PAAIA retained Babak Hoghooghi, esq.,* a Washington lawyer, to write a report on sanctions against Iran. The PAAIA report says:
“The purpose of this report is to provide an … analysis of current sanctions, … their overall impact on Iran, and the impact on the Iranian American community.”
The above sentence is in bold so you do not forget the alleged purpose.
Can you imagine? A Washington D.C. lawyer undertaking such a monumental task. I waited with baited breath for a serious analysis of the ‘impact of sanctions on Iran and Iranians in America.’ I suspected what he promised was not going be included the PAAIA report in any meaningful way.
I will summarize what was in the report.
The first portion of the report is filler material that discusses policies under Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter, which is of little relevance to Iranians today. Why not write a high school book-report on the type of credit cards Cyrus the Great kept in his wallet? Totally pointless.
Then PAAIA weasels in references to Iran’s “sponsorship of terrorism” and “the Iranian government’s harsh crack-down on protesters.” Whether you like this subject matter or agree with such statements is not the point: Remember the monumental task outlined as the purpose of the report: (a) the impact of sanctions on Iran and (b) impact of sanctions on the Iranian community. We don’t need a nostalgic trip through the wonderland of the green movement. If that’s what you want, it exists elsewhere. But when you go to your physician for a prostate exam you don’t want to hear a lecture about how Mir Husssein Mousavi was robbed of the election or where to buy a “Neda” T-shirt.
By the 4th page, he finally says something relevant to the purpose he outlined: “Iran’s oil output has reached its lowest level in 20 years and the Iranian Rial has lost more than 50 percent of its value against the dollar within a matter of months.” He had to wait until page 4 to give the PAAIA report an attempted appearance of legitimacy. What he wrote is something a child could have copied from a single CNN article. Nevertheless, he finally wrote 1 sentence after 4 pages of gibberish that relates to the purpose he outlined.
By the time you get to page 9, all he has done is describe the sanctions – not analyze their impact on Iran or their impact on the Iranian community. And his descriptions of the sanctions are not a particularly impressive feat because all it really requires is copying from secondary sources or from a database available to lawyers (Lexis-Nexis). Trust me: Even you can copy statutes and executive orders from an online database.
He continues until page 18 in this same manner, and then turns to writing that sanctions have impeded Iran from obtaining “steel and carbon fiber” necessary for its nuclear program. Who knows if that is true? And who cares except the Israeli lobby? I don’t think Iranians joined PAAIA to get reports on “steel and carbon fiber” that can be used in a nuclear program. Why not just drop a footnote on how much butter to use on your bagel? It’s just not relevant to ordinary Iranians.
He then writes that there has been an “increase in both the cost of goods and inflation in Iran.” Wow! This guy is a genius. Someone recommend him for the Nobel prize in economics. His breathtaking analysis is about as nutritious as the stuff they put in hotdogs to avoid selling you real meat. He then claims that imports of goods are down by about 14% and relies on a single source from the World Policy Institute (WPI). However, he does not tell you that WPI is a New York based organization that covers far-reaching issues ranging from climate change to banking to counter-terrorism. The source is another of “those” do-it-all organizations with dubious data to be able to seriously analyze Iran’s economy. But because the source has a fancy name, it should be good enough for you.
He then says sanctions “significantly impacted Iran’s economy” because a number of companies, including banks, can’t do business with Iran. Like I said before, this guy deserves the Nobel prize in economics. Here is the best part: As his source, he cites to “United Against a Nuclear Iran” whose leaders are some of the people that brought you the Iraq war and what to me look like card-carrying Yeshiva members with anger management problems. Fortunately, that source doesn’t have the so-called spy “Reza Khalili” on their board, but they do have his pal James Woolsey, Meir Dagan (ex-Mossad) and one young Asian woman as an intern (don’t complain: someone has to get the bagels and look sexy in front of the main chieftains).
Our PAAIA genius further notes that sanctions have made it difficult for foreign banks to “transmit payments” to Iran. No kidding? Really? I thought sanctions were a good source of dietary fiber for better regularity. He claims exports account for half of Iran’s revenue, but provides no source.
By page 21 – yes, page 21 ! – he actually writes something about the impact of sanctions on Iranians (that he summarized from a CNN article):
“[M]any Iranians have had to cut back on what they purchase and eat. Many Iranians live on monthly government subsidies of $40 – $50 that are no longer sufficient to meet their food and shelter needs. The cost of medical and dental care, medications and basic procedures and service have similarly soared, leaving many an Iranian resident reluctant to obtain much needed medical care.”
Out of PAAIA’s 30-page-long report, only 1 page has a section called “IMPACT OF SANCTIONS ON IRANIAN AMERICANS.” Didn’t the author of this report tell us that his purpose was to analyze the impact of sanctions on Iranians? Then why devote only a bare 3% of the article to it? And that 1 page is also mostly filler material. To me it smells like someone wants to build a case for sanctions and war, while not coming across as a traitor, so he can hurry up and eat some kabab in Tehran after the attack. It will not happen. Let that be a lesson to PAAIA: Iranians will call a spade a spade where the evidence, whether direct or anecdotal, presents itself. But what do you expect from an organization that has board members with biographies that state:
“Following the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Mr. Ebrahimi’s entire assets were confiscated by the new Government in Iran and he moved permanently to the United States.”
Only God knows what he did. To give you some background about my own life, my family has owned the same property in Iran for generations; the land was purchased during the Qajar era, then we added to it and purchased the neighboring property during the Pahlavi era, and IRI has not done anything to us. Here is what is even more dramatic: Our next door neighbor was the Shah. If we can keep our property through three Iranian dynasties, and PAAIA board members can’t, perhaps they should look closely at their own behavior. The PAAIA board member above is also an executive with the World Affairs Council, yet another non-profit “think tank,” with members that include James Woolsey (the CIA director that fabricates information about Iran), and executives from Aramco Services Company (ASC) a wholly-owned affiliate of Saudi Arabian Oil, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and other such companies. What has the Iranian-American community done to win the constant admiration of these devils? And why is James Woolsey a member of every think tank north of the equator? The guy barely even thinks before he speaks.
PAAIA’s report further speaks of, “Iran’s capabilities to potentially produce a nuclear weapon,” without giving facts. This is Israeli lobby material. Is that why people join PAAIA? To hear about nuclear weapons from a D.C. construction lawyer?
The PAAIA report also speaks of “alleged acts of discrimination or profiling” against Iranians. And though numerous concrete examples exist including court cases that terminated in the favor of Iranians that were discriminated against he uses the word “alleged.” Obviously, the lawyer knows some of the real history and could have pointed it out. A lawyer that cannot publicly and fairly defend their own ethnic group from discrimination is lower than trash, in my opinion.
The report is more about the impact of sanctions on an assumed nuclear weapons program and not on the impact of sanctions on ordinary Iranians. The report states:
“The broader impact of sanctions can be seen in a host of other areas ranging from the challenges in developing nuclear weapons ….”
The report also speaks of attempts to “persuade Iran to abandon its drive for nuclear weapons capability.”
Seriously, who signed up to PAAIA for this right-wing zio-fascist garbage?
Please don’t misunderstand: groups like PDMI and NIAC is just as bad. Right now Trita Parsi is looking for an Iranian that was denied the right to buy an electric shaver so he can make another Youtube video so he can pretend to fight discrimination, while consistently failing to speak out about serious acts of discrimination against Iranians that in earnest started in 1979. Nevertheless, let’s keep the focus on PAAIA before we turn to the other groups on another date.
PAAIA previously stated:
“We also deliberate before making organizational decisions while ensuring that, unlike some other organizations, one voice does not drown all others.”
Fair enough. If you are affiliated with PAAIA, you are accountable for the crap that is generously being called a report. If you are a PAAIA member and disagree with the contents of the sanctions report as I have described them, register for an account here and stand and be counted in opposition to it and clearly explain the passages I have quoted. Otherwise I am guessing that the closest you will get to a Persian-speaking country is if you buy a condo in Afghanistan – most Iranians do not like weasels or traitors, despite what you read on many (unnamed) Internet sites.
I will give Iranians a tip on how to organize yourselves: If you care about problems facing Iranian-Americans, first and foremost focus on the misbehavior of the Israeli lobby because they are driving it. Any organization that cannot steadfastly stand-up to, and directly condemn, the Israeli lobby for its behavior towards Iranians does not deserve the time of day.
Adios PAAIA.
* Note: The lawyer that wrote the report works in construction law and handles compliance with U.S. sanctions on Iran. In other words, he stands to make money as a result of sanctions, and he likely could have told you more about how sanctions affect ordinary Iranian-Americans or written a report detailing the hardships caused to ordinary Iranians because of the convoluted nature of the sanctions regime in place. It was a pretty low-life move on both parts, if you want my personal opinion.
