Alireza Jafarzadeh, president of Washington-based Strategic Policy Consulting and spokesperson for the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), was the guest of the Middle East Forum at Philadelphia's Cozen O'Connor law offices last Wednesday over lunch. Bob Guzzardi, chairman of the Middle East Forum, introduced Jafarzadeh, who used his visit with the Middle East Forum to promote his new book, The Iran Threat: President Ahmadinejad and the Coming Nuclear Crisis.

The best policy option for the U.S., according to Jafarzadeh, is to support the Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), currently listed by the U.S. State Department as a terrorist organization. Jafarzadeh said that all other options - including an economic boycott of Iran, support for minority groups within Iran and military action - are only ancillary to supporting MEK.
Bombing Iran, Jafarzadeh claimed, will not help and, at best, would delay the nuclear program. In focusing on Iraq, Jafarzadeh said, "Nouri al-Maliki, the current prime minister, must be removed and Shiite militias disarmed." He accused Maliki of being an agent of Iran and emphasized Iran's decisive voice in the Maliki government. He asserted that "ministerial appointments in the Maliki government get approval from Tehran."

America's and the free world's best hopes for Iran, he said, are with the younger generation and women. Being born into a climate of oppression, the young people - and women in particular - are rebelling and demanding freedom.

Jafarzadeh stressed the futility of any talks held between U.S. officials and their Iranian counterparts. "Talks with the Iranian officials exposes the U.S. weakness and encourages Iranian aggression," Jafarzadeh asserted.

Jafarzadeh, an active Iranian dissident, became more widely recognized in 2002 when he revealed the existence of clandestine nuclear facilities in Iran. When he originally sounded the alarm, Jafarzadeh noted, "it did not seem real to many people at the time. Now people are realizing how serious the situation is."