God's
assassins
The Lebanese Hezbollah
and the fundamentalist regime ruling Iran
July 16,
2006 iranian.com
The Lebanese Hezbollah is intimately
linked with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps
(IRGC) and their personnel have been stationed in joint
camps and headquarters in the Bekka Valley in Lebanon
and in Iran. In 1983 the Lebanese Hezbollah suicide
bombers attacked the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, killing 63
people including 17 Americans. Six month later, Lebanese
Hezbollah suicide bombers attacked U.S. Marine barracks
killing 241 U.S. Marines.
Moreover, Lebanese Hezbollah kidnaped numerous
journalists, scholars, and other non-combatants in
Lebanon in the 1980s, with the support of the
fundamentalist regime. In the 1980s the Lebanese
Hezbollah kidnaped 18 Americans; three of the of
kidnaped were killed and the rest released after the
Iranian regime told them to release them after making
secret negotiations with the U.S. in what became known
as the Iran-Contra affair.[1]
Lebanese Hezbollah was also responsible for hijacking
of a Kuwaiti civilian airliner. The fundamentalist
regime in Iran has also given harbor to Imad Mugniyah, a
leader of Lebanese Hezbollah and the mastermind of
several terrorist actions including the hijacking of the
TWA jetliner in 1985, and the 1983 bombing of the U.S.
Embassy and Marine barracks in Beirut.[2]
The fundamentalist regime does not deny its financial
and strategic support and alliance with the Lebanese
Hezbollah, but it regards it to be a guerrilla
organization and not a terrorist organization. Imad
Mugniyah, however, who had been residing in Iran,
reportedly quietly left Iran after 9/11.
The fundamentalist regime has denied that its agents
have engaged in terrorism, although in many Western
European courts, its agents have been arrested and
convicted and imprisoned for assassination of Iranian
dissidents. The regime has also used its proxy, the
Lebanese Hezbollah, in assassinations in Europe.
One infamous case is the Mykonos assassinations in
Berlin where a German court convicted officials of the
fundamentalist regime for the murder of four Iranian
dissidents. According to Parviz Dastmalchi, who survived
the assassination attempt and is regarded as one of the
foremost scholars on the event:
"In the weeks following the assassinations, several
persons were arrested, among them one Iranian and four
Lebanese citizens. The arrested person who was the main
organizer of the terror is Kazem Darabi Kazerouni who
was sentenced to life in prison and in currently in a
prison in Berlin. Kazem Darabi Kazerouni is a member of
VEVAK [the Ministry of Intelligence and Security of the
Country] and a member of the Islamic Revolutionary
Guards. ...The liaison between Kazem Darabi Kazerouni
and the VEVAK in the country [Germany] was a person in
Bonn named Hassan Javadi who was a diplomat. He [Hassan
Javadi] left the country in October 1989 and was
replaced with Morteza Gholami.
Also Kazem Darabi
Kazerouni was in contact with Mr. Amani Farahani, the
Consul-General in Berlin whose main duty was to gather
intelligence on Iranian opposition and other related
intelligence work. Mr. Darabi was a member of the
Muslim Student Association in Europe, in the Berlin
branch. The Muslim Student Association was one of
Hezbollah organizations in Europe that the
intelligence organizations of the regime hired its
agents from among them.
Other colleagues of Darabi in this group were
Farhad Diyanat Sabet Gilani and Bahman Berenjian, both
of whom were also members of VEVAK. Mr. Darabi in 1982
along with 85 members of Hezbollah of Iran and Lebanon
attacked a dormitory occupied by Iranian students in
West of Mainz, which resulted in the death of one
person and injury of several others. Darabi was
arrested then and convicted and sentenced to 8 months
imprisonment and expulsion from Germany. But with the
intervention of Iran’s Ambassador in Bonn, he was
released.
The terror team stayed in Darabi’s house for two
days and then stayed in a second house belonging to
Bahman Berenjian....
Another person who was arrested is Mr. Abbas Rayel
who is Lebanese. This is the person who shot the last
bullets to finish off the murder victims. In the years
1985 and 1986 in a camp belonging to the Islamic
Revolutionary Guards close to Rasht, he was given
terrorist training for six months and he was a member
of Lebanese Hezbollah. He was convicted in the court
and sentenced to life and is currently in prison.
Another person who was arrested is Youssef Amin who
was guarding the entrance door of the restaurant (the
terrorist who closed the door and stood in front of
the door). This person, like Abbas Rayel, is also a
member of Lebanese Hezbollah and received terrorist
training close to Rasht. He was sentenced to 11 years
imprisonment.
Two other persons were also arrested. One is Mr.
Mohammad “Idris” and the other one is Mr. Ataollah
Ayad, the first one a member of Lebanese Hezbollah and
the other one a member of Shia Amal of Lebanon. These
two were in the organizing section of the operations.
There was one other person who is a member of Lebanese
Hezbollah whose name is Ali Sabra who was responsible
for buying a car. Sabra was able to escape Germany and
go back to Lebanon and currently is one of the
personal security guards of Sheikh Fazlollah, the
leader of Hezbollah of Lebanon.
Another person is Abu Jafar also known as Abu
Heydar who was also a member of Lebanese Hezbollah,
which was created in 1982 with budget and training of
its cadres by the Islamic Republic. He was the driver
of the get-away car of the terrorist who carried out
the operations at Mykonos restaurant. After the
operations, he escaped to Lebanon and then to Iran and
is currently employed in the Islamic Revolutionary
Guards Corps.
But the most important of them all was the person
who was not arrested was a person with the name
Abdol-Raham Bani-Hashemi who was also know as Abu
Sharif. He was the main person with machine gun who
was leading the operational team. He is a highly
trained terrorist who works directly under Fallahian
[then Minister of Intelligence]. On August 18, 1987,
he had assassinated an officer of Iranian air force
pilot named Talebi in Geneva. After the assassination
in Berlin, Abu Sharif goes to Iran through Turkey and
was awarded a Mercedes Benz. In addition, he is given
shares of several factories belonging to VEVAK and
other bonyads....
At the court it was brought out that none of the
assassins knew the murder victims and did not have any
personal animosities. Therefore, they were given a
mission from someone or some ones. In the court
proceedings, and after the witness accounts of Mr.
Abol-Qassem Mesbahi, who was one of the senior
officials of VEVAK and the Director of Terror Network
in Western Europe, it’s become clear (he provided
testimony) that these terrors both inside and outside
Iran were ordered directly by Ayatollah Khomeini as
long as he was alive, and after his death, a committee
was established called Special Committee. This Special
Committee would make decisions on who should be
eliminated in the opposition inside Iran and outside
Iran.
The head of the committee is the Supreme Leader Ali
Khamanehi and includes President, Minister of
Intelligence, Foreign Minister, Head of Council of
Guardians, and Head of IRGC. The decision to
assassinate is made by the Special Committee and then
can be carried out with the consent of the Supreme
Leader. For implementation, the order is forwarded to
another committee called Qasr Firooz Committee. The
Qasr Firooz Committee draws up a plan for the
implementation of the murders and a copy is sent to
Supreme Leader for his approval and another to the
President for his approval. [3]
The use of Lebanese assassins to
kill Iranian opposition members was not new. In 1981,
the regime has used Anis Naghash, a Lebanese, to
assassinate Dr. Shapour Bakhtiar. The would-be assassin
failed in his attempt to kill Bakhtiar, but in the
process killed a French policewoman and a French
bystander. Ali Akbar Velayati, the IRI’s Foreign
Minister, heavily lobbied the French government, which
agreed to extradite the convinced killer to Iran.
The fundamentalist regime death squad, however,
succeeded in their second serous attempt ten years
later. On August 6, 1991, three members of the Islamic
Revolutionary Guards Corps’ death squad killed Dr.
Bakhtiar and his assistant, Mr. Soroush Katibeh in their
Paris residence. One of the assassins was arrested,
convicted and imprisoned in France; two other members of
the assassination team, Fereydoun Boyerahmadi and
Mohammad Azadi, succeeded in escaping to Iran.
About Masoud
Kazemzadeh is Associate Professor in the Department
of Political Science at Sam Houston State University
in Huntsville, Texas. He is the author of Islamic
Fundamentalism, Feminism, and Gender Inequality in Iran
Under Khomeini (Lanham, MD: University Press of
America, 2002).
Notes
[1] Dana Priest and Douglas
Farah, “Terror Alliance Has U.S. Worried: Hezbollah, Al
Qaeda Seen Joining Forces,” in Washington Post, June 30,
2002.
[2] James Risen, “U.S. Traces Iran’s Ties to Terror
Through a Lebanese,” in The New York Times, January 16,
2002.
[3] Interview with Parviz Dastmalchi in “Joziyat
Kostar Restorant Mykonos az Zaban Yeki az Bazmandegan
Fajeh,” may be accessed on the Internet here.
My translation from Farsi original.
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