The MEK has matured since I’d seen them last … They are still very much playing the great geo-political game. ibid.
Germany is proving a diversion. The girls are clearly not here. ibid.
Thousands of their members are still trapped there [Iraq] and need to be airlifted out. The only place that will accept them is Albania. ibid.
The cheque cleared: Khan had helped Iran on the road to nuclear power. Nuclear Secrets V: The Terror Trader, BBC 2007
Late last month reports emerged of a secret deal reached between the US and Israel setting out a wide-ranging plan to confront Iran in a number of different areas. The Corbett Report, We Need to Talk About Iran, James Corbett online 2017
A wave of protests broke out across Iran … soon morphed into rallies, riots and violence aimed against the Iranian republic itself. ibid.
The US, Israel and their allies are actively supporting and fomenting regime change in Iran. ibid.
Repeated allegations of bias against the broadcaster made by senior officials in both Tehran and Whitehall. Document: BBC Bias and the Iranian Revolution, BBC Radio 4 2009
Papers I’ve come across which raise doubts about the role of the BBC in the late 1970s when Iran was teetering on the brink of revolution. ibid.
The growing threat to the Shah was endangering British interests. ibid.
This man [Ruhollah Khomeini] changed the world. He took Iran and made it an inspiration for a new uncompromising strand of Islam. His Iran broke all the rules of diplomacy. It unleashed forces the West still cannot handle. It has undermined the West’s hold on the Middle East. Iran and the West I: The Man Who Changed the World, BBC 2009
‘America is behind all that’s gone wrong.’ ibid. Khomenei
Khomenei’s success in stoking the revolution embarrassed the French president, an ally of the Shah. ibid.
The Shah announced that he and his family would soon be taking an extended holiday … The Shah had fled a popular uprising once before, in 1953. ibid.
Many soldiers were conscripts and followers of Khomenei. They deserted in droves. ibid.
‘Good evening. The American embassy in Tehran is in the hands of Muslim students tonight.’ ibid. NBC News
The students paraded their captives. ibid.
Saddam Hussein saw an opportunity. ibid.
Ayatollah Khomenei had laid down a pattern of intransigence that continues to this day. And still bamboozles the West. ibid.
Iran’s Islamic revolution deprived the West of a powerful friend: the Shah of Iran. Soon it threatened to destabilise more of the West’s oil-rich allies. Iran and the West II: The Pariah State
This new group would call itself the Party of God – Hezbollah. ibid.
America added Iran to its list of state sponsors of terrorism. ibid.
In 1997 Rafsanjani came to the end of his two terms as president. ibid.
The Americans used their influence in the region to rein in the Taliban. ibid.
Since the birth of the Islamic Republic thirty years ago, Iran has been at daggers drawn with the West. In the last decade as the West has put more troops on Iran’s borders the conflict has grown ever more dangerous. Iran and the West III: Nuclear Confrontation
Iran helped America create a new government for Afghanistan. But America still had Iran on its list of state sponsors of terror. ibid.
Iran would provide America with Intelligence and advice to help get rid of Saddam Hussein. ibid.
Iran was building its first civil nuclear power station. ibid.
1979: Grand Ayatollah Khomeini returns triumphantly to Tehran after 16 years in exile. The revolution had been made reality and in Khomeini the figurehead around whom the opposition had coalesced there was a ready-made leader. And yet, beyond their hatred of the Shah, the opposition had little to unite them. Iran 1979: Legacy of a Revolution, Al Jazeera 2009
Khomeini’s supporters immediately began to marginalise all other elements of the revolutionary movement by any means necessary. ibid.
30 years later the Republic not only survives but appears more influential than ever. But to its critics the success of the revolution has come at a cost. ibid.
The hostage-takers were Khomeini supporters but they had acted without his knowledge and without the knowledge of the interim government. ibid.
Saddam used chemical weapons against Iran. ibid.
He [Khomeini] was able to use the war to further consolidate the clerical grip on the Islamic republic and the revolution. ibid.
Modern Iran is now a Middle East superpower. ibid.
Iran has the highest number of heroin addicts in the world. ibid.
State-sponsored abuse is one of the few constants to survive the revolution. ibid.
‘Whenever you speak about an Iranian intervention, the mastermind behind it is Qassem Soleimani.’ This World: Shadow Commander: Iran’s Military Mastermind, BBC 2019
Most people have never heard of him but he’s been pulling the strings behind the scenes in the Middle East for decades. He’s orchestrated deadly attacks on British and American soldiers. Iran’s military mastermind is now at the centre of the global stage. But who is Qassem Soleimani and is he shaping up for a new conflict with the West in the region? ibid.
A new military force was born – the Revolutionary Guard, a young Soleimani joined up. ibid.
In the 1990s Soleimani joined the Quds Force – the most elite and secretive unit in the Revolutionary Guard … In 1998 Soleimani became head of the Quds Force. ibid.
All these young people are now dead. Killed in the street protests against their government’, the Islamic Republic. Their videos remain online almost as memorials. This World: Inside the Iranian Uprising, BBC 2023
In September 22 the death of a young woman in police custody, Mahsa Amini, triggered anti-government protests across Iran. In the crackdown that followed, human rights groups estimate that more than 500 Iranians were killed including 72 children. ibid.
Mike Pompeo has been doing this grand world tour trying to get people behind his attack on Iran … An attack on Iran is all over this meeting. Tony Gosling, Bilderberg 2019: What Do We Know So Far, Youtube 35:29, interviewer Jason Bermas
In a world of spies a cover story and an alias must be watertight. This requires more than just convincing paperwork. It’s how you look, what you say, from the way you act. And it means staying in character no matter what. This is the remarkable story of how one man used inspiration from Hollywood to school six frightened diplomats in the art of being someone else. Damian Lewis: Spy Wars s1e5
Tehran January 1980: Iran was in the grip of an Islamic revolution … CIA agent Tony Mendez entered Iran on a covert mission: his task to rescue a group of six American diplomats from almost certain death. ibid.
The Iranian hostage crisis had begun … 13 embassy workers made a break for it, but in the confusion they were forced to split up. ibid.
The Iranians brought in teams of carpet-weavers to piece together the fragments of paperwork. ibid.
The Canadian government had supplied the American diplomats with genuine Canadian passports. ibid.
This is a land known by two names: the first is Persia: ancient, mysterious, a place of adventure, of mighty temples and palaces built by powerful kings, a land of unimaginable beauty. The other is Iran: isolated, proud, defiant, especially of foreign interference. Samira Ahmed, Art of Persia I, BBC 2020
Persia’s great kings built a vast empire and a rich culture that became an envy of the ancient world. ibid.
In 1979 revolution came to Iran when Ayatollah J transformed it into an Islamic republic. The country has been locked in conflict with the West ever since. ibid.
Our story starts over 3,000 years ago with some ancient plumbing. ibid.
They also made extraordinary monuments like this: Ziggurat of Chogha Zanbil … The temple was once full of beautiful objects and statues. ibid.
[Statue in cave:] Shapur I is making a statement: he is setting out his Sasanian dynasty to rule … Shapur I ruled for over 30 years; he built many cities during his reign … Under the Sasanians, Zoroastrianism became Iran’s official religion. ibid.
This: recording in stone in a gorge nearby the epic saga of Shapur’s triumphs over Rome. ibid.
Back to when the Arabs conquered Persia: a conquest that was more than a confrontation between two mighty armies … Iran isn’t Arab, and how it has proudly held on to its Persian identity and language to this day. Samira Ahmed, Art of Persia II
‘Zoroastrianism is the great forgotten world faith. And it’s a great shame because Zoroastrianism has embedded in it very basic principles of good thoughts, good words, good deeds, under the head of one supreme God – Ahura Mazda.’ ibid. Professor Lloyd Jones, Cardiff University
The spirit of the Zoroastrian religion runs right through Persia’s pre-Islamic history because of the special powers of the god Ahura Mazda bestowed on her kings. This place is called Naqsh-e Rostam: it’s home to a series of extraordinary rock carvings. ibid.