US Lawmakers Call On Allies To Designate IRGC

The federal prosecutor's office announced the verdict against Babak J. on Thursday, saying he was instructed by an intermediary "acting on behalf of unknown Iranian state agencies" in November to carry out the attack.

Following the order, the accused is said to have sought to convince an acquaintance to set fire to the synagogue using a Molotov cocktail.Apparently, the acquaintance had refused.

Later, Babak J.'s handler named another synagogue as a target in the city of Bochum rather than Dortmund, prosecutors said, adding that "the accused refrained from attacking the well-monitored synagogue in Bochum itself for fear of discovery".Instead, he tried to set fire to a school building adjacent to the synagogue. 

It is one of a series of foiled attacks in recent months on Jewish sites at the behest of the regime, In March, Israeli intelligence foiled a plot to target a Jewish cultural center in Greece.

Also in March, the Washington Post cited Western intelligence officials as saying that Ramin Yektaparast was the main suspect in organizing an attack in November on a Jewish cultural center in the German city of Essen, allegedly at the behest of Iran’s IRGC.

Ahmad Naderi, a member of the Presiding Committee of the parliament representing Tehran, made the threat in a tweet on Friday in reaction to the Swedish parliament voting in favor of designating the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The Swedish parliament's decision to list the IRGC as a terrorist group is only “a show" that has no real value, he said, adding that "formerly colonialist countries like France and England, which are the leaders in Europe, do not have the courage to do this because they know that we will attack their forces in the region”.

Without further details, he added that plans to retaliate against Sweden for its recent designation on Wednesday still stands.

It followed the execution this week of Swedish-Iranian Habib Chaab (Asyud) which saw Sweden's Ministry of Foreign Affairs summon Iran's chargé d'affaires in protest of the execution, one of hundreds since the start of the year.

Iran's relations with Sweden have been strained since July when a Swedish court sentenced a former Iranian jailor, Hamid Nouri, to life imprisonment over executions of political prisoners in 1988.

The US has already designated the IRGC which for decades has conducted operations abroad including maritime hijackings, political assassinations and hostage taking. Other nations such as the UK are hesitant in hopes to resume dialogue on Iran's nuclear program.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen Mark Milley testified before the Senate Defense Appropriations subcommittee, where they called for budgetary support in the face of Russian, Chinese and Iranian threats.

“Iran threatens to push the Middle East yet again into instability by supporting terrorists and proxy forces and they continue to improve the capability to produce a nuclear weapon,” Gen. Milley said.

“From the time of Iranian decision by the Supreme Leader, Iran could produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon in less than two weeks from time of decision. It will take several more months to produce an actual nuclear weapon. United States policy remains the same. United States remains committed that Iran will never have a nuclear weapon,” he added.

Although this has always been the Biden administration’s position, Gen. Milley’s previous testimony at the House Appropriations subcommittee on Defense in March had raised questions.

Gen. Milley at the time said that “the United States remains committed as a matter of policy that Iran will not have a fielded nuclear weapon.”

The term “fielded” led to questions about what the Biden administration’s policy exactly is regarding Iran becoming a nuclear power. Previously, President Joe Biden and all top officials had repeatedly said that US policy is not to allow the Islamic Republic to acquire a nuclear weapon, threatening that all options were on the table.

It was not clear what Gen. Milley meant by a “fielded” nuclear weapon. Did it mean the administration would allow Iran to build a bomb but not “field” it, which in essence is a vague concept.

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Being a nuclear threshold state is a familiar concept, meaning that a country has the fissile material and the knowhow to build a nuclear bomb but has not decided to do so, but once a bomb is produced, it is not clear what the difference would be between a bomb in the basement and one “fielded.”

But in the Senate testimony on Thursday both Austin and Milley were clear that the administration is committed to prevent any Iranian nuclear weapon.

Secretary Austin in response to a question by Senator Susan Collins also emphasized that his responsibility is to present options to the President for making sure that the United States can prevent Iran from building a bomb.

Iran began to breach the low-level uranium enrichment it was allowed under the 2015 nuclear accord, the JCPOA, when former President Donald Trump withdrew from the agreement and imposed economic sanctions in 2018. But Tehran accelerated the enrichment, stockpiling 20-percent and 60-percent enriched uranium once the Biden administration began talks in early 2021 to revive the JCPOA. Currently it is believed that Iran has enough enriched fissile material for 2-5 nuclear bombs.

Israel has repeatedly vowed to resort to military force to stop Iran from crossing the threshold and has reportedly been behind several sabotage attacks against Iran’s nuclear facilities since July 2020.

The US has expanded military cooperation with Israel and regional Arab states in the past two years, conducting large military drills with the Israeli armed forces in January.

Vaclav Balek, president of the Human Rights Council, said in a statement Wednesday that he had decided to appoint Bahraini following the receipt of a nomination from regional coordinators. 

The forum to be held in Geneva on November 2 and 3 will focus on the contribution of science, technology, and innovation to the promotion of human rights including in the context of post-pandemic recovery. 

UN Watch launched a petition to the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres Wednesday to stop the Islamic Republic from chairing the forum and said there were still six months left to cancel the appointment.

The petition has so far been signed by more than 30,000. 

In a tweet Wednesday, UN Watch said they sent a letter to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken urging him to condemn the appointment.

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Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, called the appointment “shameful” in a series of tweets and said it is “an insult to the tens of thousands of victims beaten, brutalized, tortured, raped and murdered by this regime.” 

“Iran just hanged Yousef Mehrad and Sadrollah Fazeli Zare for using social media to criticize religion,” he pointed out and criticized the US and its allies for not taking action to stop Iran from being elected to the UN Commission on Crime Prevention like they did in the case of Russia in January. 

A group of Iranians staged a rally in London Thursday to protest the regime’s executions. 

Neuer added that UN Watch will approach governments with a draft resolution for the 53rd session of the UN Human Rights Council to overrule the president's decision to appoint Bahraini if the petition gathers 100,000 signatures. 

Headquartered next to the UN human rights apparatus in Geneva, UN Watch is a nongovernmental organization that monitors the performance of the United Nations according to the yardstick of its charter and promotes human rights for all.

“Ali Bahraini is the representative of the leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Ali Khamenei. Khamenei stopped millions of covid vaccines from entering Iran which resulted in thousands of deaths. On his orders innocent protesters were shot and more than 500 people, 70 of whom were children, were killed [in recent protests]. This is the same regime that in recent days has executed one person every 6 hours and was condemned by the United Nations Human Rights Council yesterday for its executions,” Iranian protester Vahid Beheshti who staged a hunger strike outside the UK foreign office for over two months and is now in hospital said in a tweet Wednesday. 

“How dare you to insult the people of Iran like this assuming they are ignorant?” he asked the UN Human Rights Council. 

The UN’s Third Committee, also known as the Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee or C3, approved a draft resolution on Iran’s human rights situation on November 16 and expressed concern at the alarmingly high frequency of the death penalty in the country. The motion was ratified by a recorded vote of 80 in favor to 28 against, with 68 abstentions.

The Islamic Republic was also voted out in December from the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) for policies contrary to the rights of women and girls. The resolution passed against Iran was drafted by the US due to the regime’s bloody crackdown on protests ignited by the death of a young woman in custody of hijab – or the so-called “morality” -- police.

The US-based opposition activist, in London to meet lawmakers and lobby for proscribing the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps as a terrorist organization, said she has been put under 24-hour police protection in the UK after the Metropolitan police received threats to her life.

After she appeared at the Piers Morgan Uncensored show earlier this week, British police came to see her at her hotel room, informing her that they would be giving her protection during the remainder of her stay. 

However, unperturbed, in spite of numerous threats to her life from IRGC operatives abroad, the fearless campaigner said: “I’m not as scared for my life, I survived kidnapping plots,” she said. “I survived an assassination plot, so I am not scared for my life at all. I dedicate my life to giving voice to voiceless people.”

Alinejad said the move confirmed the level of danger she continues to live under, the regime seeing her outspoken leadership against the Islamic Republic as a major threat.

“I know that the British are a little bit relaxed when it comes to death threats. Now, I believe that the level of the threat is very intense, and it’s very serious.”

It has, however, given her direct access to security chiefs to fight for proscribing the IRGC, which has been behind numerous attacks globally, not only on Iranian soil.

Since 2015, there has been a surge in IRGC activity in the UK, Europe and the United States. Most recently, UK spy agency MI5 acknowledged the real threat from Iran’s “aggressive intelligence services” to kidnap or kill UK-based people in 2022.

Earlier this year, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard took credit for the relocation of Iran International studios from the UK to the US following terror threats, calling it a victory for the Islamic Republic.

Iran International was warned by authorities in November that its journalists were under threat from Iranian agents and the Metropolitan Police took measures to strengthen security around the network’s office in the area.

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On February 18, the network announced that following the advice of UK anti-terrorism officials it decided to temporarily move its studio operations to the US.

In her remarks at Sir Harry Evans Global Summit in Investigative Journalism on Wednesday, she said, "I told the members of the British Parliament that you asked the Iran International network to stop their work in London... Instead of canceling the activities of journalists, you should stop the Islamic Republic."

She made the remarks at a panel discussion titled "Iran's War Against Journalists," during which she talked about the latest developments of the "Women, Life, Freedom" protests in Iran, sparked by the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, and the Islamic Republic’s repression of journalists and any voice of dissent at home and abroad.

In February, the Jewish Chronicle reported that Iran is reportedly preparing to close the British embassy in Tehran as tensions simmer over a plot to kill journalists in the UK, and London’s rebuke of crackdown on dissent. 

The British embassy in Tehran has been a regular flashpoint in recent years. In December, its walls were defaced by the Basij paramilitary militia, one of the forces operating under the IRGC, with slogans labelling it a “terrorist center”.

Alinejad, who has become one of the main opposition figures amplifying the voice of protesters inside Iran, has appeared at the UN and met with several European leaders such as France’s Emmanuel Macron and the Netherland’s Mark Rutte.

Talks about further restrictions on the activities of the regime and proscribing the IRGC have been among the hot topics at the British parliament in the past several months.

Despite repeated calls by a large number of lawmakers, London has failed to take any tangible actions against Iran and its most important arm the IRGC. However, several rounds of sanctions and other punitive measures have been taken but Iranian people suffering under the atrocities of the regime do not believe that they have been enough.

Earlier in the week, The UK’s Charity Commission removed trustees from the board of the Islamic Center of England for its links to Iran. The UK's security minister Tom Tugendhat welcomed the decision by the regulator, saying its leadership was appointed by the head of the Islamic Republic of Iran.