US mainland under threat as Iran pushes assassinations, kidnappings: report

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Journalist Masih Alinejad speaks out after Iran’s plot to kill her: This is a national security issue

Journalist and activist Masih Alinejad explains why she wants to meet with President Biden after the plot against her on ‘America Reports.’

Amid the report that a top Iranian regime military official on Friday urged the murders of the ex-commander of the United States Central Command General Kenneth McKenzie, former President Trump, and former Secretary State of Mike Pompeo, a new report asserts that Iran is likely behind a “kill list” targeting law enforcement agencies in Boston.

Amirali Hajizadeh, the commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Aerospace, who declared during a televised interview last week that, “Inshallah (God willing) we will be able to kill Donald Trump, Mike Pompeo (former) CENTCOM chief Kenneth McKenzie, and others who ordered killing of Qasem Soleimani.”

The U.S. military killed Soleimani with a drone strike in January 2020 because the EU and U.S.-designated terrorist was planning an attack and was responsible for the murder of over 600 American military personnel.

The reach of Islamic Republic of Iran terrorist activities impacted the independent TV network Iran International Iran just days ago. The Persian-language TV outlet said it was suspending its London-based operation and relocating to Washington D.C. because of a “significant escalation in state-backed threats from Iran.”

IRAN REISSUES THREAT TO ‘KILL TRUMP, POMPEO’ FOR SOLEIMANI DEATH WHEN ANNOUNCING LONG-RANGE CRUISE MISSILE

Iranian activist Masih Alinejad. (Fox News)

Across the Atlantic, Iran’s regime—which the U.S. State Department classifies as the world’s worst international state-sponsor of terrorism— launched a kidnapping attempt of the Brooklyn-based Iranian dissident Masih Alinejad.

Following the arrest of the three alleged kidnappers, FBI director Christopher Wray noted the very real threat posed by Iran to the U.S. and the world. “The conduct charged in today’s case shows how far Iranian actors are willing to go to silence critics of the Iranian regime—even attempting an assassination right here in the United States. But looking at the threat from Iran more broadly, we’ve seen the Iranian regime become more aggressive and more brazen across vectors.”

Wray continued that “In just the past couple years, actors associated with Iran have launched a ransomware attack on a children’s hospital in New England, attempted to assassinate the former U.S. National Security Advisor on U.S. soil, and now plotted to silence a U.S. citizen—a journalist who publicized the Iranian government’s human rights abuses—by carrying out a murder in the heart of New York City.” 

Wray warned, “If that doesn’t show how serious the threat from Iran is to Americans right here in America, I don’t know what does.”

There is a bill of particulars of Iranian assassination plots on U.S. soil. In 2009, Iranian agents sought to murder California resident Jamshid Sharmahd for his opposition to the county. The regime kidnaped Sharmahd when he was in the United Arab Emirates in 2020 and sentenced him to death on Tuesday on reportedly trumped-up charges.

Amir Ali Hajizadeh, head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps aerospace force, threatened former President Trump and top members of his former Cabinet, including former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, for the 2020 killing of its top military commander, Qasem Soleimani (IRINN via AP)

NEW YORK MAN WITH LOADED AK-47 ARRESTED NEAR HOME OF IRANIAN DISSIDENT, CRIMINAL COMPLAINT SAYS

In 2012, the former New York City Police Department Commissioner Ray Kelly disclosed during an anti-terror conference that “We’ve been concerned about Iran for a while.”

In 2014, the United States government linked Iran’s regime to the planned assassination of the Saudi Arabian Ambassador in a Washington, D.C., restaurant. 

A new 24-page report by the California-based Zachor Legal Institute outlines what it says are Iranian threats against U.S. targets that include the Boston Police Department, the FBI and other government and law enforcement agencies.

The report, titled “The Unseen Threat of The Mapping Project,” claims there “is considerable evidence that Iranian elements may be involved in creating the Mapping Project.” The document notes that the Iranian regime-owned PressTV -published a “supportive column” on June 26, 2022, and a 30-minute video segment about it in July of the same year that praised the Mapping Project and called for its replication in all 50 American states.

The U.S.-sanctioned outlet PressTV reported, “It is perfectly legitimate to target Jewish groups that support Zionist crimes, just as it is to target Christian groups that do the same. The Mapping project, to its credit is already doing that.”

Rebekah Koffler, a former analyst at the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, told Fox News Digital, “It is my professional assessment that there’s a high probability of Iran’s involvement in this heinous project. The project’s stated goals, antisemitic narrative, and methodology employed to galvanize support from extremist sympathizers, are consistent with the tradecraft of Iranian intelligence tradecraft and Iran’s declared policy to target U.S. persons.”

BOLTON CALLS IRAN ASSASSINATION PLOT AN ‘ACT OF WAR,’ CALLS ON BIDEN ADMIN TO ‘TERMINATE’ NUCLEAR TALKS

A huge mural of Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei Iran’s Supreme Leader painted next to a smaller one of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, right, seen on Motahari street on March 8, 2020 in Tehran, Iran. The message on the wall reads “The power and influence and dignity of America in the world is on the fall and extermination” and on top of the building, another slogan reads “We are standing till the end.” (Photo by Kaveh Kazemi/Getty Images)

The Boston Mapping Project was initially thought to be largely limited to planned antisemitic terrorism attacks against Jewish and Israeli organizations in Boston. The Zachor Legal Institute, however, revealed that “out of the roughly 500 entities publicly listed on the Mapping Project website, 298 are American strategic security assets and institutions. This raises concern that the true goal of the project is to map the American security apparatus and that the targeting of the American Jewish community – while real and troubling – may be a façade to obfuscate this plan.”

Fox News Digital reported last year that Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions Boston, which supports the anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, posted an endorsement of the Mapping Project.

According to Zachor, “A particularly noteworthy feature of the Mapping Project is that it provides, in meticulous detail, the precise addresses of U.S. government institutions and law enforcement offices. This refers not only to department and agency headquarters but also to numerous local branches and offices of these institutions.”

Koffler said “As recently as last November, Homeland Secretary Mayorkas testified to the Senate that the Islamic Republic could attack the United States ‘with little to no warning.’ FBI Director Christopher Wray testified that Iran posted an escalating threat to the homeland, having become more capable and more aggressive in their harmful and criminal activity.”

Tehran’s clerical regime has Iranian dissidents and American officials on its terror assassination radar screen. Koffler noted that “The U.S. government already pays millions of dollars to provide 24/7 security to former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former President Trump’s special envoy to Iran Brian Hook, both of whom face, to this day, ‘serious and credible’ threats from Iran.” 

GERMANY EXPELS 2 IRANIAN DIPLOMATS WHO WERE CONVICTED OF TERRORIST ACTIVITIES

Demonstrators burn representations of Israeli and U.S flags during the annual Al-Quds, or Jerusalem Day rally, with the Azadi (Freedom) monument tower seen at left, in Tehran, Iran, Friday, May 7, 2021. Iran held a limited anti-Israeli rally amid the coronavirus pandemic to mark the Quds Day. After the late Ayatollah Khomeini, leader of the Islamic Revolution and founder of present-day Iran, toppled the pro-Western Shah in 1979, he declared the last Friday of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan as an international day of struggle against Israel and for the liberation of Jerusalem. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

The website of the Boston Mapping project declares that, “Our goal in pursuing this collective mapping was to reveal the local entities and networks that enact devastation, so we can dismantle them. Every entity has an address, every network can be disrupted.”

Mariellen Burns, chief of communications for the Boston Police Department, referred Fox News Digital to federal partners. She also noted that, “We are continuously engaged with security and threat briefings with the Jewish Community, and they are aware we are here to help.”

When asked about the report and the alleged list of federal and security targets, a spokesperson for the FBI told Fox News Digital that the organization “has no comment.” 

Thomas Dalton, the deputy press secretary for Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell, told Fox News Digital that the attorney general “has been on the record in vocal opposition to the Boston Mapping Project.” He linked his statement to a June 2022 tweet sent by Campbell stated that, “The explicit naming of people, school, and orgs within the Jewish community is dangerous and absolutely unacceptable. This creates a real threat for our Jewish community especially with an uptick in anti-Semitic attacks and hate crimes. The map should be taken down immediately.” 

Dalton added that, “Her position remains the same today.” When pressed, Dalton declined to comment on the alleged role of Iran’s regime in planned attacks against Boston police and government agencies.

A spokesperson for the U.S. National Security Council referred Fox News Digital to the State Department.

Hundreds of people attend a rally on Saturday, Oct. 22, 2022, in Washington in a show of international support for demonstrators facing a violent government crackdown in Iran, sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in the custody of that country’s morality police. (AP Photo/Farnoush Amiri)

US NAVY OFFICIAL SAYS IRANIAN ATTACKS IN MIDDLE EAST ‘HAVE THE ATTENTION OF EVERYONE’

 A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department told Fox News Digital that, “We have no information to provide on this question” with respect to the alleged role of Iran in the Boston Mapping Project. 

Koffler told Fox News Digital that, “The U.S. intelligence community is aware that Iran has been building networks inside the U.S. homeland for more than a decade with the goal of threatening U.S. persons directly or through proxy attacks. There have been attempts by Iranian agents to conduct lethal operations inside the U.S.”

Two Democratic Massachusetts congressional representatives, Rep. Seth Moulton and Rep. Jake Auchincloss, who last year blasted the Boston Mapping Project’s antisemitism, declined to answer numerous Fox News Digital press queries about the Iranian regime threat to the Boston area. Both Democratic senators for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey, also went mom in response to Fox News Digital press queries.

Koffler said, “The Biden Administration’s security team has been quite enthusiastic about investigating parents under ‘domestic terrorism’ laws. It is stunning that they are ignoring the real and escalating threat …against our security institutions, such as police stations, air force bases, naval installations, the U.S. Secret Service, FBI, Homeland Security, U.S. Marshals.”

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When asked about Iranian plans for such an attack and whether Teheran was behind the mapping project, a spokesperson from the Iranian mission to the United Nations told Fox News Digital that “The group you mentioned isn’t supported in any way by Iran.”

Fox News Digital reporter Ronn Blitzer contributed to this report.

Benjamin Weinthal reports on Israel, Iran, Syria, Turkey and Europe for Fox News Digital. Benjamin has contributed articles to The Wall Street Journal, The Jerusalem Post, Foreign Policy, Haaretz, Forbes and The New York Post. You can follow Benjamin on Twitter @BenWeinthal.