OIAC Welcomes the Letter by 22 Bipartisan U.S. Senators to President Donald Trump”
OIAC
WASHINGTON, Feb. 3, 2017: Organization of Iranian American Communities (OIAC) welcomes the letter by 22 bipartisan U.S. Senators to President Donald Trump, demanding that the Administration hold Iran accountable for its January 29, 2017 ballistic missile test, conducted in violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 2231 as well as other provocative actions.
Joining Senators Ben Cardin (D-MD) and Bob Corker (R-TN) on the bi-partisan letter are Senators Tim Kaine (D-VA), Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), Chris Coons (D-DE), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Bob Casey (D-PA), Bill Nelson (D-FL), Michael Bennet (D-CO), and Ron Wyden (D-OR), as well as Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL), Ron Johnson (R-WI), Todd Young (R-IN), Cory Gardner (R-CO), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Johnny Isakson (R-GA), Tom Cotton (R-AR), John Barrasso (R-WY), Jeff Flake (R-AZ), Jim Risch (R-ID), and Rob Portman (R-OH).
Iran- Human Rights (Women, Minorities, Ethnics)
Iranian authorities executed One person every 9 hours in January
Iran Human Rights
Iran Human Rights (FEB 3 2017): According to reports compiled by Iran Human Rights, the Iranian authorities hanged 87 people in the month of January 2017, including two juvenile prisoners and six prisoners who were executed in public. Out of the 87 executions, only 19 of them were announced by official Iranian sources. Most of the executions which were carrieed out in Iran in January 2017 were for drug related charges.
According to research conducted by Iran Human Rights, executions tend to significantly increase in the months leading to an election in Iran but significantly decrease or stop a couple weeks before the election. Iran Human Rights is deeply concerned that a new wave of executions have started in Iran and worries that the number of executions will increase following the “Fajr Decade” celebrations.
Iran: Two Juvenile Prisoners Executed
Iran News Update
Two child executions have reportedly been carried out in Iran since the start of 2017.
Iran Human Rights (JAN 28 2017): Two juvenile offenders were executed in Kerman (southeastern Iran) and Tabriz (northwestern Iran) prisons. This is in addition to the more than 70 people who have been executed since the beginning of 2017. Iran Human Rights calls for international reactions to the wave of executions and in particular juvenile executions in Iran.
“We want abolition of the death penalty, and as a first step abolition of the death penalty for all offences committed while under age of 18. We are calling on the international community, especially the United Nations and the European Union, to place abolition of the death penalty, in particilar the death penalty for juveniles, at the top of their talks with the Iranian authorities,” says Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, spokesperson of Iran Human Rights.
IRAN: “Stoning Sentence for a Woman and a Man, Increasing Sentences of Brutal Amputations”
NCRI
The criminal judiciary of the clerical regime in the Lorestan province sentenced a man and a woman to barbaric punishment of stoning (Kashkan state website, February 4, 2017). In another incident,Yoiusef Parvaneh, a 70 year old prisoner, has been transferred from Karaj Ghezel Hessar prison to Orumiyeh Central prison for carrying out the inhumane amputation of his fingers. His alleged charge is theft in 2009. Since the plaintiff in the case is a criminal revolutionary guard, the regime’s judiciary ignored the appeal of this prisoner and intends to carry out the sentence.
The judiciary of the regime has sentenced two brothers in Yazd, in addition to life imprisonment, to flogging and hand amputation. (state run Mizan news agency, January 17, 2017)
Also a young woman in Tehran has been sentenced to a year in exile and 99 lashes for having a “telephone conversation with a man” (Rokna site – February 4, 2017).
Iran to blind acid-attack woman in Sharia retribution punishment 
The Telegraph
ran’s supreme court has ruled that a woman must be blinded in one eye as punishment for an acid attack that left her victim sightless, using the principle of “eye for an eye” of Sharia, the Islamic law, Tasnim news agency, which is close to the elite Revolutionary Guards, reported on Thursday.
Under Sharia, imposed since the 1979 Islamic revolution, qesas (retribution) is permitted in cases where bodily injuries are inflicted.
Iran- Terrorism Activities (Middle-East)
Pence Warns Iran to ‘Think Twice’ Before Testing Trump Administration
ABC News
Days after the Trump administration imposed new sanctions on Iran, Vice President Mike Pence issued a stern warning to the country in an interview with ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos.
“Iran would do well not to test the resolve of this new president,” Pence said on “This Week” Sunday, adding that Iran should “think twice about their continued hostile and belligerent actions.”
When Stephanopoulos pressed the vice president on what actions by Iran would test Trump’s resolve, the vice president specifically mentioned the country’s ballistic missile tests and military support for Houthi rebels in Yemen. Asked how the U.S. would respond to another provocation, Pence answered that the “president said everything’s on the table” — including military action.
The very real, very dangerous threat of the Iranian regime”
Fox News
In an recent article in Foreign Policy magazine, author Trita Parsi wants us to believe that “Iran’s proxy wars [are] a figment of America’s imagination.” He brushes off the statements of newly minted Secretary of Defense James Mattis-a career Marine, four star general and universally lauded military expert-as hyperbole.
Interestingly, Parsi neglects to mention Iran’s long-held position as the leading state sponsor of terrorism. At a time when facts are at a premium, let’s assess the stark realities of the Iranian regime and the severe threat it poses to global security.
Iran is responsible for the death of more than 1,000 U.S. service members, and the catastrophic injuries of countless more through its financial support, provision of weapons and training of terrorists in Iraq, Lebanon and across the Gulf states.
ANALYSIS: Iranian regime’s Achilles Heel”
Al Arabiya
In the last week of January, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) test-fired a new ballistic missile in violation of a United Nations ban imposed on the Iranian missile program.
In the same week, Harakat al Nujaba, an Iranian proxy-militia in Iraq staged a public event to test-fire its new long-range missile provided by Iran. Then, Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen attacked a Saudi warship in the Red sea killing several servicemen.
These acts by the Revolutionary Guards and its regional proxies are part of a larger campaign to project the Iranian military power and help Iran to energize its supporters across the region while intimidating its rivals.
Trump Must Pressure Iran
American Thinker
Iran was involved in a long slate of aggressive measures up to the very doorsteps of President Donald Trump taking the helm in Washington. This concerning pattern of escalating extremism ironically increased following the Iran nuclear deal sealed between the P5+1 and Tehran, despite many in the West arguing such an accord would rein in the mullahs. And now, a new U.S. president has rightfully pinpointed “radical Islamic terrorists,” of which the root lies in Iran.
Further to the mullahs’ advantage was the Obama administration’s reluctance to adopt any serious stance against Iran running its Shiite extremist rampage across the region. Obama’s White House only imposed sanctions considered anything but harsh.
Iran- Nuclear Activities
USA House Foreign Affairs Committee: “My suggestion is, put them on notice”.
Foreign Affair Committee
At an Israel Project forum yesterday, Chairman Ed Royce responded to Iran’s latest ballistic missile launch – a violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 2231 – and urged the administration to put the regime on notice that these types of dangerous and provocative acts will not be ignored, a step the White House took later that afternoon. Video and key excerpts from the forum are below.
Trump administration sanctions Tehran – but what now?
BBC
Within days of an Iranian missile test and a subsequent warning from the Trump administration, the US has now followed up by imposing a new round of economic sanctions.
The sanctions focus upon suppliers to Iran’s missile programme and groups that help to arm what Washington sees as terror organisations in the region.It is hard to see what practical impact these sanctions will have, since few of these organisations or individuals probably do business in the United States.
But the sanctions sends a clear warning to Tehran the guard has changed in Washington.
