Iran: A Trump Administration's Effective Iran Policy Should Have An Eye To The Mullahs' Weakening Grip

BY SOONA SAMSAMI

 Iran: A Trump Administration's Effective Iran Policy Should Have An Eye To The Mullahs' Weakening Grip

A Trump Administration's Effective Iran Policy Should Have An Eye To The Mullahs' Weakening Grip

Earlier this month, it was reported that the Iranian judiciary had granted temporary release to Golrokh Ebrahimi. A political prisoner, Ebrahimi made international headlines after she was brought up on charges stemming from the “dissident” sentiments expressed in an unpublished, fictional short story found in her home during a police raid. Amnesty International described the charges as “ludicrous,” explaining that she was “effectively being punished for using her imagination.”

Over the past two months, her case attracted more attention after her husband, Arash Sadeghi, launched a hunger strike. He had been imprisoned ahead of her on vague national security charges stemming from his peaceful human rights activism. Ebrahimi’s release on Tuesday finally prompted Sadeghi to end his fast that had lasted a staggering 71 days....Mor..

 

IRAN SHIITE MILITIAS ENDANGERING FUTURE OF IRAQ

IRAN SHIITE MILITIAS ENDANGERING FUTURE OF IRAQ

IRAN SHIITE MILITIAS ENDANGERING FUTURE OF IRAQ

The Islamic Republic continues on its path of death and destruction.
A conglomerate of Iran-backed Shiite militias in Iraq, known as the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), or more commonly by the Arabic label al-Hashd al-Shaabi, pose a very dire threat for the future of Iraq. This sectarian group of dangerous armed elements is resorting to any and all crimes with the objective of pursuing Tehran’s policies across Mesopotamia.

The PMU, established back in the mid-2014, has taken part in the battles of Syria from mid-2013 onward and now, despite participating in the offensive to retake Mosul from Daesh (ISIS/ISIL), this phenomenon poses the gravest of all threats for the Iraqi nation. Mor...

IRAN ACTIVIST ENDS 71-DAY PRISON HUNGER.....

Arash Sadeghi

AP:IRAN ACTIVIST ENDS 71-DAY PRISON HUNGER STRIKE AS WIFE FREED


By JON GAMBRELL
AP - An imprisoned Iranian human rights activist ended a 71-day hunger strike Tuesday as his detained wife won a temporary release from prison, a day after his case sparked a rare unauthorized protest in Tehran.
Arash Sadeghi was to be taken to a hospital, his lawyer Amir Raisian said, while Amnesty International said he would be fed intravenously. His wife, Golrokh Ebrahimi Iraee, was temporarily freed for several days in a decision that can be extended, the semi-official ISNA news agency reported.
The sudden decision comes after a dayslong social media campaign and the march Monday toward Evin prison by dozens of Iranians. Such protests have been rare in Iran after violence that followed the country's disputed 2009 presidential election.Mor....

Iran: Arash Sadeghi's father on hunger strike to support his son

Political prisoners father on hunger strike on solidarity with son

Prominent Iranian political prisoner, Arash Sadeghi's father, Hossein Sadeghi, has staged a hunger strike in solidarity with his son. Mr. Sadeghi said: “My son Arash in his 67th day of hunger strike is experiencing moment to moment struggle with death. On Monday, December 26, Arash was urgently transferred to Taleghani hospital in Tehran due to his deteriorating health condition and underwent medical examination. The hospital’s doctors said my son was in extremely dire health condition and in a written report warned about my son’s «dangerous heart condition and risk of cardiac arrest, and danger of coma and even death».”
The suffering father continued: “Now, since last Friday, December 23, I staged a hunger strike to protest the authorities lack of attention to address the demands of my child, and to protest keeping him incommunicado and denying him visit with his wife, and also to support his hunger strike and legitimate demands. I demand his dire condition be addressed and his demands be met. I call on all to be the voice of my son, his wife and other imprisoned loved ones (political prisoners).”Mor...”Mor...

Iran The Political Prisoners Congratulate the New Year

http://bit.ly/2iOGvbz

Iran The Political Prisoners Congratulate the New Year

NCRI - On Wednesday December 28th 2016, a group of political prisoners of Gohardasht Prison in a message congratulated the New Year 2017.The political prisoners stated:"today in the days left till the New Year 2017, we, the political prisoners of Gohardasht Prison commended Iranian and Syrian people and especially children and women’ struggle for freedom and said: We honor the hardworking workers, imprisoned teachers and so on. We will begin the new year with great ambition and unity."
On the eve of New Year, the political prisoners said that they will strongly protest against the plunders and repressions of the Mullahs' regime as well as the men behind the scene. They added: “we will challenge the security and police authorities and those who are behind the scene and then we will shout at the top of our voice against their plunders and lootings. We will not forget that there is not enough food for the children of my country and they suffer from poverty and unemployment due to thousands of economic rents, far-fetched salaries of officials and the lootings."Mor....

Iran Maryam Rajavi: The Mullahs' "Moderate" President Shamelessly Calls for the Killing of Besieged People of Aleppo .....

Maryam Rajavi

Maryam Rajavi: The Mullahs' "Moderate" President Shamelessly Calls for the Killing of Besieged People of Aleppo by Using Terrorist Label

“moderate” President of the religious fascism ruling Iran, in a gathering of a number of regime paid agents and mercenaries, called for continuation of killing people of Aleppo and criticized that some "Islamic states" had expressed concerns about the success "of the people and the army" of Syria, saying some "Islamic governments are concerned about the fate of the terrorists and want their safe exit from Aleppo" (State-run media - December 17, 2016).Mor....

Iran Regime Claims Unity While Killing Innocent Women and Children in Aleppo

Regime Claims Unity While Killing 

Iran Regime Claims Unity While Killing Innocent Women and Children in Aleppo

NCRI - The Iranian regime president, Hassan Rouhani, in his speech on Thursday December 15 in the so-called Islamic Unity Conference, claimed violence from any religion or ethnicity is against Islam.

In this regard, Turkey’s Anatolia news agency in a report on December 15 questioned Rouhani’s statement regarding Islam’s opposition to violence and said while Rouhani today talked about Islam opposing violence, the (sectarian) militants backed by Iranian regime killed several civilians, who were evacuating East Aleppo during the ceasefire, by firing direct shots.

Sectarian militants affiliated to the regime in Iran today once again under the command of Seid Javad, a commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), fired direct shots at the civilians, who were evacuating East Aleppo following the ceasefire, killing several civilians and injuring a large number of them. This is while Hassan Rouhani in his speech in «Islamic Unity Conference» today said: «Violence is against Islam. Violence from Shiite or Sunni is unacceptable. Murder by anyone is undue and rejected»” Anatolia reported.....Mor..

iran Why We Shouldn’t Worry About Giuliani’s Ties to an Iranian Resistance Group

http://politi.co/2gqshNC

iran Why We Shouldn’t Worry About Giuliani’s Ties to an Iranian Resistance Group

 Mujahidin e-Khalq, or MEK, an Iranian resistance group, and the U.S. politicians who support it, especially former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani. As a former Democratic member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and someone familiar with the MEK and Giuliani’s work on the organization’s behalf, I can say unequivocally that Benjamin’s assertions are outrageous—so outrageous that I must respond.

First, I want to be clear about one thing: This isn’t about Rudy Giuliani. Arguably the broadest and most impressive bipartisan coalition in a generation has supported the MEK in its campaign for regime change in Iran. This includes two former chairmen of the joint chiefs, two former CIA directors, a former attorney general and the former chairs of both political parties. The ideological range includes everyone from Howard Dean and Patrick Kennedy to Newt Gingrich and John Bolton. From this perspective, the outlier isn’t Rudy Giuliani; it’s Daniel Benjamin mor...mor...

Iran- Has the Iran Lobby Set its Sights on the Trump Administration?

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Has the Iran Lobby Set its Sights on the Trump Administration?

Repeated attacks on Iranian dissidents featuring discredited talking points normally espoused by Tehran’s well-organized Washington lobby are landing with Donald Trump’s White House transition in full swing.

Daniel Benjamin’s Politico Magazine hit job – Giuliani Took Money From a Group That Killed Americans. Does Trump Care? and Josh Rogin’s takedown in The Washington Post – Giuliani was Paid Advocate for Shady Iranian Dissident Group – are case in point.

Were the smears designed to influence the selection of key members of the president-elect’s cabinet and, by extension, US policy?

If allegations levied by Benjamin or Rogin were substantiated by actual evidence, their claims might be credible. They are not. Instead the articles traffic in innuendo that is easily dismissed.
How do I know?

I am the author of three empirical, peer-reviewed journal articles that examine matters involving the exiled Iranian resistance group Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), also known as People’s Mujahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI). I also penned the foreword to an independent 2013 study undertaken by Ambassador Lincoln P. Bloomfield Jr. that addressed the misinformation campaign directed at Western government policies toward the Iranian opposition group. Bloomfield, a former defense and foreign policy official who served three presidents over five administrations in the Pentagon, White House, and State Department, produced the scholarly history of the MEK to challenge conventional wisdom within the Department of State and to prompt fresh policy thinking.
MOR.....

Iran:Can propaganda save the threadbare Iran appeasement policy?

With President Obama's administration expiring in a few weeks, the Iranian regime, its lobbies in the United States and Iran apologists with vested interest in the continuation of rapprochement with Tehran have initiated a widespread propaganda campaign to avoid losing their earnings in Obama's eight years of appeasement policy vis-a-vis Iran.

Their efforts involve the publication of lopsided reports and hastily scribbled op-eds with enticing titles on highly viewed media outlets to reframe past failures as historical achievements, and to discourage President-elect Trump from choosing vocal critics of Iran's mischievous deeds as his cabinet members.

An op-ed published in the Washington Post shortly after Trump's victory tried to demonize Rudy Giuliani, calling him a "paid advocate of a shady Iranian dissident group," referring to the People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK), the main opposition of the Iranian regime. The author of the article, Josh Rogin, has a long history of attacking the PMOI/MEK and quoting Tehran lobbies in his reporting..Mor

Iran regime even more oppressive since nuclear deal, dissidents say

Iran regime even more oppressive since nuclear deal, dissidents say

Now free in the West, recently escaped political dissidents say Iran’s regime has grown more oppressive since its nuclear deal with the U.S. and other world powers that had hoped the agreement would moderate the Islamic-ruled nation.

The protesters also say the billions of dollars in cash the U.S. shipped to Iran, plus the West’s release of frozen Iranian bank assets, already have been diverted to Iran’s expansionist armies in Iraq, Syria and elsewhere.

“Every deal, every negotiation with the regime, it means additional gallows in Iran,” says Shabnam Madadzadeh, 29, who gained fame as a student organizer at Tehran’s Tarbiat Moalem University. She spent five harsh years in confinement, including in Iran’s notorious Evin prison, but she did not break..Mor....

Iran; As understanding of the Iranian resistance grows, support should follow

As understanding of the Iranian resistance grows, support should follow

Iranian Maleheh Hosseini (R) participates in a rally at the White House against Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and his alleged killing of 52 Iranian dissidents at Camp Ashraf in Iraq in 2013. File Photo by Kevin Dietsch/UPI

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This summer marked the 28th anniversary of an extraordinary massacre of political prisoners in the Islamic Republic of Iran. In the span of a few months in 1988, upwards of 30,000 people were put to death as a result of minutes-long trials that were little more than loyalty tests for the regime. The vast majority of those victims were members and supporters of the People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK), and recently revealed information has helped to confirm that the massacre was primarily motivated by a longstanding desire to snuff out the opposition of the MEK to the increasingly repressive theocracy.... http://bit.ly/2cgHJsW