For Americans fed a diet of rhetoric about Iran that constantly links it to the sending, not the receiving, end of terrorism—in which “the leading state sponsor of terrorism” is the adjectival phrase routinely affixed to Iran, and in which official rhetoric such as President Trump’s speech in Riyadh mashes Iran together with Sunni Islamist terrorism of the Islamic State (ISIS or IS) variety into one undifferentiated blob of evil—the deadly attacks today in Tehran generate much cognitive
On Sunday, just hours after three men launched an assault on London Bridge, British Prime Minister Theresa May stepped in front of 10 Downing Street and told the world, “We believe we are experiencing a new trend in the threat we face.” In many ways, the attack in the British capital, as well as others over the past two years in Nice, Berlin, Stockholm, Paris, and Manchester, actually weren’t all that unique in terms of tactics, targets, or even motive. A century ago, a battered horse-drawn
A meeting in the European Parliament on 30 May discussed the problems associated with the Mojahedin Khalq Organisation (MEK) both inside the Parliament and across Europe and the wider world.
The meeting, which was attended by MEPs, researchers and analysts along with representatives of agencies outside the parliament such as security personnel, was organised by Ana Gomes, SND (Portugal) and seconded by Marietje Schaake, ALDE (Netherlands) and Michael Gahler, Christian Democrats (Germany).
You are about to enter the ultimate minefield.
Let’s start with 28 EU leaders discussing the Western Balkans at a recent summit and blaming – what else – "Russian aggression" in the EU’s backyard.
Cue to a Montenegro prosecutor raging that "Russian state bodies" staged a coup attempt during the October 2016 elections to stop the country from joining NATO.
And cue to President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker warning that Donald Trump’s anti-EU rhetoric could lead to war in the
Right-wing, anti-Iranian figures and media in the United States have begun circulating claims that Iran had violated the JCPOA that resulted from the P5+1 nuclear negotiations, and indeed has a nuclear weapons program. Various pro-Israeli and anti-Iranian voices in the US echoed this claim. Mark Toner was even asked about the allegations during a press briefing in April.
The source for this allegation was the National Council of Resistance of Iran, a front group for the Mujahadeen E-Khalq
On a scale of one to seven — one being not at all and seven being very much — how similar do you think you are to a terrorist?
When Boston College researchers asked hundreds of students this question, they noticed that the ones who had been taught about terrorists found it easier to relate to them — an outlook that they say could help improve policy against terrorism.
Researchers of the study “Know Thy Enemy: Education About Terrorism Improves Social Attitudes Toward Terrorists,” which was
According to news reports, the Trump administration is weighing the option of designating the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO). In parallel, Congress also seems to be taking steps in that direction. Some of the most hawkish and ideological elements of the American foreign-policy establishment, as well as hardcore opponent of the nuclear agreement such as United Against Nuclear Iran and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, have long
Despite his rhetoric as a hard man against terror, Trump is happy to do business with governments that have links to extremists. President-elect Donald Trump has gone out of his way to portray himself as a hard man in the fight against terror.
He’d “quickly and decisively bomb the hell” out of the Islamic State (IS), he has claimed, and he’d even deploy US troops into Iraq – as many as 20,000-30,000, to “knock them out fast”.
He has threatened to ban oil imports from Saudi Arabia and other Arab
Donald Trump is proving himself a President prone to unleashing inconvenient truths side by side with blatant falsehoods. One of the most scurrilous of those falsehoods is his recent claim that Iran is the “number one terrorist state.”
Throughout his campaign for the White House in 2016, and since assuming office in January, Trump has made Iran the focus of his ire, to the point where the Iranians are more than justified in preparing for the very real prospect of military confrontation with the
If there's one thing that the United States truly excels at — aside from diabetes and predatory lending — it's psychological projection.
For those uninitiated in this ancient art, psychological projection "involves projecting undesirable feelings or emotions onto someone (or something) else, rather than admitting to or dealing with the unwanted feelings." It's a defense mechanism to avoid dealing with your own bullshit, to put it simply.
So, for example, when you terrorize half a dozen
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — An official in U.S. President Donald Trump's Cabinet and at least one of his advisers gave paid speeches for organizations linked to an Iranian exile group that killed Americans before the 1979 Islamic Revolution, ran donation scams and saw its members set themselves on fire over the arrest of their leader.
Elaine Chao, confirmed this week as Trump's transportation secretary, received $50,000 in 2015 for a five-minute speech to the political wing of the
For the past two weeks we have discussed the opportunities and challenges facing al Qaeda and the Islamic State in the year ahead. As we examined these groups, we largely focused on their core leaders and franchises. But both jihadist organizations seek to inspire grassroots terrorists around the world as well, and though they have recently seen many setbacks, their calls to action will not go unanswered.
Grassroots jihadists are homegrown operatives who think globally but act locally. They
On December 14, Tom Suárez spoke at The House of Lords, London, at the invitation of Baroness Jenny Tonge. Drawing from his recently published book State of Terror, he addressed the centennial of the Balfour Declaration and his views on the way toward ending today’s Israel-Palestine “conflict”. The following are Suárez’s remarks. The book was reviewed here by David Gerald Fincham.
Good evening, thank you so much for taking time out of what I know are your busy schedules to be here now. My
In the wake of the attack on a Christmas market in Berlin, Muslims are bracing for the next round of accusations. As more details concerning the possible motivation and origin of the perpetrator begin to emerge, Muslims in Germany know what is coming.
Last Monday evening we all had something in common. We had the same burning questions on our minds. Is it a terrorist attack? Is the perpetrator a refugee? A Muslim? So it is an Islamist act of terrorism?
Yet the brief shared moment is already
By framing the war with ISIS in explicitly religious, them-against-us rhetoric, he's playing right into the extremists' hands
ISIS may be losing ground in Iraq and Syria, but things are very much moving its way on the next battleground: The realm of terror attacks like the truck rampage in Berlin. The group thrives on the kind of clash-of-civilizations rhetoric frequently invoked by populist politicians across the West – especially President-elect Donald Trump, who as a candidate famously
An article published in the Washington Times Security section claims that (yet again) the Mojahedin Khalq (aka MKO, MEK, NCRI, Rajavi cult, Saddam’s Private Army) has provided intelligence to the West on Iranian crimes and atrocities. However, in terms of actual intelligence revelations, the article should more properly have sat in the Opinion section.
In this post-truth era, it almost goes without saying that facts and fiction rub shoulders in most of the articles reporting on Syria and
When it comes to claiming attacks, the Islamic State seems to believe in the old advertising adage that there's no such thing as bad publicity. The group apparently feels that the very mention of its involvement in an attack, successful or otherwise, will serve to fuel public panic — a strategy that has proved effective. No matter how inept an attacker or how ineffective an assault, the Islamic State is quick to take credit, even where credit does not appear due. One such example is a recent
Rudy Giuliani is reportedly a top candidate for Secretary of State. There are also reports that Giuliani’s business dealings may prevent him from being nominated to the post, and I hope those are true, because Giuliani would be in some ways even worse than Bolton.
Bolton is a hard-liner and an ideologue, and he would be a disastrous Secretary of State, but Giuliani shares the same flaws but has absolutely no relevant experience. If Bolton has been a sometime MEK booster, Giuliani has been
A senior Al-Qaeda operative told a parole board at Guantanamo Bay that Saudi Arabia’s lauded “rehabilitation” center, which uses art therapy other methods to de-radicalize convicted terrorists, in reality appears to be a “hidden radicalization program.”
“You guys want to send me back to Saudi Arabia because you believe there is a de-radicalization program on the surface. True. You are 100 percent right, there is a strong… externally, a strong de-radicalization program,” a Saudi detainee at
This November 28th is the sixth anniversary of the assassination of leading Iranian nuclear scientist Majid Shahriari, whose death represented a particularly disgraceful episode in the attempts made by Israel’s Mossad intelligence service to interfere with and damage Iran’s peaceful nuclear research program. Shahriari, who reportedly had no connection to any possible military applications in his research, was the most prominent of the four Iranian nuclear scientists and technicians who were