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His first impulse was to dismiss the ominous email as a prank, says a young Iranian-American named Koosha. It warned the 29-year-old engineering student that his relatives in Tehran would be harmed if he didn't stop criticizing Iran on Facebook. Two days later, his mom called. Security agents had arrested his father in his home in Tehran and threatened him by saying his son could no longer safely return to Iran. "When they arrested my father, I realized the email was no joke," said Koosha, who asked that his full name not be used. Tehran's leadership faces its biggest crisis...

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has labeled the Iran regime as “weaker than people think” and that is susceptible to international pressure. Speaking with Wolf Blitzer of CNN, the Prime Minister said, “The Iranian people detest this regime, as has been plainly evident in the recent election fraud. But, equally, I think that Iran is susceptible because its economy is susceptible. And the time for pressure is now, with or without talks.”

When a tyrannical regime dies, you can see the symptoms in the little things. Late Friday afternoon, after millions (yes, millions–this according to Le Monde, France 2, and L’Express, with the BBC saying that the demonstrations were bigger than those at the time of the Revolution) of Greens mobbed the streets and squares of more than thirty towns and cities to call for the end of the regime, there was a soccer game in Azadi Stadium in Tehran. It holds about a hundred thousand fans, and it was full of men wearing green and carrying green balloons. When state-run tv...

TEHRAN — Gunmen shot dead a prominent Iranian cleric on Thursday in the northwest province of Kurdistan, the official IRNA news agency reported, in the latest attack to shake the region. Mullah Mohammed Sheikh Olislam, who represents the province in Iran's top clerical body the Assembly of Experts, was shot twice in the head by unknown attackers at a mosque in Sanandaj, Kurdistan's main city.

A wealthy investment banker and prominent fundraiser for President Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and other top Democrats was arrested Tuesday on charges he lied to get a $74 million business loan that -- once confronted by authorities -- he hastily repaid. Prosecutors accused Hassan Nemazee of giving Citibank documents showing he owned millions of dollars in collateral. They said the documents were "fraudulent and forged." A Clinton spokesman didn't immediately return an e-mail message seeking comment. The chairman and chief executive of Manhattan-based Nemazee Capital Corp. served as national finance chairman for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign in 2008, and later...

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...

It's a red letter day in contemporary US history. Joe Biden is right for the first time in his adult life. He predicted that zero would be tested in his first six months in office and, yepper, it's happening. So, let's look at the test results. We've got russian nuclear submarines off our coast. I don't remember the last time that that happened, but don't worry, they're probably just fishing. We've got NKs kidnapping American lefty reporters and putting them in gulags. Let's face it, they wouldn't be working for algore if they were not on the far left and...

Another Iran Video: Iranian Friday leader aligned with the hard-line regime directing crowd to chant "down with U.S.", Iranian people defiantly respond "Down with dictator", "Down with Russia". Iranian people have blamed Russia for its support of Ahmadinejad/Khamenei. Link here

Another eyewitness account, emailed to us from a very close friend. Made my way down the west side of Laleh Park, large crowd was gathered around a radio listening to Rafi give the sermons, moved down to Keshavarz Blvd, where people had already started to taunt the bassijis who look like teenagers with Darth Vader helmets that was one size too big for them. The main slogans were “Baradar’e basiji chera Baradr Koshi” (”Brother basiji, why do you kill your brother?”, the speaker after Rafi was urging people to shout “death to America” and “death to Israel” people responded in...

Tear gas was still wafting through the streets of Tehran when, at a June 23 White House press conference, The Huffington Post's Nico Pitney conveyed an Iranian's question to President Obama: "Under which conditions would you accept the election of [Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad? And if you do accept it without any significant changes in the conditions there, isn't that a betrayal of what the demonstrators there are working towards?" Obama avoided a direct answer, saying only that the Iranian government should "recognize that there is a peaceful path that will lead to stability and legitimacy and prosperity," and expressing hope that...

Demonstrations in the wake of Iran's presidential election are a sign that country's dissidents want the U.S. to get involved in the disputed contest, Sen. Kit Bond (R-Mo.) asserted Monday. Bond, the ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, pushed back against President Obama's claim that the election is not a U.S. issue, and urged the administration to speak out more forcefully in favor of Iranian dissidents."We didn't have anything to do with this uprising; we're not trying to tell them who they should select," Bond said on CNBC Monday morning. "But when they have such obvious election fraud and...

BELGIAN POLICE ARE HOLDING IRANIAN WHO SAYS WAS INVOLVED IN PLOT TO BOMB PASSENGER PLANE IN BELGIUM -PROSECUTORS

SNIPPET: "The survey was conducted by KA Europe SPRL, a privately owned research company. Telephone interviews, conducted in Farsi, involved a random sample of 1,001 adult Iranians from May 11-20. The poll has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points. The company says more than 90 percent of Iranians have landline telephones."

(IsraelNN.com) Iranian protestors threw a show at Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as he was riding to speak in a presidential campaign speech, according to Iranian blogs. His convoy sped away from the scene, but supporters of Ahmadinejad called the report a false rumor.

(IsraelNN.com) The following is Part II of an interview Israel National News conducted in recent days with Amil Imani, an Iranian-born pro-democracy activist currently living in North America. The discussion focused on an effort to understand Iran at this critical time in history. INN: What do you think would be the reaction of Iranians to an Israeli attack to take out the nuclear sites in Iran? The mullahs are highly vulnerable, given the ruin they have visited upon Iran and their stone-age discriminatory practices. Imani: It would be a mixed reaction outcome which would not be easy to envisage. Some...

As fears grow over Iran secretly developing nuclear weapons, U.S. counterintelligence officials are keeping a close eye on scientists from Iran and other Muslim nations working at the U.S. nuclear weapons laboratories, WND has learned. The Energy Department recently revoked the security clearance of an Egyptian-born nuclear physicist because he was suspected of "conflicting allegiances." Last year, DOE and FBI agents began questioning Moniem El-Ganayni, who worked on the side as a Muslim prison chaplain.

U.S. troops release Iranians detained in Iraq Military hands 7 over to Iraqi authorities hours after their apprehension BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. troops released seven Iranians early Wednesday, hours after detaining them at a central Baghdad hotel, an Iranian embassy official said. The Iranian diplomat, who refused to give his name, told The Associated Press that one of those released contacted the embassy Wednesday morning to say that they have been handed over to Iraqi authorities. American troops raided Baghdad’s Sheraton Ishtar hotel and took away a group of about 10 people late Tuesday. The diplomat said the seven Iranians...

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iranian operatives are training fighters in Iraq and helping to plan attacks there despite diplomatic pressure on Tehran to halt such interference, U.S. officials said on Wednesday. The latest accusation leveled against Iran by the U.S. military followed rare diplomatic talks in Baghdad last month between the two old adversaries to discuss Washington's concerns in Iraq. "There absolutely is evidence of Iranian operatives holding weapons, training fighters, providing resources, helping plan operations, resourcing secret cells that is destabilizing Iraq," said military spokesman Brigadier-General Kevin Bergner. "We would like very much to see some action on their part...

~~~snip~~~ The capture of the British sailors raised several questions. For example, why wasn't their ship, the HMS Cornwall, within range of their operation, so as to provide cover for the rubber inflatable boats (RIBs) from which the boarding teams were operating? Why did the British helicopter tasked with loitering over the RIBs during the boarding operation leave its station? Why did fourteen armed British fighting men, and one woman, simply give in, and decide, in the words of Royal Marine Captain Chris Air, that "fighting back was simply not an option?" Most of all, though, the question raised by...

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) A group of Iranian lawmakers wants to create a "friendship committee" that would open contacts with the U.S. Congress - an unprecedented attempt to build ties at a time when Iran's hard-line leadership also appears willing to talk with the country's No. 1 enemy. Proponents hope the effort, for which they were gathering petition signatures Tuesday, will be condoned by Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has final say in national matters. Contacts between the countries have long been taboo, a status enforced by Iran's top leadership - made up of Shiite clerics - since the...

Tehran's release of 15 Britons may have been a gift, as its president claims, but the standoff is a gift for the captors: The incident pushes oil prices higher and brings the Iranians millions in additional revenue. So, what did Iran get out of holding on to 15 British sailors and marines for some 10 days? A lot of attention from the West, that's for sure -- and possibly an extra $167 million in oil revenue. No, there wasn't a ransom paid, but the standoff did push the price of crude oil abruptly higher around the world.

A Palestinian source has said that the Iranian general nabbed in Gaza by Palestinian security officers supervised the manufacturing weapons and explosives for Hamas. The source told Ynet on Friday that the expert was in charge of several labs in the university, mainly chemistry labs in which he instructed Hamas activists, most of them women, manufacturing the explosives. At least five Iranian citizens were arrested during a raid at the Islamic University, a Hamas stronghold in Gaza City. One of the Iranians committed suicide during the raid. Six to nine Palestinians were killed in the raid, sources said. The raid...

Palestinian security arrested seven Iranian citizens during a raid at the Islamic University, a Hamas stronghold in Gaza City, a security official said, and another committed suicide during the raid. The raid came during a large-scale assault by Fatah-affiliated gunmen on the university. A Hamas official denied the claim and said there were no Iranian citizens at the university. The raid came at the end of a day of clashes that collapsed a three-day truce between the warring factions. Iran has supplied Hamas with funds, but there have been no previous claims of Iranians working with Hamas in Gaza.

Iranians 'trained Shia militants' By Damien McElroy Last Updated: 12:38am GMT 15/01/2007 Tensions between Washington and Teheran deepened yesterday after the American military accused five Iranians detained by its forces in Iraq of helping to supply cash, weapons and training to Shia militias on behalf of the Iranian regime. Iran rejected the claims of collusion with Iraq's Shia Muslim militants and demanded the release of the officials, who were stationed at a liaison office in Irbil, the capital of Kurdish northern Iraq. Condoleezza Rice: America would no longer tolerate Teheran's support for armed groups in Iraq A statement from the...

WASHINGTON, Dec. 27, 2006 – Several Iranian nationals were detained in recent coalition raids conducted in Iraq’s capital city, a senior U.S. military officer said in Baghdad today. Two Iranians were among eight other suspects detained during a coalition raid at a Baghdad site Dec. 21, Army Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV, Multinational Force Iraq spokesman, told reporters. The early-morning operation was based on intelligence information, Caldwell said, noting documents, maps, photographs, and videos were also confiscated. “Debriefings of these detainees and investigation of the seized materials have yielded intelligence that link perhaps some of them to some...

Tehran: Iranians voted on Friday for local councils and a powerful clerical body in the first electoral test since 2005 for President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The vote for city and rural councils and the Assembly of Experts is to show if the president’s rivals are regaining popularity. Witnesses said that Ahmadinejad waited in line for about half an hour to vote at a mosque in east Tehran. In the Tehran race, the conservative camp is split between Ahmadinejad's backers and supporters of Tehran mayor Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf. Results will depend on the turnout of Iran's 46.5 million eligible voters, who will...

"The Muslims of America need to get organized and make sure they get out to vote for Democrats for both the House and the Senate. … Every Muslim in the Middle East who has a relative in the U.S. should get the message across to their relatives." — Skip Conover, host on Muslim-American Bridges TV, Arab News, October 19 As the November 7 midterm elections approach, Iranian and Arab officials and journalists are hoping the Democrats will win control of the House and Senate. It should be noted that before the 2004 elections, they also overwhelmingly predicted and rooted for...

In the midst of the war of words between Iran and the United States and a hot war between Teheran-backed Hizbullah and US ally Israel, young Iranian readers are finding inspiration from the works of American novelist Richard Brautigan. Azadeh Azizi said she was enchanted by the author's "Trout Fishing in America" as she paged through the book while sitting on the doorsteps of a downtown Tehran bookstore on Tuesday. "I love Brautigan's work. His pen feeds my appetite for knowing about my own mind, society and the world," the 17-year-old high school student said. Poet and novelist Brautigan, a...

Kurdish villagers are fleeing their homes in northern Iraq after shelling and incursions by Iranian forces and a massive build-up of Turkish troops as both countries move to crush separatist guerrillas. Government leaders in Iraqi Kurdistan say Iran has attacked Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) guerrillas in Iraq three times in the past two weeks, and Turkey insists it has the right under military law to carry out cross-border operations if need be. The PKK, seeking a Kurdish homeland including southeastern Turkey, accuses Ankara and Tehran of mounting coordinated operations against the group and its Iranian wing, PJAK. About 60 of...

LONDON, April 26 (IranMania) - Thousands of religious hardliners chanting "Death to America" gathered in Iran's central desert to celebrate a failed US hostage rescue mission 26 years ago, AFP reported. The anniversary of the US military debacle came amid a mounting war of words with Washington, reported to be mulling the use of force to rein in the Islamic republic's disputed nuclear programme. Iranian officials used the occasion to tell US leaders that they risked yet more "divine intervention" if they dared to again set foot on Iranian soil. "The Tabas incident should act as a reminder to US...

By stating his wish to see Ariel Sharon, “the criminal of Sabra and Shatilla dead and joining his ancestors”, the news Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad demonstrated that not only he is genuinely anti-Semite, but he has not the slightest human compassion and feeling. "Hopefully, the news that the criminal of Sabra and Chatilla has joined his ancestors is final", the extravagant, islamo-populist Ahmadinejad told hard line religious students in the holy city of Qom, known as the “cradle” of militant Shi’ism, where he took his cabinet for meeting on Thursday. His remark were so shocking that most of Iranian press,...

DUBAI, Dec 31 (Reuters) - A little-known Sunni rebel organisation says it has abducted nine Iranian soldiers to pressure Tehran to free imprisoned members of the group, Al Arabiya television said on Sunday. A caller speaking for the Jundollah (God's Soldiers) said the soldiers were seized near Iran's border with Pakistan, and demanded the release of 16 group members, the satellite television channel said. Iranian officials were not immediately available to comment. In July, the group said it beheaded an Iranian security agent it had abducted the previous month. Iran's remote southeastern areas on the border with Pakistan have seen...

China's government yesterday demanded that the Bush administration lift sanctions imposed on six companies on charges of illicit sales to Iran, saying the action undermined Beijing's cooperation with the United States. New details of the arms-related transfers were disclosed yesterday, including two chemical shipments from India to Iran, and Tehran's purchase of 800 high-powered sniper rifles from an Austrian gun maker. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters in Beijing that the sanctions were unjustified and should be lifted.

The take of Iran’s conservative media on an article published last week in the German magazine Spiegel once again highlighted their disconnection with the real world, especially on issues relating to Palestine. Spiegel published a satirical article on Iranian president Ahmadinejad’s suggestion of moving Israel and the Jews to Europe, which in itself was received with chuckles and cynicism in Europe. But the conservative press in Iran and even the influential newspaper Resalat devoted its main headline (issue no 23) to the Spiegel’s article, referencing it as a “document attesting the righteousness of president Ahmadinejad’s suggestion.” In this article, I...

The Greater and Lesser Tunbs and Abu-Musa Islands are situated near the Straight of Hurmuz in the Persian Gulf, south of Iran. The Lesser Tunb is 22 miles from the mainland of Iran. The Lesser Tunb is 17 miles from the Iranian land. Both of them are not able to sustain living and they had never inhabitants. Abu- Musa is the home for a limited number of people (less than 50 households). The Greater and Lesser Tunbs and Abu-Musa Islands have been part of Iran since the times immemorial. In the Nineteenth Century, they were parts of the "Lengheh Territory"...

Maryam swept expertly down the mountainside before swivelling to a halt, sending a spray of snow over her male companion who was waiting for her by the chair lift at the base of the slope. The 21-year-old lifted her Raybans from her eyes, ran her fingers through her bleached blonde tresses and leant towards him for a congratulatory kiss. Such coquettish behaviour, although officially banned, has become commonplace on the ski-slopes of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The country's middle classes fear that under the hardline fundamentalist presidency of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was elected in June, their freedoms will soon...

Iran's hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has packed his government with former security and intelligence officials responsible for serious human rights abuses, including the killing of thousands of dissidents in Iranian jails, a leading human rights group said yesterday. After Mr Ahmadinejad caused renewed international outrage by calling the Nazi Holocaust of Jews a "myth", a report by Human Rights Watch, based in New York, took aim at his hardline cabinet - in particular the new interior minister, Mustafa Pour-Mohammadi. Mr Pour-Mohammadi, a notorious former deputy intelligence minister, held the post from 1987 to 1999 at a time when his agents...

Washington Prism – Babak Yektafar It was strange watching Brian Lamb, the founder of C-SPAN, on TV at a party in mid-town Tehran last month. Stranger yet, was the number of people at that party who were familiar with him, and his call-in show, Washington Journal. After talking to a few people at that party, and later on at another gathering, I came to realize that Brian Lamb, the pride of Lafayette, Indiana, actually has a small and rather cultish following in Iran. C-SPAN is carried via World Net satellite network, which among other programs, carries programming by the US...

Click HereVideo: Jay Leno goofs of Iran's space program Very funny stuff It requires Real Audio

The United States and its allies have to help the democratization of the Middle East, and Islamic Republic is the centre Islamic republic has got twenty seven years of history behind it, starting with the slogan "Freedom". What the ordinary Iranian people thought of that was democracy and human rights. But what the leaders of Islamic Republic really meant was freedom for themselves to destroy our country first and then export this so-called revolution to the Islamic world and in order to destroy the entire Western civilization and replacing it with Islamic fanatic ideas. But the success of the Iranian...

We will use force, Blair warns Iranians By Anton La Guardia, Toby Helm and David Rennie (Filed: 28/10/2005) Tony Blair delivered his strongest warning to Iran last night, saying Teheran would not be allowed to become a "threat to our world security". He hinted that the West might have to resort to force. The Prime Minister said western allies would meet in the next few days to decide how to react after President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad called for Israel to be "wiped off the map". Tony Blair felt a 'real sense of revulsion' at the remarks While the initial response is...

Major fires hit oil, gas pipelines in southwest Iran TEHRAN (AFP) - Two major fires in oil and gas pipelines in Iran's southwestern province of Khuzestan have left one guard dead and disrupted the supply process, state television said. The first fire broke out during welding on a crude oil pipeline and was immediately extinguished, the Iranian police information centre said. The cause of the second inferno was not yet clear. State television said firefighters had been battling the second blaze for more than 13 hours. That fire, which broke out shortly before midnight Friday, was sparked by an explosion...

The Iranians are conducting a clandestine nuclear program in parallel to the public one, the aim of which is clearly the acquisition of nuclear weapons. The Israeli intelligence assessment speaks of three or four years; the Americans add another year or two to this timetable. The Americans conducted a large-scale operation in Iraq in order to bring down a regime which was engaged, it was thought at the time, in supporting terrorism and having weapons of mass destruction programs. Iran is clearly in the same category, and therefore it is concerned about an American/Israeli operation against its nuclear facilities. From...

An outlawed Iranian opposition group, which obtained a permit from the New York Police Department to hold a demonstration in front of the United Nations today, attracted an estimated 2,500 supporters to protest the presence of Iran’s president at the annual meeting of the UN General Assembly. But many of the crowd, coming from Denmark, Germany, Canada, Eritrea and Sudan, acknowledged that they had been recruited by the organization to attend the rally for money, and that all their expenses – including international air fare, hotels, and a daily stipend - had been paid by the organization. “Basically, what you...

TEHRAN, Sept 13 (Reuters) - Back in 1968 Mick Jagger had plenty of "Sympathy for the Devil", but his first wife Bianca is far more critical of "The Great Satan" and fears U.S. unwillingness to talk to Iran could lead to conflict. Rights campaigner Jagger, the Council of Europe's goodwill ambassador, has travelled to Iran with a group called "U.S. Academics for Peace", seeking to ensure the Islamic Republic does not become the next Iraq. The group argues the mudslinging rhetoric branding the United States as "The Great Satan" and Iran as part of the "axis of evil" is one...

Why Iran, asked friends and relatives. Why should a group of women journalists decide to go on a busman’s holiday to Iran of all places? “You will have to cover your heads and won't be allowed to talk to men,” exclaimed a colleague. Iranian embassy officials were equally curious. The usual reasons were trotted out — it is an unlikely destination for a holiday with the family, but it is of interest to journalists as an important country in India’s neighbourhood. The visas finally arrived, just as we were giving up hope, and were accompanied by elaborate instructions — heads...

Assets held by Iranian nationals residing in the United States reached $800 bln last year, said an economic expert. Bijan Bidabad told Fars news agency that the latest estimates by University of Massachusetts show that the Iranian American community held $600 bln in 2003. He further noted that restrictive laws have put investment security at stake in Iran, stressing that the country has failed to encourage investors to keep their capital at home. Investments usually seek places with adequate security, because capital always moves away from the insecure areas gradually, he noted, adding that when investors see their capital at...

The Iranian government must investigate the deaths of at least 17 people at the hands of security forces in the western province of Kurdistan over the past two weeks, Human Rights Watch said today. Security forces reportedly also wounded hundreds when they opened fire on demonstrators protesting the killing of a young Kurdish man, Shivan Qaderi, on July 9. In addition, the government forces arrested hundreds of people throughout the province, including Roya Toloui, a women's rights activist, and several other leading human rights defenders and journalists. On July 9, security forces shot and killed Shivan Qaderi in Mahabad. Kurdish...

The Iranian government has deployed large numbers of troops in cities in the northwestern region which borders Iraq in an effort to quell three weeks of civil unrest that has left up to 20 people dead and more than 300 wounded, according to reports from dissident groups. They said as many as 100,000 state security forces, backed up by helicopter gunships, had moved into the region to crack down on pro-Kurdish demonstrations. The claims, from Kurdish groups in Iraq, could not be independently verified, and Iranian officials remained silent about the unrest. The state-owned news agency IRNA said the trouble...

WASHINGTON — Free speech advocates are frustrated with a host of American companies they say have been collaborating with oppressive regimes in countries like China, Iran and Saudi Arabia, to help them filter and monitor the Internet activity of their citizens. Big technology names like Microsoft, Yahoo! and Cisco have been criticized roundly in recent years for providing foreign governments with the tools they need to crack down on Internet use, but critics say they have not been able to do much more than complain. "These companies' lack of ethics is extremely worrisome," said Lucie Morillon, the Washington representative of...