Reza Kahlili (an alias) recently wrote the book, A Time To Betray, a portrayal of his double life as a Revolutionary Guard member and CIA Agent. Although it is impossible to independently verify his recounting of all the events and facts, it is a fascinating read about the despotic Iranian regime. The best part of the book is when he discusses his personal experiences and reactions to the brutal Iranian government from its inception in 1979 through today. NewsRealBlog talked with the author about his feelings, past and present, regarding the radicalized extremist Iranian system.

NRB: You had a very interesting comment in the book about why September 11th happened. You said, “Being soft on bin Laden emboldened him to commit a heinous act.” Can you explain what you meant?

Reza: Al Qaeda started with small jobs and they grew bigger and bigger. America took no action which made bin Laden believe he was untouchable. This same thing is happening with Iran.

NRB: Should America have done more to help the protestors?

Reza: The US Government lost an opportunity. There was a deafening silence. The Iranians want nothing more than freedom and democracy. I feel the protestors were betrayed by the West.

NRB: Some former CIA officials disagree with you. They feel if the US became more involved then the Iranian government would have argued that the US Government is meddling in their internal affairs and killed more protestors. Can you comment?

Reza: It is an excuse that not being vocal was to ensure the protestors safety. That is just not true. Every day the Iranian Government propagandizes against the West. They have sold the idea that if you take any drastic measures or voice harsh criticism the moderates in Iran will be weakened.

NRB: What should be done to help the opposition?

Reza: Let me first say that it is totally unacceptable and undoable to invade Iran. Any attempt at an invasion would unite everybody. Sanctions will work when the US and the European countries stop ALL diplomatic and trade relations with Iran. If that happened, the Iranian Government’s infrastructure would CRACK.

NRB: Do you want to see the Shah’s son regain power?

Reza: Not now. I don’t want to see too much power in one individual. I want a government established that is a copy cat of the US with checks and balances.

NRB: Should we try to contain Iran’s nuclear ambitions?

Reza: The question is can we deal with a nuclear armed Iran? To allow it would be a great mistake. If Iran becomes nuclear they will take the world hostage. Remember they are in the center of the most important area for energy. No one understands the philosophy of this regime.

NRB: Do you think President Obama should negotiate with the Iranians?

Reza: He is making the same mistake as every other administration. No way can you ever trust them. It is a cat and mouse game. Here’s what they do: Ahmadinejad comes out and says the most outrageous things. Then others in the regime come out and provide some hope to keep you in a state of confusion. Take for example what happened in Geneva in October (Iran agreed in talks with the United States and other major powers to open its newly revealed uranium enrichment plant near Qum to international inspection.) Everyone was jubilant that we would have an agreement, which never happened. They are deceived by the leadership in Tehran.

NRB: What would you like to say to the American people?

Reza: I betrayed my country for a reason, to bring freedom to my people and end this ruthless regime.

Reza Kahlili (an alias) recently wrote the book, A Time To Betray, a portrayal of his double life as a Revolutionary Guard member and CIA Agent. Although it is impossible to independently verify his recounting of all the events and facts it is a fascinating read about the despotic Iranian regime. The best part of the book is when he discusses his personal experiences and reactions to the brutal Iranian government from its inception in 1979 through today. NewsRealBlog talked with the author about his feelings, past and present, regarding the radicalized extremist Iranian system.

NewsRealBlog: Why did you write the book?

Reza Kahlili: I am trying to get the word out about the dangers of the Iranian regime. I am the first one coming out. They did not know I existed as an American spy inside the system. I want to alert the American people that the US government has a reactionary foreign policy where they wait for something to happen and then react. My goal is to stop a nuclear Iran from happening.

NRB: Don’t you think by coming out you are endangering more Iranians since the regime is so paranoid?

Reza: This is the same line of thinking that has prevented any meaningful action against Iran. The Iranian government arrested people for espionage, interrogated, tortured, and killed them, regardless if I wrote the book or not.

NRB: A very riveting part of the book was your description of Roya, a girl arrested, sent to Evin Prison, and tortured because she was falsely accused of being part of an opposition group. Here is a portion of her letter to you before she hung herself:

“I wish I was one of those girls who were lucky enough to go in front of the firing squad. They took everything from me in that prison. I have nothing left…When I was in solitary confinement these filthy, evil men would come to my cell…not even animals would do what they did. They raped me, but it was more than rape. When they were through they kicked me in the back as hard as they could, threw me down next to the toilet…They would make us hold one leg up for a long time. If you got tired, they would lash you on the tired leg. Some would faint from the pain and bleeding. They cut my arm with a knife and told me that they would cut my throat the next time if I did not confess. The next day they sent me to a small dark room where another guard raped me. This was the routine.”

How do you feel when you read about the CIA being criticized for its harsh interrogation techniques compared to what happened to Roya?

Reza: Comparing those techniques, like putting someone in a cell with an insect, if they call that torture then they don’t know what torture is. Torture is what was done in that prison, the most disgusting things to innocent people. Besides that description they hang people upside down and beat them for hours, burning them with cigarettes, breaking bones until they protrude out, and gouge eyes out. This is torture.

NRB: Another powerful segment in the book was your description of a girl’s, Asieh, stoning for committing adultery:

“From what I could tell her sin was trying to feed her two children by the only means available: selling herself to a man…Now she was to face the punishment decreed by fanatical mullah’s in Allah’s name. A young woman was being slaughtered, and I had to know her pain. They’d covered her body from the waist down with dirt. The Guards started shoveling more dirt in the hole until they buried Asieh up to her shoulders. The crowd attacked the pile of rocks. Soon Asieh’s face was veiled in blood and her head tilted to one side. She was gone. But the crowd continued to assault her.”

It seems that Iran is made up of two different worlds: a medieval society VS a modern society. Do you agree?

Reza: Currently, the minority rules the majority. The minority are the fanatics that follow every word of the Koran. They want nothing more than the blood of all non-believers. The stoning of a human being is savage. This is their idea of justice. They believe that this idea of Islam will conquer the world.

NRB: Are you upset that the feminists in this country do not speak out more against these acts?

Reza: They have a responsibility to speak out. They should voice their support of women everywhere.

NRB: You described how you view yourself. Can you explain?

Reza: Iranians don’t see themselves as Arabs. We see ourselves as Persians.

NRB: Are you a practicing Muslim?

Reza: I was born a Shiite Muslim. I was a devout Muslim. Because of all the terrible things I saw in Allah’s name my family is not practicing as Muslims. This is currently a family of infidels.

NRB: Can you describe the Revolutionary Guard?

Reza: They are part of the establishment, formed to confront military leaders sympathetic to the Shah. They are the main radical base that secures the government. If they would be taken out this regime would topple. It is a separate organization from the regular military army.

NRB: Why did you join the Revolutionary Guard?

Reza: After graduation I was very hopeful that Khomeini would bring freedom and democracy to Iran. I joined when my best friend asked me to be a part of the Revolutionary Guard.

NRB: Why are you using an alias?

Reza: Besides the safety of my immediate family and myself, I have a good many friends and relatives back in Iran. I have recruited many agents for the Agency. If I blew my cover they would torture those who I knew in Iran and know all my contacts.

Tehran, 26 Feb. (AKI) - An evangelical priest was among nine Christians arrested in central Iran on Friday as authorities continued a crackdown against Christians in the Islamic country. The Christians' evangelical church in the city of Isfahan was closed down last month, according to advocacy group International Christian Concern.

"Iranian Christians are under constant threat of discrimination, imprisonment, torture, and even execution by the Iranian government," said Washington DC-based ICC president Jeff King, quoted by Christian news agency BosNewsLife.

"This severely restricts religious freedom," King added.

Reverend Wilson Issavi was arrested by Iranian state security agents in Isfahan, some 340 kilometers south of the capital Tehran, King said.

"Reverend Issavi, his hosts and others were apprehended by the security agents and immediately taken to prison. Friends and family are deeply concerned as they are unable to contact Reverend Issavi," King stated.

Christian and opposition groups say Christians are the target of oppression by the Iranian government. Iranian intelligence services arrested six Christians accused of proselytism on 15 January, according to the opposition website 'Rah-e sabz'. [...]

Elam Ministries believes Iran's conservative clerical leadership is concerned about the spread of Christianity in the Islamic nation.

King said he could not reveal the names of eight people who had been arrested, citing security concerns.

Issavi was visiting a friend's home in Isfahan's Shahin Shahr area when state security raided the house unannounced, King said.

The location where the nine Christians are being held and their physical condition is unknown, he said.

King said before Issavi's church, the Evangelical Church of Kermanshah, was closed down on 2 January, it was among the few remaining churches still open in Iran.

Iran's hardline president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has come under international pressure to improve religious rights but he has denied wrongdoing....

Following the West’s dismissal of Iran’s latest “acceptance” of a theoretical deal to enrich some of its uranium outside of the country, the Iranian government has announced it is enriching its current stockpile to 20 percent purity. Well, the regime needs to enrich it to 90 percent to become bomb-grade so we’ve still got plenty of time, right? Wrong, Officer Overly Optimistic.

As the AP reports states:

David Albright, whose Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security tracks suspected proliferators, said that it would take 2,000 centrifuges about a year to turn Iran’s 1.8 ton stockpile of 3.5 percent uranium into enough weapons grade uranium for one warhead. But he said it would only take 500 to 1,000 centrifuges, and half a year, to move from 20 percent to 90 percent plus enriched material.

By enriching its present 3.5 percent uranium stockpile to 20 percent, ”it would be going most of the rest of the way to weapon-grade uranium,” he said.

Get your ibuprofen ladies and gentlemen, it gets worse.

Albright’s first estimate is based on 2,000 centrifuges. The head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization says they are operating over 5,000, a number in line with previous IAEA  reports.

As I’ve written, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty allows Iran to complete most of the steps needed to develop a nuclear weapon, enabling them to quickly develop an arsenal. They can even do this legally if they announce with six months notice that they have to leave the treaty due to threats to their national security.

The Nonproliferation Policy Education Center writes:

“It is also legal under the NPT for Iran to make as many implosion devices (sans fissile cores) as one might want and have them ready to receive metal plutonium cores…At this point…Iran could break out of the NPT and have a large arsenal of weapons in a matter of weeks or days.”

This legal loophole allows Iran to proclaim innocence and gives countries like China some wiggle room to keep opposing sanctions. Looks like President Obama may have to form a coalition outside of the United Nations to take action. How George W. Bush of him.

Ryan Mauro is the founder of WorldThreats.com and a regular contributor to FrontPage Magazine.

President Obama understandably focused the vast majority of the State of the Union on domestic issues. As a national security specialist, though, I listened and waited to hear about the threats facing us as they are what I am best educated in. To my disappointment, President Obama again referred to the “Islamic Republic of Iran,” an unofficial recognition of the unelected government and a way of disavowing regime change as a goal. A few minutes later, he briefly said the U.S. stood alongside the female demonstrators in Iran, mentioning them alongside others fighting for freedom and prosperity in the world.

Related posts:

1. State of the Union: “Woe to the People Whose Leader Has No Teacher”
2. FULL TEXT: President Obama’s State of the Union Address
3. The State Of The Union Address Obama Should Give

Code Pink members became known during the Bush Administration as confrontational anti-war protestors, but the group is actually worse than that. Code Pink’s leadership has aligned with almost every tyrannical force opposing the U.S., from Chavez to Ahmadinejad to Hamas to Iraq insurgents. Code Pink is acting more like the ambassador for enemies of the free world than an advocate for peace.

Kristinn Taylor and Andrea Shea King over at BigGovernment.com are doing an excellent job chronicling the outrageous activities of Code Pink and its leadership over the years. Most recently, Code Pink has organized a “Gaza Freedom March” to call for an end to the blockade of the Gaza Strip, currently controlled by Hamas. The organization boasts that they have provided humanitarian aid to the territory, and has done so under the protection of Hamas. The terrorist group often diverts such aid for its own purposes, and it should be suspected that this is no different. Hamas also builds support by providing social services, so if such aid didn’t directly go to supporting the group’s violent operations, it certainly did go to support its recruiting efforts.

Hamas is a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, a radical Islamic organization whose goal is to wage “a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.” In other words, it wants to create a worldwide Islamic state. Code Pink has also teamed up with this extremist organization, placing ads on its website asking them to “join us in cleansing our country.”

Code Pink has been embraced by the Iranian government as well. Jodie Evans, one of the group’s leaders, met with Ahmadinejad in New York in September 2008, resulting in a trip to the country two months later. The group met with high-level government officials, and offered to help fund a “peace park” and environmentally-friendly businesses in Tehran. Co-founder of Code Pink Medea Benjamin praised the prices of public transportation in Iran and said she was “struck by how much more open Iran is than I had thought.”

To their credit, Code Pink did express sympathy for the protestors confronting the regime this summer, but called on the U.S. to lift sanctions and end threatening language and supported President Obama’s initial silence. In other words, Code Pink said they supported the Iranian people, but did not want do anything to support the Iranian people.

In January 2006, Evans and other colleagues including Cindy Sheehan met with Venezuela’s President Chavez. Benjamin had previously described Chavez as a “doll,” and said “George Bush—and John Kerry for that matter—could learn a thing or two from Hugo Chavez about winning the hearts and minds of the people.”

Jodie Evans’ reaction to the 9/11 attacks shows a complete ignorance of the ideological element of the terrorists, instead linking the disaster to Middle Eastern anger over U.S. foreign policy. She agreed in an interview that Bin Laden had a valid argument against the U.S., and said, “Why do we have bases in the Middle East? We totally violated the rights of that country,” referring to Saudi Arabia. Apparently, Evans is unaware that those bases were constructed with the permission of the Saudi government and are meant to protect the country from the very people she defends, like Saddam Hussein.

In 2003, Saddam hosted Evans and other Code Pink members in Iraq, aware that their anti-war activism had crossed the line into propaganda efforts on his behalf. As long as a regime redistributes wealth and is socialistic in how it governs, the country is praised by Code Pink, who seems to have little passion for promoting democracy, free markets or the human rights of oppressed citizens overseas. This type of thinking was apparent when she praised Saddam Hussein’s social services, saying “there was a good education and health care system, food for everyone. That system didn’t belong to Saddam, it belonged to the Iraqis, it belonged to year of creating what a civilization needed. If your parents didn’t send you to school, they could be put in jail.”

After Saddam’s toppling, Evans supported the insurgents fighting American soldiers, ignoring the fact that many of these were foreign jihadists affiliated with Al-Qaeda-type groups, and were former members of Saddam Hussein’s Republican Guards, Fedayeen militia, and intelligence service. To Code Pink, these forces of oppression and evil were the representatives of the Iraqi people fighting for liberation. They are completely unaware that the insurgents fight not only against American forces, but target Iraqi civilians and want to overthrow Iraq’s elected democratic government.

“We must begin by really standing with the Iraqi people and defending their right to resist. I can remain myself against all forms of violence, and yet I cannot judge what someone has to do when pushed to the wall to protect all they love. The Iraqi people are fighting for their country, to protect their families and to preserve all they love. They are fighting for their lives, and we are fighting for lies,” Evans wrote on June 26, 2005.

When Coalition forces began an offensive into Fallujah when it was the primary safe harbor of the insurgents, Code Pink reacted by delivering tens of thousands of dollars in humanitarian aid to its residents. This act sounds noble on the surface, but when you consider the group’s sympathy for the insurgents, it is quite possible that this aid was given to the enemy side. Furthermore, Evans and her delegation met with Iraqi politicians connected to the extremist Iranian-backed militia leader, Moqtada al-Sadr, and other supporters of killing American soldiers.

Evans has even, according to her friend, Jane Fonda, met with members of the Taliban in Afghanistan and Benjamin has tried to paint them as being motivated by lack of employment.

“Everybody we talked to said that most of the Taliban are poor rural people, $10-a-day Taliban, who are doing this for economic reasons. If you want to encourage people to stop fighting, encourage them to work,” Benjamin said.

According to an account posted on the Free Republic forum, a group of counter-protestors were confronted by Evans on August 30, 2004. During the exchange, Evans reportedly said, “We have nothing against communism.” This shouldn’t be surprising considering Medea Benjamin’s ties to the Workers World Party and described her life in Cuba as feeling like she had “died and went to heaven.”

Today, Code Pink is campaigning against President Obama’s decision to send 30,000 more soldiers to Afghanistan and against the use of drones in Pakistan. Politics seems to pull more weight than principle though, as Code Pink is against an immediate withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan for the exact same reasons as such a move would be wrong in Iraq. President Obama can pursue a similar type of policy that Code Pink lambasted under the previous administration, but they aren’t calling for citizens’ arrests of him and his officials like they are doing for members of the Bush Administration.

Code Pink’s embracing of anti-American actors is part of a calculated strategy. Medea wrote in 2003 that members of the movement she belonged to needed to “link up with appropriate local and regional groups” overseas to “channel the bursting anti-American sentiment overseas.” Forces supporting America are left out as part of the equation.

Code Pink is not a group genuinely promoting peace and human rights. The organization links up and supports virtually any anti-American actor, ignoring their oppression of their citizens that can hardly qualify as “peace” and the threat that they pose. In choosing its friends, Code Pink’s leadership has decided that the sole standard is that they must be an enemy of the United States.

"Using the courts as an instrument of religious persecution." Islamic Tolerance Alert from the Islamic Republic of Iran: "Trial underway for Baha'i leaders in Iran," from CNN, January 12:

(CNN) -- Seven leaders of Iran's Baha'i minority went on trial in Tehran Tuesday accused of spying for Israel, a charge their supporters say is motivated by religious discrimination.

Naaahh!! Couldn't be!

The seven -- two women and five men -- are also accused of spreading propaganda against the Islamic republic and committing religious offenses, charges that can carry the death penalty....

They have been held at Tehran's Evin prison since their arrests in March and May 2008. Their trial was delayed twice. Ala'i said it was because the Iranian regime had no basis for a case.

The U.S. State Department on Monday condemned Iran's decision to try the leaders.

"Authorities have detained these persons for more than 20 months, without making public any evidence against them and giving them little access to legal counsel," the department said in a statement.

Leonard Leo, U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom chairman, said his group is "extremely concerned about the fate of the seven" -- who risk facing the death penalty.

"It appears that the Iranian government has already predetermined the outcome, and is once again using its courts as an instrument of religious persecution in blatant violation of international human rights law," Leo said....

As a student dissident in Iran, Amir Fakhravar was jailed and tortured for his pro-democracy political activism. Since moving to the United States in 2006, he has continued to take part in Iran’s opposition movement. He serves as the secretary general of the Confederation of Iranian Students and the president of the Iranian Enterprise Institute. Last week, Fakhravar’s 18-year-old-brother, Arash, was arrested by the Iranian regime. After three days of absence, the Fakhravar family learned that Arash had been arrested, beaten up and taken to the Islamic Revolutionary Court in Tehran, then placed in solitary confinement in an undisclosed location. Amir Fakhravar spoke to Front Page about his brother’s arrest, Iran’s growing “green revolution,” and the best strategy for ending the mullahs’ three-decade rule.

FP: Can you tell us what happened with your brother Arash? What do you know of his current whereabouts?

Fakhravar: Arash is in the very middle of this fight. He became politically active in high school and now he goes to all the anti-government demonstrations. My mother always says, “Please talk to him.” But my response is: This is what he has chosen. We need to pay the price for freedom. The day after the Ashura festival, the intelligence services called my mother in Tehran. They said, “We know all about your son. He’s been involved in protests, making videos. Be careful or they will arrest him.” The day after the phone call, they arrested him. My mother didn’t know anything for three days. She called the police, but they didn’t know anything. So she went to the Revolutionary Court with my sister and they saw him there. He was beaten up and blindfolded, wearing a bloody shirt and handcuffs. They tried to take a picture but could not. Right now, he is still in the hands of the Revolutionary Court.

In the line of fire: Amir Fakhravar’s 18-year-old brother Arash is among the thousands of opposition demonstrators beaten up and arrested by the Iranian government.

FP: What are you doing to free Arash and what can those outside of Iran do to help?

Fakhravar: His best chance of survival is organizing a media campaign for his release. In Iran, my family cannot do anything. But from the outside we can do quite a lot. We created a Facebook page for him that now has 2,000 members. We can also write letters to the news media and human-rights groups to cover his case. This is probably the best thing we can do. We need to put more pressure on the government. They are afraid of free information.

FP: Your brother, like you, is active in the “green revolution” in Iran. How do you see what is happening inside the country right now?

Fakhravar: What has happened is that something many thought was a small movement has become a revolution. After the summer election, the government tried to strike fear into the people, but millions came out into the streets in Iran’s major cities. After seven months, they are showing that they are not going to give up. The recent death of Ayatollah Montazeri was a good excuse for this new generation to oppose the government because he had fought [Ayatollah] Khomeini for twenty years. The latest demonstrations have taken place during the Ashura festival, which is a symbol of the Islamic Republic and Shiism. This is a sign that they want to get rid of the mullahs and they are not afraid anymore. [Politician and presidential challenger] Mir Hossein Mousavi has said it best: We are not leading these people. They are leading themselves.

FP: So where does the leadership come from?

Fakhravar: This movement doesn’t have a leader, but things like Facebook help. We use social media to help organize events inside Iran. For instance, we are planning a demonstration in February to coincide with the 31^st anniversary of the Iranian revolution. Earlier this year, I was giving a speech before Congress and I said, “Iranians don’t want a war. All we need are cell phones, cameras and computers.” Some of the Senators laughed at that. But it has happened. We are close to a cyber revolution in Iran.

FP: What are the aims of this revolution? What do the participants hope to achieve?

Fakhravar: Most of the demonstrators are young – 70 percent are under the age of 35 – and they are not motivated by partisan politics. They are not communists or Marxists or monarchists; they are not involved with political parties and they don’t want to be. Via the internet, they know a lot about American culture – perhaps more than many people here – and they want the things it represents: life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. They are secular and they want a country where Islam is kept separate from the government. A free, secular, democratic Iran – that is their dream

FP: What do you make of the “pro-government” rallies that have been held in recent days? The government has tried to portray them as representing the true voice of the Iranian people.

Fakhravar: Actually, this what my brother was protesting when he was arrested. He was at a counter protest. For thirty years, the Iranian government has used petrodollars to create the illusion of popular support. These protests are designed to show that the government is strong and that it has real legitimacy. But the protests are staged. What happens is that the government will bus in people, usually poorer people from the countryside. They will give them food, and arrange for them to see the sites. For some of those people, it was their chance to see Tehran for the first time. They are being used to create these protests. But it’s not working. They had one of the pro-government protests in a big city near Tehran. Just 150 people showed up.

FP: How would you rate the Obama administration’s response to the protests in Iran? President Obama, for instance, has condemned the brutality of the regime, but the U.S. has not meaningfully supported the opposition.

Fakhravar: I think Obama just did not have any idea of what to do about Iran. So he decided that the U.S. would not become involved and would watch the situation unfold. This is not a football game, Mr. President. The Iranian government is killing the people, but during the past seven months the United States has done nothing positive to support them. It has done something negative, though. The Obama administration recognized the Ahmadinejad government as legitimately elected, which it is not. It also said it wanted to hold talks with Ahmadinejad. That was the wrong decision. It gave the regime legitimacy and hurt the democratic movement a lot.

FP: What should the administration do?

Fakhravar: First, it needs new advisors on Iran. Second, it needs to pass sanctions. By that I mean smart sanctions. The kind of targeted sanctions against the Revolutionary Guard that have been proposed will not be effective and will probably be watered down by China and Russia. Smart sanctions – on oil and gasoline – can help us. Petrodollars are the lifeline of the Iranian regime. If they can’t pay the salaries of the Revolutionary Guard, within two months they will be powerless because most of the Revolutionary Guard don’t believe in the mullahs. They believe in money. Right now, they are killing people for money. Take away the money away and you can collapse the regime.

FP: Some observers have called for a preemptive strike on Iranian nuclear facilities. Do you think that’s the right strategy?

Fakhravar: Not right now. At this moment, I believe it would be unhelpful. When you have an army in the streets – like Iran’s new generation – it is a sign that the mullahs’ reign is over. A strike on Iran would allow the regime to play the victim and would give it legitimacy. That is the last thing we need. To those who support a strike, my message is: Give us time. This June, there were four million people on the street in Tehran. It was the biggest anti-government protest in Iran’s history. Even during the 1979 revolution, you did not see that many people in the street. This is the Iranians’ fight against the mullahs, and they believe they can bring them down. If they had a little help from free countries, especially the United States, they could succeed right now.

Ten months after President Obama set a year-end deadline for Iran to engage with world powers on its nuclear program, the government in Tehran has failed to respond in kind, other than an abortive gesture in the fall.

Now, in what may be a difficult balancing act, officials say the administration wants to carefully target sanctions to avoid alienating the Iranian public — while keeping the door ajar to a resolution of the struggle over Iran’s nuclear program. The aim of any sanctions is to force the Tehran government to the negotiating table, rather than to punish it for either its apparent push to develop a nuclear weapon or its treatment of its people.

“We have never been attracted to the idea of trying to get the whole world to cordon off their economy,” said a senior U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. “We have to be deft at this, because it matters how the Iranian people interpret their isolation — whether they fault the regime or are fooled into thinking we are to blame.”

As a result, top officials show little apparent interest in legislation racing through Congress that would punish companies that sell refined petroleum to Iran. “Sanctions would not be an alternative to engagement,” another senior official said. “Our intention is to keep the door open.”

via As standoff with Iran continues, U.S. prepares targeted sanctions – washingtonpost.com.

On December 19, one of the Iranian government’s most prominent critics, Grand Ayatollah Hussein Ali Montazeri, passed away. His demise may yet portend the beginning of the end for Iran’s oppressive regime.

The regime may have been relieved that this independent source of religious authority and popularity among the people would no longer be around, but the Shiite holiday of Ashura fell on the seventh day following his death. The rallies mourning Montazeri combined with the Ashura celebration, creating a storm of anti-regime activity that only brutal suppression can contain.

Ayatollah Montazeri was a ferocious critic of the regime and advocate of ending clerical rule in government. Clerics, Montazeri believed, should serve as advisors to elected rulers. He wanted freedom of speech and assembly, and became particularly incensed in recent months over the fraudulent re-election of Ahmadinejad and widespread human rights abuses. His ardent opposition to the regime made him a hero among the people, despite his original role in bringing Ayatollah Khomeini to power and founding the Islamic Republic.

This year, he even issued a fatwa declaring the regime illegitimate and listed various transgressions committed by Khamenei and Ahmadinejad and their underlings, including hurting Shiite Islam by misrepresenting it. The fatwa even said that by breaking the “contract” with the people, “the people may remove the position holder from his post,” a not-so-subtle endorsement of overthrowing the government. He followed that up with an even bolder challenge to the regime: a declaration that Khamenei lacked the religious credentials to be a source of canon law and did not have the authority to issue fatwas.

Montazeri’s religious credentials as a Grand Ayatollah made such statements deeply unsettling for the regime. Originally, he was so adored by Khomeini that he was appointed as his successor. However, moral and religious conviction led Montazeri to disqualify himself from this post by speaking out against Khomeini’s massacres and human rights abuses. He even called on Khomeini to stop trying to export the Islamic Revolution by supporting terrorists and militias, and urged him to lead by example instead of force.

In 1989, Montazeri was placed on house arrest and the regime began trying to marginalize him. The current Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, was chosen to succeed Khomeini, even though he lacked the religious qualifications and Montazeri’s education dwarfed his. Montazeri has thus been able to speak with greater authority than Khamenei, especially as Iran’s economy and human rights situation spiraled downhill. Following the June “election,” a Seven-Point Manifesto was spread about Iran listing the demands of the opposition for democratic reform called for Montazeri to replace Khamenei as Supreme Leader until the constitution is changed to reconfigure the government.

The death of Montazeri couldn’t have come at a worse time for the regime. The opposition had already been gearing up for massive demonstrations during the Ashura holiday, knowing that the regime could not ban gatherings on that day. The mourning that followed his death led to growing expressions of discontent that extended into Ashura, creating momentum that only gunfire and violence could stop from spreading to every street.

Voice of the people: Montazeri’s death has galvanized Iran’s opposition.

It became clear immediately following Montazeri’s death that the opposition was energized. On the day before Ashura, about 50 members of the Basiji stormed a mosque where former President Khatami, a critic of the regime, was speaking and ended the presentation. It is said that the attack happened as Khatami tried to equate the uprising of Imam Hussein, who Ashura honors, with the opposition movement fighting for freedom. To make things even more offensive to the regime, this took place at the home mosque of Ayatollah Khomeini.

The regime eventually had to ban public mourning of Montazeri, leading to ongoing clashes. People in Tehran were seen having their Iranian flags confiscated for removing the religious symbols in them and were arrested for wearing black to honor him. On December 21, one woman walked up to the Basiji militiamen blocking access to Montazeri’s home and ripped up a photo of Khamenei, knowing she would be beaten and arrested. The next day, in Kerman Province, protests went to a scheduled public hanging of two alleged robbers and freed them. They were recaptured later, but this is a very aggressive challenge to the government.

Opposition forces claim that at least four protestors have been shot and killed, including the nephew of Mir-Hossein Mousavi, the man on the losing side of the rigged election. Hundreds of thousands are demonstrating in Iran’s major cities, chanting “death to the dictatorship” and making direct attacks on Khamenei. Video and photos leaking out show large pillars of smoke over Tehran from the mass use of tear gas to stop the demonstrations from spreading. Regime forces even ran over two protestors—twice.

The clashes with the security forces are getting longer and more vicious. At least ten motorcycles used by the forces are said to have been set ablaze in Tehran, along with a state building, police van, a Basiji outpost, state-owned banks and a vehicle used by the Revolutionary Guards. The windows of the Oil Ministry have reportedly been broken. Reports say that there have been numerous incidents where the Basiji have arrested a protestor only to have the crowd fight back and free them. Some police officers are said to be refusing orders to attack the demonstrators.

Ayatollah Mehdi Karroubi, another man who competed with Ahmadinejad for the presidency and has rankled the regime by reporting systematic rape and torture and demanding full rights for women, boldly predicted recently that the current regime “will not last” its entire four year term. Based on the demonstrations going on today, Karroubi may be right.

Invited recently by the newly formed Pechter Middle East Polls to ask three questions of 1,000 representative Egyptians and 1,000 urban Saudis, the Middle East Forum focused on Iran and Israel, the countries that most polarize the region. The results are illuminating.

Some Egyptians and Saudis support the idea of an Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear facilities.

(Technical note: Respondents were interviewed face to face in Arabic, in their own homes using a structured questionnaire during November by a credible, private, local commercial company with a solid track record. The margin of error is ±3 percent.)

Iran: In today’s Middle Eastern cold war, the Islamic Republic of Iran heads the revolutionary bloc, while the governments of Saudi Arabia and Egypt head the opposing status-quo bloc. How anxious are the Saudi and Egyptian populations of the Iranian nuclear weapons buildup? Pechter Polls asked two questions for MEF: “Assuming the Iranian government continues its nuclear enrichment program, would you support an Israeli strike against Iranian nuclear facilities?” and “How about an American strike against the Iranian nuclear facilities?”

In Egypt, 17 percent support an Israeli strike and 25 percent an American one. In Saudi Arabia, the figures, respectively, are 25 and 35 percent. Backing for an Israeli strike is surprisingly strong, for an American one, roughly as I expected. These numbers confirm a just-completed review of polling data by David Pollock of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, who found “strikingly high levels of support—especially among Saudis—for tough action against Iran’s nuclear program.”

These figures suggest that between a sixth and a third of the population in the two most important status-quo countries is agreeable to an Israeli or American attack on the Iranian nuclear infrastructure. Although not a negligible minority, it is small enough to give the Egyptian or Saudi government pause about being associated with a strike on Iran. In particular, giving Israeli forces permission to traverse Saudi airspace would seem to be out of the question.

Israel: The Forum asked, “Islam defines the state of Egypt/Saudi Arabia; under the right circumstances, would you accept a Jewish State of Israel?” In this case, 26 percent of Egyptians and 9 percent of Saudi subjects answered in the affirmative.

As this map showing Arabia in 1923 implies, the modern kingdom of Saudi Arabia contains several historically diverse regions. Click for large version

We posed this question to quantify the heart of the Arab-Israeli conflict, a conflict not about the size of Israel, its resources, armaments, sovereignty over holy sites, or the number of its citizens living on the West Bank. Rather, it concerns the fundamental goal of Zionism, the creation of a state defined by Jewish identity.

To provide context: About 20 percent of Palestinians since the 1920s have been willing to live with Israel in a state of harmony. The Egyptian response exceeds this slightly, the Saudi one comes in substantially below it. These results are in keeping with the more overtly religious nature of political life in Saudi Arabia than in Egypt. They confirm that the main source of anti-Zionism now is no longer nationalism but Islam.

Drilling down into the survey numbers shows little demographic variation (by age, education, etc.). One difference runs along gender lines, with Egyptian females accepting a Jewish state of Israel more than Egyptian males, but just the reverse in Saudi Arabic, something not readily explainable.

Geographic differences in Saudi Arabia are more consequential. Residents in the western part of the country, that closest to Israel, accept it as a Jewish state much more readily than do residents of the more distant central and eastern regions. Conversely, residents in the eastern and central regions are 50 percent more likely to endorse an American strike on nearby Iran than those of the more remote western region.

The Saudi west (Hijaz, Asir) remains true to its pedigree as the most liberal part of the country, whereas the east (Al-Ahsa) has the most Shi’ites and the most fear of Tehran. These regional variations point to the utility of seeing Saudi Arabia not as a homogenous whole but as an amalgam of regions with historically different identities, and perhaps making policy with these distinctions in mind.

In sum, these polling numbers point to a small but not trivial base of constructive views in countries largely hostile to the West and Israel. If this base has few prospects of driving policy anytime soon, it offers a kernel of common sense that, if given suitable attention, can be built upon to foster long-term improvements.

Dr. Ramin Pourandarjani, murdered for speaking out against Iranian government brutality

When spontaneous street demonstrations broke out following the fraudulent Iranian presidential election last June, the Mullahs lost no time in unleashing the security forces and their allied militias upon the protesters. Scores were killed, and images of the carnage made the rounds of YouTube and other outlets.

The demonstrations were crushed. Hundreds of protesters and opposition activists were taken into custody in the brutal crackdown that followed, and the Western media soon lost interest in the story. For those (mostly young people) now in custody, however, their nightmare was just about to begin.

Most of the demonstrators were taken to a prison on the outskirts of Tehran called Kahrizak, where they were subjected to widespread abuse, including rape and torture.

Savage torture.

Ramin Pourandarjani was a 26-year-old doctor working at the prison. He witnessed the abuse of those taken there, and it sickened him. One day, a young protester was brought to him after one such torture session. “He was brought to me in a dreadful state after being subjected to extreme physical torture. He was in a critical state” There was nothing Dr. Pourandarjani could do. The young man died. Security officials forced Dr. Pourandarjani to list meningitis as the cause of death. This was the last straw.

Dr. Pourandarjani could no longer be a pawn of the Mullahs, and began to talk about what he saw. He ultimately ended up testifying before a parliamentary committee as to the abuses he witnessed at Kahrizak, describing how people were being tortured to death there.

Although he didn’t know it at the time, Dr. Pourandarjani had just signed his own death warrant.

One day, a deliveryman dropped off a take-out meal. Dr. Pourandarjani took it to his room, ate it, went into convulsions and died. The salad was poisoned.

Now all the Iranians had to do was cover it up.

Dr. Pourandarjai, they explained, had died in a car accident. Later, they changed the cause of death to cardiac arrest. When his parents and others began to ask questions, the Iranians changed the story yet again: Dr. Pourandarjai, it was announced, had killed himself.

A week after Dr. Pourandarjai’s death, Iran’s top police commander, Ismail Ahmadi Moghaddam, officially announced the cause of death as being a suicide. He said the doctor was facing criminal charges over “failure to fulfill his duties to treat the detainees” and had killed himself in despair in a courthouse lounge. The commander said a note was found with the body. As far as the government is concerned, that is the end of the matter.

Although they have been beaten down, pro-reform demonstrators have not given up. A major anti-government protest is scheduled for Monday, December 7, and Dr. Pourandarjai’s mysterious death has acted as a catalyst by providing one more example of the regime’s brutality.

“I understand now,” said one student planning on attending Monday’s protest, “that we are in a state of war.”

In response, the regime has mobilized its secret police, guards and militias, announcing that it will be looking for “troublemakers” at the protest

Let’s hope they find them. Millions of them.

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The decade-long attempt to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons may have entered the final round on Sunday when Iran announced to the world it intended to build ten new uranium enrichment sites.

“This is really a statement of defiance,” a former senior Israeli atomic official told The Wall Street Journal, “telling the world we are going to go ahead with our nuclear program.”

The Iranian government’s statement came only two days after the world’s major powers condemned Iran’s nuclear program, which, despite Iranian denials, is believed to be producing nuclear weapons. China and Russia joined the United States, France, Britain and Germany to support an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) resolution ordering Iran to stop construction on the uranium enrichment plant near Qom, a secret facility whose existence President Obama revealed last September.

Due to the international criticism, Iranians are now threatening to pull out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and reduce cooperation with the IAEA, the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog. North Korea is the only other country ever to have pulled out of the treaty.

According to news reports, the Iranian decision to thumb their nose at the U.N. and world opinion and construct new nuclear fuel refinement facilities was made Sunday evening at a cabinet meeting chaired by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinijad. The Iranians will start work on five of the new sites within two months and at an unspecified future time on the remaining five.

It is believed the reason for the extra facilities is to allow Iran to build more nuclear bombs. One military analyst says U.N. weapons inspectors and the U.S. Department of Defense are of the opinion Iran currently has enough enriched fuel for one nuclear weapon. Iran would like to have several more in order to present itself as a “credible threat.”

The Iranian announcement signals a defeat for President Obama’s ‘soft’ approach towards the Islamic Republic’s leadership. In an interview with Dubai-based Al-Arabiya satellite television network last January, Obama said Iran’s leaders would find the extended hand of diplomacy if they “unclenched” their fists.

“As I said in my inauguration speech, if countries like Iran are willing to unclench their fist, they will find an extended hand from us,” Obama said.

But as early as March there were already signs that Iran was in no mood to unclench and drop the rock it was holding in the form of its nuclear weapons program. That month, President Obama released a video, wishing the Iranians a happy New Year, which, in Iran, falls on the first day of spring. In return for his friendly overture, the American president received from the Iranian government nothing but a demand for apologies for America’s past transgressions, real or imagined, against Iran.

Sunday’s statement simply proves what most have suspected all along: One cannot talk to the Iranian leaders and that they are simply stringing out negotiations to complete their nuclear arms program. And the fact the Iranians still celebrate the 1979 American embassy seizure every November, a flagrant and criminal breach of international law, shows they do not want to talk to the United States in particular and are still willing to flout international norms.

Essentially, Iran’s leaders are religious fanatics who believe they have been chosen by God to establish a Shiite hegemony over the majority Sunni Islamic world and then, hopefully, over the whole planet. Of the world’s one billion Muslims, about 220 million are minority Shiites, of whom the largest number, about 62 million, live in Iran. Pakistan contains the next largest community of Shiites at 33 million, while India is third with 30 million and Iraq fourth with 18 million.

Iran’s mullah regime sees possessing nuclear weapons as instrumental to its plans for world domination. Nuclear arms would also add significant muscle to Iran’s security in a part of the world where any sign of weakness or vulnerability could be dangerous. Iranians have not forgotten how Iraq took advantage of Iran’s revolutionary turmoil to launch a devastating eight-year war against it in 1980. And like Russia with its former Eastern European satellites, Iran would also use nuclear weapons to intimidate weaker neighbors.

The Asia Times columnist, Spengler (a literary pseudonym), gives another reason why Iran is not afraid to seek confrontation over its nuclear weapons program. Iranian demographics have sunk to West German levels of about 1.6 children per woman, which would make waging a war in 20 years impossible. Iran currently has enough young men to embark on a military adventure, whether internally for nuclear weapons acquisition or externally against the Sunni world, while in twenty years it won’t.

Iran’s heavily-subsidized economy is also imploding. Like Argentina with its 1982 Falkland Islands’ invasion and Germany in 1939, economically it is now or never for Iran to make a grab for the ring. In a year’s time it may be too late, especially if oil prices drop dramatically again. Besides, again like Argentina, a military adventure would probably cause those Iranian people actively opposed to the regime to put aside their economic and political grievances and rally around the country’s leadership in nationalistic pride.

But if Iran wants a fight, it will most likely get one. The Islamic regime’s Holocaust-denying leadership has openly stated it wants to erase Israel from the map. Facing such a naked threat to their country’s existence, one military publication states the Israelis are now openly discussing using a missile attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. While Israel’s Jericho missiles can carry nuclear warheads, they also can be equipped with a conventional warhead. An attack by Israeli warplanes is also a possibility.

The Israelis already have American backing for such a strike if negotiations fail, as they appear to have. American Vice-President Joe Biden said in an ABC interview last July America would not prevent an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. And since the only other option would be a nuclear-armed Iran, the Israelis will now likely ensure this last round ends in a knockout.