Revolutionary Guard

Reporting from Beirut — In a ratcheting up of official U.S. rhetoric against Iran, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton flatly accused Tehran on Monday of trying to build nuclear bombs and painted the Islamic Republic as an imminent military dictatorship increasingly ruled by the elite Revolutionary Guard. But Clinton also denied the U.S. was planning to launch a war against Iran, saying Washington was instead trying to rally nations to economically pressure Tehran into curbing sensitive aspects of its nuclear program.

Tehran's hard-line Revolutionary Court warned Sunday that those criticizing its ongoing proceedings against postelection protesters could face jail time themselves. The threat came after a chorus of reformists and even some political conservatives labeled as a sham the televised court hearing Saturday of about 100 defendants arrested in the unrest that followed the disputed June 12 presidential election in which incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was declared the winner.

Iran's military this week is showing off its defensive capabilities, including what it described as new air defenses, amid renewed talk of airstrikes on Iran's nuclear sites. Iranian military authorities said they activated radar and signal detection installations along the mountainous nation's 4,200 miles of borders; put army, Revolutionary Guard and Basiji militia forces on alert; and launched a six-plane mock military raid by the fictional "orange forces" likely meant to mimic an Israeli or United States airstrike on its nuclear facilities.

Contradictory accounts clouded Iran's announcement Tuesday that it had captured the leader of a Sunni Muslim militant group it has been fighting for years. Iran declared that it had caught Abdulmalak Rigi, leader of the outlawed Jundallah, after a months-long operation, saying it had evidence that he and his group were backed by the United States. There were conflicting statements by Iranian officials about where he was detained. "We had spread a dragnet and we managed to capture him," said Interior Minister Mostafa Mohammed Najjar, state radio reported.

In another blow to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a controversial deputy foreign minister allied with Ahmadinejad's increasingly embattled and isolated clique resigned Tuesday under pressure from hard-liners who threatened to impeach the country's top diplomat over the appointment. Mohammad Sharif Malekzadeh — an ally of both Ahmadinejad and his closest aide, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei — resigned from his post as deputy foreign minister for administrative and financial affairs after drawing fire over allegations of criminal activity.

The European Union slapped new sanctions on Iranian individuals, companies and organizations Thursday in response to a report alleging that Tehran had pressed ahead with ambitions to build a nuclear weapon. European governments also kept up their condemnation of the ransacking of the British Embassy in Tehran on Tuesday by an angry mob of protesters. Germany, France, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands have temporarily recalled their ambassadors from Tehran in solidarity with Britain, which shut down its embassy Wednesday and gave Iranian diplomats in London 48 hours to leave the country.

Syrian security forces appear to be shifting their strategy for crushing the popular uprising against the rule of President Bashar Assad to a less bloody approach similar to that used effectively by its main ally, Iran, to end massive 2009 street protests. In recent days, Assad loyalists have curbed their use of live fire, which has left hundreds of Syrian civilians dead and many more friends, relatives and neighbors willing to avenge them. Instead, security forces are increasingly using nonlethal means such as tear gas, truncheons and waves of random and targeted arrests, just as Iranian authorities did to rein in the protests that followed the disputed reelection of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The Iranian government has displayed brutality and disdain for its own people in numerous ways since the disputed June 12 election that prompted mass demonstrations. The latest was a show trial this past weekend of at least 100 prominent reformist politicians, journalists and foot soldiers, with some high-profile "confessions" that family members and Iran- observers say were coerced.

An elaborate Iranian-backed plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States was disrupted by FBI and DEA agents, officials said Tuesday. Members of an elite Iranian security force planned to detonate a bomb at a busy Washington restaurant, killing Adel Al-Jubeir, the Saudi Arabian ambassador to the U.S. and possibly over 100 bystanders, according to documents filed in New York federal court. The State Department has listed Iran as a state sponsor of terrorism since 1984.

No one understands the revolutionary potential of students better than old revolutionaries. That's one reason Iranian security forces fought hard with tear gas, batons and arrests this week to put down university protests across the country. Another is that six months after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disputed reelection, and despite persistent government efforts to quash the unrest, the protests continue. To these students, the leadership that took power three decades ago in a popular uprising against the repressive government of Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi is now the repressive establishment.