Scandal Unfolds As Top Ayatollah’s Relative Is Caught For Bribery

The online outlet for the Israeli Yedioth Ahronot newspaper, Ynet, published an article on Saturday, reporting that the Israeli Defense Forces had allowed Iran International to visit the site.

Against the background of the mutual threats between Israel and Iran, and attempts to restore the nuclear agreement, the IDF for the first time authorized the cameras of a channel broadcasting in Persian to enter an Iron Dome base, Ynet said, adding that “The channel's reporter even spoke in Hebrew with fighters and commanders at the base.”

Mashregh News, a website in Tehran affiliated with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard reported on this development, harshly attacking Iran International for visiting an Israeli military installation, while the country is threatening Iran with an attack. 

The report by the channel’s correspondent Babak Es’haghi (Babak Itzhaki) was broadcast from inside a base near the Gaza border this week. 

Iron Dome is a mobile all-weather air defense system designed to intercept and destroy short-range rockets and artillery shells. 

The Iron Dome missile defense system successfully intercepted 97 percent of incoming rockets launched by the Iran-backed Palestinian Islamic Jihad group in their latest bout of violence in August. 

On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid said the country is leading “an intensive campaign” meant to prevent the signing of “a dangerous” nuclear deal between Iran and world powers.

Mohammad Javad Karimi Ghoddusi (Qoddusi), a member of the Iranian parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said on Sunday that Iran “generously” provides drones to every country that needs them “according to the strategy of Islam and in line with maintaining the region’s security.”

He said the country’s drone industry and all its costs are justifiable for Iran’s defense system because it has not prioritized the strategy of expensive and complex aircraft. 

Claiming that “the Americans admit their air supremacy in the world has been challenged by Iran,” he said that “the combination of Iran’s missiles and drones' capabilities has created a very extensive, deep, precise and low-cost security for the entire Islamic nation and Islamic countries.” They pay for the drones and Iran’s aid is not free, he added. 

Last week, a member of the Ukrainian parliament, Yuliya Leonidivna Klymenko, told Iran International that she was “deeply shocked and saddened" by the fact that Iran sent drones to Russia to be used in its invasion of Ukraine, noting that Moscow is going to buy 100 more drones from Iran in addition to the drones it recently bought from the Islamic Republic.

US Defense Department spokesperson Todd Breasseale said on Tuesday, August 30, that Russia has faced "numerous failures" with Iranian-made drones acquired from Tehran this month, adding that the United States assesses Russia has received the delivery of Mohajer-6 and Shahed-series unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) over several days this month.

In a thread of tweets on Friday, Ardeshir Motahari, a lawmaker accused Rostam Ghasemi, the minister of roads and urban development, of taking advantage of his hospitalization as an excuse not to provide any response regarding the arrest of his adviser by intelligence ministry’s agents "exactly on the date he arranged to receive a bribe in euros." 

Ghasem Makarem Shirazi, the adviser, is the grandson or nephew of – according to different reports – of Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi, a well-known hardliner Shiite leader who is a close ally and staunch supporter of Ali Khamenei. In the latest parliamentary election, the accused ran for office from the city of Shiraz but failed to garner enough votes. He has held several positions during his career and has always been close to Ghasemi. 

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"Since the arrest of his advisor and special inspector, instead of answering questions, he has been lying on the bed,” Motahari said.

He also implicitly accused the road minister’s son of collaborating with his father’s detained adviser, and mentioned some other names and a corruption case about a land grab in the district of Boumehen (Bumehen) west of the capital Tehran. 

Last week, the administration of Ebrahim Raisi confirmed reports about Makarem Shirazi’s arrest, but said the minister is in hospital for a spinal surgery. 

Relatives of top figures in the Islamic Republic are often appointed to jobs unrelated to their education and expertise and many of them take advantage of their connections to circumvent regulations to make profit or receive bribes.

He made the remarks in an Instagram post on Friday after Iran International released travel documents that reveal two of Zarepour's children hold Australian citizenship.

Zarepour claimed that none of his family members and even immediate relatives has dual nationality. 

In early August, Mohammad Saleh Hashemi Golpayegani, the secretary of Iran’s Headquarters For Enjoining Right And Forbidding Evil, tasked with promoting the clerical regime’s interpretation of Islamic laws, criticized the high number of “senior officials” whose relatives are living abroad, confirming that there are over 4,000 sons and daughters who have left Iran.

Earlier in the year, General Morteza Mirian, the commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards’ ground operations, said that the relatives of these officials should be “tracked” so as not to be allowed back to Iran to take up managerial positions.

A figure of 5,000 “descendants” of senior officials living abroad was cited in 2020 by Mohammad Gharazi, communications minister between 1985 and 1997 who was at the time considered a presidential hopeful. In November 2021, Alireza Salimi, a member of parliament, suggested that officials under former President Hassan Rouhani, including deputy ministers had moved to Europe due to fears they would be banned from leaving the country.

In 2019, Brian Hook, special representative for Iran (from 2018 to 2020) under President Donald Trump told Iran International that “children of Islamic Republic officials live rich and comfortable lives in the United States and other countries while Iranian people live in terrible conditions.” Hook said this showed “the regime’s hypocrisy.”

Responding to Iranian hardliners' insistence on employing clerics to supervise government and private institutions in a wide range of areas from banking to medicine, Iranian lawmaker, Massoud Pezeshkian said that no cleric, judge or government minister would put his life at risk by going to a doctor who is a devout Muslim but does not have the medical qualifications.

He said, on the contrary, many of those officials would go abroad to seek medical assistance for a simple surgical operation but when it comes to taking care of the people, they advise that religious virtues, without the right qualifications, comes over and above their academic credentials.

Pezeshkian, a member of the Iranian parliament's medical committee suggested that in the interest of the people's welfare, the government should prioritize professional abilities in various professions instead of employing zealot Muslims with little qualifications and skills. The lawmaker who is a medical doctor criticized government plans to place clerics in all bank branches as Islamic supervisors.

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Criticism of the government in Iran during these days is not limited to lay officials and politicians. Grand Ayatollah Hossein Nouri Hamadani, a source of emulation, one off the highest ranks in the Shiite clerical system, has also called on President Ebrahim Raisi (Raeesi) on September 2, to be serious in tackling inflation.

Didban Iran website quoted Noori Hamadani as saying "It is undeniable that sanctions imposed by the enemies have affected the country's economic situation, but the government should not take advantage of this to justify its failure in controlling the prices and harnessing inflation."

Saying this during a meeting on Friday with the Minister of Industry Reza Fatemi Amin, the grand ayatollah suggested that the government should do its best to provide what the people need by boosting production. He added that "the only sign of the officials' success is the people's happiness. But we see that people find it difficult to buy even a kilogram of fruit."

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In another development, lawmaker Behrouz Mohebbi of the Iranian parliament's planning and budget committee, told reporters in Tehran on Friday that government’s decision in early May to cancel import subsidies for food, medicine and animal feed has led to unprecedented inflation.

Meanwhile, he attributed part of the problems people face to the fact that the government always talks about long-term plans and has no short-term planning to solve the country's economic issues. Mohebbi further called on President Ebrahim Raisi to take serious measures to help the underprivileged part of the Iranian society.He criticized Raisi and his ministers for pretending during cabinet meetings that the people's financial situation is improving. Mohebbi reiterated that people find it difficult to make ends meet. They are under immense economic pressure.

Meanwhile, conservative commentator Mohammad Mohajeri, a former editor of hardline daily Kayhan, wrote on his Telegram channel that it appears the government has reduced the individual quota for purchasing gasoline at the subsidized price from 250 to 150 liters per month in what appears to be a prelude to raising fuel prices in Iran.

He added that gasoline rationing cards are likely to be made obsolete soon. According to Iranian media, Iranians consume some 120 to 130 million liters of gasoline every day.