Elika Yusuf

ANALYSIS/OPINION: By  Clifford D. May September 19, 2017 Eleven years ago,  Henry Kissinger  famously said that  Iran ’s rulers must “decide whether they are representing a cause or a nation.” If the latter,  Iran ian and American interests would be “compatible.” As for the former: “If Tehran insists on combining the Persian imperial tradition with contemporary Islamic fervor, then a collision with America is unavoidable.” Since then,  Iran ’s rulers have left no room for doubt. They’ve been aggressively spreading their Islamic Revolution and constructing what can only be called a new Persian Empire. That will surprise no one who has seriously studied the ideology of  Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini , founder of the Islamic Republic. What might: Their project has received significant support from the United States.

BY  CRISTINA MARCOS 09/13/2017 The House adopted measures on Wednesday to prevent  sales of commercial  aircraft to  Iran , despite warnings from some Democrats that it would undermine the international accord to curtail the country’s nuclear weapons program.

BY HESHMAT ALAVI SEPTEMBER 12, 2017 Deep military and nuclear cooperation between North Korea and  Iran  makes sanctions on both regimes all the more essential he world currently faces two atomic crises in  Iran and North Korea , despite long strides in the effort of nuclear non-proliferation. Deep military and nuclear  cooperation  between the two states makes dealing with these challenges even more difficult. One may have thought lessons would have been learnt from the devastating lessons of  appeasement  from World War II – yet the approaches adopted vis-à-vis North Korea and Iran in signing nuclear agreements have raised accusations that Neville Chamberlain’s  famous policy  is still alive and well.

By: Heshmat Alavi  AUG 29, 2017 Iran  is currently striving to manage a number of increasingly painstaking dilemmas. International spotlight is again on Tehran’s  nuclear program , with the  United States  demanding United Nations inspectors be granted access to its military sites.    Raja'i Shahr (Gohardasht) prison in Karaj, 20 kilometers west of Tehran

By Heshmat Alavi 28 August 2017 As ISIS is losing ground in its two last enclaves of Raqqa and Deir el-Zor, there are many rightfully concerning reports of Iran seeking to chip further control in Syria . All the while, there are also signs of contradictory remarks heard from senior Iranian officials, parallel to indications on the ground of how international counterparts are seeking their own interests that fall completely against those of Tehran’s. Such incoherency signals nothing but troubling times ahead for Iran in losing its grasp of strategic interests across the Middle East , including Syria.

08/25/2017 By: Dr. Majid Rafizadeh Human rights record has  deteriorated   markedly in  Iran  according to  human rights  organizations including Amnesty International.

August 23, 2017 By  Keyvan Salami Iran can enrich uranium within five days if the  U.S . imposes more sanctions on Iran, Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran's atomic agency head, warned this week. He claimed that  Iran  could achieve 20% enriched uranium in five days – a level at which it could then quickly be processed further into weapons-grade nuclear material. Last week, Iranian  president Hassan Rouhani  announced that Iran could abandon its  nuclear  agreement with world powers " within hours " if the United States imposes any more new sanctions. "If America wants to go back to the experience of imposing sanctions, Iran would certainly return in a short time – not a week or a month, but within hours - to conditions more advanced than before the start of negotiations," Rouhani told a session of parliament broadcast live on state television. In response,  U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley  said Iran should not be allowed "...

22 August 2017 By Heshmat Alavi  The military phase of the fight against ISIS is winding down after the liberation of Mosul , and the battle for the nearby  town of Tal Afar  is predicted to end soon. This has provided an opportunity for Iraq to begin distancing itself from the influence gained by Iran following the disastrous 2003 war, and returning to its true Arabic heritage.Iraq was known as a melting pot where Arabs, Kurds  and Turkmens lived alongside and in mixed societies for centuries. Prior to Iran gaining its disastrous sway across Mesopotamia, this was a land where the majority of Shiites lived and prospered with their Sunni, Christian, Yazidi and all other religious minority brothers. Has not the time arrived for Iraq to regain its true position as part of the Arab world, and rid its soil of the meddling of Iran’s clerics?

By: Dr. Majid Rafizadeh 08/12/2017 While August seems usually a passive time of the year in politics, it has  been  quite the opposite for Iran and the wide variety of developments around this controversial international dossier. A senior  delegation  of  United States  Senators travelled to Tirana, the capital of Albania , today, August 12, 2017, to meet the Iranian opposition  leader  Maryam Rajavi , who heads the National Council of Resistance of Iran. The  delegation ,  Senators Roy Blunt , Vice President of the Republican Conference, and member of the Appropriation, Select Intelligence, Rules and Administration, and Commerce, Science, and Transportation committees; John Cornyn, the Majority Whip, and a member of the Judiciary, Select Intelligence, and Finance committees; and Thom Tillis, a member of the Armed Services, Judiciary, Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs and Veterans’ Affairs committees, also visited members of...

OPINION: COUPLE US SANCTIONS WITH MIDDLE EAST EXPULSION OF IRAN by Shahriar Kia 16 August 2017 Riyadh Daily, 16 August 2017 - The  Iranian regime  is attempting to secure a corridor through  Iraq ,  Syria , and  Lebanon , providing a supply route for its numerous terrorist proxies in the region. Iran ’s clandestine nuclear and  ballistic missile  drive, support for terrorism and domestic crackdown are all aimed at maintaining the  Tehran’s fascist mullahs  in power and pursue their regional policies.

By: HeshmatAlavi AUG 16, 2017 The pro- Iran deal  camp is recently making much noise about how the Trump administration and critics of the pact, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action ( JCPOA ), are making rightful complaints of the text failing to address Iran’s destructive belligerence in the Middle East. These are valid concerns, considering the fact that even if the deal remains intact come October’s decision by  President Donald Trump  to find  Iran  in compliance or not, the mullahs are hell-bent to continue wreaking havoc and expanding influence across the region.

14 August 2017 By Alireza Jafarzadeh On the second anniversary of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), or the Iran nuclear deal, some argue that the agreement succeeded in slowing Iran’s progress toward a nuclear weapon. However, the restrictions on the  Iranian nuclear program  are only limited, as is the international inspectors’ access to the country’s illicit facilities.In addition, in areas unrelated to the nuclear agreement,

AUG 21, 2017 |  By  KELLY JANE TORRANCE Hassan Rouhani  was sworn in for his second term as president of  Iran  on August 5, surrounded by fresh flowers, fervent followers, and around 500 foreign officials. Representatives of the United Kingdom, France, the United Nations, and the Vatican rubbed shoulders with the Syrian prime minister, Hezbollah second-in-command Naim Qassem, Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader and FBI Most Wanted Terrorists list member Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, and murderous Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe. The Westerners didn’t seem uncomfortable in such company; indeed, European Union foreign policy chief  Federica Mogherini  was described as the star of the show after Iranian members of parliament elbowed through the crowd to take selfies with the diplomat.

By: Pooya Stone 10 August 2017 The  regime in Iran has come under immense domestic  and international pressure recently. Most vivid are the sweeping sanctions imposed by US Congress and signed into law by President Donald Trump.

By Heshmat Alavi 7 August 2017 Thanks to years of Western appeasement in the face of  Iran’s belligerence  across the  Middle East , evidence of Tehran’s dangerous footprints are now visible in several countries across the region, including even Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province. The Trump administration, however, has made it quite vivid its adoption of a firm approach. This stance, signaled in the historic May conference in Riyadh, is long overdue and should be enhanced by Washington supporting the Iranian people’s desire for  regime change .

BY HESHMAT ALAVI AUGUST 2, 2017 President Obama's overtures to Tehran were disastrous. The Trump Administration must act now to stop Iran from creating a functioning nuclear weapon, but it may already prove too late.

By: Shahriar Kia  2017-08-01    The Iranian regime is attempting to secure a corridor through Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, providing a supply route for its numerous terrorist proxies in the region. Iran’s clandestine nuclear  and ballistic missile drive, support for terrorism and domestic crackdown are all aimed at maintaining the Tehran’s fascist mullahs in power and pursue their regional policies.

by  Amir Basiri  |  Jul 31, 2017 The unprecedented sanctions  passed by House lawmakers last Tuesday and  the Senate last Thursday  are a milestone achievement in countering the Iranian regime's belligerence and fixing  some of the key flaws  contained in the nuclear deal hammered between Iran and world powers in 2015.

Written by Poorang Novak  Published: 30 July 2017 CONTRARY TO IRAN LOBBY CLAIMS, REGIME CHANGE DOES NOT END IN WAR One of the great falsehoods of the Iran lobby and the appeasers of the clerical regime in Tehran is that any effort at regime change would inevitably lead to war. This by-line can be seen in every article by the Iran lobby and the appeasers attempting to underscore the growing global support for the Iranian opposition (MEK/PMOI) and the Iranian people’s quest for regime change.

Created: 26 July 2017 by Dr. Majid Rafizadeh On the heels of the major  gathering  of the Iranian opposition in Paris on  July 1 , some thirty prominent American luminaries and former officials  issued  a joint  statement  expressing  bipartisan support for the Iranian resistance and underscoring the need for a more firm approach towards Iran’s ruling clerics. Among  the signatories were former House Speaker  Newt Gingrich  and former New York City Mayor  Rudy Giuliani .