the motto of the religion of death. In Rasmus Christian Elling’s report, one way to interpret this situation is that this is the regime’s way to impose upon the university milieu and student life a militant ideology, one that praises shahâdat (the martyr death), endless war and military values accompanied with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards and eulogizing of the eight-year war with Iraq. It is also an Orwellian tactic for the militia groups (Basijis) to clamp down on student gatherings and demonstrations. It is an invasion of personal privacy, either directly physically or indirectly by surveillance. It is an Islamic way of controlling its citizens' daily life, as in " Big Brother" is watching you. It is the Islamic republic’s strategy to suppress dissident voices within Iran’s lively university environment. The mullahs are skillfully steering the train back on track by changing the ambiance of the universities to Rozeh Khooni—Shiite’s religious revival composed of a mix of passages chanted from the Quran and narration of the suffering of the Imams. Perhaps their ultimate motive is to make universities a mosque-like place, with never-ending weeping and eulogies for Imams who have been dead for over 1400 years. Expecting student protests, the Mullahs and their lackeys planned yesterday’s burial in advance. As recently as a few weeks ago, the members of the Revolutionary Guards started rounding up some of the main associates of the dissident Islamic Students Association (Anjoman-e eslami-ye daneshjuyan) in Amir Kabir Polytechnic University, Tehran. This university is known for is vigorous and diverse pro-democratic activism. In addition, a few days ago, the Supreme Leader of the Islamic regime, Mullah Khamenei, prepared the ground by issuing a public message hailing the martyrs and expressing that “the youth of today is indebted to these anonymous war heroes to be buried in their campus yard.” Hence, the highest political authority blessed yesterday’s intensive action. Amir Kabir University’s Student Newsletter website has reported on the intense situation at the university. They have reported that the atmosphere has been tense for the past couple of days when a barrage of “chest-beating mourners brought the martyr coffins yesterday morning. Before the parade, security forces, Basiji campus police, Revolutionary Guards, plain-clothed intelligence officers, armed vigilantes known as Ansâr-e hezbollâh (a violent Islamist organization under the unofficial sway of the Supreme Leader) and even the fire brigade gathered inside and around the university compounds.” The Supreme Guide of the Islamic Republic, Mullah Khamenei, for instance, has urged the close-minded faithful to hold large protest demonstrations. It appears that the call of the Mullah for demonstrations is an attempt at intimidation, the best he can do since he does not have a rational defensible response and he is not able to send his assassins all the way to Rome to carry out the Islamic unconscionable favorite way of supplying answers. “The security forces and vigilantes used clubs, tear gas sprays, iron knuckles, knives and other weapons in order to wound the protesting students. At least 25 have been arrested and 9 hospitalized with knife wounds and other injuries so far, and the fighting continues as we speak. Another student slogan repeated on the website: Ansâr commits the crime, the Leader supports it,” according to the Persian students’ newsletter. Also reported by the Amir Kabir Newsletter, students carried placards and yelled slogans such as “University is not a graveyard”, “ Death to Dictatorship,” “ Run off, Ansar," “ Incompetent Basijis, get lost,” and so on. “These harsh slogans clearly unveil the hard-deep animosity amongst students against the militant ideology of the regime.” Amir Kabir Newsletter reported yesterday, that the situation in the university is horrible. While protesting students at the university are being beaten up and wounded, the coffins of the so-called nameless martyrs have been placed in a corner, left in a disgusting fashion along the graves while clerics are singing mourning hymns. "By burying the bodies of the martyrs on university campuses, they can destroy every freedom seeking movement under the claim that the blood of the martyrs is being disregarded and trampled upon," says a university student activist. The modern manifestation of the Islamic Caliphate has reincarnated into the "the Islamic Republic" of Iran, which has been holding the majority of Iranians hostage for the past 30 years. The Islamofascists ruling the country hope to realize their expansionist master plan after defeating the people of Iran, and ultimately unleashing their reign of Islamic terror on the rest of the world in succession. Hence, the importance of world support for the Iranian people (not because of an altruistic and unselfish regard for others, but as self-interest) cannot be overemphasized. Surely, the Islamic state and its anti-Iranian forces have once again brought death into universities with the intent of suffocating discontent and strangling freedom of speech and thought. However, the Iranian student movement might come alive again from such brainless actions as that carried out this morning by the Islamic State. One student, identifying him/herself as ‘a Patriot’ wrote: “Right in front of me, they kicked and carried off a couple of the kids in a red van. I swear to God, from now on, I count the minutes until the fall of this regime and I will do anything. Long Live Freedom, Death to Dictatorship.” Almost three decades after the tragic Islamic Revolution of 1979, the suffocating rule of Islam casts its death-bearing pall over Iranians. A proud people with enviable heritage is being systematically purged of its sense of identity and forced to think and behave like the barbaric and intolerant Muslims. Iranians deserve better than being manipulated by a bunch of devilish mullahs who have been riding on the back of the ignorant poor, by deceiving the poor and with empty promises of all the goodies that they are promised in the afterlife. Not a bad scheme for the charlatan mullahs. They have it all in this world while issuing I-owe-yous to their victims, by the authority, they claim vested in them by none other than Muhammad. Given enough time, the death game that the mullahs are playing with their chase after the atom bomb, by the exodus they force on those who can flee their suffocating rule, and by slowly killing the remainder of the helpless Iranian patriots may eventually catch up with them. Yet the best hope for Iran to free itself from the claws of death-based Islam is with its students. They have always been in the vanguard of Iranian progressive struggles. Realizing this major source of threat to their existence, the murdering mullahs are literally changing Iranian universities to graveyards. Source: International Analyst Network
February 03 PRESS TV, the Iranian-government-owned English-language web and television broadcasting company, recently published a report contending Iran’s intelligence ministry had uncovered and publicly disclosed details regarding an alleged “’US-backed’ spy ring which had plans to topple the Tehran government.”
According to the report:
“Following the arrest of four Iranian nationals on charges of plotting to overthrow the government with Washington’s support, head of the counterespionage department in the Intelligence Ministry said Monday that the group intended to build social and political tension in the country.”
The official, whose name was not revealed, added “organizing anti-government public rallies and creating ethnic division in the country” were among the tactics to be employed by the network.”
In our ongoing conversations with Dr. Walid Phares – director of the Future of Terrorism Project at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies who now also serves as secretary general of the Trans Atlantic Legislative Group on Counter Terrorism — we asked for his interpretation of any underlying message within the report.
We know what the report says. What are the Iranians not saying?DR. WALID PHARES:First, the Iranian regime has always conducted arrests among its opposition. It has done so since coming to power in 1980. The regime has – for all intent and purposes – physically eliminated Iranian citizens – thousands of them – by labeling them as being “U.S.-backed” and/or “Zionist” elements inside the country. If you look at the archives of the various international human rights organizations, or country reports in various foreign ministries; and of course, if you review the information collected from the many Iranian opposition groups, you’ll easily discover a continuous and systematic suppression of freedoms in Iran for the last 30 years. The arrest campaigns have covered nearly every sector of Iranian society: students, women, labor, artists, but also ethnic minorities such as Arabs, Kurds, Baluch, Azeri and others. Also, religious minorities such as Christians, Jews and Bahais have also been persecuted. The news regarding arrests of Azeri ethnics in Iran is not unusual. We’ve been reading open sources reports about Bahais arrests in recent weeks, as well as arrests of Ahwaz Arabs over the past several months, and women over the last year. So, the reports by the Iranian regime about a “U.S. conspiracy” is neither strange nor exceptional. W. THOMAS SMITH JR.:The Iranian press reported the unnamed intelligence official as saying “the group” had been successful in fomenting dissent among Azeri people in the Azerbaijan Province. Why the regime’s focus on this province? PHARES:This is very telling in that anti-Khomeinist sentiment is spreading in the northwestern part of the country and among the single largest ethnic minority in Iran. Azeris are the second group after the Persians, and they form a contiguous group settling the entire northwestern part of Iran in what is known as southern Azarbaijian. It is historically a part of the Azeri nation and they speak a Turkic language. Traditionally the Iranian Azeris have been loyal to the Iranian nation, and many among them have served in Iran’s military. But with the radicalization of the regime and the economic crisis now underway in Iran, many ethnic minorities are protesting bad socio-economic conditions in their areas. They mainly accuse the Mullahs in Tehran of concentrating wealth among their own elite in the center while letting the provinces decay. The Azeris aren’t happy with the state of affairs in the so-called ‘Islamic republic.’ Hence we’re witnessing the rise of local opposition movements in their areas. The regime responds with preemptive arrests, and of course labels any protest as a ‘pro-American’ conspiracy: Classical Khomeinist narrative. SMITH:Why would the Iranian press quote ‘Intelligence officials’ and not the justice ministry? PHARES:Because most likely when the opposition is widening, the regime unleashes its strongest arm, the intelligence services. If anything this is an indicator that the Azeri movement, and all other movements are getting stronger with time. SMITH:The report states: “Tehran’s Islamic Revolution Court sentenced the four suspects without announcing the length of their sentence.
‘They have confessed to trying to distance the people of Iran from the government and introduce the United States as their sole savior,’ the court said in a statement.
“Two of the detainees are internationally renowned doctors Arash and Kamyar Alaei, who specialize in HIV/AIDS.
“In the Monday press conference, the top Iranian counterespionage official said that the US intelligence agencies had resorted to ‘soft overthrow projects’ over the past decade, as there is no international statute law against such measures.” What are we to deduce from such arrests? PHARES:It means the middle class in Iranian Azarbaijian is fed up with the Mullah regime. When the Khomeinists begin striking out at citizens – doctors as in this case, or professors and bloggers as in other cases – we’re talking about a serious development. When educated people are accused of political ‘incitement’ against the regime – which translates to political opposition – it means that many more activists are mobilizing civil society, and that of course is a red line to the regime. SMITH:The report also mentions the U.S. having spent $32 million on “soft overthrow projects,” a means by which the U.S. could “infiltrate elite and expert circles” and therein gain access to information regarding national “infrastructure, microbiological achievements, and defensive capacity.” They also named names of Americans. Why? PHARES:It is an act of desperation. It shows the regime is angry and wants to send a message to the U.S. government, which by the way is preparing to open dialogue with Tehran. By naming names and agencies, the Iranian Pasdaran [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps] and intelligence services are sending a message to the Obama administration telling them that if they want to open dialogue, they will have to shut all these ‘democracy operations.’ What is ironic is that the Bush administration was criticized for doing so little to help the Iranian democracy movement. If indeed the Iranian regime is complaining about $32 million spent allegedly by the U.S. on democracy activities, this is peanuts compared to the billions of dollars spent on the war on terror and the hundreds of millions of dollars spent on the war of ideas. This amount is ridiculous: Yet the Iranian regime wants Washington not to spend a penny on any program that would help democracy groups in Iran. This pressure is aimed at preempting the Obama administration. SMITH:The report said “Iranian intelligence operatives had been able to infiltrate the network and ‘launch an intelligence war with the CIA by leaking false information.’” It also said the UK and Israel were involved. PHARES:Typical of the regime to try to frame all three governments of the U.S., UK, and Israel in one giant conspiracy. For by linking alleged Israeli activities to alleged U.S. and British activities against the regime, they would create a ‘radioactive’ environment in the region. Again, Tehran is trying to build a big bargaining chip for the day of dialogue. Thus the Iranian negotiators hope to be in a position of strength: Hold the high ground and lead with other subjects before the discussion of the most relevant ones, i.e. the nuclear issues. SMITH:The report mentions the claim by Mohammad-Javad Zarif, the former Iranian ambassador to the United Nations, that “the White House is taking essential measures to orchestrate a ‘Velvet Revolution’ in Iran.” PHARES:It is a reminder of the last decade of the Soviet Union when Soviet citizens invited to the West were eager to learn about open and free societies. They were often punished by Moscow for concocting revolutions against the Communist regime. The Iranian establishment lives in the paranoia of a similar situation. They spy on their own citizens when they travel and accuse them of being recruited by the West. When the Khomeinists start talking about a so-called ‘American support’ of a so-called ‘Velvet Revolution’ inside Iran, it means they are indeed afraid that seeds have already been sown for such a revolution. In fact, what worries the regime are not these scientific conferences but the narrative on many Iranian web sites talking about ‘democratic revolution.’ Ali Khamenei’s Pasdaran can feel the sentiment inside Iran’s civil society. Thus they want to suppress these sentiments by connecting them to an alleged American and Western activity. [Dr. Phares, who has provided similar analysis to U.S. government – and who regularly conducts Congressional and State Department as well as European Parliament and UN Security Council briefings – has been providing exclusive analysis to us for nearly five years.] [The Iranian Press TV report also states: “Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh revealed in July that U.S. Congressional leaders had secretly agreed to President George W. Bush’s $400-million funding request for a major escalation in covert operations inside Iran.” Our sources coordinating with the Iranian opposition groups, have informed us that members of those opposition groups “are wondering why Hersh is leaking such information, which is in turn used by the regime against them.”] Source: Europe News
 Tehran, 19 Dec. (AKI) - A top Muslim cleric in Iran, Hojatolislam Gholam Reza Hassani said on Wednesday that women in Iran who do not wear the hijab or Muslim headscarf, should die.
"Women who do not respect the hijab and their husbands deserve to die," said Hassani, who leads Friday prayers in the city of Urumieh, in Iranian Azerbaijan.
"I do not understand how these women who do not respect the hijab, 28 years after the birth of the Islamic Republic, are still alive," he said.
"These women and their husbands and their fathers must die," said Hassani, who is the representative of the Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei in eastern Azerbaijan.
Hassani's statements came after two Kurdish feminists in Iran were accused of being members of an armed rebel group and of carrying out subversive activities threatening the security of the state.
It is believed that his statements and the arrests could spark a fresh crackdown on women who do not repect the Islamic dress code in Iran.
Thousands of women in Iran have already been warned this year for their "un-Islamic dress" such as wearing tight, short coats and skimpy headscarves. Source: AKIH/T: Shariah Finance Watch
By Amil Imani It is a fundamental human trait to locate the source of anything bad happening and try to neutralize it. There are, however, times that the source of the harm cannot be pinpointed or when successfully recognized it cannot be eliminated. Failure to recognize the source or neutralize it is frustrating. And frustration triggers a variety of emotions and reactions. The feeling of victimization is one possible reaction that frequently goes hand-in-hand with displaced aggression on a convenient safe target. The aggression can be verbal, physical, or a combination of the two. The Mullahs presently ruling Iran are faced with monumental threats. Internally, the great majority of the populace is against their misrule. Labor unions, teachers associations, student groups, religious and ethnic minorities, journalists and many others have suffered and continue to suffer inordinate hardship under the heavy-handed Mullahs and their front-men. Externally, they are engaged in brinksmanship with the United States and Israel, while trying to wrestle the mantle of Islamic leadership from the Sunni Saudis and their Wahhabi cabal. The Mullahs deflect responsibility for the mess they have made of Iran by skillfully playing the blame game. Blaming others for our problems seems to have become part of our national character, dating some 1400 years to the time when an army of bloodthirsty savages lofting the banner of Islam invaded our country. These barbarians hailed out of the Arabian Peninsula, heartlessly slaughtered innocent people, burned libraries, and took whatever they wanted, including women and children, as booty of war. Read more ...Source: Islam Watch
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By: Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury
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