Iran Has Held An Assyrian Pastor In Prison Since Raiding His Home On Christmas Day – The Islamic Republic of Iran’s Revolutionary Court interrupted Christmas when officers raided the home of an Assyrian pastor in Tehran and arrested everyone in attendance. Pastor Victor Bet-Tamarz and another man remain under arrest; the others were reportedly freed.
Iran Has Held an Assyrian Pastor In Prison Since Raiding His Home On Christmas Day
All of the Christians present were videotaped by the officers and asked to state their full names and explain why they thought they were being arrested, according to the Assyrian International News Agency (AINA). After separating the men from women (mixing between genders is strictly prohibited under Sharia Law), the guards reportedly proceeded to search all those present, confiscating Bibles, mobile phones, and identification papers. Pastor Victor’s residence was also searched, and his computer, mobile phones, and books were seized.
Assyrian Christians have been officially permitted to worship in their own language, which is a form of Aramaic; Aramaic is the language used in the Zohar which is the literary work associated with Jewish mysticism known as the Kabbalah. Pastor Victor had previously been formally recognized by the Iranian government; however, his church in Tehran was closed in 2009 because he had refused to comply with Iranian law, which calls for the banning of non-Assyrians from attending Assyrian churches, AINA notes. The Islamic Republic of Iran also demanded that Pastor Victor’s services only be taught in Assyrian and not in Farsi, which is the official language of the Muslim majority.
There are less than 20,000 Assyrians left in Iran today, and as an officially recognized minority group, they are granted one parliamentary seat–which is currently occupied by Yonatan Betkolia.
Iran’s Basij or “morality police” also apprehended nine other Christians on Christmas Day without giving any reason for the arrests. The Basij (in Farsi the full name is Sazmane Basij-e Mostaz’afin which literally translates to “The Organization for Mobilization of the Oppressed”) is primarily comprised of volunteers. In addition to the Christmas arrests, the Islamic Republic carried out the executions of nine people in Iran’s infamous Adelabad prison, where gross violations of human rights are also carried out–including routine beatings, harassment, and sodomy as a form of torture. In Farsi, “Adel” means one who exhibits “justice,” has morals, and is righteous.
Ironically, the day of the multiple arrests and executions, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei sent out the following Christmas Eve and Christmas Day tweets in which he sang words of love and admiration for Jesus Christ and called on people to “truly honor Jesus’s birthday”.
Iran’s Air Defense Drones Probably Aren’t Very Good at Air Defense – Iran’s military is assigning a new and unorthodox mission to its fast-expanding fleet of aerial drones—air defense. That is, engaging enemy planes from the air.
Iran’s Air Defense Drones Probably Aren’t Very Good at Air Defense
Now, whether Tehran’s robots can actually do that job is an open question. The world’s other military drone operators have been reluctant to assign such a difficult task to unmanned aircraft.
Indeed, it’s likely Iran’s air-defense drones are mostly targets … or merely propaganda.
Iran’s armed forces have been using drones since the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s. Tehran’s Air Defense Force, however, is a relative newcomer to unmanned technologies.
The Air Defense Force stood up in 2009 to help defend a handful of strategic sites from foreign air power—a nod to the growing tension over Iran’s nuclear program and the looming threat of Western air strikes.
Officially, the Air Defense Force didn’t announce its move into unmanned technologies until three years later, when Brig. Gen. Farzad Esmaili—the ADF commander—told reporters covering the 2012 National Day of Air Defense that he planned to integrate drones into his force.
The Hazem drone, announced in October 2012, became the first public symbol of that move. Although Esmaili insisted that the Hazem drone was meant “for specific and strategic goals,” the aircraft is actually a modest tactical Unmanned Aerial Vehicle.
Closeups of the rarely-seen drone, taken during an Air Defense Force photo op in November, show that the Hazem II—there are three versions so far—has a small propeller in the nose powered by what appears to be a single cylinder engine.
The airframe is roughly the size of a hobby plane. Meaning it pretty much is a hobby plane.
The delta-wing aircraft started out as a target drone — simple cannon fodder for Iran’s air defense missiles and artillery during training exercises. More recently, the Air Defense Force has tried to add a curious mission to its portfolio — propaganda.
During the Mohammed Rasulullah war games in late December, a Hazem simulated spreading propaganda leaflets on a hypothetical enemy.
To be sure, propaganda won’t do much to stop the foreign fighters, bombers and drones that Iranian officials worry might attack its strategic sites. And so the Air Defense Force has tried to augment its arsenal of surface-to-air missiles with a drone called the Sarir that purportedly totes small air-to-air missiles.
Like the Hazem, the Sarir is a relatively small drone—but has propellers at both the front and rear of its fuselage. Matt Schroeder, an expert on small arms and missiles at the Small Arms Surveys, says Sarir’s twin rockets, fixed to a hard point on each wing, are similar to the Chinese QW-1M shoulder-fired surface-to-air missile.
Iran may produce its own version of the QW-1M, according to Schroeder.
Unconventional though the Sarir may be, the concept of attaching shoulder-fired missiles to an aircraft isn’t unheard of. The U.S. once equipped the Predator with a Stinger missile, albeit to little effect.
American Apache helicopters are also capable of firing the air-to-air version of the Stinger.
The Sarir could, in fact, be vaporware. Thus far, the drone has only appeared in public once, on a parade float during the April 2013 National Army Day. The word “experimental” was clearly stenciled in English on its side, putting a question mark on Esmaili’s claims that the UAV had gone into “mass production.”
Adding to the mystery, Iran’s Defense Ministry unveiled another rocket-toting drone, the Saedegh, back in September. Despite the new name, Saedegh is a just an old Mohajer-4 with two shoulder-fired missiles attached to its wings that are similar in appearance to Iran’s homemade Misagh-1, according to Schroeder.
In contrast to Sarir’s scant public footprint, Iranian authorities released footage of the Saedegh in flight successfully firing its missile at a target.
Iranian officials are mum about which armed service will receive the Saedegh, but it would seem to be a logical fit for the Air Defense Force. The service already has at least one Mohajer-4 in its inventory.
But it’s the humble target drone, in its various forms, that comprises the bulk of the Air Defense Force’s UAV fleet—and seems likelier to be of practical use than its exotic cousins.
The Saeqeh, another delta-wing target drone common to other services in Iran’s armed forces, occasionally serves as a target. The Air Defense Force has also used Ababil-II drones, an early iteration from Iran’s Ababil series of robots, to test its Shalamcheh missiles.
These are in addition to a number of smaller, largely unremarkable hobbyist-style drones that make appearances at the Air Defense Force’s public events.
The most sophisticated target drone in the command’s inventory—that we know of—is the Kian. As some observers have pointed out, this UAV bears a strong resemblance to the the turbojet-powered U.S. MQM-107A target drone, which Washington exported to Tehran during the Shah’s reign.
Moreover, an Iranian-flagged UAV with a strong resemblance to the Kian has been seen in pictures with “MQM-107A” stenciled on the side along with “VSTT,” the abbreviation for the U.S. Army’s Variable Speed Training Target program that birthed the MQM-107.
Iran has maintained its fleet of vintage U.S. target drones for years and kept them in service even today—occasionally forgetting to paint over the original American markings. Some observers believe Iranian engineers used the MQM-107 as a basis for the Karrar bomber drone.
While the Karrar has made appearances at parades over the years, Iran’s Air Defense Force claimed to have tested an aerial robot called Kian for the first time against its Shalamech air-defense missiles during the December exercises, although there are no pictures or video to prove it.
Iranian propagandists are eager to inflate both the role of drones in warfare and Iran’s ability to produce them.
So it only makes sense that they would feature in the Air Defense Force’s chest-thumping displays of its ability to keep American and Israeli warplanes out of Iranian skies.
But ultimately, the greatest value of Iran’s air-defense drones likely lies in their ability to augment the other systems the country’s sky guardians already have—providing target practice for the patchwork of S-200s and TOR M-1 surface-to-air missiles and other dated air-defense systems.
The truth behind Iran’s supposed nuclear ties with Syria – A new Western intelligence assessment points to efforts by the Syrian government to renew its operations in an underground and clandestine facility, close to Qusayr near the border of Lebanon, in order to produce nuclear weapons. Citing the Western intelligence assessment, the German weekly Der Spiegel stated that the reconstruction of the nuclear facility is being conducted with the assistance of the Islamic Republic, North Korea, and Hezbollah.
The report has led to a war of rhetoric among Western officials, outlets, along with Iranian and Syrian officials.
The Western intelligence report indicates that dialogues among Ibrahim Othman, head of the Syrian Atomic Energy Commission, Iranian, North Korean and Hezbollah affiliates were “intercepted.” In addition, according Abu Mohammad al-Bitar, the Free Syrian Army has also noticed the “unprecedented” presence of Iranian and Hezbollah security members in the town of Qusayr on the suburbs of Homs.
Although one should be cautious about jumping to conclusions about Western intelligence reports, Iran-Syria or North Korean-Syria military and nuclear cooperation is not something new.
The report rattled Iranian leaders, and Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarifresponded immediately by stating: “The magazine’s allegation is one of the attempts made by those circles whose life has been based on violence and fear to cloud the international community with illusion and create imaginary concerns about the Islamic Republic, and this is a ridiculous claim.” In addition, a Syrian source refuted the report and called it “mere lies.”
Although one should be cautious about jumping to conclusions about Western intelligence reports, Iran-Syria or North Korean-Syria military and nuclear cooperation is not something new; however, the reaction of Iranian and Syrian leaders have been different this time.
Iran-Syria nuclear cooperation?
The truth behind Iran’s supposed nuclear ties with Syria
The fact that high Iranian officials responded immediately to the Western intelligence assessment refuting the report and calling it “ridiculous“ reflects the notion that the Rouhani administration’s attempts to exclude any efforts that might scuttle the nuclear negotiations between the six world powers (China, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Russia and the United States) known as the P5+1 and the Islamic Republic.
Reports with respect to the Syrian government renewing its nuclear program were previously published in 2013. There had been reports that some activities were being carried out at an alleged Syrian nuclear facility close to eastern suburbs of Damascus, Marj Sultan. Nevertheless, Iranian leaders took the matter more seriously this time around.
Iranian and American chief diplomats will be meeting on Wednesday to find ways to speed up the nuclear negotiations and strike a final nuclear deal. According to Zarif, the reason behind these direct talks with American Secretary of State John Kerry “is to see if we can speed up and push the negotiations forward”
The Islamic Republic is attempting to show that it is complying with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the interim nuclear deal by restricting its uranium enrichment, not engaging in the international black market for obtaining nuclear material, and halting operation in its Plutonium reactor in Arak.
Syria’s nuclear program
In comparison to Iran’s sophisticated nuclear program, Syria’s nuclear program seems potentially nascent. There are two major nuclear sites in Syria. The first one is Al-Kibar reactor in the northeast of the city of Deir Azzor and the second one is Marj Sultan in the outskirts of Damascus- where the fuel is reportedly stored.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) previously reported that Damascus was building a nuclear reactor in Deir Azzor. Reportedly, tons of enriched uranium in Damascus are being protected by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and Hezbollah.
This issue has resulted to heightened tensions between Israel and the Iranian-Syrian nexus as well. Formerly, Syrian nuclear site Al-Kibar reactor in the northeast of the city of Deir Azzor, was target of Israeli strikes in 2007, almost destroying the infrastructure and halting the program.
There are three common concerns about the undeclared Syrian nuclear site and nuclear proliferation. First of all, the argument is that the nuclear material might fall in the hands of the wrong side. In other words, if these nuclear sites are seized by some radical groups or al-Qaeda-linked affiliates, they might be capable of utilizing the highly enriched uranium and producing nuclear weapons.
Technically speaking though, the primary question is whether the 50 tons of uranium is natural or highly enriched to a level that can be transferred to nuclear warheads. In order to build nuclear weapons, weapons-grade highly enriched uranium or an adequate amount of centrifuges are needed.
The second question is whether the radical militants possess the capability of transferring Syria’s enriched uranium into weapon-grade bombs. But more fundamentally, Syria possess other military capabilities that can pose the same threat such as ballistic missiles and biological weapons. For example when it comes to the issues of ballistic missiles, Syria has previously cooperated with Iran and North Korea.
In addition, since Syria can hardly make an estimate of 50 tons of natural uranium, the role of other state and non-state actors is inevitable. Third, one can make the argument that without doubt, becoming a nuclear state for the Syrian government can be a formidable tool and deterrence against foreign intervention.
But more fundamentally, this report has diverted attention from Iran’s other indisputable and multi-layered activities and engagements in Syria- including the military, financial, intelligence, and advisory assistance to the Syrian government which have further radicalized and militarized the ongoing Syrian war.
Iranian killed in Iraq subject of 2009 controversy – An Iranian volunteer who was killed in Iraq fighting alongside Iraqi forces against the Islamic State (IS) had been entangled in controversy over the post-2009 election protests and the subsequent crackdown when he was incorrectly labeled by opposition activists as a Lebanese Hezbollah commander.
Mehdi Noroozi, a Basij Forces member from Iran’s Kermanshah region who, according to the Iranian media, later “held numerous positions defending the Islamic system,” was killed Jan. 10 in Samarra, a city north of Baghdad that has been the scene of heavy fighting between IS and Iraqi forces backed by militias with close ties to Tehran.
Iranian killed in Iraq subject of 2009 controversy
Iranian news agencies reported that Noroozi was “martyred defending the Imam Askari Shrine and confronting the takfiri terrorists of [IS].” While a majority-Sunni town, Samarra is home to the important Shiite shrine. When al-Qaeda terrorists blew up the dome of the mosque in 2006, it unleashed a wave of sectarian killings.
When pictures of Noroozi surfaced online, some recognized him from his role in the post-2009 election unrest. There are a number of photos of Noroozi on the streets during the violent Ashoura protests and also attacking the campaign offices of Reformist presidential candidate Mir Hussein Mousavi. In the pictures, Noroozi can be seen along with other plainclothes officers with a walkie-talkie in his hand, and it is clear he is playing a leading role.
At the time, Noroozi was identified by foreign Persian-language analysts as a Lebanese Hezbollah commander by the name of “Hossein Ashmar.” A number of blogs active during that era still identify Noroozi this way and after his death, some tweeted screenshots of news sites referring to Noroozi as Ashmar.
Conservative Iranian media outlets took the opportunity to once again criticize and condemn the 2009 Green Movement.
Raja News reported that the accusation that Hezbollah had participated in the 2009 crackdown was a claim made “time and time again on satellite channels and social media.” The article featured a screenshot of a BBC Persian article headlined, “Hezbollah and Tehran’s plainclothesmen.” The article read that it was these types of claims that led some protesters to chant “Neither Gaza nor Lebanon, my life for Iran.”
The Raja piece also included a number of pictures of Noroozi during the 2009 protests and reported that he died for “beliefs … so important for him that he risked his life and entered the den of the Qaytariah sedition [Mousavi campaign office] in the heart of the Iranian [Green Movement] and Iraq and Samarra to confront the Iraqi [IS].”
Arsh News reported that supporters of both Mousavi and IS were celebrating Noroozi’s death and shared screenshots of social media posts condemning Noroozi, though it is not clear whether the screenshots are from Green Movement supporters. The website also shared screenshots of other pages claiming that Noroozi was Hossein Ashmar.
Funeral services were held for Noroozi at Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf, Iraq and in Tehran. He was buried in Kermanshah in the Ferdowsi cemetery in a location designated for martyrs.
Underground Movements Divide Iranian Citizens From The Regime – At Huffington Post on Tuesday, travel writer Jake Threadgould shared an account of his experiences visiting Iran and being welcomed into the underground movements and parties that he described as “spaces of freedom” set apart from the constant government monitoring and harsh restrictions that one faces in the streets and in public places.
Underground Movements Divide Iranian Citizens From The Regime
His stark experiences lead him to wonder in his article, “Which of these worlds is the real one?” That is perhaps a matter of perspective, but it is fair to say that no account of the Islamic Republic of Iran is complete without reference to both of these worlds. Threadgould’s glimpse of the Iranian underground reflects upon a number of other accounts that have been referenced on Iran News Update regarding clandestine movements for teaching Western dance, practicing Christianity, and so forth.
This latter topic is of particular interest in light of a report by Catholic news outlet Patheosindicating that the Catholic Catechism has recently been translated into Farsi. The article says that this development was spearheaded by Iran and Iranian religious authorities and that it has taken place “in a context of increased inter-religious dialogue carried forward by Shi’ite Islam.”
Patheos also quotes a Catholic expert on Islam as saying that the pursuit of this translation “proves that [Iranian authorities] are opening to the Western world and to Christianity, and especially to Catholic Christianity.” But as the same article makes clear later on, this incident is in fact another example of the divisions and double standards that separate the Iranian people from the ruling clerical government.
The Farsi translation of the Catechism is intended only for use by Shiite religious scholars who happen to be studying Catholicism. Patheos indicates that about 2,000 scholars at the religious center of Qom are studying non-Islamic religions, out of a total scholastic population of roughly 60,000. The translated Catholic text will be available for those studies, but will not be available to actual Iranian practitioners of Catholicism, who are still banned from using the official Iranian language, as the regime fears that allowing this could teach ordinary Iranian Muslims about other faiths and lead them to contemplate conversion.
In fact, using the Farsi Catechism could potentially land Iranian Christians in prison. Last week it was reported that Pastor Victor Beth Tarmez had been arrested by Iranian authorities during a Christmas party at his home, after having been previously targeted for teaching courses in Farsi at his church.
And while certain double standards shield political and religious authorities while punishing private citizens for similar activities, there are other instances in which the regime’s fear of what it considers to be “sedition” leads even to the targeting of public officials. Indeed, “sedition” was precisely the accusation that was levied by several members of the Iranian parliament when they verbal and by some accounts physically attacked one of their colleagues during a session on Sunday.
Iran Building Missile Sites in Syria – Iranian military leaders admitted this week to building and operating missile-manufacturing plants in Syria, where it was also revealed that Tehran is helping to build a secret nuclear facility.
Iran Building Missile Sites in Syria
An Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander stated in a recent interview that the country’s Supreme Leader ordered forces to build and operate missile plants in Syria, where Iran continues to fight on behalf of embattled leader Bashar al-Assad, according to regional media reports.
IRGC Aerospace Commander Haji Zadeh touted Iran’s capabilities and bragged that Iran has gone from importing most of its military hardware to producing it domestically, as well as for regional partners such as Assad.
“A country such as Syria which used to sell us arms, was later on to buy our missiles,” Haji Zadeh was quoted as saying earlier this week by the Young Journalists Club. “Right now the missile manufacturing firms in Syria are built by Iran.”
It has long been suspected that Iranian forces operating in Syria are providing weaponry to Assad’s forces. Haji Zadeh’s remarks confirm that Tehran is committed to a long fight in Syria and hopes to turn the country into an Iranian proxy state.
Iran’s military actions in Syria could constitute a gross violation of sanctions on the regime enacted by the United Nations and Western powers.
Haji Zadeh also bragged about Tehran’s ability to build missiles capable of travelling at least 2,000 kilometers, far enough to reach into Israel and other Middle Eastern countries, according to the report.
“The Supreme Leader wanted us to make the missiles prices, something which he had noted earlier than that,” he was quoted as saying.
Meanwhile, Germany’s Der Spiegel reported over the weekend, based on leaked intelligence and other sources, that Iran has been helping to build a secret nuclear facility in Syria.
Western sources fear that Tehran is attempting to continue its controversial and clandestine nuclear work in Syria, where it does not have to battle against international nuclear inspectors and Western powers seeking to curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
Obama administration officials have sought to downplay the developments and said that they will not raise the issue with Iran during an upcoming round of talks over its program.
“Will you discuss this issue with the Iranians in the upcoming talks?” a reporter asked State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf on Monday.
“No,” Harf replied. “The upcoming talks are about the Iranian nuclear program.”
When pressed on the issue, Harf said that nuclear talks only focus on Iran’s domestic program and nothing else.
“We don’t discuss other issues with them at those talks, as you all know,” she said.
Iran’s ‘Reformist’ President Is Shielding The Revolutionary Guards – A joke is making the rounds in Tehran.
Iran’s ‘Reformist’ President Is Shielding The Revolutionary Guards
In it, the Iranian press confront President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad just before he leaves office with a report declaring Iran the second-most corrupt country in the world. Pressed over who is to blame, an indignant Ahmadinejad bursts out: “You ingrates! Do you know how much we had to pay in bribes not to top the list?”
The new anticorruption campaign by Ahmadinejad’s successor Hassan Rouhani rings similar.
Conveniently, the campaign does not tackle the corruption of his own circle or that of his mentor Ayatollah Ali-Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, but rather the Ahmadinejad-era economic scandals that have infuriated an Iranian public struggling through a sanctions-hit economy.
Take Babak Zanjani, the profiteer who was tasked with bypassing international sanctions and selling Iran’s oil in the black market. Zanjani is behind bars, but there is no trace of more than $2 billion he owes the Oil Ministry. Or Mah-Afarid Amir-Khosravi, a university dropout executed for bank embezzlement, but whose stolen $2.6 billion remains unaccounted for.
In addition to the legal campaign, Rouhani has sought to restore public confidence by targeting the tax exemption of large business conglomerates. That effort, under the motto “equality under the law,” has already made some gains: On December 3, the parliament passed Rouhani’s bill annulling the exemption of certain arms of the executive branch that directly report to the Supreme Leader.
The list includes the charitable organizations such as the Mashhad based Astan-e Qods-e Razavi, Setad-e Farman-e Emam[Headquarters for Execution of the Imam’s Decree], Bonyad-e Mostazafan [Foundation of the Oppressed] and the Khatam al-Anbia [“Seal of the Prophets”], a massive engineering contractor operated by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).
Iranians, however, know that some government entities are more equal than others, and few expected the IRGC to pay its fair share of taxes. When earlier this month, Rouhani implicitly criticized the concentration of power in IRGC hands, the Guards accused him of “insulting the Iranian nation.”
Shortly thereafter, the president’s oil minister and deputy for planning and strategic oversight showered Khatam al-Anbia with praise, emphasizing that the IRGC poses no threat to the private sector. Parliamentary Speaker Ali Larijani then welcomed expensive bids from the Guards’ contracting arm at a time of dwindling public funding for infrastructure projects.
Rouhani, the putative anti-corruption and wealth-concentration campaigner, is now perpetuating his regime’s worst corruption practices.
Rouhani’s change of heart on the IRGC’s privileges appears due to pressure from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to maintain balance within the government. The regime, after all, rests upon two pillars: Rouhani’s appointed technocrat ministers and the brute force of the IRGC.
The IRGC, which oppose Rouhani’s nuclear negotiations, are now benefiting from the West’s sanctions-easing and the preferential economic status that Rouhani’s government has granted it. The Guards now appear set to have it both ways: reaping the windfall from sanctions relief without yielding concessions at the nuclear negotiating table.
American legislators have an opportunity to convince the Guards otherwise.
Washington has already designated the IRGC and its larger arms as terror organizations. It could go further, by targeting economic fronts of the Guards such as the IRGC Cooperative Foundation and its subsidiaries; the Basij Cooperative Foundation and its subsidiaries; Mehr Finance and Credit Institution and its subsidiaries; and Mehr-e Eghtesad-e Iranian Investment Company and its subsidiaries.
The United States can still weaken the Guards considerably, even if Rouhani has proven he cannot.
Mounting casualties raise questions about Iran’s role in Iraq – The death of Iranian Brigadier General Hamid Taghavi in Iraq in late December underscores the depth of Iran’s commitment to the fight against the Islamic State group (IS).
Mounting casualties raise questions about Iran’s role in Iraq
Taghavi’s seniority and real influence (beyond his official ranking) in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) was in full display at his funeral last Monday which was attended by thousands of Revolutionary Guards.
As the IRGC’s leading Iraq expert and one of the founders of the 9th Badr Corps, the specialized IRGC unit staffed by Iraqi defectors during the Iran-Iraq War, Taghavi’s death – at age 55 and allegedly at the hands of an ISIS sniper – is a significant tactical and psychological blow to the Revolutionary Guards (also known as Pasdaran).
This high profile casualty puts a spotlight on Iran’s leading role in the fight against ISIS. But it also calls into question Iran’s expanding role in Iraq and more broadly Iran’s strategic posture in the region.
Most important of all it raises the question as to whether Iran needs to reach an understanding with the United States if it wants to escalate its influence-building infrastructure in the region to the next level.
Syria: A spurious comparison
Supporters of the intensification of Iranian involvement in Iraq often point to Syria, where broadly similar circumstances have prompted a deep Iranian intervention on behalf of the Syrian government and the Syrian armed forces.
But comparisons with Syria are deeply flawed and misleading.
First and foremost, Syria and Iran maintain an official alliance (Iran’s only formal alliance) and deep ties that stretch back over three decades. In the early 1980s Syria was the only major Arab country to dissent from the norm by supporting non-Arab Iran in the long-running Iran-Iraq War. This unprecedented move has never been forgotten in Tehran.
By contrast, Iraq has been an enemy and deadly rival to Iran for most of recent history. Memories of the Iran-Iraq War are still very fresh in Iran, and repercussions from that epic conflict continue to influence regional dynamics and events, including the emergence of IS.
The alliance with Syria is crucial to Iran’s regional policy in so much as Syria is an avowed enemy of Israel and an unwavering supporter of Iran’s proxy in Lebanon, the Hezbollah movement. The collapse of the Syrian state would pose very serious challenges to Iranian policy in that it would remove Iran’s upper hand in the ideological and geopolitical conflict with Israel.
Again, by contrast, Iran’s interests in Iraq are nowhere near as wide-ranging. During the 1980s and 1990s Iran’s principal aim was to remove Iraq as a pressing threat, and to subsequently alter Iraq’s strategic profile from one of proximate enemy to potential friend. This objective was achieved following the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in April 2003, arguably the most striking, unintended consequence of the US-led invasion of Iraq.
Without a doubt, the rapid deterioration of security in Iraq in recent months and the near collapse of the Iraqi army necessitate a degree of Iranian intervention. IS and its allies are implacable foes of Iran; they don’t just have their sights on Baghdad, but given half the chance, they would take the fight inside Iran’s borders.
This point was eloquently made by Admiral Ali Shamkhani, head of the supreme council for national security, who told a large crowd at Taghavi’s funeral that if IRGC men don’t fight and die in places like Samarra they would have to fight and die in Tehran.
Shifting strategic posture?
In recent weeks, more and more senior Iraqi officials have openly alluded to Iran’s leading role in the pushback against IS and its allies. Most dramatically, Hadi al-Ameri, the head of the powerful Badr organization, the successor to the IRGC’s 9th Badr Corps, and an influential Iraqi politician, is on the record as saying that absent the intervention of Major General Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the IRGC Qods force, “we would not have a government headed by [Iraqi Prime Minister] Haider al-Abadi in Baghdad”.
There appears to be an acute appreciation on the part of powerful Iraqi politicians that whole-hearted Iranian intervention on the ground, as opposed to half-hearted US-led air strikes, is the decisive factor in the existential struggle against IS.
Despite the apparent success of the Iranian intervention, Iranian strategists are faced with difficult choices and decisions in Iraq and beyond.
In Iraq, the most pressing question revolves around the timeframe of the Iranian intervention. The spurious comparison with Syria is actually useful in bringing strategic facts into sharp relief: Whilst Iran is indefinitely committed to the survival of the Syrian state, its commitment in Iraq cannot be open-ended. This is also a question of resources, as the Islamic Republic cannot afford to fight on two fronts indefinitely.
More broadly, there is the question of the strategic underpinning of intensifying Iranian interventions and influence-building operations across the region. Hitherto these efforts have been undertaken not just independently from Western powers, but in many cases, in direct defiance of American interests and actions in the region.
Contrary to what US President Barack Obama appears to believe, Iran is already a highly successful regional player. Nevertheless, Iranian strategists must think more originally about the scope and nature of Iranian policy in the region and possibly beyond.
Ultimately, Iranian interventions have so far taken the form of covert “advisory” roles, with the IRGC Qods force at the helm. For a variety of political, strategic, and ideological reasons, the IRGC and other Iranian armed forces have been reluctant to deploy avowed expeditionary forces.
If Iran wants to be recognized as more than a just a regional player, then its armed forces will need to accept greater international responsibility and crucially submit to commitments which have the blessing of the international community. It remains to be seen if Iran can achieve this outcome without coming to terms with the United States.
Paris Attack: Jihadi Cancer Has Its Roots in Tehran – The horror assassination of ten journalists and two policemen in Paris is simply the latest manifestation of the spread of Islamic fundamentalism whose genesis can be traced directly back to the Iranian revolution and the coming to power of Grand Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeinei, who made Iran the world’s first Islamic Republic.
Paris Attack- Jihadi Cancer Has Its Roots in Tehran
His medieval belief that his authority came directly from God enabled him to rule over a fascist theocracy that could imprison, torture, maim and execute at will, ruling by fear and violence and defending these excesses by stating they were the will of God. Similar to the “divine right of Kings” which bathed Europe in blood for centuries, this discredited anachronism plunged the 74 million forward-looking and highly civilized Iranians back to the Middle Ages, where women could be stoned to death and men hanged from cranes in town squares because they were guilty of “waging war on God.”
After executing 130,000 members of the Opposition Group in the 1980s, Khomenei set about spreading his fundamentalist cancer across the Middle East. His successor Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has internationalized this obscene distortion of Islam by funding, training and equipping terrorist organizations across the Middle East. Iran is now extending its hegemony across the entire region and it is worth remembering that ISIS is not the only organization intent on using violence and bloodshed to create a worldwide Islamic caliphate; it is a core principle of the Iranian Constitution, drawn up by Ayatollah Khomenei, that they will export the Islamic revolution with the clear intention of creating an Islamic caliphate. Tehran regards ISIS as direct Sunni competitors in this struggle to enslave the world in a medieval corruption of the Muslim faith.
Iran now funds not only the brutal Shiia militias in neighboring Iraq, but Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Palestine, Bashar al-Assad in Syria and the Shiite Houthi militia who seized Sanaa, the Yemeni capital last September. The so-called “moderate” President Hassan Rouhani also finances Iran’s hugely expensive program of uranium enrichment, the construction of nuclear weapons and the purchase of sophisticated missile delivery systems.
The plummeting oil price has caused a massive problem for the mullahs. Their future budget was predicated on oil prices rising from $112 to $130 a barrel. Today it has fallen to below $50 and experts predict it will fall to $45. This, combined with Western sanctions, is catastrophic for Tehran. Rouhani has found himself in an impossible trap. He was elected on a pledge to improve the Iranian economy and to improve living conditions for ordinary Iranians. But the hardliners in Tehran corruptly live off the back of the billions poured into the terrorist Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). Despite the collapsing oil price, Rouhani last month announced a 50 percent increase in the IRGC budget, taking their total annual spend to over €5 billion, which is more than half of Iran’s total defense budget which itself was increased by 33 percent last month. Buried in the small print of the budget was a further €2.5 billion that will go directly to the IRGC’s construction and engineering wing known as Khatam al-Anbia, a crooked vehicle for distributing largesse to the IRGC hierarchy.
Iran simply cannot afford this. The 74 million Iranians are facing economic meltdown. The people are fed up. They don’t want to be international pariahs. There is a seething undercurrent of protest in the air. Bread prices rose by 30 percent last month and the likelihood of another popular uprising is looming. Sanctions and the collapsing oil price are biting hard. Now is the time for the West to support the Iranian opposition and foment regime-change. The West must help the Iranian people overthrow the tyrannical mullahs and restore freedom, peace and democracy to Iran.
The spread of violent jihad across the world was the inspiration of Ayatollah Khomenei. The way to tackle this obscenity cannot simply rely on advanced intelligence and sporadic arrests.
Revolutionary Guard Website Lists Steps for Iranian Takeover of Yemen – A news site belonging to Iran’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) revealed a plan by which Iran intends to gain control over Yemen. The plan lists three different tactics that the rebel Houthi Shiites in Yemen “have to take” in order to conquer the whole country.
Revolutionary Guard Website Lists Steps for Iranian Takeover of Yemen
According to the Amarion website, the first tactic is to use buzzwords that address Yemeni citizens concerns and meet the requirements of “the street,” such as freedom, justice and fighting corruption. The site claims that use of these slogans will increase the popularity of the Houthis among the majority Sunni population and help them take control of the various institutions in the country without significant popular resistance.
The second tactic mentioned in the Iranian plan is the establishment of “popular committees” similar to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards committees, in order to conduct security tasks both within and outside the cities that are already ruled by rebel Yemeni Houthis. According to the Iranian website, this step will facilitate the merger of the Houthis with the army and the other Yemeni security forces in the future.
The third tactic is a declaration on war against economic corruption. Through the struggle against corruption, the Houthis will strengthen their political presence and power among the Yemenite Sunnis.
The IRGC ended their recommendations by saying that the Yemeni revolution has not been completed yet and that complete victory will be achieved only if the tactics presented above are realized.
Since September 2014 the Shiites, who make up roughly 40 percent of Yemen’s population, have dominated by force of arms the key institutions in the capital of Sanaa. Although they signed a truce with President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi and pledged to withdraw from the capital, they continue to exert control over the country and its institutions.
