Iran: The Islamofascist Terrormasters
Author: Christopher Holton
Source: The Family Security Foundation, Inc.
Date: December 20, 2006
In this stunning piece, Family Security Matters' Contributing Editor Christopher
Holton details why Iran is the premium terror master of them all. In an explicit
count-by-count indictment, Holton leads us through the labyrinth of facts we all
need to master as we get closer and closer to a showdown with this
terrorist-sponsoring nation state run by "Atomic Ayatollahs."
The U.S. State Department has for years described Iran as the world’s most
active state sponsor of terrorism.
However, in recent years, it has suddenly become fashionable in some circles to
downplay Iran’s role in Jihadist terrorism. Most notably, Richard Clarke, the
former terrorism advisor in the executive branch, has begun insisting that
Iran’s support for terrorism is largely something of the past, and as long as we
don’t interfere with their nuclear ambitions, Clarke believes they will continue
to behave. On the other hand, if we do take a stand against Atomic Ayatollahs,
Clarke says we can expect terrorism worse than anything Al Qaeda is capable of
from Iran’s favorite terrorist organization, Hezbollah.
All of this hogwash was recently detailed and refuted nicely by Thomas Joscelyn
in the Weekly Standard, in an article entitled “Iran’s War on the West.”
Other observers, notably Gary Sick writing in the Autumn 2003 issue of the
Center for Strategic and International Studies’ The Washington Quarterly, insist
that Iran would not establish an alliance with Al Qaeda because Al Qaeda is
Sunni and Iran is Shiite (never mind all the evidence to the contrary, such as
Iran’s longstanding support for Sunni HAMAS and close relations with the Sunni
Islamofascists in Sudan). In that article Sick even stated that “U.S. charges of
Iranian association with terrorist activities brought potentially constructive
contacts to a halt.” In other words, it was American accusations of Iranian
involvement in terrorism that was hurting relations between the two sides!
As Charlie Brown might say, “Good grief.”
The Iranian constitution includes a clause calling for spreading the Islamic
revolution to other lands. Terrorism is one of the chief means through which
they have been fulfilling this mandate.
For more than 26 years, the radical Islamist regime in Iran has been the
godfather of Jihadist terrorism. They have never stopped their support for such
warfare and are even now actively recruiting, funding, sheltering, training and
arming Jihadists to attack U.S. and other Western interests and, of course, to
kill Israelis.
This terror war waged against the West began in earnest on 4 November 1979, when
Iranian militant “students”, likely including a young man named Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad, invaded the U.S. embassy in Tehran and took its staff hostage.
In reality, the U.S. war with terrorism began on that day, and not on 11
September, 2001.
Over the next two and a half decades, Jihadist terrorists backed in some way by
the Ayatollahs in Iran continued to attack and kill innocent Americans, Israelis
and other Westerners.
Among the terrorist groups that Iran sponsors are Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, HAMAS and
Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
Iran and Al Qaeda
Iran’s relationship with Al Qaeda may be the most intriguing and important
aspect of their involvement in terrorism at this point simply because of denials
by some that the two could and would never form an alliance due to the
fundamental split between Shia and Sunni Islam.
It is high time that this quaint notion be put to rest forever.
Shi’ite Iran’s support for Sunni Wahhabi Al Qaeda was probably first brought to
light in a book written by The Washington Times reporter Bill Gertz which was
published in 2002: BREAKDOWN: How America’s Intelligence Failures Led to
September 11.
In his book, Gertz revealed that Defense Intelligence Agency analyst Kie Fallis
had discovered in 2000 that Al Qaeda “was intimately linked to the government of
Iran—namely to agents of Iran’s intelligence and security services.”
And thus began a series of reports from authoritative authors detailing the
Iranian-Al Qaeda relationship:
• Also in 2002, in his bestseller, See No Evil, retired CIA agent Robert Baer
revealed that the CIA had become aware of contacts between Osama Bin Laden and
Iran way back in 1995 and that Bin Laden had met with an Iranian intelligence
officers in Afghanistan in July 1996 to “hammer out a strategic relationship.”
• In 2004, in Shadow War, journalist Richard Miniter cited two Iranian sources
who told him that Bin Laden himself was being harbored in Iran, along with many
other Al Qaeda terrorists.
• In 2005, in Iran’s Nuclear Option, author Al J. Venter, a distinguished
journalist who has written for Jane’s Defense Group, discussed two startling
revelations about Iranian involvement with Al Qaeda. First, he reported that an
Iranian defector, Hamid Reza Zakeri, a former Iranian intelligence official, had
been present for two meetings in Iran between “top Al Qaeda operatives and
Iranian officials only months before September 11.” Additionally, Venter
provided a report indicating that Hezbollah terrorist leader Imad Mugniyah, who
is a member of the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorists list, traveled from Iran to
Lebanon to “coordinate links between Hezbollah and Osama Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda
terrorist network.”
• Also in 2005, Congressman Curt Weldon of Pennsylvania, wrote Countdown to
Terror, in which he quoted a source as telling him that Osama Bin Laden was
indeed in Iran as an “honored guest” of the regime and that Iran was supporting
Al Qaeda.
• Finally in 2005, America’s foremost authority on Iran, Kenneth Timmerman, in
Countdown to Crisis: The Coming Nuclear Showdown With Iran, succinctly explained
the role that Iran played with Al Qaeda: “Today, Iran’s leaders are plotting new
attacks on the West with Osama Bin Laden, whom they are sheltering inside Iran,
and are continuing to finance Abu Musab Zarqawi, the terrorist who became
infamous for beheading his victims in Iraq.”
But perhaps no published authority has provided as complete a summary of Iran’s
ties to Al Qaeda as the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United
States, also known as the September 11th Commission. In its report, the
Commission said that it had found “evidence of a significant and continuing
relationship between Al Qaeda and the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
• The Commission found evidence of Iranian involvement in the 1996 Khobar Towers
bombing in Saudi Arabia, which killed 19 U.S. servicemen.
• The Commission found evidence that Iran provided training to Al Qaeda
operatives “for actions carried out primarily against Israel and the United
States.” This included training in Sudan up until 1996, training in Lebanon in
1993 and training in Iran itself off and on during the 1990s. So much for the
Shia-Sunni division being a barrier to cooperation.
• The Commission found evidence that Iran had provided safe transit for Al Qaeda
operatives traveling to and from Afghanistan after Osama Bin Laden relocated
there in 1996.
To sum things up, the same Iran that is working on nuclear weapons and building
and acquiring ballistic missiles, is in league with America’s most strident
Jihadist terrorist enemies: Al Qaeda.
Iran and the Iraqi Insurgency
No analysis of Iran’s terrorist activities would be complete without mention of
Iran’s extensive involvement in the insurgency in neighboring Iraq. All the
available evidence shows that Iran is up to its ears in the violence in Iraq. In
fact, without Iranian support, one wonders whether the insurgency could hold up
more than a few months.
Perhaps that is why, as WorldTribune.com recently reported, the new Iraqi
government has announced its intention to construct 45 forts along its border
with Iran to stem the flow of terrorists and arms.
Iran’s role in the Iraq insurgency has been known for some time. Back in
November of 2004, U.S. News & World Report published an excellent cover story on
this issue, entitled The Iran Connection. The magazine revealed that “secret CIA
and Pentagon documents” showed that Iran was largely “behind the trouble in
Iraq.” Among the specific findings from USN&WR’s investigation:
• Iran has set up a large intelligence network in Iraq. That network spies on
the U.S. military and recruits insurgents.
• Iranian intelligence agents are believed to have taken part directly in
attacks on U.S. forces and have smuggled weaponry into Iraq and distributed them
to insurgents.
• Iran has trained Iraqi insurgents inside Iran and facilitated their safe
passage back into Iraq. This includes the group Ansar al-Islam, an affiliate of
Al Qaeda leader of Abu Musab Zarqawi.
• In the southern parts of Iraq, Iran has been the chief sponsor of radical
Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and his militia, known as the Mahdi Army.
There would surely still be an insurgency in Iraq without Iran’s involvement,
but that insurgency would almost certainly be smaller, less deadly and more
vulnerable to coalition forces without Iran’s money, weaponry, training and safe
harbor.
Iran and Hezbollah
Before September 11th, 2001 the Jihadist terrorist group that boasted the
highest body count of American victims was Hezbollah. Hezbollah is a Shiite
terrorist group based in Lebanon. Hezbollah gets its money, weaponry, and
training from Iran. They also receive aid from Syria, mostly in the form of safe
haven in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, which Syria has controlled for decades.
According to some observers, including former CIA director George Tenet, former
US Senator Bob Graham and former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage,
Hezbollah is more capable and dangerous than Al Qaeda.
Historically, Hezbollah has targeted Americans with bombs, suicide attacks,
hijackings and hostage-taking. These attacks started in 1983 and seem to have
subsided in the 1990s, however, some counterterrorism experts believe that Iran
and Hezbollah have just been biding their time and making plans for future
attacks. Among Hezbollah’s more significant terrorist attacks have been:
• On April 18, 1983, a Hezbollah terrorist crashed a suicide truck bomb into the
U.S. embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 49 and wounding more than 100.
• On October 23, 1983, a Hezbollah terrorist crashed a suicide truck bomb into
the U.S. Marine barracks at Beirut International Airport, killing 241 Americans.
At almost the same time a French Army barracks across town was attacked in a
similar manner and 58 French soldiers were killed.
• Starting in 1984 and going into 1991, Hezbollah began kidnapping U.S. citizens
in Beirut. These kidnappings involved dozens of victims. Some were eventually
released, but others were killed. Among those murdered by Hezbollah were CIA
officer William Buckley and Marine Colonel William Higgins.
• On September 20, 1984, yet another Hezbollah bomb exploded at the U.S. embassy
annex in east Beirut, killing 23 and wounding more than 50.
• On December 3, 1984, Hezbollah terrorists seized a Kuwaiti airliner which they
evidently knew was carrying two U.S. diplomats. They murdered the two diplomats
and forced the airplane to land in Iran, where they were granted safe haven. To
this day, no one has ever been known to have been tried for this crime.
• In June 1985, Hezbollah terrorists hijacked a U.S. TWA airliner destined for
Rome and diverted it to Beirut. Before they are forced to surrender, the
terrorists murdered one of the passengers, U.S. Navy diver Robert Stetham. The
leader of the attack, Hezbollah terrorist Mohammed Ali Hamadei was later
arrested and imprisoned in Germany. Though he was given a life sentence, he was
released from prison in Germany in 2005. It is thought that he returned to
Lebanon, but his whereabouts are not known.
• On September 19, 1989 a French airliner was destroyed in flight over Chad by a
bomb planted by Hezbollah. 171 passengers and crew were killed.
• On March 17, 1992, a Hezbollah car bomb killed 20 and wounded 200 at the
Israeli embassy in Beunos Aires, Argentina.
• In June 1996, a truck bomb killed 19 American servicemen and wounded hundreds
more at the Khobar Towers Air Force barracks in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. It was
believed, and then-FBI director Louis Freeh later confirmed, that the attack was
carried out by a Hezbollah cell in Saudi Arabia, with possible Al Qaeda
cooperation and direction from Iran.
After the 1996 Khobar Towers attack, it appeared that perhaps Hezbollah and Iran
had decided to curtail operations aimed at America and the West in general. This
is a subject of heated debate in intelligence circles, however, and the FBI has
admitted that there are Hezbollah cells in the United States. One such cell
uncovered in the late 1990s was the subject of the excellent book, Lightning Out
of Lebanon.
Another item of concern is Hezbollah cooperation with Al Qaeda. It has been
documented that Osama Bin Laden met with Hezbollah operatives in Sudan way back
in the first half of the 1990s and sought information on the type of truck bomb
that Hezbollah used to kill 241 Americans at the Marine Barracks in Beirut in
1983. However, even more extensive ties are feared.
Finally, there have been persistent reports of Hezbollah operatives surfacing in
Iraq, mainly in support of Moqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army. British Army officers
in particular have speculated that the number and type of Improvised Explosive
Devices indicate, to them at least, that Hezbollah is active in Iraq.
Iranian Support for HAMAS and Palestinian Islamic Jihad
Iran openly provides funding to the Palestinian Jihadist terrorist groups HAMAS
and Islamic Jihad.
Iran has also openly exhibited hostility to the peace process between Israel and
the Palestinians, which is no surprise given the statements of Iranian President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad calling for Israel’s destruction. The extent of Iran’s
involvement in Palestinian terrorism is probably best illustrated by the seizure
by Israeli forces in January 2002 of a cargo ship sailing from Iran with a cargo
destined for Palestinian terrorists. The ship, the Karine-A, held more than 50
tons of weaponry and munitions, including everything from AK-47s and small arms
ammunition to 122mm rockets and 1.5 tons of C4 explosive.
Other Iranian Terror Actvities
Iran has been involved in other acts of terrorism that go beyond sponsorship of
Jihadist terrorist groups. Two come to mind, one very well known, and the other
a very worrisome event that has gone largely forgotten.
In 1989 author Salmen Rushdie’s novel, The Satanic Verses, was published. The
book contained material that was thought as insulting to the prophet Mohammed
and the supreme leader of Iran, the Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa, or
religious decree, calling for Rushdie’s death. Khomeini’s successor, the
Ayatollah Khameini, upheld the fatwa after Khomeini died and it has never been
lifted. Rushdie has lived in almost constant fear for his life ever since and
rumors of terrorist cells and assassins stalking him have persisted.
International appeals to have the fatwa lifted have fallen on deaf ears and
efforts by Rushdie to express regret have been equally ineffective. So far,
Rushdie has escaped assassination, however, in view of his experience, the
recent controversy surrounding the cartoons of Mohammed published in Europe
should have come as no surprise.
Back on June 29, 2004, something happened that caused a brief media stir, but
all too quickly was forgotten and has completely faded from America’s memory
now. On that day, the U.S. expelled 2 Iranian security guards stationed at
Iran’s UN mission in New York. The FBI and NYPD had observed these guards
repeatedly photographing and videotaping New York City subways, buses, tunnels,
skyscrapers and landmarks. Almost shockingly, at the time of the incident, the
State Department reported that this was the third time such activities by
Iranian security personnel at their UN mission had resulted in their expulsion
from the United States.
For their part, the Iranians claimed that their personnel were just sightseeing,
but law enforcement personnel were convinced by the nature and scope of their
videography and photography activity that it was something more sinister. This
incident two years ago is even more worrisome now given the burgeoning
confrontation with Iran over their nuclear program. When the world’s most active
sponsor of Jihadist terrorism sends agents out to conduct surveillance and
target acquisition of key locations within America’s largest city, one has to
wonder how far we will be willing to let the Ayatollahs go. Their recent threats
to retaliate against the U.S. for any action taken against Iran for its nuclear
activities should prompt all Americans to sit up and take notice of their
terrorist activities.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor, Christopher Holton, heads the
Center for Security Policy's Divest Terror Initiative (http://www.divestterror.org).
He can be reached at holton@centerforsecuritypolicy.org
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