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HOUSTON: The Zoroastrian Association of Houston celebrated the Grand Opening of the first fire Temple to be built outside India, Pakistan and Iran and included the Navroze (the Iranian New Year heralding the first day of Spring) in 5 days of celebrations from March 20 to 24. The Bhandara Atash Kadeh (fire temple) is a new addition on the site of the vast ZAH grounds on West Airport near the Beltway and is a result of decades of planning and was made possible by the generous donation of Feroze and Shernaz Bhandara. Vada Dasturji Khurshed Dastoor (High Priest of Iranshah in...

Tonight San Bruno police identified the shooter at YouTube's HQ as Nasim Aghdam, a 39-year-old woman from San Diego and said there is no evidence she knew the victims or that they were specifically targeted. While the sources have not confirmed a reason behind the attack, now that her name is known we've found a number of videos from her posted on YouTube and other sites saying that she was a vegan athlete and animal rights activist.In several videos posted over the last year or so, she angrily spoke about the company's policies, saying they were filtering her videos so...

My 3-year-old daughter is obsessed with Donald Trump. This is a problem if 1) you live in New York City, 2) you are liberal, 3) your friends are liberal, 4) your daughter attends a liberal school and 5) your relatives are affected by the Trump administration’s travel ban. Yassi, my daughter, attends the kind of school that made counseling available in the wake of the 2016 presidential elections. Parents stood together comforting one another on Nov. 9 in an act of collective mourning that I hadn’t seen since Sept. 11. This is probably exactly the type of school that the...

President Trump on Wednesday marked the Persian new year, Nowruz, amid heightened tensions between the U.S. and Iran. “To the Iranian people and all those around the world celebrating Nowruz: On behalf of the American people, I wish you freedom, dignity, and wealth,” Trump said in a statement. The president recognized Iranian-Americans as “one of the most successful immigrant groups in our country’s contemporary history” who “share an affection for their ancestral heritage” despite their diverse religious backgrounds.

WASHINGTON — When President Trump sent greetings to the Iranian people on Wednesday for the Persian New Year, or Nowruz, it offered a glimpse into an administration that is still debating how to deal with a country that Mr. Trump has painted as an implacable foe. The five-paragraph statement went through multiple drafts, according to two people involved in the process. Hard-liners in the White House first tried to kill the message, and when that failed, stripped it of references to engaging with the Iranian government or a future in which Iran and the United States might peacefully coexist. Instead,...

An award-winning Iranian nuclear scientist, who disappeared last year under mysterious circumstances, has defected to the CIA and been resettled in the United States, according to people briefed on the operation by intelligence officials. Shahram Amiri, a nuclear physicist in his early 30s, went missing last June three days after arriving in Saudi Arabia on a pilgrimage, according to the Iranian government. The officials were said to have termed the defection of the scientist, Shahram Amiri, "an intelligence coup" in the continuing CIA operation to spy on and undermine Iran's nuclear program. A spokesperson for the CIA declined to comment....

For $250,”friends” — or $1000 for a “champion” (photo included) — you too can attend a fundraiser with Chelsea Clinton for her mother at the home of Michael and Sholeh Chegini in Newport Coast, California, according to an invitation to the event obtained by Right Turn. Michael Chegini served on the board of directors and thereafter the advisory board of the National Iranian American Council (NIAC), a notorious group with links to the Iranian regime that opposed, among other things, any sanctions on Iran. “The Clintons never miss an opportunity to put money ahead of principle,” a spokesman for the Republican Jewish Coalition...

The Justice Department has settled with an Iranian-American immigration judge who alleged that her superiors had ordered her not to hear cases involving Iranian nationals.

President Barack Obama is nominating a major fundraiser for his presidential campaign to be the next U.S. ambassador to Sweden. The White House says Azita Raji is Obama’s pick for the job. She’s a former investment banker who served as national vice-chair of finance for Obama’s 2012 campaign. She helped raise more than $500,000 for Obama’s campaign as a “bundler” in 2012. …

CIA goes hiring in heart of Arab America Fri Nov 27, 2009 10:43am EST By Soyoung Kim DEARBORN, Michigan (Reuters) - At Tuhama's Lebanese deli in Dearborn, and at bakeries and barbershops throughout town, it's no secret the CIA is looking for a few good spies. "There is a lot of talk, and nobody likes it," said Hamze Chehade, a 48-year-old Lebanese-American, taking a bite of his chicken shawarma. In dire need of agents fluent in Arabic, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency has made an unusual public show of its recruiting effort in Dearborn -- a city of 100,000 with...

An Iranian-American scholar, Kian Tajbakhsh, is facing a new charge of spying. A judge read new charges against him of “spying for the George Soros foundation,” a reference to the Open Society Institute, a pro-democracy group founded by Mr. Soros, a prominent financier and philanthropist. He was sentenced in October to 15 years for working as a consultant for the Open Society Institute, which the indictment identified as an adjunct of the C.I.A. Tehran has accused the Open Society Institute of trying to stage a “velvet revolution” in Iran along the lines of the Orange Revolution in Ukraine and the...

Since his arrest last July -- he was accused of helping to plan the post-election uprisings -- Kian's family and friends have made countless appeals for clemency to the Iranian government, written letters to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad pleading his innocence, and signed dozens of petitions. All to no avail. I've come now to realize that the regime probably thinks we're obtuse. Indeed, they know better than anyone that Kian is an innocent man. As the expression goes in Persian, "da'va sar-e een neest," i.e. that's not what this fight is about.

TORONTO — When Kian Tajbakhsh went before a judge in Tehran on Sunday he had several reasons to think he would be released. Instead, to his utter shock, he was given a 15-year prison term. Since being detained in July, Mr. Tajbakhsh, an Iranian-American scholar, had been permitted two home visits, the last on Oct. 15, when he appeared hopeful that he would be released soon, a family member said. He said he had been transferred recently to a villa on the compound of the Evin prison, a sign of leniency that he thought suggested his release was imminent. Mr....

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Hassan Nemazee, a fund-raiser for Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and other Democrats, has been indicted for defrauding Bank of America, HSBC and Citigroup Inc out of more than $290 million in loan proceeds, U.S. prosecutors said on Monday. The announcement follows last month's indictment of Nemazee, head of a private equity firm and an Iranian American Political Action Committee board member, on one count of defrauding Citigroup's Citibank. The new indictment adds allegations that he defrauded two other banks, Bank of America and HSBC Bank USA, in a similar fashion by falsifying documents and signatures to...

Video of Iranian-Americans Rally in Dallas, Texas in support of pro-Democracy movement in Iran. Chants are "down with Khamenei" "don't be afraid we are all together". Video here: Here

Hassan Nemazee, a multimillionaire Iranian-American investment banker and top Democratic Party fundraiser, was arrested today by federal law enforcement authorities in New York City and charged with engaging in criminal fraud for his role in arranging a $74 million dollar loan from Citibank, Bloomberg reported. U.S. Attorney Prett Bharara in New York City and FBI investigators told Dow Jones Newswires the 59-year-old Namazee applied for the Citibank loans for Nemazee Capital Corp. by giving Citibank "numerous documents that purported to establish the existence of accounts in Nemazee's name at various financial institutions containing many hundreds of millions of dollars." According...

Hundreds of protesters, many of them Iranian-Americans, marched from Capitol Hill to the White House on Saturday, most holding Iranian flags and chanting demands for the U.S. to more take action after Iran's disputed election. Hundreds of protesters, many of them Iranian-Americans, marched from Capitol Hill to the White House on Saturday, most holding Iranian flags and chanting demands for the U.S. to more take action after Iran's disputed election. After marching through several blocks of downtown Washington, more than 200 people rallied in front of the White House. They shouted demands for President Obama and leaders of other countries...

******* Maryam Yusefzadeh, a management consultant in Minneapolis, said she objected bitterly to the rule of Iran’s mullahs. She has not returned to Iran since leaving in 1975. “I simply can’t accept some man telling me to cover my head because he can’t control his penis,” she said. “It just won’t fly with me.” The theocratic regime had blatantly stolen the presidential election and was intent on “destroying the people” of Iran. Mr Obama’s softly softly approach, however, was wise. “The good aspect is that he didn’t walk in there like the typical American cowboy bullying his way in.” Western-style...

A teenager's story, with graphic photos, of abuse at the hands of Iran's religious paramilitaries, the Basij Editor's note: Salon has obtained an e-mail, written in Farsi, circulating among Iranian American activists that tells the story of a 17-year-old boy who says he was tortured by government agents in Tehran. [snip] "All of a sudden agents in black uniforms and helmets carrying batons broke the door and entered. We tried to hide behind the big trash bin at the end of the parking but one of them saw us, whistled and informed the rest of them who were just leaving...

With Iranians demonstrating daily to protest their disputed presidential election, the Iranian-American community has also taken to the streets in major U.S. cities, including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Boston and Washington. Sheida Jafari was among several hundred Iranian-Americans who gathered last week in front of a Washington office that houses the Iranian Interests Section to protest what they viewed as rigged election results that gave a landslide victory to incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad over challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi. "For me, it's more about showing my solidarity with all my friends in Iran, my family in Iran, everyone who...