Iran: More on the Political Attack on the National Iranian American Council

As we expected, the whipped-up controversy over the activities of the National Iranian American Committee --- fuelled by the attack journalism in The Washington Times --- has descended into further invective and allegations.

The Lake piece gave cover to the earlier exaggerations and distortions not only of The Weekly Standard, which is trying to blow apart any engagement with Iran, but also Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic:

A couple of weeks ago I retracted my assertion that Trita Parsi, the head of the National Iranian American Council, did "leg-work" for the Iranian regime. I was trying to suggest, in a not-so artful way, that Parsi is trying to build his organization into an Iranian version of AIPAC, but "leg-work" seemed, in retrospect, like too harsh a description for his activities.

But now I may have to retract my retraction....

Meanwhile, the counter-allegation is spreading that Hassan Daioleslam, who is the source of the allegations and who is being sued by Parsi for defamation, is a long-term member of Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MKO). The group has sought the overthrow of the Iranian regime since 1979, often through violence, bombings, and assassinations.

Josh Rogin of the Cable blog of Foreign Policy is writing that Daioleslam is well-connected with Washington neoconservatives who are challenging NIAC to undercut the Obama administration's engagement strategy.

Rogin is posting emails between Daioleslam and Kenneth Timmerman, in which the two plot strategy and discuss the plans to leak documents to Eli Lake, who wrote the Washington Times story. Timmerman is a longtime advocate of regime change in Tehran, through platforms such as the Foundation for Democracy in Iran, which he co-founded in 1995 with Joshua Muravchik and the late Peter Rodman. He has accused Iran of a role both in the September 11 attacks and the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.