U.S. Senators Placate Iranian Terror-masters at a Bad Time By Andrew L. Jaffee, February 4, 2004	Home   Search   Forum   Terms

At a time when Iran's "pretend democracy" could be shown to be what it truly is, an illegitimate sham, two U.S. senators and one House member are placating that country's evil regime.

Parliamentary ("Majlis") elections are scheduled for later this month, and the extreme, Islamist Guardians Council has disqualified about 3,000 of the 8,200 candidates standing for election/reelection on the grounds that they're not as hard-line as the Council would like them to be. Some of the disqualified candidates were already members of the Majlis. The BBC claims that the disqualified candidates are "reformers." As Iran is the world's "most active state sponsor of terrorism," I'm not sure how "reformist" these candidates could be, as they are participating members in that country's government. But maybe I'm wrong. Sometimes you have to attack the system from within, as Boris Yeltsin did in the collapse of the Soviet (Russian) Empire. Be that as it may, there is a tidal wave of dissent in Iran towards the Guardians' disqualifications.

Several "mainstream" indigenous Iranian groups have called for boycotts of the planned elections. According to the BBC:

"All provincial governors have announced unanimously that, under present circumstances, there will be no possibility of holding elections," interior ministry spokesman Jahanbakhsh Khanjani told the Associated Press news agency.

In addition, over 100 members of the Majlis resigned to protest the Guardians' election interference. The Islamic Participation Front, Iran's "largest pro-reform party," has said it will boycott the poll. In fact, the leader of this party, Mohammad Reza Khatami, is the brother of Iran's President Mohammad Khatami. The Office for Fostering Unity, "Iran's main pro-democracy students' group," has also called for a boycott:

"There is no possibility of fair and free elections," the student movement, the Office for Fostering Unity, said in a statement.

"Considering that people's vote has no affect on the establishment, and there is no way to hold fair and free elections, there is no justification for people to participate in this election."

Some of Iran's establishment institutions will be boycotting the poll. What a grand opportunity to show the world that Iran's government is indeed undemocratic and illegitimate. But at this opportune time, Senator Arlen Specter (R-Pennsylvania), Senator Joe Biden (D-Delaware), and Congressman Bob Ney (R-Ohio) are making nice with Iran's terrorist regime.

Michael Ledeen, a brilliant and honest expert on the Middle East, points out in The National Review that these three elected U.S. representatives have

...undertaken to "improve relations" between the United States and the theocratic fascist regime of Iran. Specter announced over the weekend that congressional staffers would soon go to Tehran in the first stage of the appeasement program. After supping in Washington with the Iranian ambassador to the U.N. at a dinner helpfully facilitated by the State Department, Specter proclaimed that Iran had "helped us in the fight against al Qaeda and in the Afghanistan situation. I don't think we have given them sufficient credit. They deserve credit." And since "They are showing some signs of wanting to improve relations. Now is a good time."

How can this be a "good time?" Ledeen points out:

The recent wave of terror attacks against our Coalition in Afghanistan famously include the Iranian-supported forces of Gulbadin Hekhmatiar, and the whole world now takes it for granted that top al Qaeda figures, including Osama and his number-one son, along with the likes of Zawahiri and Zarkawi, have been operating out of Iran for some time.

But it only gets worse:

Did Specter, Ney, and Biden — and the deep thinkers at State who sponsored the appeasement — happen to notice that, at the very moment they were kissing up to the mullahs, the leaders of some 30-plus terrorist organizations were converging on Tehran for their annual powwow? Is this the sort of helpfulness of which Senator Specter oozed enthusiastic? ...

Someone should tell them [Specter, Ney, and Biden] about the January 24 executions of several commanders and senior officers of the Revolutionary Guards, the elite security force of the regime. The most distinguished of the men was Brigadier General Mohammed-Mehdi Dozdoozani, one of the founders of the RG and a hero in the Iran-Iraq War. His crime was to have exposed government corruption, especially the massive trafficking in young Iranian girls, sold for prostitution to Arab countries. Dozdoozani and his comrades had written an open letter, entitled "We the Warriors," threatening rebellion against these evils.

If they want to know more, they can read "Sex Slave Jihad" by Donna M. Hughes (read her on NRO today, too, here), which speaks of a 635-percent increase in teenage prostitution, and trafficking of girls as young as 8 and 10 years old. There are 25,000 street children in Tehran alone, and the trafficking network feeds on them, often in cahoots with authorities, including judges and Justice Department officials. As Hughes concludes, "only the end of the Iranian regime will free women and girls from all the forms of slavery they suffer.

The behavior of Specter, Ney, and Biden deeply disturbs me. I'm sure they are privy to the mounds of reports American intelligence has collected on Iran's government. Yet they want to befriend the mullahs. Their wishful thinking serves only to hurt -- not help -- the democratic aspirations of the Iranian people. Please contact your elected representatives and urge them to do everything possible to facilitate the fall of Iran's Islamist/fascist regime.