Recently released reporting about an ‘Iranian assassination’ plot may have little or nothing to do with the July 13 assassination attempt on President Donald Trump at a rally event in Butler, Pennsylvania. In March 2024, the FBI in Miami warned of an Iranian assassin wanted in connection with assassination plots against former and current public officials, such as former National Security Advisor/Ambassador John Bolton, former CIA Director/Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and others who served in former President Donald Trump‘s administration. The Iranian regime has repeatedly threatened both Trump and other officials it holds responsible for the drone strike that killed Quds Force Commander Qassem Suleimani in January 2020. The FBI stated, “Majid Dastjani Farahani, an Iranian intelligence officer, is wanted for questioning in connection with the recruitment of individuals for various operations in the United States, to include lethal targeting of current and former United States government officials as revenge for the killing of IRGC-QF Commander Qasem Soleimani. Farahani acted or purported to act for or on behalf of, directly or indirectly, Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security.” In 2022, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi made a speech in which he blamed Trump and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo for the killing of Suleimani.
Different Operations?
One theory being floated in some circles is that Thomas Matthew Crooks—and possibly others across the United States who may fit an anti-Trump, disaffected profile—could have been recruited on online gaming sites by Iranian intelligence agents posing as Americans. We’ll note that Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL) told FOX News host Jesse Watters in an interview at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, WI, that Crooks had three encrypted overseas apps on his cell phone. Subsequent reporting identified the locations of those three apps as Belgium, Germany, and New Zealand. Waltz, who sits on the House Intelligence, Foreign Affairs, and Armed Services Committees, did not offer additional details, nor did Watters press him to. Online recruitment is a well-known tactic employed by Islamic jihadis, usually with the intent of enticing young people to war zones or to act within communities in support of jihadist objectives. The Islamic State (IS) exemplifies the use of technology to disseminate high-quality propaganda that emulates Hollywood movies and popular video games. Using a variety of social media platforms, IS has been able to reach millions of people and encourage tens of thousands to leave their homes and join the Caliphate. In this case, if Crooks was recruited from a gaming platform, he was not being recruited for war in Syria or Gaza. He was being recruited for a “special” operation, which could be viewed by those recruiting him as jihad.
Crooks’ attempt to murder the former US President may or may not be part of the known ‘Iranian assassination plot.’ Crooks was not a ‘trained’ assassin. He may have received some training, but he is not an IRGC/MOIS (Islamic Revolutionary Guard/Ministry of Intelligence and Security) operative. Moreover, the discovery of one plot a year ago does not mean it’s this plot. In fact, the Iranian regime and other hostile state actors continuously develop various plots to undermine the U.S. government and its allies. Disclosure to the media of the Iranian intelligence assassination plot—which came after the Trump shooting but apparently had been known for several months, if not up to a year prior—may or may not relate to this attempt by Crooks. There could be a different plot related to maintaining the Biden administration and its policies towards Gaza/Israel in power that supersedes this earlier-but-still-in-effect plot of revenge for Suleimani or it may be in addition to the threats against Trump related to Suleimani.
Which regime benefits from a Democrat administration the most? Given the situation in Gaza and the likely upcoming war between Israel and Hizballah, it is clearly in the Iranian regime’s interest to maintain the status quo. The Biden administration is, after all, an administration that has consistently demonstrated a policy of appeasement towards Tehran. The Biden, Burns, Bitar, and Blinken team has been viewed as less adversarial to Iranian interests and those of its intelligence services than the prior Republican administration led by then-President Donald Trump. The Biden administration is viewed by the Iranian regime as willing to permit and even finance its drive to deliverable nuclear weapons capability and support for Islamic terror across the region, while at the same time being antagonistic toward longtime ally Israel.
For example, the Biden administration has sought to sanction Israel’s battalion, an Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) unit comprised of observant Orthodox Jewish men. Such a step is unheard of among allies and certainly from what was, until recently, the closest ally of the Jewish State of Israel. Recently, however, in deference to the UN and other aid agencies, some of which have been found to aid and abet terrorists, the Biden administration built a ‘humanitarian aid’ pier with U.S. taxpayer money to support food and other supply efforts in the Gaza Strip, in full knowledge that HAMAS takes control of most supplies coming into Gaza. The $230 million pier has now been dismantled because it could not withstand the Mediterranean’s typical buffeting by wind and waves. The U.S. State Department has proffered ‘ceasefire’ agreements that were not coordinated with Israel and which demonstrably would benefit HAMAS and its fight to survive and remain in control of Gaza, and has delayed critical weapon shipments to Israel, all of which serve to undermine Israel’s military objectives during what can only be described as an existential war.
Then there are the pro-HAMAS and pro-Iran officials who populate the Biden administration, such as Hady Amr, the Special Representative for Palestinian Affairs within the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. Add the Iran Experts Initiative network, established in 2014 by the Iranian regime’s Foreign Ministry to infiltrate the highest levels of U.S. national security in collaboration with then head of the International Crisis Group think tank, Robert Malley. Malley was subsequently selected to head the Biden administration’s State Department negotiating team for the Iran nuclear talks in Vienna, Austria, before having his security clearance and job suspended over reports of ‘mishandling’ classified information.
There have also been questionable appointments to the Biden National Security Council. According to an article that appeared in Dnyuz, Maher al-Bitar, the White House Coordinator for Intelligence and Defense Policy at the U.S. National Security Council (NSC), was a radical pro-Palestinian activist and a leader with Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) while at Georgetown University. “Bitar’s record is coming under closer scrutiny as President Joe Biden takes unprecedented action to undermine Israel’s war against the HAMAS terrorists that attacked it on October 7, including withholding arms from Israel.” Usually, the sensitive position is reserved for a CIA officer who is detailed to the National Security Council. Bitar, however, is not an intelligence professional. He is an anti-Israel political activist who formerly worked for UNRWA (UN Relief and Works Agency), a HAMAS partner in Gaza. Bitar also played a key role in the first impeachment of President Donald Trump, working for Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) on the House Intelligence Committee.
The View from Tehran: Biden, Bitar, Burns and Blinken a Dream Team
Relaxed U.S. enforcement of oil sanctions continued through October 2023, refilling Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s coffers even after the Oct. 7 slaughter and the more than 40 attacks on U.S. troops by Iran’s regional proxies in the weeks since. The Iranian surge in oil exports since President Biden took over has brought Iran an additional $32 billion to $35 billion, according to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. The calculations are tricky, but the cause of the Iranian windfall is clear: as part of President Biden’s quiet diplomacy with Iran, the U.S. has curtailed sanctions enforcement.
As should have been predictable, even as the money fails to moderate Iranian behavior, the mullahs’ regime grows more confident in its belligerence. It finances Iran’s aggression abroad via proxies such as HAMAS in Gaza, Hizballah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and the front groups in Iraq and Syria that shoot at American bases once again on a regular basis. In 2020, the State Department assessed that Iran sends $100 million a year to regional Islamic terrorist groups, arming and training them to attack Israel and murder its civilians, as HAMAS, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and thousands of fully supportive Gazan civilians did on Oct. 7. In 2023, HAMAS leader Ismail Haniyeh said that his group receives $70 million a year from Iran, plus long-range rockets. Citing an Israeli security source, Reuters reports that Iran’s funding for HAMAS ballooned in the past year to $350 million. HAMAS’s capabilities, but more importantly, its objectives and intent, inexplicably took Israel and the U.S. by surprise, but they didn’t come from nowhere.
With Biden now out of the running as the Democrats’ candidate or out of office, Iran may believe it is imperative at all costs to maintain a Democratic administration, one favorable to Iran and overtly hostile to Israel. It is keenly focused on regime priorities to accelerate its nuclear weapons program, sell oil, and fight Israel through its main proxy, Hizballah. It needs a U.S. administration willing to look the other way, approach sanctions with kid gloves, and deliver sanctions against the Islamic Republic’s near enemy, Israel.
Regardless of whether the current Biden administration attempts to downplay any association between Iran and the attempted killing of the former U.S. President, it is incumbent upon U.S. security services and those responsible for the safety of President Trump and other possible Republican targets to consider the potential recruitment of Crooks by Iranian intelligence (even if that was done anonymously to an unwitting Crooks). On July 9, 2024, U.S. Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines revealed that Iran was trying to “stoke discord and undermine confidence in our democratic institutions. Haines said that actors tied to Tehran were encouraging protests over the war in Gaza by posing as activists online and even providing financial support to demonstrators. Did MOIS assess Crooks and others as potential recruits to further its Gaza goals? The primary mission of Iran’s intelligence agencies is to keep the Islamic regime in power. The MOIS and IRGC are the regime’s two main intelligence agencies.
Americans who are being targeted by this Iranian campaign may not be aware that they are interacting with or receiving support from a foreign government. Against this background of Iranian influence, it will be interesting to see what Crooks’ foreign-linked accounts reveal.
Should Iran and its security services eventually be discovered to have some association with Crooks, Trump could well be in continuous danger from a significant hostile state-level party. The threat to him may not have gone away with the takedown of Crooks and may still be at the same, if not a greater, level. If Crooks were recruited online, which is currently under investigation, we should not assume that any plot to kill the former President is over. This is not similar to a school shooter incident in which once the shooter is killed, the threat is gone.
Conspiracy theories will likely run wild for months, if not years, after this horrific attempt on the former—and likely incoming—President’s life. At the end of the day, the shooter does not appear to be a lone wolf, nor does he meet the criteria floated by several media outlets, to put everyone’s mind at ease, of a ‘school shooter.’ This is not Columbine; this was the attempted assassination of a U.S. president. It was a head shot that missed killing Trump by millimeters, not the wild spraying of bullets across a lunch hall. Nor was it an up-close event, as in the case of Ronald Reagan’s assassination attempt. Crooks conducted pre-operation surveillance, flew a drone over the site, acquired a weapon, and once situated atop his chosen roof, assumed a prone sniper position. These factors separate this operation from anything close to a ‘school shooter’ or ‘lone wolf/disgruntled youth’ event. What comes to the surface once the dust has settled may be far worse and far more complicated. If Iran recruited Crooks to maintain Biden, Bitar, Burns, and Blinken, or at least hope to keep Democrats in power while it attacks Israel, did it simultaneously recruit others like him as insurance? Are there more out there? It doesn’t seem likely that Iran would put all its efforts into just one recruit. Will Iran double down?
Beyond the ‘revealed’ assassination plot discovered several months ago, is this a new, active, and more urgent threat to Republican candidates? Is this part of a larger plot extending beyond the death of Suleimani, as some suspect? More critical and highly concerning, after the near assassination of Donald Trump, we must ask: Does the United States have a Secret Service capable of handling such a threat as possibly posed by Iran in its determination to keep the Democrats in power? Does it have the intelligence capability and the wherewithal to halt Iran from enriching ever more uranium for its nuclear weapons program, deploying nuclear-tipped weapons, and annihilating Israel? Secretary of State Blinken has now stated that Iran is within two weeks of having a nuclear-capable weapon. There are still some six months remaining until Inauguration Day in January 2025. If anything, the Trump assassination attempt has shown the stakes for the U.S., Israel, Republicans, and indeed, the world, could not be higher.
AUTHORS
Jill Bellamy is a biodefense specialist with a focus on Iranian BW programs.
Clare Lopez is the Vice President for Research and Analysis for the center for Security Policy. Ms. Lopez manages the Center’s counter jihad and shariah programs, bringing with her also an expertise on Iran, Hizballah, and southern border issues. From 2010-2014, she was a Sr. Fellow with the Center. Lopez began her professional career as a CIA operations officer and later applied her national security expertise as a consultant, intelligence analyst, and researcher in various contract positions within the defense sector. She has been an instructor for military intelligence and Special Forces students and lectures widely on Iran, Islam, and the Muslim Brotherhood around the country. Earlier an advisor to EMP Act America, in February 2012 Ms. Lopez was named a member of the Congressional Task Force on National and Homeland Security, which focuses on the Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP) threat to the nation and is a member of the Center’s Secure the Grid Coalition.
This column originally appeared in American Greatness
©2024. Clare M. Lopez. All rights reserved.
