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As Giuliani Calls for Regime Change in Iran, Netanyahu Raises the Specter of “War”

RUDY GIULIANI, the former mayor of New York City who now serves as President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, called for the overthrow of Iran’s government on Wednesday during a rally in Poland staged by a cult-like group of Iranian exiles who pay him to represent them.
Speaking outside the Warsaw venue for an international conference on the Middle East attended by U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Giuliani said that his message for the 65 governments discussing ways to confront Iran was simple. “The theocratic dictatorship in Tehran,” Giuliani said, “must end and end quickly.”

Former NY Mayor @RudyGiuliani in Warsaw:
In order to have peace & security in the Mid-East there has to be a major change in the theocratic dictatorship in #Iran. It must end & end quickly in order to have stability#FreeIranWithMaryamRajavi#PolandSummit#IStandWithMaryamRajavi pic.twitter.com/aKafMjxq4k
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) February 13, 2019

Giuliani went on to suggest that peace in the region would only come when Iran was ruled instead by his clients, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, an exile group of former terrorists also known as the Mojahedin-e Khalq, or People’s Mujahedin. The group’s leader, Maryam Rajavi, already refers to herself as “President-elect.”

.@RudyGiuliani: We have seen regime change work & fail. In #Iran’s case we don’t have to worry. There is a viable alternative. Maryam Rajavi’s 10-point plan stands for a #FreeIran w/ a democratically-elected Gov instead of a tyrant/monarch.#FreeIranWithMaryamRajavi #WarsawSummit pic.twitter.com/EFJHIw2WUV
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) February 13, 2019

Off-stage, the U.S. president’s lawyer admitted that he was paid by the exile group, but stressed to reporters that he was in Warsaw on behalf of the MEK in his personal capacity and would not be attending the diplomatic conference organized by the State Department.
Even before the conference began, the Israeli prime minister appeared to shrug off efforts by the State Department and the Polish government to portray the gathering as broadly focused on Middle East peace, describing it as primarily a meeting of Iran’s enemies.
In video posted on the prime minister’s official Twitter feed, Netanyahu characterized a meeting with Oman’s foreign minister as “excellent,” and one focused on “additional steps we can take together with the countries of the region in order to advance common interests.”
According to the English translation of Netanyahu’s remarks in Hebrew prepared by his office, the prime minister then added: “What is important about this meeting — and it is not in secret because there are many of those — is that this is an open meeting with representatives of leading Arab countries that are sitting down together with Israel in order to advance the common interest of war with Iran.”

Netanyahu’s use of the word “war” seemed to throw Israel’s diplomatic corps into chaos. Within minutes, as journalists speculated that the prime minister’s office might have mistranslated his comment, Netanyahu’s spokesperson to the Arab media, Ofir Gendelman, wrote that the Israeli leader had described his nation’s common interest with Arab nations as “combatting Iran,” not “war with Iran.”
The subtitled video produced by the prime minister’s office was then deleted from his Twitter feed and replaced with the text of Gendelman’s alternative translation.
As my colleague Talya Cooper explains, however, Netanyahu did in fact use the Hebrew word for “war” in the video, which has not yet been deleted from his Hebrew-language YouTube channel. In a separate video, posted by Netanyahu’s office on Facebook earlier in the day, the prime minister had used the Hebrew word for “combat.”
Aron Heller, an Associated Press correspondent based in Jerusalem, also filmed the remarks and reported that although Netanyahu had mentioned “war,” his office said later that he was referring to “combatting Iran.”

Did @netanyahu really say “war” with Iran? I was there and the word was ”milchama” = war. pic.twitter.com/ZzhrDs2lWA
— Aron Heller (@aronhellerap) February 13, 2019

Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, seized on the Israeli leader’s apparent Freudian slip as evidence that Netanyahu’s true aim of provoking a war with Iran was now out in the open

We’ve always known Netanyahu’s illusions. Now, the world – and those attending #WarsawCircus – know, too pic.twitter.com/0TSDzIak9e
— Javad Zarif (@JZarif) February 13, 2019

Zarif also suggested that the Trump administration and the exiles of the MEK might have been behind a suicide bombing on a bus in southeastern Iran on Wednesday, which killed 41 members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.

“Is it no coincidence that Iran is hit by terror on the very day that #WarsawCircus begins?” Zarif tweeted. “Especially when cohorts of same terrorists cheer it from Warsaw streets & support it with twitter bots? US seems to always make the same wrong choices, but expect different results.”

The foreign minister was clearly referring to the MEK, which spent three decades trying to achieve regime change in Iran through violence, including terrorist attacks. The well-funded exile group was also suspected of being behind social media trickery discovered by the BBC, which reported that Twitter bots had been deployed “to artificially create a trend which hints at popular support for the summit and — by extension — widespread resentment towards the Iranian establishment.”
The Iranian exiles have been caught in the past paying nonsupporters to fill out its crowds at rallies, a tactic reportedly used at the event in Warsaw on Wednesday, according to journalists on the ground.

The MEK is having a rally in Warsaw where as usual about a third of the crowd is random non-Iranians who’ve been bussed in from Slovakia and can’t read the signs they’re holding pic.twitter.com/NnJyqMxnEY
— Gregg Carlstrom (@glcarlstrom) February 13, 2019

Spoke to journalist in #WarsawSummit. He had attended the MEK terrorist org’s rally. Many of the”demonstartors”were Slovak high school kids who couldnt really provide an answer as to why they were there.

Just as the MEK buys bots on Twitter, they do so in real life as well…
— Trita Parsi (@tparsi) February 13, 2019

Members of the MEK helped foment the 1979 Iranian revolution, in part by killing American civilians working in Tehran, but the group then lost a struggle for power to the Islamists. With its leadership forced to flee Iran in 1981, the MEK’s members set up a government-in-exile in France and established a military base in Iraq, where they were given arms and training by Saddam Hussein as part of a strategy to destabilize the government in Tehran that he was at war with.
In recent years, as The Intercept has reported, the MEK has poured millions of dollars into reinventing itself as a moderate political group ready to take power in Iran if Western-backed regime change ever takes place. To that end, it lobbied successfully to be removed from the State Department’s list of foreign terrorist organizations in 2012. The Iranian exiles achieved this over the apparent opposition of then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in part by paying a long list of former U.S. officials from both parties hefty speaking fees of between $10,000 to $50,000 for hymns of praise.

Despite the claims of paid spokespeople like Giuliani and John Bolton — who predicted regime change would come at a lavish MEK rally in Paris just months before being named Trump’s national security adviser — the MEK appears to be as unprepared to take power in Iran as Ahmad Chalabi’s exiled Iraqi National Congress was after the American invasion of Iraq.

#JohnBolton 8 months ago among MEK supporters tells them they will overthrow #Iran’s regime and celebrate in #Tehran with Bolton himself present, “before 2019” pic.twitter.com/H7oaaU3faU
— Bahman Kalbasi (@BahmanKalbasi) March 22, 2018

Ariane Tabatabai, a Georgetown University scholar, has argued that the “cult-like dissident group” — whose married members were reportedly forced to divorce and take a vow of lifelong celibacy — “has no viable chance of seizing power in Iran.”

If the current government is not Iranians’ first choice for a government, the MEK is not even their last — and for good reason. The MEK supported Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq War. The people’s discontent with the Iranian government at that time did not translate into their supporting an external enemy that was firing Scuds into Tehran, using chemical weapons and killing hundreds of thousands of Iranians, including many civilians. Today, the MEK is viewed negatively by most Iranians, who would prefer to maintain the status quo than rush to the arms of what they consider a corrupt, criminal cult.
Despite such doubts, spending lavishly on paid endorsements has earned the MEK a bipartisan roster of Washington politicians willing to sign up as supporters. At a gala in 2016, Bolton was joined in singing the group’s praises by another former U.N. ambassador, Bill Richardson; a former attorney general, Michael Mukasey; the former State Department spokesperson P.J. Crowley; the former Homeland Security adviser Frances Townsend; the former Rep. Patrick Kennedy, D-R.I.; and the former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean. That Paris gala was hosted by Linda Chavez, a former Reagan administration official, and headlined by Newt Gingrich, the former speaker who was under consideration to be Trump’s running mate at the time.
Fears about Bolton’s apparently open desire to start a war with Iran have been exacerbated by his boosting of the MEK and his steadfast denial of the catastrophe unleashed by the invasion of Iraq that he worked for as a member of the Bush administration. Last year, when Fox News host Tucker Carlson pointed out that Bolton had called for regime change in Iraq, Libya, Iran, and Syria, and the first of those had been “a disaster,” Bolton disagreed.
“I think the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, that military action, was a resounding success,” Bolton insisted to Carlson. The chaos that followed in Iraq, he said, was caused by a poorly executed occupation that ended too soon. On the bright side, Bolton said, the mistakes the U.S. made in Iraq offered “lessons about what to do after a regime is overthrown” in the future.
Earlier this week, Sen. Chris Murphy warned that Bolton appeared to be laying the groundwork for war in a belligerent video message from the White House to mark the 40th anniversary of the Iranian revolution.

Here Bolton says Iran is seeking nuclear weapons. This simply isn’t true. The intelligence says the opposite and he knows it. He is laying the groundwork for war and we all must be vigilant. https://t.co/1zHR5vaEGn
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) February 12, 2019

Another strong supporter of the disastrous U.S. invasion of Iraq was Netanyahu, who, between terms as prime minister, testified to Congress on Sept. 12, 2002 as a private citizen, and advised lawmakers that attacking Iraq would be wise.
A review of Netanyahu’s 2002 testimony — in which he said, “I think the choice of Iraq is a good choice, it’s the right choice” — reveals that he linked his strong support for a United States invasion of Iraq to topple Saddam Hussein with the possibility of inspiring the implosion of the ruling theocracy in neighboring Iran.

“It’s not a question of whether Iraq’s regime should be taken out but when should it be taken out; it’s not a question of whether you’d like to see a regime change in Iran but how to achieve it,” Netanyahu said then. “If you take out Saddam, Saddam’s regime, I guarantee you that it will have enormous positive reverberations on the region. And I think that people sitting right next door in Iran, young people, and many others, will say the time of such regimes, of such despots is gone.”

“If you take out Saddam,”Netanyahu told Congress in 2002,”I guarantee you that it will have enormous positive reverberations on the region. And I think that people sitting right next door in Iran… will say the time of such regimes, of such despots is gone.”pic.twitter.com/ZNTxpSP3a2
— Robert Mackey (@RobertMackey) February 14, 2019

Updated: Feb. 14, 2019
This article was updated to include Congressional testimony from Benjamin Netanyahu on Sept. 12, 2002, in which he advocated a U.S. invasion of Iraq.
Robert Mackey, The Intercept,

February 16, 2019 0 comments

The cult of Rajavi

Whether Massoud Rajavi Is Dead or Alive, Big Brother Is Alive

Although it is thought that the dictatorship of communism was perished with the collapse of the Soviet Union, the monster is still alive. One may find it strange that the symbolic world that George Orwell depicted in “1984” is still practiced in some communities. As a former member of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi), the book might astonish you with the huge similarity of the real world inside the MKO and the fictional world in Oceania – the fictional country in the book.

“I was in Turkey in 1992 when a friend recommended me reading “1984” of George Orwell,” writes Mehdi Khoshal, ex-member of the MKO.
“I read the book three times in six months because it was very similar to the situation inside the Cult of Rajavi that I had personally experienced.”

Creating the fictional world of a dictatorship in 1984, George Orwell coined some words and expressions that are called ‘Orwellian’, defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as “Characteristic or suggestive of the writings of George Orwell, esp. of the totalitarian state depicted in his dystopian account of the future, Nineteen Eighty-four”.
It’s the dystopian substance of Oceania which fits so accurately with the Mujahedin Khalq Organization. It is 2019 and members of the MKO are living in an Oceania-like world. This means that ruling system in Oceania is not only a government but also a life style that removes individuality from human beings and make them follow the community and its ruler.
The parallel of the term “Big Brother”—referring to the absolute leader of Oceania—is “Brother Massoud” referring to the co-leaders of the MKO.

Using the terms brother or sister is a successful attempt to diminish the notion of family in the minds of members of the community. Big Brother and Brother Massoud neglect the identity of members. Under their rule, mother and father are taboos. Members should revolt against the opposite sex.

According to the symbolic world that George Orwell creates in “Animal Farm” and “1984”, totalitarians can be communists, fascists or terrorist extremist like ISIS and the MKO. The leaders of the MKO were the leftist Islamists in 1970s but turned out to extremist cultists who rule their rank and file by their propaganda that launches lie, hatred, war and hypocrisy among the public.
George Orwell also created the word “doublethink” in his dystopian novel. “Doublethink is the act of holding, simultaneously, two opposite, individually exclusive ideas or opinions and believing in both simultaneously and absolutely”, based on Oxford dictionary.
In “1984”, the three slogans of the party —”War Is Peace; Freedom Is Slavery; Ignorance Is Strength”— are obvious examples of doublethink. The act of doublethink also occurs in more subtle details throughout the novel. In the MKO, members are called “freedom fighters” but they are not free. They are not allowed to leave the group. They are called “unique gems” but they bear sever verbal and physical abuses under brainwashing programs imposed by the group leaders everyday.
The novel explicitly shows people learning doublethink and newspeak due to peer pressure and a desire to”fit in”, or gain status within the Party—to be seen as a loyal Party Member. In the novel, for someone to even recognize—let alone mention—any contradiction within the context of the Party line was akin to blasphemy, and could subject that person to disciplinary action and to the instant social disapproval of fellow Party Members. This is exactly what the MKO members have been enduring in their everyday life at least for the past three decades. Amir Yaghmaiee who once has been one of the MKO militia recently recounted the very contradictions he experienced inside the MKO. He ultimately could manage to leave the group after the American invasion of Iraq. He was under a 24-hour-long brainwashing session just because he had declared his willingness to leave the group. [link of the video]
1984 demonstrates the rule of ignorance instead of the rule of wisdom. Isolation and brainwashing of members of the community leads to the ignorance of the public opinion. In Oceania, technology in form of telescreens and televisions brainwashes people. In the MKO, the group’s satellite TV and its websites together with the bots in the social media deviate the realities, cover the truth and launch misinformation.
Big brother is alive even if brother Massoud is dead. Brother Massoud is a notion that rules the minds of victims of the MKO.
Mazda Parsi

February 14, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

The Proof of US Cold Shoulder for Rajavi

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo meets with Iranian women’s rights activist Masih Alinejad

Masoumeh (Masih) Alinejad-Ghomi, an Iranian American journalist, author and activist who currently works as a presenter at VOA Persian Service, met with Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo in the White House on February 4, 2019.

I am not sure about the significance of this meeting – there have been different and even opposite points of views expressed in the Iranian communities both inside and outside Iran.

But something I am quite sure of is that Maryam Rajavi, the so-called leader of the Iranian Resistance and self-proclaimed President of Iran in exile, has been dreaming for many years to get a visa to visit the United States. But let alone not even getting near to the White House or the Secretary of State she has had no luck whatsoever with getting her visa.

Rajavi tries to give the false impression that her so-called alternative to the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK, MKO, NCR, or the Rajavi Cult), has close ties with the US and has the support of the west, but her well paid lobbyists such as Rudi Giuliani and John Bolton did not even manage to get a visa for her to enter the States despite their extensive and expensive efforts.

I also know that for many years her well known British lawyers and parliamentary lobbyists in London didn’t succeed in getting a visa for her to visit the UK despite opening a lawsuit in the Judiciary and spend a lot of money on it.

The open meeting of Masih Alinejand and Mike Pompeo clearly proves the cold shoulder the US officials have always shown to the MEK and its leaders through the years. But why?

The answer is quite simple. For the very fact that everyone in the west and especially the United States clearly knows how this cult is hated by Iranians. Personalities such as the Secretary of State are well aware that getting near to this notorious cult will not only bring them no credit, but on the contrary would cost their own credibility.

The Trump administration might not mind using the MEK covertly for various purposes against the Islamic Republic of Iran, but surely not at the cost of losing its international reputation.

Ebrahim Khodabandeh

February 13, 2019 0 comments

Maryam Rajavi

Maryam Rajavi just doesn’t get it does she

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has invited several of what are known as Iran’s ‘fake opposition’ to his Middle East summit in Warsaw on 13-14 February. (A thinly disguised Iran bashing fest!). But Rajavi is being kept at arms’ length, a barge pole’s length even. She has not been invited.

To be clear, Maryam Rajavi is notorious inside the MEK to be jealous and throw tyrannical temper tantrums. No doubt she reacted similarly to the photograph of Pompeo posing alongside the much younger controversial ‘activist’ Masih Alinejad circulating in social media.

Though, apparently, these days just about anybody except Rajavi can have their picture taken with Pompeo.

Rajavi’s actions indicate that she really doesn’t understand why this is. Her desperate efforts to stay visible – parading on stage in glamorous outfits before paid speakers and audience – expose her ego rather than her leadership. As de facto leader of the MEK, Rajavi has successfully carved out a niche for the mercenary MEK in the anti-Iran front – acting out the silent wishes of America, Israel and Saudi Arabia, who might proclaim an interest in regime change against Iran, but who cannot necessarily do the dirty deeds.

By continually insisting on her propaganda events she is overstepping her mandate: the MEK’s role is to get paid, do the work, then disappear.

Rajavi is not invited to Warsaw because, quite frankly, she and her organization stink. The smell of terrorism, murder, crime and corruption cling to the MEK in spite of all the group’s efforts to whitewash, re-write, lobby and otherwise hide their past and present. No other fake opposition is as dirty and untrustworthy as the MEK. No other fake opposition keeps its members as slaves and kills dissenters. No other fake opposition commits false flag ops to blame on Iran and destroy trust.

So, while western media is reluctant to delve deeper into what the MEK are actually capable of, the security services which advise those governments who turn a blind eye to this activity are fully aware of Maryam Rajavi’s weaknesses. The fact she is prepared to sell her homeland for dollars means she is just as easily capable of selling another country for Rials when the time comes!

February 12, 2019 0 comments

Maryam Rajavi

Maryam Rajavi’s protest is more about being left in the cold by Pompeo in Warsaw

Maryam Rajavi headed a ‘protest’ in Paris yesterday using paid participants to promote her regime change agenda against Iran. Rajavi is afraid of being overlooked by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s Iran Action Group run from inside the State Department. Pompeo will hold a summit in Warsaw next week where it is predicted Iranian opposition groups will feature. Sadly for Rajavi, she has not been invited. Wonder why? Here’s a timely reminder of just who the Mojahedin-e Khalq are. In 2012, Owen Bennett-Jones from the BBC conducted an in-depth investigation into the group, including interviews with top MEK members, as well as critics and victims. This is his reporting.

US-Iran relations

February 10, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Watch out the Problematic Case of the MKO in Europe!

During the past decade, the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi) has been notoriously known for its deep pockets to donate the US high profiles for their lobbying campaign to advocate the group against the Iranian government. However, the group’s multi-million dollar contributions are not restricted to the US. The Spanish political party, Vox has recently been in the limelight for receiving donations from the MKO. In addition, the group has paid hefty sums to Spanish politicians for speaking on behalf of the group in its gatherings.

“The so-called National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), is under the spotlight for having financed the campaign of Vox in the European elections of 2014,” El Confidencial reported. “This Iranian sect, whose members live confined in a camp in Albania, it also counted on the participation of other former Spanish high-ranking officials in its conferences.” [1]

However, El Confidencial asserts that the US politicians have been the favorite political figures to receive MKO’s money.

“Rudolph Giuliani, former mayor of New York, still charged 150,000 euros or 200,000 more expenses. Bill Richardson, former governor of New Mexico, between 75,000 and 100,000 euros, ”El Confidencial cites a person who has collaborated in the organization. “The cache of Spanish politicians is lower, perhaps 50,000 euros or less, for a former president, according to industry sources.” [2]

The MKO’s lavish funding of Western politicians is their unfailing tactic to cultivate sponsors. As they could manage to gain the support of John Bolton and Rudy Giuliani. The Spanish journalist explains how the tactic works in his country. “For Iranian dissident it was a way to make high-level contacts,” he suggests.

“They say that they did not supervise the speech and did ask for a previous meeting in Madrid to explain their plans and their movement. The ex-politicians converted into lecturers accepted without asking much about the origin of the funds, which, according to most specialists, come largely from Saudi Arabia, in addition to the donations of their followers and other sources of support.” [3]

Robert Fantina of the Counter Punch sees the threat of the MKO’s presence in another part of Europe: France. “At present, there are two groups active in France,” he asserts.

“One is known as the ‘Yellow Vests’ an informal organization that started to protest an increase in fuel taxes, and expanded to oppose a wide range of practices of the government of president Emmanuel Macron that are seen as detrimental to the public. There was no well-established plan and no recognized leader. The second organization is the MEK (Mujahideen-e Khalq), a terrorist organization that seeks the overthrow of the Iranian government. MEK members have been responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent people.” [4]

Fantina believes that by sheltering the MKO, the French government is following the American hypocrisy.

“France, one of the signatories of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, condemned the U.S. withdrawal from this international agreement, and French government officials are looking for a means to circumvent the threatened US sanctions if its corporations continue to do business with Iran,” he writes. “Yet they support a terrorist organization whose sole purpose is the overthrow of the Iranian government.” [5]

Fantina advises the French government to be clear on its stance towards Iran emphasizing on the decline of US’s power and influence in the international politics. He points out that the many nations are seeking ways to continue trading with Iran despite the US sanctions.

“The fact that several nations are looking for ways around his threatened sanctions is in itself a good sign, one that is indicative of dwindling US power and influence,” he writes. “While France praises the terrorist MEK, it also seeks ways of continuing to trade with Iran.” [6]

Today, 40 years after the Iranian Revolution, It is not hard to understand the root and legacy of Iranian hatred towards the West. Even, Thamar E.Gindin, the pro-Israel activist confirms that the MKO is one of the reasons of the Iranians’ concern over the Western interference in their country. She investigates the roots of such a resentment. In his recent article titled “Understanding ‘Nofuzophobia”, he correctly accomplishes that most Iranians embrace Western culture but

“they do remain apprehensive about foreign political involvement and interference”. “One of the fears expressed by many Iranians, people who detest the current regime but do not take active measures to overthrow it, is that because there is no clear alternative, they are afraid the West would interfere again and impose a regime they don’t want, such as the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK)—the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran, an Iranian opposition group favored by the West,” he writes. [7]

Thus, Western governments should take it into consideration that the Iranians want to stop their reckless policies regarding the terrorist cult-like MKO. Otherwise, the European countries may be haunted by the cells of terrorist extremists of the MKO someday.
By Mazda Parsi

References:
[1] El Confidencial, Aznar, Zapatero … The other politicians financed by terrorists, January 16, 2019.
[2] ibid
[3] ibid
[4] Fantina, Robert, France, Yellow Vests and the MEK, Counter Punch, January 25, 2019.
[5] ibid
[6] ibid
[7]E. Gindin, Thamar, Understanding ‘Nofuzophobia’, The roots and legacy of Iranian resentment of the West, part of a weeklong look at 40 years of the revolution, Tabletmag.com, January 17, 2019.

February 7, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

An Unholy Alliance: The Use of Terrorism According to John Bolton

John Bolton is carefully uniting an unholy alliance of terrorist groups who all share one goal: opposition to Iran

In 1978, President Carter’s National Security Advisor, Zbignew Brzezinski, decided to use the Muslim Brotherhood against the Soviets, and sent Arab combatants to support the Afghan opposition against the Communist regime. Responding to a call for help from the Afghan government, the Red Army became bogged down in an unwinnable conflict.
In Afghanistan, the Muslim Brotherhood was not armed by the CIA, who were unable to obtain the authorization from Congress for an operation of that magnitude, but by Israel. In view of their success, the Arab-Afghans were later mobilized in many other theatres of operation. It followed, amongst other things, that the Brotherhood, armed both by Israel and Iraq, took a shot at the Syrian Arab Republic, in 1978-82. One thing leading to another, a representative of the Brotherhood was incorporated into the staff of NATO during the attack in Kosovo against Yugoslavia.
The position of the Muslim Brotherhood as auxiliary troops for NATO was canceled at the end of the Clinton presidency, but the collaboration of the Brotherhood with the CIA has never been terminated. It was clearly re-instated with the attack on Libya under the Obama presidency, where it furnished almost all of the ground troops for the Atlantic Alliance. One of their representatives was even incorporated into the U.S. National Security Council. Then, during the attack on Syria, NATO’s LandCom, situated in Izmir, coordinated the jihadist troops.
Since the Trump administration opposes on principle the use of terrorist groups by U.S. military, the moment arrived for the White House to redefine the role of the Muslim Brotherhood.
We do not yet know the new strategy defined by National Security Advisor John Bolton. However, several elements enable us to guess its general form.

Daesh

At the beginning of 2018, U.S. Special Forces illegally stationed in Syria exfiltrated thousands of Daesh (ISIS) combatants overseas. In May 2018, General Yahya Rahim Safavi, military advisor to Ayatollah Khamenei, accused the U.S. of organizing the transfer of Daesh combatants to Afghanistan.
Currently, approximately 7,000 of them are still on Afghani soil. Contrary to their past position, they do not support the Taliban, who are currently opposed to all foreign presence, but now oppose them.
According to the spokesman for the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (in other words the Taliban), Qari Muhammad Yousuf Ahmadi,
The American invaders and their lackeys carried out a raid last night [12 January 2019] against a Mujahedin camp where members of Daesh were being held, situated in Pani Bus in the district of Jwand, Bâdghîs province. The joint enemy forces martyred two guards and left with 40 Daesh-affiliated prisoners. Apparently, the American invaders and their henchmen from the Kabul administration launched this raid in order to help the Daesh prisoners. Every time the Mujahedin of the Islamic Emirate [the Taliban] have fought Daesh, the American invaders have assisted Daesh and bombed Mujahedin positions. Exactly the same way that when Daesh was uprooted by the Mujahedin of Darzab, in the district of Jowzjan, and was about to be destroyed [last August], the American invaders and the Kabul administration jointly assisted 200 members of Daesh by helicopter.”
It was at this moment that the Combating Terrorism Center of the Military Academy of West Point published a historical study of the divergences between the Mujahedin during the war against the Soviets. This document noted that in 1989, during the retreat of the Red Army, and when Osama Bin Laden had returned to Saudi Arabia, certain young members of the Muslim Brotherhood questioned the laxism of their senior officers. They created the “Jalalabad School”, which was much more strict, and began to accuse various people of impiety and excommunicated them (takfir). This, they say, is the conflict that blew up again in 2014, provoking the split between al-Qaida and Daesh.
This flashback should not blind us to the fact that the Muslim Brotherhood continued to welcome not only the Taliban but all Afghani resistants, until the assassination of Ahmed Chah Massoud (himself an ex-member of the Muslim Brotherhood), on September 9, 2001 (two days before the attacks of New York and the Pentagon). For two decades, Afghanistan became the training ground for jihadists from all over the world, particularly the combatants from the Russian Caucasus. Today the Taliban are much more careful with their choice of allies and their friends. It is true that today they control 60 % of the territory. They no longer base themselves on theological grounds, but on nationalist criteria.
During the war against the Soviets, the Muslim Brotherhood were mainly aligned with ex-Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who was their representative in the country. On 22 September 2016, with the support of the Obama administration, he was awarded the pardon of the new Afghan state and was removed from the UN list of terrorists.
The arrival of Daesh in Afghanistan occurred at the time when the Trump administration had been trying – since July 2018 – to negotiate with the Taliban. Preliminary contacts took place in Qatar with ambassador Alice Wells, assistant to Mike Pompeo for Central Asia. The negotiations were headed by ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad in September and October, despite the anxiety of the Afghan government, which sent a representative but were not admitted. Khalilzad had fought alongside the Talibans, Pachtuns like himself, against the Soviets, before taking US citizenship. He was trained in neoconservatism and became ambassador to the UNO in 2007, when the Senate opposed the nomination of John Bolton.

The People’s Mujaheddin

Last week, the head of the People’s Mujaheddin (MEK) of Iran, Maryam Radjavi, traveled to Kabul on an official visit, from Tirana, where she lives. She met specifically with the President of the National Security Council and ex-ambassador to the United States, Hamdullah Mohib. Within the next few days, she should be traveling to Herat, in the district of Shindand, to establish a military base for her organization. According to the Pakistani newspaper Ummat, the Pentagon has already trained 2,000 of the People’s Mujahedin there, in October 2012.
Despite their apparent similarity in name, there is no connection between the Mujahedin (with one d) of the Muslim Brotherhood (who are Arabs and Sunnis) and the Mujaheddin (with two d’s) of the MEK (who are Persian). The only objective link between the two groups is that they have both been used by the United States and both practice terrorism.
As from 2013, the MEK has been transferred from Iraq to Albania with the support of the United States. A small town has been built for them by Israeli companies. However, on 23 June 2014, Maryam Radjavi, in a long speech given before 80,000 members of the sect and 600 Western personalities, spoke of her satisfaction that Iraq had been conquered by Daesh. We should remember that this victory had been organized with the help of General Ezzat Ibrahim al-Douri, ex-right-hand man for President Saddam Hussein, and as such, protector of the People’s Mujahedin.
John Bolton’s links with the MEK date back to the Bush administration. They were strengthened by his presence – for a price of 40,000 dollars – during their annual meetings at Villepinte (France), in 2010 and 2017. Having become the National Security Advisor, he now unites the jihadists from Daesh and the loyal followers of Maryam Radjavi against their common objective.
The most immediate of the targets of this terrorist is Iran, with whom Afghanistan shares a long frontier, hard to defend.
Thierry Meyssan is a political consultant, President-founder of the Réseau Voltaire (Voltaire Network). His latest work in French is Sous nos Yeux. Du 11-Septembre à Donald Trump (Right Before our Eyes. From 9/11 to Donald Trump).
Thierry Meyssan, Mint Press News

February 6, 2019 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Handling Of Iran Is Juvenile. MEK the darling of Trump Admin

While we have been focused on domestic politics, some of what this Administration has been doing abroad poses serious risks. The Administration has been trying to make Iran the devil behind everything we don’t like and threats have been flying back and forth. That has many of us concerned about where we are going.

The MEK has been the darling of the Administration as a potential successor to the mullahs because they both dislike the Iranian regime. Never mind that the MEK objected when Khomeini decided to release the hostages, that it has been a terrorist organization and killed Americans. Never mind that it has no support in Iran because it backed Iraq against Iran in a war that left 300,000 Iranians dead, and never mind that human rights organizations have documented its abuses. Never mind that Iranians despise the MEK’s version of Islam because it is “worse than the current mullahs.” But it is apparently enough that it dislikes the mullahs regardless of what might happen if they actually tried to take power in Iran, mirroring the tragedy of the second Bush war with Iraq.

Our handling of Iran is both juvenile and dangerous.
We, in this country, are very upset that Russia may have interfered in our elections. Yet we behave dismissively about the American engineered coup d’etat that removed the democratically selected prime minister of Iran and brought the Shah back.
That was a while ago but it led directly to the taking of hostages 26 years later. Everyone in Iran knew that American staff inside the Embassy had reorganized a failed coup d’etat, ended democratic government and brought monarchy back. So yes, the Iranians violated international norms by storming and seizing the Embassy, but would we do less if we believed that Russia was organizing a coup in their Washington embassy? Or would it have been our patriotic duty to stop it by any means necessary?
Yet all the enmity between Iran and the US stems from those two events and we don’t seem to be able to get past it. Iran tried on several occasions to reestablish a decent relationship with the US. It offered to negotiate the full panoply of differences between us. But no president before Obama was willing to deal with them. It was considered unpatriotic even to talk with Iran.
We changed the balance of power in the Middle East by defeating Iraq, leaving Iran the sole major local power and target because power in the region had become unbalanced. This country then worked to complete their local isolation, refusing to include them in regional meetings and arrangements. Their relationship with Israel had been fine and productive until we tried to squeeze them out. Like Germany in NATO, Iran could easily have been included in regional security arrangements. It could and would have become a much better friend than the likes of the Saudis.
But we got furious at every step, shaking fists, making threats, even threatening war, instead of using our heads to create a peaceful Middle East. It’s been much like a fight between kids in a sandbox except that all the kids have powerful weapons. Some presidents need to grow up, for the sake of our fellow citizens.
Tyrants want enemies to vilify in order to unite the country behind them instead of against them. It’s also a distraction from the embarrassments of domestic politics. But warlike behavior can get out of hand, leading some young men to their deaths and families to become refugees. Getting people to unite behind an unpopular president is a sick reason for people to go to their deaths.

Steve Gottlieb’s latest book is Unfit for Democracy: The Roberts Court and The Breakdown of American Politics. He is the Jay and Ruth Caplan Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Albany Law School, served on the New York Civil Liberties Union board, on the New York Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, and as a US Peace Corps Volunteer in Iran.
Stephen Gottlieb, WAMC, Morning Edition,

January 31, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Who do you think you are fooling Mr Pompeo?

Betting on a dead horse

Once again the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK, NCR, or Rajavi Cult) moves in on behalf of the hawks in the White House to launch another wave of political war against Iran and the Iranian people.

According to the MEK outlets, the US State Department has sent a message to the people of Iran and has asked them to write their demands and wishes for the future of the country. They have apparently created posts on Twitter, Facebook, and other social networks in this regard.

The MEK has asked all its supporters to be active and leave comments on “hash tag forty years” demanding the US to impose even more severe sanctions on the Iranian people, follow the “regime change” policy more seriously, recognize Maryam Rajavi as the President of Iran and invite the NCRI as the representative of Iran to the Warsaw Summit.

It is obvious that the MEK Trolling Machine is active now to turn the results in favour of the aggressors in the White House and fulfil their wishes. As far as the people of Iran are concerned, they do not believe that the US has anything to do with the future of Iran.

John Bolton Promising Regime Change in Iran

At a Paris gathering last year, John Bolton, the US National Security Advisor, told members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq that the Trump administration should embrace their goal of immediate regime change in Iran and recognize their group as a “viable” alternative.

“The outcome of the president’s policy review should be to determine that the Ayatollah Khomeini’s 1979 revolution will not last until its 40th birthday,” Bolton said. (The 40th anniversary of the Iranian revolution will be on February 11, 2019.) “The declared policy of the United States should be the overthrow of the mullahs’ regime in Tehran,” Bolton added. “The behavior and the objectives of the regime are not going to change and, therefore, the only solution is to change the regime itself.”

This would have certainly been objected to immediately and firmly if it was said in any other place except in a so called gathering of an Iranian opposition group. That is why the MEK has become the loudspeaker of the hidden demands and wishes of the White House after the fall of Saddam Hussein, their only state sponsor ever.

Rally Scheduled for February in Paris

While the U.S. is hosting a conference in Warsaw, Poland, this February to discuss the Middle East and Iran in particular, a Free Iran (disguised organization of the Mojahedin-e Khalq) Rally is being held on February 8 in Paris.

According to a statement released by the organizers of the rally (MEK), “Iran regime’s terrorist plots, assassinations, missile launching, and violation of Human Rights should no longer be tolerated; ongoing nationwide protests and strikes in Iran reflect the desire of Iranian people for regime change. Let’s be the voice of the Iranian people and participate in (the) Free Iran Rally.”

No doubt, all these have been masterminded in Washington and instructed to the MEK, which exposes the weak and naïve strategy of the Trump administration against Iran.

Hardly anyone dealing with Iran can be found who does not know that the MEK is the most hated by the Iranian people. They also see the US as the force which organized the 1953 coup d’etat against the only democratically elected leader in Iran, who supported the Shah when the vast majority of the people wanted him to go, and now supports the MEK which has a record of assassinating the Americans in Tehran, claiming the death of 12000 Iranians in terrorist activities, and joining Saddam Hussein’s aggressive war against Iran.

Relying on MEK is just like betting on a dead horse and exposes the empty hands of the Trump administration against Iran. Mike Pompeo cannot fool anyone by scheduling senseless political games like this to falsely exhibit that what the warmongers do is the wish of the Iranian people.

January 31, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

Aznar, Zapatero … The other politicians financed by terrorists

The Tehran opposition that financed the Vox campaign also had PSOE and PP politicians as guests in Paris. Two Spanish ex-presidents attended the annual event in Paris.

There are not many issues that could unite Vox, the conservative Alejo Vidal-Quadras, two former presidents, the popular José María Aznar and the socialist José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, and the former vice president and president of the State Council, María Teresa Fernández de la Vega . The Iranian opposition is one of them. Or at least a certain section of that opposition: the so-called National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), under the spotlight for having financed the campaign of Vox in the European elections of 2014. This Iranian sect, whose members live confined in a camp in Albania, it also counted on the participation of other former Spanish high-ranking officials in its conferences.

All the mentioned politicians attended an event of the organization called ‘Free Iran’, which is held every summer in Paris. A person who has once attended recalls on the condition of anonymity what those annual NCRI events are like outside the French capital.”That was a huge rally in a pavilion, bigger than a PP or PSOE convention. ‘Speakers’ followed one another.”Among those speakers, were Aznar, Zapatero and María Teresa Fernández de la Vega.

Regardless of the ideological or political reasons that may encourage the speakers, the NCRI is famous in the world for the ‘lobbying’ and for the generous fees it offers its guests. A person who has collaborated in the organization explains that for the Iranians the Spanish speakers were something secondary, that the organization was looking for US heavyweights.”Rudolph Giuliani, former mayor of New York, still charged 150,000 euros or 200,000 more expenses. Bill Richardson, former governor of New Mexico, between 75,000 and 100,000 euros.”The cache of Spanish politicians is lower, perhaps 50,000 euros or less, according to industry sources, for a former president.

For Iranian dissident it was a way to make high-level contacts. They say that they did not supervise the speech and did ask for a previous meeting in Madrid to explain their plans and their movement. The ex-politicians converted into lecturers accepted without asking much about the origin of the funds, which, according to most specialists, come largely from Saudi Arabia, in addition to the donations of their followers and other sources of support.
That was a huge rally in a pavilion, bigger than a PP or PSOE convention. The ‘speakers’ succeeded

Aznar attended an event of this group on June 26, 2010, opening the way for other Spanish politicians. Probably the former president – who has never hidden his opposition to the theocratic regime of Tehran and his support for the adoption of firm measures against it – felt supported by the presence of the American John Bolton, former Ambassador of the United States to the UN and today National Security Adviser of President Donald Trump, despite the fact that his country still officially considered MeK terrorists.

The popular has never been reluctant to admit their participation in this event, and FAES sources say that it did so for political reasons, in line with its position on Iran. Some of his comments on that occasion, in fact, are posted on Aznar’s own website:”I support your struggle for freedom and for democracy, the Iranian people have suffered too much, and demand and deserve a better government that respects dignity of people and ensure their fundamental rights,”reads the selected text, along with a comment lamenting the failure of the Green Movement, the wave of protests that shook Iran in 2009.
In the full transcript of his speech, Aznar is much more forceful:”For me, stopping the nuclear escalation in Iran is essential, but not enough. We must bring a regime change to Iran. The Iranians have shown that despite repression that is what they want, and in my opinion the liberal democracies have an obligation to support freedom in those places where there is none and people seek it.”

A controversial organization
The NCRI is presented as a broad platform of various Iranian dissident groups, but in practice it is the political arm of a controversial armed organization, the Mojahedin-e Khalq (“people’s fighters”or MeK). Both groups are led by the same person, Maryam Rajavi, and the web page of each contains links to the other. According to most specialists, the group is largely a cult led by this activist and, previously, by her husband, Massoud Rajavi. Its members live in a military enclosure provided by the Albanian authorities, and for some countries they are a kind of medium-term investment, with a view to a future regime change in Iran in which they could play a leading role.
Because of its bombing campaign against Iranian institutions in Western countries, especially during the 1990s, the MeK was on the terrorism lists of the US and the European Union for a long time. In 2009, thanks to the efforts of Vidal-Quadras and other MEPs, they were eliminated from the European list, but not from the US list, where they remained until 2012.
In 2014, this organization financed the vast majority of the Vox campaign for the European companies led by Vidal-Quadras. The PP exec exempted did not obtain a seat and although the far-right formation directed by Santiago Abascal has affirmed that it was audited by the Court of Auditors, it has denied it. Among other things, having no parliamentary representation, he was not obliged to submit to this audit.

The PSOE and the PP have criticized Vox for using this foreign financing – the electoral law prohibits the interference of other countries in the electoral contests. The popular have even threatened to take the case to the Senate investigation committee investigating Podemos for receiving money from Venezuela. Vox has been very critical of this financing of Pablo Iglesias’ party, but he claims that his is transparent and was an almost punctual support to Vidal-Quadras.

But there are politicians from the big parties who have also had a relationship with this Iranian group. Four years after Aznar, and already as former president, was the socialist Rodríguez Zapatero who came to Paris.”The whole world expects a completely democratic Iran, a non-nuclear Iran, an Iran committed to peace in the Middle East,”Zapatero said in English amid applause. Attendees were mostly dressed in yellow vests and applauded with artificial plastic hands of the same color, as seen in the video that the NCRI uploaded to YouTube.

During his eight years in Moncloa, Zapatero shied away from English and there are only his words, but as an international lecturer he let go.”No party and no religion can justify discrimination against women.””Dear friends, I want to wish you good luck, and I encourage you to work together for peace, a peace for men and women who respect all beliefs and do not want to impose themselves … This is my wish for Iran and the Middle East”, he closed his speech , less than nine minutes. In the self-styled”annual meeting of the Iranian resistance”, Zapatero shared a table with the French conservative minister Michèlle Alliot-Marie. The socialist returned to attend the following year.

In 2015, the person who attended was Fernández de la Vega, and according to the website of the Iranian Council, he said:”Congratulations for your struggle, you are defending your people and all of humanity, and this is a battle you must win.”One of the main joys I have today is to see a powerful woman leading the NCRI, I see with my eyes that equality is in the first line of action of this organization, we support you, and your movement.”For the former vice-president, who heads the Women for Africa Foundation and who is now president of the Council of State, the question of women’s emancipation in Iran seems to be a genuine concern: barely two years ago, given the impossibility of attending an act on ‘ Iranian women against Islamic fundamentalism ‘, organized by the NCRI in the Albanian capital, sent a video with a message of support for the cause in French.

The communication office of Women for Africa, in any case, categorically denies that the former vice president had received any money for this assistance, and affirms with completeness that the cooperation of Fernández de la Vega in both events took place exclusively within the framework of the support to the fight for women’s rights in Iran.

Speaking to El Confidencial on Monday, Alejo Vidal-Quadras insisted on the legitimacy of the NCRI, underlined by the attendance of these figures of high international profile. Aware of this, the people in charge of the group continue paying astronomical sums to the participants in their acts, before the realization that the long list of illustrious people who have passed through them act in turn as a powerful bait to attract new politicians and power continue, well, feeding the cycle.

Elconfidencial.com translated by Nejat Society

also:

Maryam Rajavi’s MEK terrorists – The group that supports Vidal-Quadras

January 30, 2019 0 comments

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