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09/25/2018

The United States is behind the terrorist attack in Ahvaz

The United States is behind the terrorist attack in Ahvaz

On Saturday, September 22, a terrorist attack took place in Ahwaz, Iran, where 25-29 people were killed.Ahwaz is the capital of Khuzestan province in Iran, which has the largest number of Arabic speakers in Iran, and therefore the center of the conspiracy of Arab countries against Iran. During the war between Iran and Iraq  the main target of Saddam Hussein’s attack was the Khuzestan province, and in general it could be described as the most important region of Iran facing the Arab countries.

A coalition group of “Patriotic Arab Democratic Movement in Ahwaz”, which includes several Arab-Iranian dissident groups,and ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack shortly after it was carried out.Based on available evidence, this terror was not carried out the by the ISIS, and the Islamic State group simply falsely claimed responsibility for it.

The most important group in the Patriotic Arab Democratic Movement in Ahwaz’ coalition is the “Arabic Liberation Movement of Alahwaz”which has carried out various terrorist operations in Khuzestan province over the past 13 years, including more than 20 bombings.The political activities of the group usually take place in Kuwait and Tunisia, the two countries informally supporting Alahwaz.Many members of the group live in the UK, the Netherlands and Denmark.

There are two ambiguous issues in this regard:

  1. The terrorists had already hidden their weapons in the attack location. The parade location was checked before the ceremony, but the weapons were neither detected nor neutralized.
  2.  The terrorist attack took place in the park near the parade location.The park was closed last year, but it was open this year, and this helped terrorists to more easily carry out the attack.

However, an official in the province completely rejected the influence of this park being open in the attack,and stated that the reason for the attack not being neutralized was that the terrorists used Iranian military uniforms.

Another important element in this story is tge Persian language television network in London, “Iran International”.The TV channel, financed and launched by Saudi Arabia, interviewed a spokesman for the coalition group of the Patriotic Arab Democratic Movement in Ahwaz immediately after the terrorist attack, trying to paint the action as unrelated to terrorism. How do the officials of network at that time of the day (5:30 a.m. London time) have a pre-arranged the interview with a spokesman for the terrorist group in question?!.This fact could fuel suspicion that the authorities or supporters of the channel already knew about the terrorist attack.Given this fact, the Iranian ambassador to London, speaking on the same topic on his Twitter, asked the authorities in London to follow up on the matter.

On the other hand, the scenario might have been designed by the opposition of the Iranian state, with the Patriotic Arab Democratic Movement in Ahwaz denying responsibility for the terrorist attack, and then the Persian-language networks opposed to the Iranian state, which are in England and the United States, stating that the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps are responsible, claiming ththe attack was carried out in order to prevent Hassan Rouhani and Donald Trump from meeting at the United Nations.This version of events is based on conspiracy theory and is to be completely rejected, but the coordination of the Iranian state’s opposition within this scenario is still interesting.

Some Iranian officials have also unofficially blamed the United States for the incident, saying Washington supported the perpetrators of the attack.The officials, whose names have not been disclosed, have access to intelligence indicating that the perpetrators of the Ahwaz terrorist attack in Tunisia met with US intelligence officials.This could affect relations between Iran and the United States.

Foreign Minister Mohammad Jawad Zarif wrote on his Twitter account that terrorists have been trained and supported by a “foreign regime.”The term “foreign regime” is used in Iran’s political literature to refer to Israel, which is why Zarif’s reference likely implied Israel.It should be noted that Muhammad Jawad Zarif cannot directly refer to the United States because of his responsibilities, and therefore, noted Israel, which is already in open conflict with Iran.This also  certifies the existence of the documents that implicat United States intelligence services involvement in the terrorist attack in Ahvaz, but they have not been made available to the media.

WikiLeaks, of course, has published documents in the past which indicatedthat two senior members of the terrorist group of the Patriotic Arab Democratic Movement in Ahwaz met with members of the US intelligence community in the United Arab Emirates in 2006.

The strategy of US-backed terrorist groups is to first come to the streets in civil demonstrations,then, by exploitation of ethnic and religious issues, such as the Kurdish, Arab, and Turkish or confrontation of the Shiite or Sunni religions against each other, create divisions, proceeding to use terrorist operations try to create chaos.This is particularly true of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan, Jabhat al-Nusra, ISIS and many other US-backed terrorist groups.

The same is true of Ahwaz. In February 2018, due to air pollution, we witnessed mass protests by opponents of the Iranian state in Ahvaz. These protests turned to violence in March.In July, with the pretext of a shortage of drinking water in Ahvaz, we witnessed an open conflict between the Iranian state’s opponents and the police.And finally, on Saturday, these clashes took the form of a terrorist attack, following the exact same metric as ISIS had in Iraq and Syria, under US support!

Finally, it can be concluded that the Ahwaz terrorist attacks were carried out with the support of Saudi Arabia, Israel and the United States. In addition to the available evidence, Iranian authorities also hold supporting documents that have not yet been provided to the media, and have only been referred to in statements.

What is important at this moment is Iran’s reaction to the incident. Iran must respond smartly to the attack, because a hasty response from Tehran authorities may make the situation even more chaotic, opening the way for US-backed terrorist groups.

Mani Mehrabi
Senior international affairs analyst, Faculty member at the Think tank of International Relations (Tehran, Iran)

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