Iran Regime Boosting Efforts to Kidnap and Kill Enemies—Including in the U.S.

Western security officials are concerned by a major uptick in plots hatched by the Iranian regime to abduct or murder dissidents, journalists, and even former senior U.S. government figures, according to The Washington Post. The efforts to wipe out opponents of Iran’s rulers have even taken place inside the U.S., with some security sources informing the Post that the number of plots has spiked in the last two years. Iranian security services reportedly offer hundreds of thousands of dollars to criminals including drug dealers and jewel thieves to execute the plans, many of which have been foiled. Since 2021, some of the plots have included an assassination attempt on former National Security Adviser John Bolton and a plan to kidnap Iranian American journalist Masih Alinejad. Anonymous security experts said many of the Iranian plots have been designed as reprisals for the January 2020 airstrike killing of Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the Iranian Quds Force, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ special operations branch.