By Editors of The Free Iran Herald

Updates on events unfolding in Iran

A Basij Commander Involved in Killing Iranian Protestors KILLED by Masked Gunmen

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Abdol Hossein Mojaddami, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC)’ Basij militia in the municipality of Darkhovin, located in the southwestern province of Khuzestan, was shot dead outside his home by two masked gunmen on Wednesday, the 22nd. No one has claimed responsibility for the killing as of yet.

According to reports, Mojaddami was a close associate of the late Qods Force commander Qassem Soleimani, and had been involved in massacring Iranian protestors during the November crackdown that saw at least 1,500 Iranians murdered.

پاسدار عبدالحسين مجدمى فرمانده بسيج شهر دارخوين شهرستان فلاحيه(شادگان) كه بامداد چهارشنبه دوم بهمن ماه 1398توسط افراد مسلح ناشناس بهلاکت رسید، يكى از ياران تروريست قاسم سليمانى مى باشد…. pic.twitter.com/MCX78eQbKM — Mina Mohsen (@MinaMohsenn) January 22, 2020

Khuzestan has been a scene of constant unrest for over two years, as the province is best with poverty and environmental degradation caused by regime policies.

Son of Corrupt Khomeinist Official DEPORTED from the USA

US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deported Mohammad Shahab Dehghani, the 24-year-old son of a high ranking Khomeinist regime official, from Boston on January 21st, two days after he had arrived at Logan Airport, and had been immediately detained. This action occurred four months after President Trump banned relatives of Khomeinist regime officials from visiting, or immigrating to, the US.

Deghani’s father, Kamal Dehghani Firouzabadi, is the deputy chairman of the Islamic Parliament (Majles)’s Foreign Affairs and National Security committee. Like many of Tehran’s rulers, the elder Dehghani has made many virulently anti-American statements in public, yet he chose to send his son to study at Northeastern University in Massachusetts. The elder Dehghani was also accused of embezzlement in 2010, specifically, of having stolen millions of dollars in state funds and deposited them in bank accounts under his son’s name.

Iranian democracy activists are pleased that the Trump administration is finally acting to stop the children of the regime’s elite from enjoying lavish lifestyles in the States, while average Iranians suffer in poverty due to these same officials’ corruption and inept governance. For many years, American authorities looked the other way to regime leaders and their families entering the US. The previous Obama administration went even further, and was accused of having given regime officials 2,500 US Green Cards as part of a secret side deal to the 2015 JCPOA.

The father (Kamal Dehghani) of the student you are talking about is part of the inner circle of Islamic Republic regime, here is his picture with @JZarif and Hassan Nasrallah, why do you think he should be allowed to stay in US? #LetShahabIn pic.twitter.com/OYaBeBtbf0 — Inspector Clouseau (@InspectorClous2) January 21, 2020

The son of an Iranian regime THUG, Kamal Dehghani, responsible for stealing millions of dollars & transferring it to his son’s name!

Well done @realDonaldTrump @StateDept @SecPompeo

👏👏👏🥂✌️#IRGCTerrorists pic.twitter.com/KXWbXcCKu4 — SAMKAY (@Freeiran_Sam) January 21, 2020

As is to be expected, the mainstream liberal media did not report on the identity of Shahab Deghani’s father, and chose to portray him as a simple “student” and “victim” of President Trump’s travel ban.

Brian Hook: “The global media does a very bad job of conveying the true beliefs of the Iranian people.”

On Thursday, January 23rd, Brian Hook, the US State Department’s Special Representative for Iranian affairs gave an interview to the Ashaq Al Awsat newspaper. Among other things, he restated the Trump administration’s support for the Iranian people in their quest for freedom. “We’re going to continue to stand with Iranian people. Nations around the world are not doing enough to stand with the people of Iran who are the longest suffering victims of the Iranian regime, and we would like to see more people follow our example and stand with the people (of Iran) and stand up to the regime,” Hook said.

Khomeinist Foreign Minister Zarif Turned Away from Davos Summit, but Pretends that He Cancelled His Trip

On January 20th, a spokesman for Mohammad Javad Zarif, the Islamic Regime’s foreign minister, abruptly announced that Zarif had cancelled his previously-planned trip to Davos, Switzerland, in order to attend the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum. The spokesman cited a “change in scheduling” as the reason for Zarif’s cancellation, while an Iranian newspaper claimed that Zarif had become angered after the WEF organizers denied him an opportunity to give a speech, in the aftermath of the regime having shot down a civilian airliner and killed 176 people. Outside observers, however, believe there is more to it than that.

The United States has been diligently attempting to diplomatically isolate the Tehran regime; earlier this month, the US State Department had refused to issue a visa that would have allowed Zarif to visit the United Nations in New York. Thus, it is most probable that Tehran’s announcement of a cancellation was merely yet another face-saving gesture, designed to disguise the fact that the Trump administration had successfully persuaded Tehran’s former protectors, the Europeans, to deny Zarif another chance to diffuse his lies. The recent European referral of Tehran to the UN for violating the 2015 JCPOA (the Iran Nuclear Deal) would add credence to this interpretation.

Another tacit sign that Switzerland did not want Khomeinist officials on its soil came on January 16th, when the Zurich newspaper Neue Zurcher Zeitung published a report by Ulrich von Schwerin titled “Iran’s guardians of the revolution defy their critics.” The report mentioned the vast economic empire the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps has seized for itself, encompassing both legal and illegal businesses, “..the revolutionary guards have stretched out their feelers in parliament, government and administration, so that no one can get past the military in politics today. In many places, their influence has long surpassed that of the clergy. Some observers therefore see the Islamic Republic as a classic military dictatorship.” The article concluded by stating that: “Despite all the criticism, the guards have the backing of revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. And if they see their power or the system in jeopardy, they will not hesitate to use force to defend them. The guards of the revolution would rather spill the blood of their countrymen than risk the status quo – they benefited too much from it.”

Also, it is worth noting that the WEF summit organizers invited the renowned Iranian journalist and women’s rights advocate Masih Alinejad to speak on a panel regarding how the Khomeinist regime oppresses women, and how Iranian women have fought back.

It’s a shame he canceled it. I’ll be joining a panel at #Davos2020 to talk about women’s prominence during #IranProtests and how Islamic Republic has kept its own nation hostage. https://t.co/QNlwDzjTFe — Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) January 20, 2020

In an event in Davos, I gave this interview to @dwnews. One should never throw human rights under the bus for the sake of being able to negotiate with a repressive government for short-term political and economic gains. The West should hear the voice of Iranian people. pic.twitter.com/liUhDqXFvx — Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) January 23, 2020

An Iranian Films Himself BURNING the Koran

An Iranian man, in Iran, from the Bakhtiari tribe (who are historically anti-clerical) made a video of himself burning the Koran, and the clip has gone viral on Instagram. “This book has nothing but violence and misery for the people of Iran; not just for the people of Iran, but for the people of the Middle East, and people of the world,” the man says before lighting the Islamic holy book on fire.

View this post on Instagram نمی‌خواهم چنان دینی که… ‏⁧‫#چالش_آتش_زدن_قرآن‬⁩ A post shared by عباس خسروی فارسانی (@abbas.khosravi.farsani) on Jan 21, 2020 at 8:25am PST

Australian Academic Imprisoned in Iran Reveals Regime Offered to Free Her if She Would Spy for Them

Kylie Moore-Gilbert, an Australian/British dual citizen and professor of Islamic Studies at Australia’s University of Melbourne, has been in an Iranian prison since September, 2018. The academic was given a sentence of ten years’ incarceration after the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) falsely accused her of being a Western intelligent agent. Now, in letters that she has managed to have smuggled out of the IRGC’s Evin Prison, she has revealed that the IRGC offered to release her if she would become their spy

On August 23rd, Moore-Gilbert wrote to the IRGC officer who was trying to cultivate her:

“Dear Mr. Vaziri, for you information I am copying to you the letter that I wrote to the case manager, which is about the topic I spoke to you about in the presence of the The Honorable Head of Legal Department of the IRGC:

‘Dear Mr. Case Manager, Please accept this letter as an official and definitive rejection of your offer to me to work with the intelligence branch of IRGC, and as a testimony that you confirm you heard all of these from me verbally before. Under no circumstances will I be persuaded to change my decision. Even my current verdict or the impending result of my appeal, or the prospect of remaining locked up in 2-A detention center (or any other prison in Iran) will not influence my rejection of this offer. I am not a spy. I have never been a spy and I have no interest to work for a spying organization in any country. When I leave Iran, I want to be a free woman and live a free life, not under the shadow of extortion and threats. I ask you to relay my decision to your boss. I hope that you do not ever speak to me again regarding this matter. Regards”

Foreign citizens are usually detained by the regime as a means of extorting concessions from their respective governments.