Iran: The Political Attack on the National Iranian American Council

The Latest from Iran (14 November): Political Fatigue?

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I had not intended to touch this story when I saw it being pushed by the polemical magazine The Weekly Standard --- why devote attention to an American political squabble, even if it had an "Iran" label, when there were matters concerning Iran that have far more significance than the point-scoring and agendas in Washington? Unfortunately, one cannot let barking dogs lie.

On Friday Eli Lake of The Washington Times paraded an alleged exposé, "Iran advocacy group said to skirt lobby rules", of the status and activities of the National Iranian American Council (NIAC). The article is lengthy, offering the appearance of background and context to frame its accusing "questions about whether the organization is using that influence to lobby for policies favorable to Iran in violation of federal law" and its warning to "prominent Washington figures" that they "could come to regret their ties to the group".

Neither length nor the article's placement in the news rather than opinion-editorial section should disguise, however, its intent. This is not journalism but a political attack.

Lake's piece follows weeks of allegations by The Weekly Standard, that NIAC is beyond political acceptability. (Far from coincidentally, the magazine has been pursuing the same line with J Street, the Jewish activist group that often criticises Israeli policy.) The articles claims to rest on thousands of NIAC documents filed in a lawsuit that NIAC's Trita Parsi has brought against Hassan Daioleslam for defamation. Daioleslam, who provided the documents to The Standard and then to Lake, charged in 2007 that NIAC was lobbying for Iran.

Lake cites a total of two of those thousands of documents, both e-mails from Patrick Disney, NIAC's acting policy director. One looks for a campaign to challenge the Obama Administration's appointment of Dennis Ross to shape policy on Iran, and the other queries if NIAC might be acting as a lobby although it has not registered under the Lobby Disclosure Act. (It should be noted that Disney claims that he wrote the e-mail when he had just joined NIAC and from a position of little legal expertise and that Lake carries the rebuttal.)

And that's it, really. Instead of offering any further evidence, or indeed referring to the court's deliberations on the documents Lake asked "two former federal law-enforcement officials" --- former FBI associate deputy director Oliver "Buck" Revell and former FBI special agent in counterintelligence and counterterrorism Kenneth Piernick --- "to review documents from the case showing that Mr. Parsi had helped arrange meetings between members of Congress and [Iran Ambassador to the United States] Zarif". They offer Lake's dramatic flourish:

Arranging meetings between members of Congress and Iran's ambassador to the United Nations would in my opinion require that person or entity to register as an agent of a foreign power; in this case it would be Iran....It appears that this may be lobbying on behalf of Iranian government interests. Were I running the counterintelligence program at the bureau now, I would have cause to look into this further.

Now, Mr Lake might want to correct me on this, but he has just asked for a legal opinion from two people who are not lawyers but federal police officers. He might want to expand on why he put their reactions above the line which he then sneaks in: "Two lawyers who read some of the same documents said they did not provide enough evidence to conclude that Mr. Parsi was acting as a foreign agent." Instead of letting this sink in for the reader --- the only legal experts cited have just said that the charge is without foundation --- Lake simply runs to a new possibility: Parsi is using his NIAC position for financial benefit, for himself and/or Iranian associates such as Siamak Namazi and Bijan Khajehpour, who just spent four months in detention in Iran.

For this is an article resting on the bedrock of insinuation. Parsi, who claims to represents Iranian-Americans, is not an American but "a green card holder". NIAC lies when it claims to represent many Iranian-American, for it "had fewer than 500 responses to a membership survey conducted last summer". Parsi, who has brought a lawsuit against someone for claiming he is an agent of Iran, still might be a foreign agent --- "Mohsen Makhmalbaf, an acclaimed Iranian filmmaker and unofficial spokesman for Iran's opposition Green Movement, told The Times, 'I think Trita Parsi does not belong to the Green Movement. I feel his lobbying has secretly been more for the Islamic Republic.'"

Let me be clear: I am not here to offer any judgement on the specifics of whether NIAC is a lobby --- if there is doubt, that is a matter for US federal authorities to determine. (It should be noted, however, that the salient issue is whether NIAC is a lobby, not whether it is a lobby acting on behalf of the Iranian Government --- that is another conflation in Lake's article.) I offer no judgement on the charges of improper financial and political behaviour by Trita Parsi; that is a matter for the court handling the defamation lawsuit --- NIAC's response to Lake emphasizes that the case is ongoing, as "the judge [has] denied [Daioleslam’s[ motion to dismiss the case on 18 out of 19 counts".

Instead, I ask: why now this campaign against NIAC by The Weekly Standard, now abetted by Mr Lake --- unsurprisingly, within hours of the article's appearance, the magazine was hailing the "blockbuster exposé"? What is it that is so threatening about its activities that it must be put out of action through allegations about its credibility and a "hands-off" notice to any politician, diplomat, or businessman who might choose to engage with it? (Lake serves his notice on two Washington insiders: "Among NIAC's advisory board members are former Undersecretary of State Thomas Pickering, and John Limbert, a former U.S. hostage in Iran, was a board member until his recent appointment as deputy assistant secretary of state for Iran.")