IRGC Navy Harasses US Attack Chopper In Persian Gulf

Iran International published a report September 26, detailing information obtained from hundreds of emails by Iranian diplomats showing that three individuals close to US Special Envoy for Iran Robert Malley, were part of a group called the Iran Experts Initiative established by the Iranian foreign ministry to promote Tehran’s interests within the US policy centers. One of this individuals, Ariane Tabatabai is currently the chief of staff of Undersecretary Maier at the defense department.

During a hearing at the Foreign Affairs Committee of the House of Representatives, Congressman Brian Mast (Rep-Fl) asked Maier to answer candidly if Ms. Tabatabai listed on her security questionnaire that she had had any contacts with the Iranian foreign ministry.

Maier replied, “This is an ongoing personnel matter…We are actively looking into whether all law and policy was properly followed in granting my chief of staff top secret special compartmented information.”

The undersecretary and the department’s counsel at the hearing said they were not involved in the security clearance decision making, and did not have information about what Tabatabai answered in related questionnaires, but were looking into this matter.

Rep. Mast asked Maier whether Tabatabai had included anyone from the Iranian foreign ministry as her foreign contacts in her national security questionnaire while seeking security clearance. Maier responded that this was part of their current investigation.

Mast noted that in the national security questionnaire, questions about foreign associates have a statute of limitations of seven years. He asked Maier if he could confirm whether it was possible any contact Tabatabai had with Iranian officials was not listed due to this “seven-year time window.”

However, the investigation by Iran International shows that there was only a period of six years and seven months between the time Ariane Tabatabai was in contact with a top Iranian official and her appointment at the State Department.

Malley recruited Ariane Tabatabai for his State Department team in February 2021.

In an email dated June 27, 2014, Ariane Tabatabai informed Zahrani that she had met in Turkey Saudi Prince Turki al Faisal -- a former ambassador to the US -- and he extended an invitation for her to visit Saudi Arabia and showed interest in collaborating. Tabatabai further inquired "I would like to know your opinion; would you be interested in this?”

She also mentioned that Ben-Gurion University in Israel had invited her to a workshop on arms control and Iran's nuclear program. Ariane Tabatabai asked, " I would like to ask your opinion too and see if you think I should accept the invitation and go.”

Zahrani replied on the same day: “All things considered, it seems Saudi Arabia is a good case, but the second case [Israel] is better to be avoided.”

Iran International's report was a joint project with Semafor and has led to intense Congressional questioning as to how individuals so close to the Biden administration's policy making could have had secret ties with Iran without the knowledge of people who either hired them or had ongoing political ties with them.

Iran Experts Initiative (IEI) is the name of a scheme devised by Iran’s foreign ministry in 2014 to bring together a network of scholars outside Iran to advocate the regime’s foreign policy and nuclear strategy.

“These are troubling allegations about Iran’s attempts to influence US Iran policy,” wrote Sen. Jim Risch, ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, on X. “Potential involvement of Biden Admin officials with the Iran Experts Initiative must be taken seriously & warrants further review.”

Robert Malley, who initially hired Tabatabai at the State Department, was the Biden administration’s special envoy on Iran until late April 2023, when his security clearance was suspended and was then placed on unpaid leave in June 2023 without any explanation from the State Department. It’s not clear if the Iranian influence operation had anything to do with his suspension.

In light of the revelations, Sen. Ted Cruz called on the Biden administration to suspend the clearances of those linked to IEI “until these allegations are fully resolved and accountability is imposed.”

On Wednesday, Republican Senator Bill Hagerty called the story “a complete scandal and outrage”.

In a thread on his X account, the Senator posted a few questions for the Biden administration, including one on Ariane Tabatabai: “Does Ariane Tabatabai, as current COS to Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations/Low-Intensity Conflict, have access to Special Access Programs? If so, did DeptofDefense subject her to further vetting or was that somehow waived by a DoD senior official?”

So far, Democratic lawmakers have been silent about the revelations, but Republicans appear determined to continue investigating and asking questions from the administration.

It marks the third such incident in just a matter of days, with a particular focus on MODAFL installations across Iran. According to the Iranian Ministry of Defense, the incident was played down, described as a fire that was extinguished within one of its battery storage warehouses, causing no casualties.

The ministry released a statement on Thursday, stating, "Following last week's fire in a storage facility linked to our organization, the area was undergoing cleaning procedures when the remaining debris and waste unexpectedly ignited."

Last week, another explosion was contained at the battery warehouse belonging to Iran's Ministry of Defense.

Since July 2020, a series of sabotage acts and drone attacks have targeted sensitive military and industrial installations within Iran. These incidents have included at least three major operations resulting in substantial damage to nuclear facilities.

Iran has attributed these attacks to Israel, while successive Israeli administrations have refrained from publicly acknowledging or accepting responsibility. However, they have consistently issued warnings that Israel would employ all available means, including military actions, to thwart Iran's progress in its nuclear weapons program and the acquisition of such capabilities.

Back in March, the US Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), in cooperation with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), designated four entities and three individuals in Iran and Turkey for their role in procuring equipment, including European-origin unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) engines, in support of Iran's UAV and weapons initiatives. The procurement network operates on behalf of MODAFL, overseeing several firms engaged in UAV and ballistic missile development.

Last week, hardliner Education Minister Reza-Morad Sahrai said "This year [which started in March], nearly 20,000 school principals have been replaced to bring about changes in schools." 

Mansour Haghighatdoust, a conservative political activist, criticized the “purification process” that is seen in almost all state organizations, describing it as “worrisome” that now educators and cultural figures are under the scrutiny of hardliners, fearing for how the sudden mass redundancies will affect children. “How can 20,000 school principals be replaced in a short period?"

Mohsen Borhani, a professor of criminal law at Tehran university, who was recently sacked for criticizing the regime on social media after the execution of four young protesters, told reformist daily Etemad that the order to remove professors critical of the regime was issued about a month after Ebrahim Raisi took office. 

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By protocol, the President of Iran is ex officio the chairman of the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, a hardliner-dominated body with a declared goal of ensuring that the education and culture of Iran remains "100% Islamic." Its duties include working against outside "cultural influences" and ideologies, a pretext that is used to sack academics who do not abide by regime dogma. It is also the body responsible for depriving the Baha'i religious minority of education, forcing university professors into retirement and gender segregation of educational centers. 

Teaching restrictions on Mohammad Soroush Mahallati, a professor of Islamic jurisprudence at Qom seminary, may be a sign that the purge has reached Iran’s seminaries, showing that Iran’s hardliners seek to sideline critics who once were members of their own circles. "These restrictions are clearly because of my critical remarks in speeches and articles, and they intend to dissuade students from engaging with me so that no one has any contact with me," Mahallati said about removing official credits from the courses he teaches at the seminary. 

Although the purge of academics has accelerated since last year’s protests ignited by the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, Borhani said that “based on undeniable documents, the process of purging academics had been planned long before the protests and is now being implemented.”

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Raisi embarked on his ‘purification’ in the first month of his tenure, expelling Bijan Abdolkarimi, an associate professor in the Department of Philosophy at the Islamic Azad University. However, Borhani claims that the firing of professors is based on the systematic plan that was started in former hardliner governments, and Raisi just made the best use of Women, Life, Freedom protests as a momentum to expedite the process. 

Since the uprising began in September last year, a large number of academics voiced solidarity with protesters and once the unrest was quelled, the Raisi administration intensified the crackdown, pushing professors into early retirement, not renewing teaching contracts, cancelling classes without prior notice, removing and suspending professors, and reducing monthly salaries. Tens of professors have also been summoned or temporarily detained.

In August, Etemad published a list of 157 tenured professors who were dismissed, forced into retirement, or banned from teaching for their criticism and dissenting views from 2006 to the end of August 2023. Of the 157 previously announced names, 58 were removed during Ebrahim Raisi's administration. The daily published another article to add 52 more names, illustrating the continuing effort by hardliners to eliminate dissenting voices from academia.

The purge of university professors in the past 17 years went beyond that, when non-tenured lecturers were replaced by "religious" and "revolutionary" professors. The trend started after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took office and continued in Hassan Rouhani’s administration. Continuing into the Raisi era, it has seen successive governments in the Islamic Republic systematically expelling seasoned professors for their "secular views," among other political reasons.

According to a report from the Ministry of Science, Research, and Technology in 2013, during Ahmadinejad's presidency, approximately 17,000 new faculty members were added to universities payroll. Such a move is speculated to be repeated as President Raisi plans to add 15,000 "revolutionary" professors to the academic faculty of universities nationwide.

The online ticket sales process for Sepahan's match against Saudi's Al Ittihad club in the second week of the AFC Champions League began without any provisions for female spectators, a move that clearly contradicts AFC regulations.

The incident occurred despite announcements from Iran's Football Federation regarding the readiness of Naqsh-e Jahan Stadium's infrastructure in Esfahan for accommodating women. Also, Sepahan's matches in Iran's Premier League have taken place without the presence of women.

The issue of women's presence in stadiums outside of Tehran has become increasingly controversial in recent years. FIFA has long advocated for women's access to stadiums, but Iran's Football Federation and other relevant entities persistently delayed its full implementation.

Iran had banned female spectators from stadiums for years, citing religious decency rules. The ban resulted in numerous arrests, beatings, detentions, and abuses against women.

The Iranian regime's handling of women's participation in football matches has also drawn international scrutiny. While there were some limited concessions granted last year, allowing controlled entry, the government's response to nationwide protests eventually led to the revocation of this privilege, resulting in months of matches conducted without spectators.

MP Mahmoud Ahmadi Bighash said the primary aim of the move is to formalize the presence of millions of illegal Afghan nationals in Iran, though it is understood to be a means of bolstering regime support and a declining population, amid a mass exodus of Iranians fleeing the country.

He admitted that “there is a lack of a comprehensive strategy to regulate and address the illegal entry of Afghans into Iran", where many come to work as economic migrants.

"The government appears to be inclined towards facilitating their entry and long-term residence, disregarding the extensive social, security, political, economic, and cultural repercussions stemming from the presence of over 8 to 10 million Afghans in Iran,” he said this week.

The issue of unlawful entry of Afghans into Iran is not a recent concern, the unregulated and unrestrained flow of Afghan nationals across the Iranian borders only intensifying since the takeover of the Taliban two years ago, prompting growing apprehension.

While the Islamic Republic may be considering accepting more Afghan Hazaras, who share Shiite beliefs with Iranians, there is a concern that an influx of Sunni migrants could potentially alter the demographic balance in the country.

Currently, Sunni Muslims constitute around 10 percent of Iran's nearly 88-million population. Hazaras make up the largest ethnic group among Afghan immigrants to Iran, followed by Sunni Tajiks, Pashtuns, and Uzbeks.