[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 86 (Wednesday, June 15, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1108-E1109]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           IRAN'S ONGOING EFFORTS TO ASSIST THE SYRIAN REGIME

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. HOWARD L. BERMAN

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, June 15, 2011

  Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise to draw attention to Iran's ongoing 
efforts to assist the Syrian regime in violently suppressing peaceful 
protestors.
  I submit the articles ``Iran Helping Syrian Regime Crack Down on 
Protestors, Say Diplomats,'' printed in the May 9, 2011, Guardian, and 
``Iran Reportedly Aiding Syrian Crackdown,'' printed in the May 27, 
2011, Washington Post.
  Press reports indicate that Iran is playing an active role in helping 
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad brutally crackdown on peaceful 
democracy protestors. As the Washington Post reports, ``Iran is 
dispatching increasing numbers of trainers and advisers--including 
members of its elite Quds Force--into Syria to help crush anti-
government demonstrations that are threatening to topple Iran's most 
important ally in the region.''
  Syrians have witnessed an increase in arrests, and door-to-door 
raids, similar to those that helped to crush Iran's Green Movement 
protests in 2009.
  Human rights groups suggest that more than 7,000 people have been 
detained since the uprising began. And more than 1100 people are said 
to have died.
  Mr. Speaker, Iran is terrified that it is about to lose its most 
important ally in the Arab world--they will do everything in their 
power to prevent that from happening. It appears that human life holds 
no value to the leaders in Damascus and Tehran.
  I encourage all of my colleagues to read these articles and follow 
this development closely. The Congress must continue to put pressure on 
Syria and Iran so that freedom, respect for human rights and democracy 
can emerge in both nations.

                      [The Guardian, May 9, 2011]

   Iran Helping Syrian Regime Crack Down on Protesters, Say Diplomats

       Iran is playing an increasingly active role in helping the 
     Syrian regime in its crackdown on pro-democracy protesters, 
     according to western diplomatic sources in Damascus.
       The claim came as Syria's security forces backed by tanks 
     intensified operations to suppress unrest in three new 
     flashpoint towns on Sunday and it was confirmed that four 
     women had been shot dead in the first use of force against an 
     all-female demonstration.
       A senior western diplomat in Damascus expanded on 
     assertions, first made by White House officials last month, 
     that Iran is advising president Bashar al-Assad's government 
     on how to crush dissent.
       The diplomat pointed to a ``significant'' increase in the 
     number of Iranian personnel in Syria since protests began in 
     mid-March. Mass arrests in door-to-door raids, similar to 
     those that helped to crush Iran's ``green revolution'' in 
     2009, have been stepped up in the past week.
       Human rights groups suggest more than 7,000 people have 
     been detained since the uprising began. More than 800 people 
     are said to have died, up to 50 during last Friday's ``day of 
     defiance''. Last night two unarmed demonstrators were 
     reportedly killed during a night rally in the eastern city of 
     Deir al-Zor.
       ``Tehran has upped the level of technical support and 
     personnel support from the Iranian Republican Guard to 
     strengthen Syria's ability to deal with protesters,'' the 
     diplomat said, adding that the few hundred personnel were not 
     involved in any physical operations. ``Since the start of the 
     uprising, the Iranian regime has been worried about losing 
     its most important ally in the Arab world and important 
     conduit for weapons to Hezbollah [in Lebanon],'' the diplomat 
     said.
       Last month White House officials made similar allegations 
     about Iranian assistance for the regime, particularly in 
     terms of intercepting or blocking internet, mobile phone and 
     social media communications between the protesters and the 
     outside world. But the officials did not provide hard 
     evidence to support their claims.
       Activists and diplomats claim Iran's assistance includes 
     help to monitor internet communications such as Skype, widely 
     used by a network of activists, methods of crowd control, and 
     providing equipment such as batons and riot police helmets.
       Syria has denied seeking or receiving assistance from Iran 
     to put down the unrest. In a statement issued on Friday, 
     Iran's foreign ministry stressed Syria's ``prime role'' in 
     opposing Israel and the U.S., and urged opposing forces in 
     the country to compromise on political reform. U.S. policy 
     towards Syria was based on ``opportunism in support of the 
     Zionist regime's avarice'', it said.
       The Assad family, from the Shia Muslim minority Alawite 
     sect, is likely to be nervous about appearing to be helped by 
     its Shia-dominated ally to crush protesters drawn from the 
     75% Sunni population.
       Regime forces backed by tanks were in action over the 
     weekend in Horns, in the town of Tafas north of Deraa, and in 
     the coastal city of Banias, activists said. Violence was also 
     reported in the Damascus dormitory town of Zabadani.
       Along with arbitrary detentions, shootings have continued.
       Razan Zeitouneh, a lawyer in the capital who is monitoring 
     the protests, said four women were shot dead in the village 
     of Merqeb, close to Banias, and six men were shot dead in 
     Banias on Saturday.

                Iran Reportedly Aiding Syrian Crackdown

                [From the Washington Post, May 27, 2011]

       U.S. officials say Iran is dispatching increasing numbers 
     of trainers and advisers--including members of its elite Quds 
     Force--into Syria to help crush anti-government 
     demonstrations that are threatening to topple Iran's most 
     important ally in the region.
       The influx of Iranian manpower is adding to a steady stream 
     of aid from Tehran that includes not only weapons and riot 
     gear but also sophisticated surveillance equipment that is 
     helping Syrian authorities track down opponents through their 
     Facebook and Twitter accounts, the sources said. Iranian-
     assisted computer surveillance is believed to have led to the 
     arrests of hundreds of Syrians seized from their homes in 
     recent weeks.
       The United States and its allies long have accused Iran of 
     supporting repressive or violent regimes in the region, 
     including Syria's government, the Hezbollah movement in 
     Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Many previous reports, 
     mostly provided by Western officials, have described Iranian 
     technical help in providing Syria with riot helmets, batons 
     and other implements of crowd control during 10 weeks of 
     demonstrations against President Bashar al-Assad.
       The new assertions--provided by two U.S. officials and a 
     diplomat from an allied nation, all of whom spoke on the 
     condition of anonymity to describe sensitive intelligence--
     are clearly aimed at suggesting

[[Page E1109]]

     deepening involvement of Iranian military personnel in 
     Syria's brutal crackdown against anti-Assad 
     demonstrators.There was no response on Friday to requests for 
     comment left with the Syrian Embassy and Iranian interests 
     section in Washington.
       In the account provided by the diplomat and the U.S. 
     officials, the Iranian military trainers were being brought 
     to Damascus to instruct Syrians in techniques Iran used 
     against the nation's ``Green Movement'' in 2009, the diplomat 
     said. The Iranians were brutally effective in crushing those 
     protests.
       Officers from Iran's notorious Quds Force have played a key 
     role in Syria's crackdown since at least mid-April, said the 
     U.S. and allied officials. They said U.S. sanctions imposed 
     against the Quds Force in April were implicitly intended as a 
     warning to Iran to halt the practice.
       The Quds Force is a unit of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary 
     Guard Corps responsible for operations outside the country. 
     It has helped fund and train Hezbollah and Hamas militants 
     and supported anti-U.S. insurgents inside Iraq.
       While the size of the Iranian contingent in Syria is not 
     known, the numbers of advisers has grown steadily in recent 
     weeks despite U.S. warnings, according to the U.S. and allied 
     officials.
       The Obama administration mentioned the role of the Quds 
     Forces in announcing two sets of sanctions imposed against 
     Syrian government officials in the past month. A White House 
     executive order last week that targeted Assad and six other 
     top government officials also included a little-noticed 
     reference to Mohsen Chizari, an Iranian military officer who 
     is the No. 3 leader in the Quds Force in charge of training.
       The naming of Chizari--who in 2006 was arrested but later 
     released by U.S. forces in Iraq for allegedly supplying arms 
     to insurgents there--suggests that officials possess evidence 
     of his role in assisting Syria's crackdown on protesters, 
     said Michael Singh, a former senior director for Middle East 
     affairs for the National Security Council during George W. 
     Bush's administration.
       ``There's a deeply integrated relationship here that 
     involves not only support for terrorism but a whole gamut of 
     activities to ensure Assad's survival,'' Singh said.
       It is not unusual for governments to draw on foreign 
     assistance during times of unrest, as Western-allied 
     governments in Bahrain and Egypt did when protests were 
     building in those countries.
       Iran's increasing engagement in the Syrian crackdown 
     reflects anxiety in Tehran about the prospects for Assad, who 
     has failed to end the protests despite rising brutality that 
     human rights groups say has left more than 800 people dead 
     and perhaps 10,000 in prison. While managing to hold on to 
     power, Assad has been severely weakened after months of 
     Syrian unrest, according to current and former U.S. officials 
     and Middle East experts.
       ``Iran is focused intently on how things are evolving in 
     Syria,'' said Mona Yacoubian, a former Middle East expert 
     with the State Department's intelligence division and who is 
     a special adviser to the U.S. Institute of Peace. ``The two 
     countries have a long-standing alliance of 30 years-plus. 
     Syria is Iran's most important inroad into the Arab world, 
     and its perch on the front line with Israel.''
       Assad, whose army is stretched across dozens of cities in 
     an unprecedented domestic deployment, increasingly needs help 
     to survive, Yacoubian said. And Iran desperately needs Assad. 
     ``If they lose the Syrian regime, it would constitute a huge 
     setback,'' Yacoubian said.
       Iran, a longtime supplier of military aid to Syria, has 
     been helping Dasmascus battle the current wave of civil 
     unrest since at least mid-March, said the U.S. and allied 
     officials. The emergence of Syria's first true mass 
     protests--with tens of thousands of demonstrators pouring 
     into the streets demanding Assad's ouster--initially 
     flummoxed the country's security leaders, who had little 
     experience with such phenomena.
       On March 23, Turkish officials seized light weapons--
     including assault rifles and grenade launchers--on an Iranian 
     cargo plane bound for Syria. Whether the shipment was 
     intended to help suppress the uprising is unclear, but around 
     the same time, Syria received other Iranian shipments that 
     included riot control gear and computer equipment for 
     Internet surveillance, the U.S. and allied sources said.
       Just before the shipments, Assad announced with great 
     fanfare that he was lifting the country's ban on the use of 
     social media such as Facebook and YouTube. While widely 
     hailed at the time, the move gave Assad's security police an 
     Iranian-inspired tool for tracking down leaders of the 
     protest movement, said Andrew Tabler, a former Syria-based 
     journalist who is a Syria expert at the Washington Institute 
     for Near East Policy.
       ``Lifting the ban on Facebook helped the regime pinpoint 
     where the [activists] were coming from,'' Tabler said in an 
     phone interview from Lebanon, where he remains in contact 
     with opposition figures. ``It was not about being 
     magnanimous; it was a way to allow more surveillance, leading 
     to thousands of arrests.''

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