Tagged: Tehran

February 20th, 2018 Breaking News

‘We will level Tel Aviv to the ground’ senior Iranian official warns Israel

(THE JERUSALEM POST) — By Juliane Helmhold

Any attacks carried out against Iran will result in the destruction of Tel Aviv, Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran’s Expediency Council, warned Israel on Monday, according to the Fars News Agency.

Quoted by Iran’s semi-official government news site, Rezaei, in response to Netanyahu’s comments at the Munich Security Conference, asserted that “If they [Israel] carry out the slightest unwise move against Iran, we will level Tel Aviv to the ground and will not give any opportunity to Netanyahu to flee.”

“The US and Israeli leaders don’t know Iran and don’t understand the power of resistance and therefore, they continuously face defeat,” he was quoted as saying in an interview with Lebanese Hezbollah-affiliated Al Manar News.

“Today, the situation of the US and Israel indicate their fear of the Zionist regime’s collapse and the US decline,” he added in the interview.

Israel came in direct conflict with Iran on February 10, when an IAF attack helicopter shot down an Iranian operated drone, and later took out its command center in Syria.

According to the Iranian Mehr News Agency, Rezaei also highlighted that, while it is true that Iran supports what it calls the “Resistance Front” which stretches from Tehran to Gaza, the regime does not interfere in the Palestinian Territories and Lebanon but merely offers advisory help.

He added that Iran never wants to dominate the countries in the region, it wants them to stand on their own feet.

Rezaei’s pointed comments came in response to Netanyahu’s speech at the Munich Security Conference on Sunday where the Israeli prime minister warned Iran, “not to test Israel’s resolve.”

Netanyahu said at the conference, which was attended by Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, that Israel “will act not just against Iran’s proxies that are attacking us, but against Iran itself.”

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January 12th, 2018 Breaking News

Iranian protestors being tortured, killed and detained in prison

(AMERICAN MILITARY NEWS) — By Melissa Leon

Government protests in Iran might have calmed, but the two-week movement continues to draw international attention, as new reports reveal that protestors are being tortured and possibly even killed while in custody. And, many of those Iranians in custody are being held without charges against them.

One Iranian spoke to Fox News from outside Evin Prison in northern Tehran and said that people in custody are being tortured – “maybe tortured to death.” The Iranian is a 31-year-old activist and business owner whom Fox said declined to give his last name out of fear.

Amir told Fox that one of his friends was arrested “by plainclothes police at the beginning of the protests in Tehran. […] Then he was beaten badly. He said 400 to 500 people were forced into a room that should only hold 120 persons. They suffered all the torture – sleep deprivation, lack of food, all the things.”

Fox reported that Amir said conditions inside the prison are “beyond abhorrent,” and that prison officials are attempted to force detainees to film videos insisting they’re being treated well, known as “stage managing.”

“People are very concerned about the health of the arrested people. Mothers are there and they don’t know anything about their child’s situation, or even if they are alive,” another protestor told Fox.

Protests began late last year, on Dec. 28, in Iran’s second largest city and one of Iran’s holiest places, Mashhad, due to the country’s high inflation, economic policies and economic inequality, and unemployment. The protests have spread to more cities and the message has turned more toward regime change.

The White House Press Secretary released a statement on Wednesday calling for the immediate release of all protestors, following reports of torture and death.

The White House said:

The Trump Administration is deeply concerned by reports that the Iranian regime has imprisoned thousands of ‎Iranian citizens in the past week for engaging in peaceful protests. Further reports that the regime has tortured or killed some of these demonstrators while in detention are even more disturbing. We will not remain silent as the Iranian dictatorship represses the basic rights of its citizens and will hold Iran’s leaders accountable for any violations. The protesters in Iran are expressing legitimate grievances, including demanding an end to their government’s oppression, corruption, and waste of national resources on military adventurism. Iran’s regime claims to support democracy, but when its own people express their aspirations for better lives and an end to injustice, it once again shows its true brutal nature. ‎The United States calls for the immediate release of all political prisoners in Iran, including the victims of the most recent crackdown.

These are the biggest waves of protests since the nationwide protests in 2009 that the world watched through Twitter.

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August 4th, 2017 Breaking News

Kissinger warns: ‘Iranian radical empire’ could emerge in a post-ISIS Middle East

(ALGEMEINER) — The downfall of ISIS could be a boon for Iran, former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger cautioned in an article published by CapX this week.

“Across large areas of Iraq and Syria, an ideologically radical religious army, Isis, has declared itself a relentless foe of modern civilization, seeking violently to replace the international system’s multiplicity of states with a single Islamic empire governed by Sharia law,” the 94-year-old Kissinger wrote. “In these circumstances, the traditional adage that the enemy of your enemy can be regarded as your friend no longer applies. In the contemporary Middle East, the enemy of your enemy may also be your enemy. The Middle East affects the world by the volatility of its ideologies as much as by its specific actions.”

“The outside world’s war with Isis can serve as an illustration,” he continued. “Most non-Isis powers — including Shia Iran and the leading Sunni states — agree on the need to destroy it. But which entity is supposed to inherit its territory? A coalition of Sunnis? Or a sphere of influence dominated by Iran? The answer is elusive because Russia and the Nato countries support opposing factions. If the Isis territory is occupied by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards or Shia forces trained and directed by it, the result could be a territorial belt reaching from Tehran to Beirut, which could mark the emergence of an Iranian radical empire.”

Last November, as reported by The Algemeiner, Kissinger said the biggest challenge facing the Middle East was the “potential domination of the region by an Iran that is both imperial and jihadist.”

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June 19th, 2015 Related News

Ex-CIA head: Iran is genocidal, theocratic, imperial, totalitarian

(THE CLARION PROJECT) — Iran’s leaders are “theocratic, totalitarian, genocidal, imperial liars,” according to former head of the CIA James Woolsey.

Speaking on a conference call organized by the Clarion Project, Woolsey said he would rather deal with the Soviets he met across the negotiating table decades ago than talk to Tehran.

“They weren’t theocratic fanatics,” he said of his Soviet interlocutors.

Listen to Woolsey’s comments.

Woolsey now chairs the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, which not only looks at Tehran’s nuclear program but also its human-rights record.

“Iran is hanging political dissidents every day,” he told reporters and an international audience. “The problem is not the Iranian people,” he said.

He urged Western powers to encourage average Iranians to “stand up to their ‘masters’,” and believes with external support Iranians could succeed where their attempted revolution failed in 2009.

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