03.12.2020

Assassinations should be condemned

Statement from Hands Off the People of Iran

The assassination of Iran’s ‘nuclear mastermind’ during an attack in Absard, near Tehran, is no doubt part of what the Israeli paper Ha’aretz called Trump’s “scorched earth” policy, aided by Netanyahu.

If an Arab country or Iran had assassinated an Israeli, European or North American nuclear scientist in broad daylight, there would have been no end to the condemnation of the act by leaders of the ‘free world’. We would have heard lectures about the ‘rule of law’, the importance of adhering to ‘international law’ … yet, when an Iranian physics professor and at least three of his companions are assassinated, in what is assumed to be an action organised by Mossad, the media prefers to bury the news and you can barely hear a murmur of condemnation from western politicians.

The plot may have been finalised during last week’s gathering of Pompeo, bin Salman and Netanyahu in Neom in Saudi Arabia - a meeting confirmed to have taken place by Israeli ministers, yet denied by Saudi Arabia.

If reports from Tehran are correct and at least one group involved in the assassination were suicide attackers, Friday’s plot involved not just Mossad agents, but Muslim ‘religious martyrs’ associated with Saudi Arabia. Mossad agents don’t take part in suicide missions.

The news is even more worrying in these last weeks of the Trump presidency, when you consider the fact that around the 12th of November the US president was seriously considering air attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities, only to be dissuaded by military advisors.

Hands Off the People of Iran is against Iran’s nuclear plan and indeed we campaign for a nuclear-free Middle East. However, this aim cannot be achieved through assassination of individuals involved in the development of the nuclear industry in Iran, Israel or anywhere else. Such acts must be condemned - especially when they are part of the desperate last actions of a discredited US president, who seems to be obsessed with creating chaos before his departure.

Of course, Iran’s Islamic Republic doesn’t come out of this very well either. Over the last few years, academics, worker and student activists arrested by the Islamic regime in Tehran have been given long sentences following false accusations of spying for foreign powers - mainly the US, UK and Israel. Some have been tortured and forced to appear on the regime’s TV stations, where they ‘confessed’ to the most bizarre claims of spying. No-one, except the most diehard supporters of the supreme leader, believes these ‘confessions’ obtained under torture.

Yet in less than four months it appears that Mossad and/or CIA agents have succeeded in hitting hard at the very centre of the regime’s security zones. The first time was in August, when it is alleged that Israeli agents assassinated al Qa’eda’s number two, Abu Mohammed al Masri, in a zone controlled by the ministry of intelligence in Tehran. Then there was Friday’s assassination. Clearly Mossad agents have infiltrated the tightly-controlled Islamic state security. Unlike the labour activists, academics, lawyers, environmentalists, etc accused of spying, the real Mossad agents involved in terrorist plots are within the ranks of the ministry of intelligence. Instead of torturing innocent individuals to force false confessions, the regime’s security forces in Tehran should look at their own agents.

Hopi condemns terrorist attacks in the Middle East, be they perpetrated by Israel, Iran or Saudi Arabia.

We oppose any imperialist intervention and call for the immediate and unconditional end to sanctions on Iran. While we remain opposed to the Islamic Republic of Iran, we believe its overthrow must come from below. We oppose US-style ‘regime change from above’ and that is why we support all working class and progressive struggles in Iran against poverty and repression.

For a Middle East free of nuclear weapons as a step towards worldwide nuclear disarmament!

November 29