"Così Teheran voleva uccidere giornalisti inglesi e sostenitori di Israele"

Whilst the United States was hastily withdrawing all twelve of the Air Force’s B-1 bombers from an airbase in the south of England, following new intelligence received by the command regarding a drone attack ordered by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and after London had foiled a minivan attack, another chilling reality emerged in a British court. Three Iranian spies carried out surveillance and reconnaissance activities that are alleged to have led to the killing of journalists in the United Kingdom. Among their targets were Mojtaba Pourmohsen and Kambiz Hosseini, journalists with the London-based Persian-language broadcaster Iran International, and Jonathan Turner, founder of the organisation UK Lawyers for Israel.

The prosecution alleges that one of the three on trial was prepared to carry out the attacks against at least one of the targets, whilst the other two assisted in the planning.

Mohamed Shafiei, an Iranian well-known critic of the regime and supporter of the Pahlavis, was shot and seriously injured in the Dutch town of Schoonhoven. He had celebrated the death of Ali Khamenei on social media. As for Pouria Zeraati, he was working for the UK-based Persian-language channel Iran International when he was stabbed outside his home in London after receiving multiple threats from the Iranian authorities. He moved to Israel after stating that he “no longer felt safe in the UK”. The threat is therefore extremely serious.

It has been a well-known fact since 1979 that Iran has sought to kill Iranian dissidents in Europe. But the threat is not limited to the Farsi-speaking community; it also extends to those who, whether in English, German or Swedish, defend Israel in court, in Parliament or within an organisation. It is not only American bases and synagogues that are being targeted (British Prime Minister Burnham accused Tehran last week), but also public figures active on the pro-Israel front.

“How do I know that Iran isn’t sending new agents to Sweden?”, asked Saskia Pantell in an interview with the Swedish daily Expressen. Pantell, president of the Zionist Federation of Sweden, has received death threats from Tehran. A man and a woman, posing as Afghan refugees, had arrived in Sweden. After discovering the home addresses of Pantell and Aron Verständig, they followed them and took photographs. They were subsequently arrested. Verständig is the president of the Council of Swedish Jewish Communities.

Volker Beck, president of the German-Israeli Friendship Society, also narrowly escaped an assassination plot by Iran’s Quds Force. Beck tells Der Spiegel that he owes his life to the Mossad. “Even to walk the dog, you need an armoured vehicle,” says Beck. “I’ve drastically cut down on my appointments outside the home.”

The Iranian plot against his life was made public after the main suspect, identified only as Ali S., a Danish national, was charged with attempted conspiracy to murder and aggravated arson. Tawab M., an Afghan national who, according to prosecutors, played a supporting role, is charged with attempted conspiracy to murder. According to a report in Der Spiegel, the intelligence services of various countries, starting with Israel’s Mossad, had been monitoring Ali S., a Quds Force operative suspected of planning the assassination of Beck and of Josef Schuster, President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany.

Last April, a bomb exploded outside the headquarters of Christians for Israel in Nijkerk, the Netherlands. A month after 7 October, Alejo Vidal-Quadras, leader of the Popular Party in Catalonia, Vice-President of the European Parliament from 2009 to 2014 and a member of a pro-Israel group, was shot in the face at close range. Five attacks, a single possible mastermind.

Vidal-Quadras was on his way home around lunchtime. He was thirty metres from his flat in the Salamanca district in the centre of Madrid when a man called out to him, “Hola, señor”, causing him to turn round. He was shot at close range with a 9 mm Parabellum pistol, so named in honour of the Latin motto “si vis pacem, para bellum”.