Archives:
Iranian Doctoral Student Being Tried In His Country ...
By Daria Carmon
Omid Kokabee, an Iranian Ph.D. candidate in physics at the University of Texas in Austin, is standing trial on espionage charges in his homeland, after being held in custody since the end of January or February. It is believed he was picked up at the Tehran airport en route to continuing his graduate studies…
Round Two in Iranian Cyber Attacks
By Daria Carmon
Several months after Iran’s nuclear facilities were hit by ‘Stuxnet’ a vicious computer virus, senior government official Gholam Reza Jalali has confirmed that another computer virus, this one borne through the Internet, has been aimed at Iran’s government computer systems. Jalali, head of an Iranian military unit that combats sabotage, alleges that the new…
Trial Date Set for Three Hikers Arrested in Iran
The only person to be released out of a trio of American hikers arrested in Iran in 2009 while accidently crossing the border between Iraq and Iran has been subpoenaed to return to Iran for a court hearing this May. Sarah Shourd, a UC Berkeley graduate, was released from a prison in Iran last September on…
Iranian Spy Rings Reaching to Kuwait?
In May 2010, seven people were arrested in Kuwait after being accused of spying for Iran. On April 5, 2011, the verdicts in their trials were handed in. Three were sentenced to death, two were given life terms in prison, and two were acquitted. The men sentenced to death are two Iranian men and a Kuwaiti…
Iran Blames West for Stuxnet; Arrests Spies
In the aftermath of the discovery of the complicated and effective Stuxnet worm, Iran’s intelligence minister Heydar Moslehi blamed western intelligence agencies for developing and unleashing the virus on thousands of Iranian computers. He has now announced on Iranian TV that his own intelligence team has captured “several spies” implicated in the plot to derail Iran’s…
Was Stuxnet an Israeli Attack on Iran?
Referred to as a ‘worm,’ Stuxnet is malware, or a computer virus, that was discovered in June 2010 by a Belarus security firm, though it was likely unleashed the previous June. Its purpose is to disrupt industrial processes and infrastructure, and the worm’s…
Spy v. Spy in Iran
While Ahmadinejad would have you believe that internally everything is hunky dory, and the only problems Iran has are with the meddling West, an August 23 shoot-out between two different intelligence units whose interests are at odds, indicates otherwise.
As per a DEBKAfile exclusive, members of the Ministry of Intelligence (MOIS) clashed with plain clothes members of…
Iranian Scientist Shahram Amiri Answers Some Questi ...
By Haggai Carmon
I don’t purport to suggest that Shahram Amiri or the Iranian intelligence services read my July 13 Op Ed (in which I posed ten questions following Amiri’s public surfacing in the U.S.) and then rushed to respond. That said, Amiri’s July 15 appearance on the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting’s public television offered some answers,…
Ten Questions Regarding the Case of the Missing Ira ...
By Haggai Carmon
Shahram Amiri, an Iranian nuclear scientist, went missing in May 2009 during a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia. Other than the fact that Amiri subsequently resurfaced in the U.S., almost everything else in the espionage-thriller style case is disputed publicly. The barrage of information offered during the past 5 weeks makes it difficult to distinguish…
U.S. v. Iran: Winds of War or Psychological Warfare ...
By Haggai Carmon
Did Brigadier-General Mehdi Moini, who commands Iran’s Islamic Revolution’s Guards Corps (IRGC) in the Iranian West Azerbaijan province, fail to read events through, or was he conducting psychological counter-warfare? Moini was interviewed by the Iranian television channel Press TV, following media reports on the presence of American and Israeli forces in Azerbaijan along the…
Perhaps Gaza Should Send Humanitarian Aid to Turkey ...
By Haggai Carmon
Is there a humanitarian crisis in Gaza that needs Turkish or Iranian support? Not according to Nicholas D. Kristof of the New York Times, who wrote just last week, “Visiting Gaza persuaded me, to my surprise, that Israel is correct when it denies that there is any full-fledged humanitarian crisis in Gaza.” Based on…
The Sick Man Upon the Bosphorus: Déjà Vu?
By Haggai Carmon
On May 14, 1876, the New York Times ridiculed the Ottoman Empire, reminding its readers that “It is now some twenty years since we began to hear about the ’sick man upon the Bosphorus,’ yet the same sort of talk, under somewhat different conditions, is current today. The Ottoman Empire seems to have as many…
Tango with Tehran
By Haggai Carmon
Time has come for the world to recognize that a nuclear-armed Iran could bring the economy to their knees by hiking the price of Middle East oil, and that what is needed is more than rhetoric and mild sanctions against Iran.
“Let’s tango with the Americans,” said Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to his aides.
“What style?”…
Mossad agent denied official entry into London
The UK’s upset about the Mossad allegedly using British passports in an assassination operation earlier this year; in retaliation, the Mossad has been banned from placing an agent in Israel’s embassy in London. Although Israel has not…
CIA to Improve Intelligence Gathering Techniques
Just about everything about the CIA is classified – including its budget – but occasionally we get a little insight into how it’s spending its money: This week, the agency announced plans to pour millions of dollars over the next five years into improving intelligence gathering techniques, technologies and communications.
Number 1 on the agenda is upping…
Italy arrests Iranian spies smuggling weapons
Iran’s steadily progressing nuclear program is top of the terrorist/espionage pops and it comes as no surprise that the country’s got its spies on the hunt for weapons and nuclear materials to import into Iran illegally.
In a nutshell, Iran is under an international UN arms embargo, so they’re having a tough time getting their hands on…
A Dangerous Tit-for-Tat
By Haggai Carmon
Iranian officials are accusing the United States of trying to encourage a “velvet revolution” in Iran. That term was first used in 1989 to describe the nonviolent revolution in Czechoslovakia that overthrew the communist government. And indeed, as part of its velvet war against Iran, the United States is broadcasting cultural programs in Farsi…
Bracing for the worst
By Haggai Carmon
While the world eyes Dubai’s failing economy with great concern, across the bay, Iran sees opportunity. Dubai is the only oil-free city-state of the United Arab Emirates. Until mid-November, it was best known for its spectacular economy and luxurious high-rises.
Intelligence services the world over, however, have long regarded Dubai as a rat’s nest of…
Ahmadinejad indignant in Sawyer interview
Diane Sawyer, anchor for ABC’s “World News,” interviewed Iranian President Ahmadinejad in Copenhagen, Denmark, after he attended the UN’s climate change conference. From an espionage perspective, Iran’s been…
Proof that Iran’s nuclear program has military ai ...
Iran swears up and down that its ongoing uranium enrichment is strictly for the civilian benefits of attaining nuclear power, but the rest of the world doesn’t exactly believe this front. And with good reason – bogus…
Three hikers to face spy trial in Iran
For those of you who’ve been following this now 4.5-month long story, a quick update: the three U.S. hikers who, according to the free world, accidentally crossed the border into Iran on July 31, will in fact be…
Iran to Charge 3 U.S. Hikers with Espionage
It’s official, the three U.S. citizen hikers who were apprehended just inside the Iranian border in July, are being accused of espionage and may face trial in Iran. Does anybody actually think backpackers Shane Bauer, Sarah…
Reiss guilty of nuclear espionage?
The plot thickens in the case of Clotilde Reiss, whom the Iranian ambassador to Paris believes is guilty of nuclear espionage. Ambassador Seyyed Mehdi Mirabutalebi was interviewed by a French daily newspaper…
Egypt: Trial of Hezbollah spies in motion
This Sunday, Egypt brought 26 alleged Hezbollah agents to the stand, where they were formally accused of passing information to a foreign organization, possession of explosive material and planning terrorist attacks on Egyptian…
Iran insists charges against Reiss legitimate
It comes as no surprise that Iran thinks France’s official perspective regarding Clotilde Reiss is “biased and irrational.” France managed to win her temporary release, at the hefty bail fee of $300,000, but calling for Tehran to drop the charges against Reiss altogether has met with indignation. Iran insists that Ms. Reiss is not a political victim.
Hassan…