Last week, the Iranian regime sacked Hossein Taeb, the longstanding intelligence chief of the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) and a confidant of the mullahs’ supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, and his son Mojtaba.
Taeb, a notorious criminal, was removed from his post after 13 years, shortly after several assassinations of the IRGC’s commanders inside Iran and hundreds of operations by the Iranian Resistance aimed at dismantling the regime’s oppressive apparatus, such as the recent takedown of Tehran’s municipality and the city’s CCTVs.
The news of Taeb’s dismissal was a bombshell as it revealed the depth of the regime’s internal crisis.
He was considered “untouchable” due to his close relations with Khamenei and his role in oppressing dissidents. But who is Hossein Taeb?
Taeb’s Early Life and his role in the IRGC
Taeb was born in 1963 in Tehran. He joined the IRGC soon after the 1979 revolution.
As an IRGC member, Taeb played a key role in the 1980s in hunting, torturing, and killing Iranian dissidents, mainly members and supporters of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK).
Taeb climbed the ladder in the IRGC due to his cruelty and was appointed as the intelligence chief of the IRGC’s first brigade, known as “Thar-Allah.”
During the Iran-Iraq war, Taeb was the IRGC’s “Habib Battalion” commander and served with Mojtaba Khamenei.
Members of this battalion occupied top posts in the regime when Ali Khamenei became the supreme leader.
Some of these figures include Mehdi Taeb, head of Amar HQ, which consists of Khamenei’s most loyal plainclothes mercenaries; Hossein Taeb, former head of the IRGC’s Intelligence; Hassan Mohagheg, a top IRGC commander, and IRGC brigadier general Mohammad Esmail Kothari, director of the “Thar-Allah HQ” in Tehran, which is responsible for oppressing protests in the capital.
Hossein Taeb, A Security Figure
In 1988, the regime’s then-supreme leader, Ruhollah Khomeini, had to accept a ceasefire under domestic and international pressure.
