Iranian operatives in the US fund and fuel hate on campus and spread propaganda across the country — and even get face time with friendly American elected officials, according to an alarming new report on extremism by George Washington University researchers.
In one of the report’s concerning images, Vice President Kamala Harris is seen happily mingling with an imam at the center of the murderous regime’s influence campaign.
An Iranian-born cleric who served as head of the Iranian Navy’s political-ideological office during the 1980s, Imam Mohammad Ali Elahi has deep, decades-long ties to his homeland, and has praised the Islamic Republic’s bloodthirsty founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and Hezbollah, saying he would die for the cause.
Harris convened with Elahi at a vaccination event at the TCF Center (since renamed Huntington Place) in Detroit in July 2021, and planned to visit his controversial Islamic House of Wisdom in Dearborn, Mich., before the tour was scrapped at the last minute due to a flood, according to the nonprofit’s website.
“Imam Elahi joined the vaccination mobilization event addressed by Vice President Harris, Governor [Gretchen] Whitmer . . . and a group of state and national political leaders,” the nonprofit gushed alongside images of a smiling Elahi with Harris.
“Talking with VP Harris, the imam congratulated the administration for their great achievements in fighting COVID 19 and advancing the vaccination services,” the organization wrote. “Vice President Harris thanked Imam Elahi and IHW for their preparation to host her at the House of Wisdom.”
The chance encounter illustrated just how far, and high up, Iran’s hateful influence in the US reaches. It was recounted in an explosive new report from George Washington University’s Program on Extremism.
The report singled out the radical Manhattan-based Alavi Foundation, once accused by federal prosecutors of serving as a “secret” front for the Iranian government. The group has funneled nearly $500,000 to Elahi’s organization since 2000, along with another nearly $1.9 million to American universities, including Columbia, according to tax records reviewed by The Post.
“Democrats hold a dangerously mistaken notion that Iran is part of the solution — not the main problem in the Middle East. This leads them to outreach here in the U.S. with Muslims tied to that tyrannical theocracy like Mohammad Ali Elahi,” Jim Hanson, chief editor of the Middle East Forum, a DC-based think tank, told The Post. “Obama, Biden and Harris have all enabled and even funded their efforts.”
Elahi, Alavi and the Harris campaign didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Elahi, 68, maintains deep contacts to the murderous regime.
He’s regularly posts photos on social media showing him meeting with former Iranian presidents, including Ali Akbar Rafsanjani, Mohammad Khatami, Hassan Rouhani, and the recently deceased Ebrahim Raisi, according to the report.
Elahi once called the ayatollah — the infamous architect behind the kidnapping of 53 American hostages for 444 days in 1979 — as “an exceptional religious authority,” and was photographed with the zealot.
Elahi has openly expressed support for Hezbollah, which killed 241 Americans during a terrorist attack in 1983 and has been locked in a war with Israel after the Oct. 7, 2023 massacre.
“If my blood would help the liberation of Lebanon, I would give my blood to liberate Lebanon,” he once told an Arabic paper in Michigan.
“The war that Netanyahu and his terrorist cult have started against Lebanon will never succeed,” Elahi thundered in September as Israel assassinated Hezbollah leaders. “I hope to see Netanyahu and his criminal cabinet in jail soon. And if they escape justice in this world, for sure they won’t escape the HELL next.”
In 1991, Elahi was tasked with inspecting American branches of Hezbollah and promoting Tehran’s influence on Shi’ite communities, according to the U.S. Institute of Peace.
Elahi is also a member of the Ahl Al-Bayt World Assembly, an Iranian-based organization founded in 1994 by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The group has tentacles in about 90 countries, aims to extend regime influence through networking with academic institutions, civil rights organizations, charities and welfare projects around the world.
Elahi is the only identifiable American member of ABWA’s general assembly and he has been photographed at top leadership meetings in Iran, GWU reported.
While sanctions prevent ABWA from operating directly in the United States, the group organizes trips for American academics to Iran to meet with regime leaders and receive training at their headquarters in Islamic holy city of Qom, the GWU report said.
Despite Elahi’s close ties to Tehran, he has managed to ingratiate himself with top American Democrats.
In addition to Harris, he has mingled with former Secretary of State John Kerry, and Whitmer, photos show.
The GWU report also named Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, Michigan Rep. Debbie Dingell and the late Rep. John Conyers as people who have associated with Elahi.
Elahi is a regular donor to Democrats through the fundraising platform ActBlue, Federal Election Commission records show.
The GWU report also discussed Elahi’s prime benefactor, the Alavi Foundation, which has long been on the feds radar.
In 2008, the Department of Justice alleged Alavi “secretly served as a front for the Iranian government and as a gateway for millions of dollars to be funneled to Iran in clear violation of U.S. sanctions,” according to court papers.
Since 2000, the nonprofit has donated at least $486,810 to Elahi’s Islamic House of Wisdom, Alavi’s tax records show.
The group has also donated roughly $1.9 million to American universities over the years, including recent hotbeds of anti-Israel hate like Harvard, Columbia and Hunter College.
In June, Elahi signed a letter to Wayne State University leaders demanding they meet radical campus activists from Students for Justice in Palestine.
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In July Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines confirmed that “Iranian government actors have sought to opportunistically take advantage of ongoing protests regarding the war in Gaza” which has included “providing financial support to protesters.”
Lara Burns, a lead researcher on the GWU report, said Haines was correct.
“We are tracking that [DNI] report and have seen messaging in protest activities consistent with support for Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran and even Iranian regime leaders have openly praised the activity,” Burns said.
Alavi is at the center of a widespread campaign to influence the American public, the researchers said.
“The New York-based Alavi Foundation is arguably the most prolific actor in the spread of Iranian regime influence in the United States,” according to the GWU report titled “Propaganda, Procurement and Lethal Operations: Iran’s Activities Inside America.”
“With its multimillion-dollar budget, it either directly owns or funds through grants, no-interest loans, and donations a broad array of mosques and entities nationwide that disseminate Tehran’s viewpoint.”
Alavi’s then-president Farshid Jahedi was sentenced to three months in prison in 2010 after pleading guilty to obstruction of justice and destroying documents concerning Alavi’s relationship with Iran’s Bank Melli.
“For decades, the Iranian regime has worked closely with far-left, far-right and Islamist groups across Europe and North America,” Sam Westrop, director of Middle East Forum’s Islamist Watch project told The Post in August. “Following the October 7th attacks . . . Tehran has poured money and logistical support into anti-Israel and pro-terror rallies, encampments and civil disorder. We’ve uncovered evidence of this in Houston, where the Iranian regime appears to operate mosques, activist and student groups that are deeply involved in pro-terror demonstrations, alongside Hamas-aligned groups.”
Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS), said Iran’s evil ideology and malign influence have “no place here,” after being apprised of the report.
“We need an administration that has the backbone to reject Iran’s propaganda that undermines America and espouses antisemitic views. America must stand up to terrorists, not cower to the ayatollah at every turn.”
