1/15/26 Max Blumenthal on the CIA and Mossad’s Latest Move Against the Iranian Regime

Summary

Podcast Summary

Podcast: Scott Horton Show – Just the Interviews
Episode: Max Blumenthal on the CIA and Mossad’s Latest Move Against the Iranian Regime
Date Recorded: January 15, 2026
Original Air Date: January 17, 2026
Host: Scott Horton
Guest: Max Blumenthal (Editor, The Grayzone; author of "The 51 Day War," "Killing Gaza," and "Goliath")

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Overview of the Episode

This episode features a wide-ranging conversation between Scott Horton and investigative journalist Max Blumenthal about the latest attempts by the CIA and Israel’s Mossad to destabilize Iran. The duo explores the foreign and domestic origins of recent Iranian protests and evaluates the reality of regime change efforts, including the role of third-party militant groups, sanctions, and covert operations. The conversation is sharply critical of U.S. and Israeli intervention, with substantive discussion on the risk of escalation and potential regional destabilization.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Current State of Regime Change Efforts in Iran

• Trump’s Dilemma: Despite pressure and financial backing from influential pro-Israel donors, the Trump administration finds no workable path for regime change in Iran without severe backlash.
• Mossad Involvement: Recent unrest in Iran is attributed to a confluence of economic hardship (fueled largely by sanctions) and direct militarization by Mossad, including public admissions of involvement.
• Boiling Point Avoided: There was near-universal relief when Trump called off potential airstrikes amid fears of full-scale war triggered by American or Israeli military action.
  • Scott: “We could have just as easily ended up in a major war last night, but luckily didn’t so far.” [03:55]
• Media Spin: Western media repeatedly frames unrest in Iran as grassroots calls for regime change, ignoring the complexities and external manipulations.

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2. Origins and Character of Recent Iranian Protests

[06:18–12:09]

• Initial Protests:
  • Originated in Iran's bazaars over inflation and the collapse of the rial, not over political liberation or wholesale regime change.
  • Sparked immediately after Netanyahu’s multiple visits to Washington, widely believed to be tied to coordinated foreign efforts to destabilize Iran.
  • Allegations of external manipulation of Iran's currency, referencing similar U.S. tactics used in Venezuela to cause economic chaos.
• Weaponization & Violence:
  • Monarchist and nihilistic factions, with external backing (notably Mossad), hijacked legitimate economic protests, escalating them into violent riots.
  • [Notable quote:] “The Mossad has effectively claimed credit for arming and weaponizing these protests...” – Max Blumenthal [11:00]
• Mossad’s Open Admission:
  • Mossad’s Farsi account publicly encouraged protestors and Mike Pompeo echoed these statements, further implicating foreign involvement.
• Violence on the Ground:
  • Rioters have burned mosques, attacked police stations and emergency services, and killed police/Basij members and civilians, including children.
  • Notable Incident: Monarchist rioters burning Qurans and religious shrines; Max links this with Islamophobic and even racial attitudes among these groups.

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3. Foreign Militias & CIA Involvement

[14:18–18:55]

• Scott highlights historical U.S. involvement, referencing Seymour Hersh’s reporting on arming various militant groups in the region.
• Kurdish Groups:
  • Kurdish organizations like PJAK and Komala have been actively involved in fighting against the Iranian state during the most recent unrest, reportedly with outside support.
  • “They met with George W. Bush publicly and I would assume they’re tied in with the CIA.” – Max Blumenthal [17:14]
• Baluchis & Others:
  • Baluchi militants are also mentioned as historic and current CIA proxies destabilizing Iran’s border regions.
• Media and NGO Propaganda:
  • Amnesty International is accused of grossly misrepresenting the protests as “largely peaceful,” echoing misleading language from other international crises.

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4. Western Intelligence & Media's Role

[21:00–22:37]

• Praise for independent investigative journalism.
  • References K. Clarenberg and the scarcity of authentic investigative journalists who challenge Western influence operations.

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5. Historical Context: The 2009 ‘Green Revolution’ and Women’s Protests

[24:00–30:18]

• Green Revolution (2009):
  • Sparked by disputed elections and propelled by both internal reformists and Western intervention, notably the National Endowment for Democracy.
  • Ultimately, it became a reform movement rather than a full regime change project.
• Woman, Life, Freedom Protests (2023):
  • Triggered by the controversial death of Mahsa Amini, with Western intelligence and Mossad quickly weaponizing the movement.
  • Despite initial broad-based, middle-class public outcry (especially regarding hijab laws), the movement devolved into violence, eventually dominated by armed, foreign-backed groups.
  • “The police officers have never seen anything like this before...never felt this threatened.” – Max Blumenthal [28:38]
• Counter-Protests:
  • Genuine, massive pro-government rallies, including millions in Tehran—often ignored or minimized by Western media.

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6. MEK, Monarchists, and Trump’s Options

[32:33–39:37]

• MEK (Mujahideen-e Khalq):
  • Largely sidelined in the current unrest, MEK is viewed as a cult-like, exiled force with little real support inside Iran compared to monarchist factions.
• Monarchists:
  • Reza Pahlavi, self-described exiled “crown prince,” acts as a visible leader but with little domestic legitimacy—his rhetoric encourages violence.
  • “They have a very hateful mentality...but they’re not trained like the MEK…This is a force that has had tanks, not just small arms…” – Max Blumenthal [34:15]
• Assassination Scenarios and Trump's Calculus:
  • Discussion over speculative plans to assassinate or kidnap Iran’s Supreme Leader, Khamenei — but Max and Scott assess such acts would backfire, provoke massive popular outrage, and trigger direct war with Iran and potentially its allies (including possible missile retaliation against Israeli military headquarters).
  • “It wasn’t just Trump who called off striking Iran. There were elements within Israel’s military intelligence apparatus that called it off for now ... their missile defenses weren’t ready for an Iranian ballistic missile barrage.” – Max Blumenthal [37:19]

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7. The Catastrophic Risk of Regime Change and Balkanization

[41:11–46:10]

• Max compares Iran’s situation to Syria and Venezuela, emphasizing the risk that actual regime change would fracture the country, sparking ethnic and sectarian civil war.
• Iran’s complex demographic makeup (Kurds, Arabs, religious minorities) could lead to infighting and state collapse—playing into Israel’s strategic interests but disastrous for the region, Europe, and the U.S.
  • “When you remove the apparatus of the Islamic Republic...this giant nation of 80 to 90 million people begins to Balkanize. And that’s something that Israel would like to see, but it’s not something Europe would like to see.” – Max Blumenthal [42:25]
• No Credible Alternative:
  • The West has no plausible “Plan B”; exiled monarchists have no legitimacy and no means to govern.
• Operational Risks:
  • Critiques the impracticality and historical failures of U.S. covert action (“Operation Eagle Claw” as a cautionary tale).
  • Killing or kidnapping Iran’s Supreme Leader would lead to catastrophic consequences, both symbolic and practical.

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8. Final Reflections & Notable Quotes

• On U.S. Policy:
  • “It’s really sick, man. Like, that’s our government right now. They’re just looking to bump off heads of state, like a mafia. They have become completely Israelified, and that’s where we are right now.” – Max Blumenthal [46:36]
• On the Nature of U.S. Threats:
  • “If she doesn’t do what I say, [she] will suffer a fate worse than Maduro, which...is just a straight-up threat to murder her right after the Delta Force kidnapped the last guy...that’s pretty gangster.” – Scott Horton [46:48]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Protests and Regime Change Dynamics: [01:24–06:18]
• Foreign Intervention in Protests: [06:18–14:18]
• CIA/Mossad Role and Historical Context: [14:18–22:37]
• Green Revolution/Women’s Protests Explained: [24:00–30:18]
• MEK and Monarchist Factions: [32:33–39:37]
• Risks of Balkanization and State Collapse: [41:11–46:10]
• Final Reflections on U.S. Foreign Policy: [46:10–end]

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Memorable Moments & Notable Quotes

• Mossad’s Open Involvement:
  “On December 29, the Mossad’s Farsi account declared, ‘We are in this. Go to the streets, take on your government and we will be walking alongside you.’” – Max Blumenthal [09:30]
• On Western Media Narratives:
  “The Western media is falsely claiming that all the deaths are just protesters who are out in the street with signs... Everybody’s lying. But a lot of people are starting to wake up to what this really was. It was rent Mossad, rent-a-riots.” – Max Blumenthal [12:15]
• On Amnesty International:
  “Amnesty International is lying completely about what’s happening right now, just as it lied to the American public about the testimony of Naira...” – Max Blumenthal [18:31]
• On U.S. Foreign Policy:
  “They have become completely Israelified, and that’s where we are right now.” – Max Blumenthal [46:36]

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Conclusion

Scott Horton and Max Blumenthal deliver a detailed, critical examination of covert regime change operations targeting Iran, highlighting manipulation by foreign intelligence, the complex internal dynamics of Iranian society, and the potentially catastrophic effects of misguided intervention. The episode emphasizes the need for skepticism regarding mainstream narratives—a core message for listeners seeking deeper understanding of international affairs.

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Recommended for:
Listeners interested in U.S. foreign policy, Middle East affairs, intelligence operations, and critical journalism that challenges prevailing official narratives.

Transcript

[Scott Horton]

You ladies and gentlemen of the press have been less than honest according to the American people. What's going on in this country?

[Max Blumenthal]

We're dealing with Hitler revisited.

[Scott Horton]

This is the Scott Horton Show. Libertarian foreign policy, mostly. When the president does it, that means

[Max Blumenthal]

that it is not a liberal.

[Scott Horton]

We're gonna take out seven countries.

[Max Blumenthal]

They don't know what the they're doing.

[Scott Horton]

Negotiate now. End this war. And now here's your host, Scott Horton. Aren't you guys introducing Max Blumenthal again, editor of the Gray Zone and author of this great book, the 51 Day War about Israel's slaughter in Gaza back in 2014. He also made a great documentary about that called Killing Gaza. And then you can see there behind him his great book Goliath that He wrote back 15 years ago when I still remember talking to you on the phone, interviewing you from Israel, where you lived for I think 10 months, writing that book from inside the belly of the beast there. And, well, obviously you don't really need much of an introduction. One of the most important journalists in America today. Very happy to have you here. Welcome back, Max.

[Max Blumenthal]

Thanks a lot, Scott.

[Scott Horton]

All right, so regime change in Iran. How's it going?

[Max Blumenthal]

It's not going very well. It's a, it's a protracted war, it looks like. And if you believe the news about what happened last night, Trump called off strikes. But I don't know if that's exactly what took place. But kind of panning out, I think there is an assessment that there's not going to be some Venezuela style solution to a Israeli imposed. It's, it's that the plan was imposed by Israel because of this, what they thought was a moment of opportunity, supposed protests, which were not actually just protests. And I'll talk about that in a second. And there was an understanding within the Trump administration that a series of airstrikes would have no effect whatsoever except to end whatever protests were left and consolidate the power of the institutions of the Islamic Republic and that it would actually boomerang and lead to attacks on US Military bases. And the deeper the US Is drawn in, the more likely there will be casualties among U.S. personnel that will damage Trump politically as midterms roll around. So I don't think there's a good solution for the Trump administration here. But the Israelis keep pushing and they seem to have some kind of agreement with Trump. Miriam Adelson kicks in.150 million to your campaign, continues to contribute, pumps in millions to take out Thomas Massie. And anyone who challenges you from within and you agree to take out Iran's Islamic Republic and replace it with either Balkanize it or destroy it or destabilize it or replace it with some kind of Zionist monarchy. But that's the deal. And so Trump is in a conundrum.

[Scott Horton]

Okay, so as we record this on Thursday morning, the news is that yesterday afternoon Trump announced that, oh, the Iranians are no longer killing protesters and they promise not to execute anyone. And so it was actually funny. I rarely watch tv, but at time like this, sometimes I have to. So I was watching a lot of BBC and Al Jazeera and other things yesterday, and essentially everyone was playing the same Kremlin Ologist type game here, trying to figure out is he signaling that he's backing down and there are going to be no strikes? And then, you know, we all woke up this morning relieved to see that there were no strikes overnight. And so obviously you build yourself casus belly on killing protesters, then that's one you could also easily back down from too, I guess. So at least, you know, we're lucky in that sense. But a huge part of this is how much of this just depends on the whim of Donald Trump. Everybody is wondering if this most mercurial president will make a decision or even change his mind at 2:00 in the morning. And God knows what. Congress has, of course, long seated their authority over foreign policy in this way. So we could have just as easily ended up in. Just as easily ended up in a major war last night, but luckily didn't so far, I guess. But yeah, so let's get back to these protests here because obviously, you know, this is the same thing that really hurt Joe Biden. It's the same thing that's hurting Donald Trump right now, price inflation. And they've got 40% inflation just this year in Iran. And a huge part of that, of course, is the crippling sanctions of Trump, Biden and Trump again and the economic war that they've waged against Iran. And of course, their central bank doesn't know how to do anything but print money all day like every other one. And so they did have these huge protests. But the thing is, on tv, if there's a protest in Iran, then they just immediately assume and translate and presume and explain that the demand of every protester is that the government cease to exist. Right? That if there's a protest, it's a revolution and a peaceful one. And so then any, you know, resistance by the government against that is pure, you know, tyrannical crackdown on peaceful protesters. And that kind of thing. But so I, I wonder if it's even right that the original protest movement was really demanding the fall of the government. Was that entirely, you know, kind of a, a foreign orchestrated thing or was that really like somewhat, you know, domestic and, and homegrown, but then, you know, kind of co opted or. How do you interpret that?

[Max Blumenthal]

The original protest movement came from within the bazaars where the Islamic Republic has strong support and they went out into the streets with police protection and were engaged in dialogue with the government and the, the clerical leadership and they were protesting the collapse of the real, which was a problem when I was in Iran in May. Everyone was complaining about it. But this followed in these protests, immediately followed Netanyahu's visit to Washington where I, I don't know, it was the fifth time or the sixth time, the sixth time, fifth time or sixth time since 20, early 2024, 2025 that Trump had played BB sitter to Netanyahu and he was obviously there to discuss plans for an attack on Iran. Iran's currency exchange faced manipulation according to the Iranian government. And I've, I saw how that worked in Venezuela where the currency was constantly manipulated and goods were withheld by anti Chavista business elements who had moved their operations to Colombia and they would basically hoard goods. There was something called dolar today which every Venezuelan used to try to determine what the exchange rate between the dollar and the Bolivar was. And they, and but dollar today was run by a former Venezuelan military officer who had participated in a coup against Hugo Chavez and worked out of Home Depot in Huntsville, Alabama. And so he and the forces behind him, which were obviously very powerful, would manipulate the currency exchange rate in order to constantly throw Venezuela's economy into chaos. And then you have secondary sanctions. Iran is unable to access something like $250 billion that are in international exchanges because of secondary sanctions. So it can't release its reserves to firm up the value of the real. But this is all, it all looked orchestrated to me. Then the protest, protests come out and then these monarchist and nihilistic elements which are, are committed to regime change and have been receiving instructions from abroad, use those protests as a vehicle to create mayhem in the streets of Iran and to generate violence, to attack police officers, to attack base guards. Besieged guards are mostly like young guys who are put out on street corners to keep watch or in squares. They're not armed and they're, they were essentially sent to their own deaths because they were brutal. They were brutally lynched and beaten by crazed mobs Highly organized mobs and you can see a lot of it on camera through CCTV that's being released on Iranian state tv. I wouldn't advise watching it. It's horrible footage. And hundreds, hundreds of police officers in Basiji have been killed along with civilians, children. A friend of mine in Isfahan had her, her neighbor was killed by the so called protesters. She was an eight year old girl. Because they're armed and who's arming them? Well, there are hunting rifles in Iran that they can get access to. But the Mossad has effectively claimed credit for arming and weaponizing these protests and militarizing these protests to create a kind of serious scenario. On December 29, the Mossad's Farsi account declared, we are in this. Go, go to the streets, take on your government and we will be walking alongside you. We are, we are with you. That was before Mike Pompeo, former CIA director, uttered almost the same exact words when he said, the Mossad is walking beside you. It looked like the Mossad had written Mike Pompeo's tweet. Maybe he was paid $7,000 for it, but they weren't really making a secret about it. And then it took until like two days ago or actually yesterday for the expert class and Twitterati to realize that this was what was taking place because Channel 14, the pro Netanyahu settler fanatic channel in Israel, one of their correspondents tweeted that Mossad has been active in weapon, in militarizing the so called protests and that they are responsible for the many body bags you see in morgues in Tehran, sort of taking pride in what they did. And you could also see in Hebrew Twitter, a lot of Israelis, like Zionist Israelis, were very mad at that correspondent for letting the cat out of the bag because it hurts their propaganda efforts. There are numerous accounts you can follow on Twitter X and elsewhere that will show you the kind of violence that Iran has endured at the hands of these rioters. We're talking about scores of mosques being burned, burned on camera, crowds standing outside cheering, large mosques being burned, burning shrines to, including to imams who are said to be the direct, from the direct lineage of the Prophet Muhammad.

[Scott Horton]

The burnings in Latin nights, right? Attack ISIS or Al Qaeda types attacking Shiite.

[Max Blumenthal]

Well, I'll, I'll get to that. I'll get to that in a second. It might be a slightly different scenario, but also burning police stations, burning fire stations, attacking emergency workers, attacking and burning city buses, randomly beating elderly motorists. There's new video today showing that weapons in the hands of the so called protesters and then, you know, bodies are piling up in the morgue. And the Western media is falsely claiming that all the deaths are just protesters who are out in the street with signs. They're basically sitting at the Woolworth segregated lunch counter nonviolently following the tactics of Gandhi's satyagraha and trying to walk across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. That's the way the Western media is framing it, like it's the civil rights movement. Everybody's lying. But a lot of people are starting to wake up to what this really was. It was rent Mossad, rent a riots. Most of the cells I think were, if you want to classify their ideology, it's referred to as ISIS attacks, ISIS style attacks or ISIS attacks in Iranian media and Iranian culture. But I think these were monarchists and the monarchists are very Islamophobic and see themselves as kind of the original Iranians and see themselves, many of them see themselves as kind of like racially Aryan and they see the Islamic Republic's leadership as racially inferior and they just see any mosque or shrine as representative of the Islamic Republic that they hate. So they draw no distinction and have been even burning Qurans, which is why you got figures like Tommy Robinson celebrating it. That and the fact that he's to clearly one of these political prostitute influencers who's getting, you know, cashing checks from Israel and the United Arab Emirates.

[Scott Horton]

All right, this episode of Scott Horton show brought to you by the books I wrote. You can see them behind me there. Enough already. Fool's errand. And then enough already. And provoked. And then of course one might have fallen down there. But I got Ron Paul, the great Ron Paul. Scott Horton show interviews and Hotter than the Sun. You see that one back there over there? That way Hotter than the Sun. Time to abolish nuclear weapons. That's all interviews I did, all about nukes and really great stuff and I busted my ass on these things and you know, I've gotten a really great reception on all of them. They all been endorsed by Ron Paul and Daniel Ellsberg endorsed two of the three I wrote. He would have endorsed the third one. I know, but he died too soon. Unfortunately. Tucker Carlson says that Provoked is the definitive account. In fact, that's what Glenn Greenwald and Aaron Mate said about it too. The definitive account of the new Cold War with Russia and the war in Ukraine. So maybe check that out. We have an [e-mail] and Libertarian Institute today citing Reuters and a couple of others about where they're boasting about their have armed groups of Kurdish fighters. Yeah, from they're calling them just Pak instead of Pjak. We used to call him P. Jack. If you go back to that great series of articles by seymour Hirsch in 2007, starting with the redirection, preparing the Battlefield and there's a few more. And the scam then was arming bin Ladenites in Lebanon, in Syria and in Iran. John Dolla in Iran, but also the Kurdish commies, the, the Iranian branch of the Turkish PKK or as we call them the YPG in Syria and that they were using them way back then and someone was saying who, which armed groups do you think are running around? And I had a tweet yesterday saying, well based on the past I'd say America is probably back in the PJ Kurds up there. And. And then out comes this Reuters article that says, yep, here's a bunch of armed PJ fighters intervening in this thing in Iran. So who do you think's behind that? Since we have that exact anecdote from previously, you know, in this same era, although it was almost 20 years ago, but still.

[Max Blumenthal]

Yeah, I mean that's reported in the, the national, the United Arab Emirates paper that PJAK or Kurdish Free Life fighters killed eight besiege guards. Again, these are guys who are usually unarmed. They killed eight of them on the night of January 10th. January 10th was the night of the most intense and violent riots. And they're not the only militarized force that's involved K, which is spelled kind of almost like Kamala Harris K, but it's K O M A L A. They're another, I would say former communist group that is consists of Iranian Kurds and has been involved in the riots. They have an office here in Washington. They met with George W. Bush publicly and I, I would assume they're tied in with the CIA. Then you have Bistan. I don't know if the BI fighters are involved, but they've been a traditional CIA proxy against Iran. And Mike Pompeo actually mentioned them in his statement when he said the Mossad is walking along side with the pro alongside the protesters during the so called Women Life freedom protests in 2023 which started as real demonstrations against the enforcement of the hijab. The Baluki fighters got involved and were carrying out fairly intense battles along and skirmishes along the frontiers of Iran against irgc. And that's when that protest devolved into violence. And you saw people stabbing besieged guards in the streets and then Amnesty International declaring them Prisoners of conscience and just lying. Amnesty International's lying completely about what's happening right now, just as it lied to the American public about the testimony of Naira claiming that Saddam Hussein's armies were pulling Kuwaiti babies off their incubators back in 1990. Amnesty retracted that report, but they're not retracting any of their false statements about Iran and its protest being, in their words, largely peaceful. They are not. The protests are over at this point, and any other action that's taking place is practically militarized. No one's going to go out in the street and challenge the Islamic Republic and its security forces without some form of weapons at this point. And I, I, I think that it's, it's all pretty much over based on what I'm hearing. But because of the Internet blackout, it's hard for me to get in touch with sources there.

[Scott Horton]

Yeah, the fact that they would use that exact phrase, largely peaceful, which is completely, you know, notorious and hilarious from the Minnesota riots in 2020 with the CNN reporter and the massive arson fire behind him at the time. Yeah, pretty, pretty nice choice of words on their part. So, and, and by the way, so speaking of ancient history, when we talk about John Dolla, the, the Balooki group there, remember Mark Perry's great reporting about how at least some of the time that the CIA was running those guys. And there's plenty of other extensive reporting about the CIA running those guys, including using a former DIA agent as one of the cutouts doing it and so forth. But Mark Perry had a great story about Mossad posing as CIA to recruit these guys to work for them back then. And good old Mark Perry. Rest in peace.

[Max Blumenthal]

RIP Mark Perry, great reporter. I knew him, actually went to high school with his son. Oh, really? We played on the same baseball team together. And I think he went to work for cnn. He's, he's like working in the, the big leagues.

[Scott Horton]

Yeah, Mark was a great guy. Really great guy, great reporter. I, I cite him on a lot of things in enough already, especially including like, for example, the way the military was in near revolt when Obama switched sides in the Yemen war and started back in Al Qaeda. There was, and Lloyd Austin and them were all so upset about it, they went, squealed to Perry about it.

[Max Blumenthal]

Yeah.

[Scott Horton]

Anyway, so

[Max Blumenthal]

him and Bob Parry and Cy Hirsch definitely inspirations for what we're doing at the Gray zone or trying to do.

[Scott Horton]

Yeah. Oh, man, you guys are killing it. And you know what I had in my notes here because I knew I would forget as long as we're on this tangent. Let me just take a second to praise get Clarenberg. I can never get this guy on my show and I think he likes me and wants to do the show. It just never works out. I tried to send him a book but they just won't deliver the mail in Serbia. I don't know why. And I had the same problem with George Zamuli. I tried to send him a book and they just won't. Customs just hates me. But anyway, I love K. Clarenberg. This guy's journalism. He is just a killer and he writes for you. So I just wanted to pass along the compliment since I haven't spoken to the man in a couple of years probably at this point.

[Max Blumenthal]

Well, I'll get him on here. I'll. I'll make a big issue of it. But kid is he's one of the best investigative journalists working today and one of the only ones in the western sphere who is actually exposing these kinds of influence operations and subterfuge by Western intelligence services. I mean most other the, the, the official investigative journalism outlets mainly work with the intelligence services at this point.

[Scott Horton]

Right.

[Max Blumenthal]

OCC rp. What is it? Occ? Yeah, occrp. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project. That's right. Department right there.

[Scott Horton]

Yeah, yeah, yep. For real. And, and man, he gets his hands on great documents and stuff. It's. He's really broken some stories and you know, you subscribe to his sub stack and to the Gray zone substack and just in the email, investigative scoop by this guy just regularly by you guys. But yeah, anyway, I just want to work that in and man, if you have any money, you should be buying gold with it. Central banks are hoarding it up and if you need some you should go to RRBI Co. That's Roberts and Roberts Brokerage Inc. It's my buddy Tim Ferray. He's a really great guy. Him and this business. They've been over there for a very, very long time and they will help you get your medals and they will always do you right. That's Roberts and Roberts Brokerage Inc. At RRBI Co. Can you talk a little bit about the, the so called Green Revolution of 2009 and then a little bit more about the women's protest and stuff because I know we had from. I'm pretty sure it was Kenneth Timmerman bragged to Newsmax about the National Endowment for Democracy's role in the Green Revolution. So we got him red handed right there. But I wonder, you know, if you can remind people like what all that was about and, and what all we know about the National Endowment for Democracy and, and their associated groups in Iran in the meantime.

[Max Blumenthal]

The Green Revolution, when I wasn't following this issue quite as closely, was supposedly sparked by public opposition to Mahmud Ahmadinejad allegedly stealing the election. And obviously it was propelled by not just, you know, Western intelligence and the National Endowment for Democracy, which functions as the overt operator of Western intelligence, but also by reformist forces inside Iran. And it really was, it became a big opening for the reformist movement in Iran and I think it ultimately helped lead to the Iran nuclear deal, which many Iranians are now furious about. And you know, the, the outcome, the ultimate outcome of the nuclear deal has really strengthened the principalist camp which are referred to as like hardliners in the US and it was not necessarily a protest for regime change that it was, it was a more reform minded, rights based protest that did face repression but also had elements, foreign elements backing it. And it was a, I think it was mishandled by Iran at the time and they have proved a little more sophisticated over the years. The Masa Amini, or sorry Woman Life Freedom protests were sparked by the death of a woman named Masa Amini who was a Kurdish who was arrested for not wearing hijab and suffered a medical emergency in a police station. There's no evidence that she was beaten to death by police or killed for not wearing hijab. The autopsy, which, you know, I, I've, I've, I, I've, I've come as pretty, I, I, I, I'm, I feel pretty confident in saying this. The autopsy showed that she was not beaten to death. And I've talked to reporters who reviewed the autopsy and reviewed the details who really have no reason to lie to me and they say that she died of a medical emergency. However, there was no reason for her to have been arrested. That's what many Iranians, there was sort of a mass movement of Iranians who said whether she was beaten to death or not, we need to stop these mandatory hijab laws. And these were younger, more middle class, cosmopolitan Iranians in places like Tehran and Shiraz and the major cities who went out and had major demonstrations. Then the demonstrations kind of caught on in this viral way and young people just wanted to be part of it because it was the thing to do. And then as I mentioned before, Western intelligence and Mossad got involved and militarized it on Iran's borders and it became violent on the inside of the country and many Basij guards as well, as average people were killed by the same kind of elements, we now see really dominating the opposition in the streets in Iran. And these protests have been much more violent. What I've heard from in, in the brief period when I was able to make any contact with anyone inside Iran, them talking to, like, police officers in their neighborhood and so on, was that the police officers have never seen anything like this before. They've never seen this level of violence. They've never felt this threatened. Academic I know not Muhammad Morandi, by the way, who's, who's a friend who has been threatened on Pierce Morgan with being chopped to pieces by a psychotic monarchist from Canada, but another one who's lower profile, this very serious scholar who occasionally does interviews in English, is getting death threats. Iranians I know on the outside, too, who have been outspoken against regime change or like the US Attacking Iran, say they're being flooded with death threats by the monarchists. It's a very dark, disturbing moment. At the same time there we, we have never seen protests like those in support of the government and against the regime change operation. And it, these protests do include some Iranians who do not cover, or women who do not cover, people who are simply nationalistic. But primarily it's supporters of the Islamic Republic going through great lengths to get out in the streets, especially in Tehran, which has some of the worst traffic I've ever seen. It's one of the most difficult cities to navigate. Even the Tehran Metro, which is, you know, clean and fairly well run. It's, it's still tough to, to take it. I mean, it gets so crowded. So they made, they went to great lengths and filled the streets of Tehran and multiple demonstrations. Over a million people have been seen in the streets. And this is a show of legitimacy for the Iranian Islamic Republic that Western media has been eager to ignore or cover up. And I think at this point, Iran now faces the next stage of the regime change operation, which is an escalated, more violent war, more violent than the 12 day war. But what we've seen between the end of the 12 Day War in June and now it's was a continuation of that war through hybrid warfare. Not peaceful, largely peaceful protests.

[Scott Horton]

All right, well, so somewhere in here, make sure and mention if you know anything about what's going on with the Mujah D and E. Colk right now. I know they're, you know, a potential major factor in all of this, but also, I think just speculating it would not make sense that Rubio or anyone else would be telling Trump that he could do a Delta Force type raid and snatch the Ayatollah. However, I don't think anybody would deny that if you can put eyeballs on the Ayatollah, you can kill him. And I think they probably know where he is most of the time. He just lives in that one little compound and doesn't leave very much. And for an American bomber to put firepower on him and just say, okay, well, now it's the first day of the rest of history without Kameny anymore, and see what happens. I think it's almost probable or likely that someone is at least telling him that. That's part of the advice that he's getting, is that, look, man, you know, just like in, in Venezuela, they didn't do regime change, they just did president change. So what if, you know, we don't necessarily overthrow the entire Islamic Republic, but what if we just kill the Ayatollah and his friends? Boss, I could see Trump buying that and going for that and not being too worried. You know, they said, like in the Washington Post, the, the raid on Maduro was flawless almost. Right? No Americans died, that kind of thing. He's really worried about getting scuffed up, though. You try to do something like that in Tehran, you're going to lose some helicopters and stuff. You drop a bomb on the guy from 60,000ft, then why not? And that's what I'm worried about is that sort of how H.W. bush was so high on Panama he thought Iraq would be easy, and we've been bombing them for 35 years, ever since then, you know, and, and that's kind of my worry here is that Ben Shapiro is right, that at least in Trump's mind, Iraq syndrome has now been defeated by the Venezuela raid. And maybe it's time, maybe it'd be easy to go ahead and take out the Ayatollah. After all, maybe Bush's problem was he was a wimp and didn't follow through. And like, you can see Trump being advised that and agree with that pretty easily, I think.

[Max Blumenthal]

Right. Did you want me to talk about the MEK first? Because you.

[Scott Horton]

Sure. And, or whatever you think about, you know, the politics in the White House and how likely you think Trump is to act on. I mean, obviously I was speculating there about some things, but that's more or less the frame of reference that he's within. Right.

[Max Blumenthal]

Yeah. The People's MEK is another one of these sort of ret. Retired or former Marxist organizations that's basically a cult run by Mariam Rajavi, the Wife of its founder out of Paris. And she's a tool for all the intelligence agencies and received backing from Saudi Arabia. They are not at the forefront of the riots that are, that have gripped Iran. These are mainly being instrumentalized by the monarchist forces who are run by the self described crown prince or clown prince Reza Pahlavi, who is based near here in Potomac, Maryland in a giant McMansion and he's been issuing all of these absurd statements from his living room calling for, you know, killing government workers and blowing up media stations and so on. He was just meeting with Lindsay Graham yesterday. The monarchist forces inside Iran, they have received some training and instructions. It's kind of apparent from the videos you see of the violence that we've witnessed. And they have a very, they have, they have a very hateful mentality. But they're not trained like the mekr. They, they're, they haven't been based out of a literal U. S. Military base in Albania for like 15 years and then before that based in Iraq where they received support and training from Saddam Hussein. This is a force that has had tanks, not just small arms, but, you know, fairly heavy weapons. And if they were able to infiltrate into Iran, the situation would look a lot more like Syria. And so the Iranian security state wants to squash this before it gets to that point. And then all the other Kurdish groups you mentioned and the groups in Baluchistan would start to infiltrate. And that's when you would see like cities taken over. That's something that I think is not fathomable right now and is, but, but, but it's, it looms. The question of assassinating the leader Ali Khamenei is important right now because that might be the only thing that Trump and the US could do to please the Israelis and to make any psychological impact on the calculus of the Islamic Republic and to potentially shatter its sense of confidence. I've been by the compound that he lives in. It's sort of, it's very humble. It's in the middle of Tehran, it's in central Tehran. And you know, when you go by it, you don't see lots of security around it. But Khamenei is protected by his own army. It's like, is his own intelligence service and force that is considered the most effective within the realm of the irgc. And they successfully hid him from the Israelis during the 12 Day War. The Israelis wanted to kill him and they failed. And it's unclear if they would be able to get him. There's also a line of succession he has a son. And there are other figures who could rise to the occasion. I mean we saw the eight of the major IRGC generals be killed in the first day of the 12 day war. The figures who designed the True Promise operations, important people who are so important. Bagheri, for example, his brother was one of the major heroes who fell in the eight years war with Iraq. And he is sort of like a legend within the culture of the Islamic Republic. And he was an important figure in any transition, political transition. He was killed and within eight hours the leader replaced them all. And the war, the, the, and they, and they got back on their feet and fought Israel to the point where Israel seemed to be ready to sue for peace by the 11th, 10th or 11th day. So Trump comes in and does the kind of climbed the strike that gives him a climb down. And it might be that right now Trump is seeking some kind of climb down through a limited strike, which would be foolish given the possibility that Iran could blanket US Military bases within its immediate strategic, within its immediate periphery with short range ballistic missiles and target Israel as well. And I think one of the main targets in Israel this time would be Hakiriya and the Mossad headquarters which is located within that complex in North Tel Aviv where it's the central node of Israel's defense and intelligence, military intelligence apparatus. And it's where Netanyahu hides out in his luxury bunker. And you know, if anything is struck there, all hell breaks loose. So what I've heard kind of through the grapevine is that it wasn't just Trump who called off striking Iran. There were elements within Israel's military intelligence apparatus that called it off for now because they did not think the moment was opportune. Possibly. And this makes sense to me based on what I know, their missile defenses weren't ready for an Iranian ballistic missile barrage. I should also say there's a lot of popular pressure in Iran within the principalist camp. And you know, the people who would be called hard liners and are, are very, are furious about what happened during the 12 Day War for a preemptive strike on Israel, for Iran to actually preempt the inevitable and to take the initiative and just hit the Mossad base, hit Hakiriya, hit Dimona, which by the way had an earthquake today, a mysterious earthquake, because it looks like they're doing nuclear tests in Israel. So that's the kind of pressure that Iranian leadership is under right now from its own population.

[Scott Horton]

Hey guys, Scott here for Mundo's Artisan Coffees. It's the Scott Horton show flavored coffee breakfast blend. It's part Ethiopian, part Sumatra. It's really good. All you do is go to scotthorton.org coffee and they'll forward you on there to Mundo's Artisan Coffees. Get it? They hate Starbucks because they represent the war party of course. And so they're moondos and they support peace. And guess what? Scott Horton Show Coffee is the number one best selling coffee at Mundo's Artisan Coffees right now. Just go again to Scott Horton.org coffee

[Max Blumenthal]

and I gotta, I gotta jump off really soon.

[Scott Horton]

Okay, fair enough. I was just gonna ask you. We'll have to catch up on Venezuela another time. But I, I wanted to just bring this up real quick at the end here that you hear so much of this hype about the evil the guaranteed built in. You know Mao say tongue level evil. Yeah. Tola's regime there and they surely have a very flawed republic. We would all just obviously reject any monarchy or theocrat where a religious leader claims to be the supreme leader of our country and sounds crazy to us. Anyone would have a system like that. And yet on TV all they talk about is that anything would be better than this. But one of the things that you brought up at the beginning was the risk of Iran falling apart, being Balkanized or tearing itself apart in, or being torn apart by foreign powers here in a Syrian style catastrophe. And I just wanted to, if you have a moment to address the, the risk of that if a real regime change was sought here.

[Max Blumenthal]

I think that was the recognition of even Marco Rubio in Venezuela was that one of the top Trump concerns is migration. And they would destabilize Venezuela and cause another mass migration wave to which would flood the US Mexico border if they tried to install Maria Karina Machado because they would have to tear down the entire apparatus of the state. So what they did is they plucked out Maduro after crippling the Venezuelan military's communications systems and its what whatever it had of radar and then just left the Chavista structure and power with a gun to its head. Don't, don't know if it'll stay stable. But for now they are stable. And that's, that's the ace card that the government of acting President Dely Rodriguez has to play is we guarantee stability. So you have to deal with us. And that means that there will be negotiations with a group that the every U.S. administration since at least Obama, but I would say going back to George W. Bush has tried to delegitimize and overthrow and sanction Iran is the same. It's the same thing in Iran. Iran, while it doesn't have the problem that Syria had of a religious minority sect, the Alawites, controlling the presidency and trying to ensure a very diverse mosaic of sects and culture and religious traditions under one flag, coexisting with a Sunni majority that was easily propagandized and recruited by Al Qaeda forces, Iran doesn't have that. It has a very large Kurdish minority. It has even an Arab, Arabic speaking minority. There are, it is much more diverse than we think. It's a large, massive land. Some of the rural areas are experiencing drought right now. There's, there are all sorts of crises that could unfold. And when you remove the apparatus of the Islamic Republic, which obviously has lots and lots of legitimacy among its constituency, then you don't really have anything to replace it. And this giant nation of 80 to 90 million people begins to Balkanize. And that's something that Israel would like to see, but it's not something Europe would like to see. It's not something I think the United States would like to see, but they're playing Israel's game and Israel's playing them like a fiddle. And they, they really have no plan beyond the Islamic Republic. And Reza Pahlavi has no legitimacy inside Iran. It's not even me saying that. Trump himself said that, just as he said that about Maria Karina Machado. They don't have a plan B for de Baathification 2.0. And just another point I wanted to make since you brought it up, the idea of Delta Force coming in and extracting the Supreme Leader, which would be even more symbolic than kidnapping Maduro as a act of humiliation to the Iranian people, to those who adhere to Shia is to Shia Islam. I mean, you have to go there and talk to people in the street to really understand how much so many of them love the leader and see him as someone who's above politics and who's a guide in their personal lives. He is sort of a religious guide for them. You can't, you just, you can't imagine what it would be like for them to see him kidnapped by violently by soldiers and what kind of reaction it would produce. But it doesn't seem possible because of Tehran's location, there's nowhere for those helicopters to refuel. And so they would have to land somewhere outside Tehran and then travel in through other means. We saw in 1980, Operation Eagle Claw. Carter sent the Delta forces to rescue the American Embassy workers and intelligence operatives inside the US Embassy who are being held hostage. And the helicopters landed and they all basically crashed in the desert of Tabas because there was a massive sandstorm and suffered casualties. I saw the. The helicopter engine when I visited the former US Embassy in Tehran. It's outside on display next to a quote by Ayatollah Khomeini that God sent the sands of Tabas to defeat the invaders.

[Scott Horton]

Yeah, no surprise there. And, yeah, I think I only brought that up as something that there's no way they're going to try that. So they're more likely to just try to drop a bomb if anything. Yeah, yeah, we got him.

[Max Blumenthal]

We got them. And. And it's not gonna. It's not going. I don't think that would produce the effect that they want. But, yeah, I don't know if they want worse.

[Scott Horton]

Yeah, yeah. All right, well, listen, I'll let it go. Thank you so much.

[Max Blumenthal]

It's really sick, man. Like, that's our government right now. They're just looking to bump off heads of state, like a mafia. They. They've become completely Israelified, and that's where we are right now.

[Scott Horton]

Yeah, I mean, as you said when you. You said the new government of Venezuela, the new president of Venezuela with a gun to her head, he literally said, if she doesn't do what I say, Rodriguez, then she'll suffer a fate worse than Maduro, which is just a. Honest, just straight up threat to murder her right after the Delta Force kidnapped the last guy. Worse than that is a bullet in the head. And that's pretty gangster. Pretty. Pretty hard to characterize that any other way. So. Yeah, you're right. It is. It's. It's completely disgusting. Anyway, I know you got to go hang around just long enough to upload your side here, but thank you very much, everybody. It's Max Blumenthal, editor at the Gray Zone, and follow him on Twitter at Max Blumenthal. The Scott Horton show is brought to you by the Scott Horton Academy of Foreign Policy and Freedom, Robertson Roberts Brokerage, Inc. Mundo's Artisan Coffee, Tom Woods, Liberty Classroom and APS Radio Network News. Subscribe in all the usual places and check out my books, Fool's Errand, Enough already. And my latest, Provoked How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine. Find all of the [e-mail] and I'm serializing the audiobook of Provoked at scothortonshow.com and patreon.com Scott HortonShow Bumpers by Josh Langford Music Intro Natural Videos by Dissident me. Media Audio Mastering by Podsworth Media See y' all next time.