ISDEI Instituto de Seguridad, Defensa y Estudios Internacionales

Members of the Fatemiyoun Brigade during the Palmyra offensive in December 2016 Over 2,000 Afghans have been killed and about 8,000 have been injured fighting in Syria on the side of the Damascus government, according to media reports. “This brigade has given more than 2,000 martyrs and 8,000 wounded for Islam,” Zohair Mojahed, a cultural official in the Fatemiyoun Brigade, said in an interview to the Iranian newspaper Shargh. According to the official, members of the Fatemiyoun Brigade have been fighting in Syria for five years. The Fatemiyoun Brigade is one of the biggest and most effective Iranian-backed units operating in Syria.  Members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards play role of military advisers within Fatemiyoun units. The brigade supported operations of the Syrian Army in the provinces of Homs, Hama and Aleppo.  Now, the group’s members assist army troops operating in Idlib province .

FILE IMAGE Written by  Paul Craig Roberts ; Originally appeared at  paulcraigroberts.org In 1953 Washington and Britain overthrew the democratically elected government of Mohammad Mosaddegh and installed a dictator to rule Iran for the benefit of Washington and the British. In declassified documents, the CIA has admitted its role in overthrowing the Iranian government. The overthrow pattern is always the same. Washington hires protesters, then introduces violence, controls the explanation, and unseats the government. Ever since the Iranian Revolution that overthrew the Washington-installed dictator in1979, Washington has been trying to regain control of Iran. In 2009 Washington financed the “Green Revolution,” which was an attempt to overthrow the Ahmadinejad government. Today Washington is again at work against the Iranian people. It is difficult to believe that any Iranian, after watching what Washington-organized protests have done to Honduras, Libya, Ukraine, and Syria,

Mossad chief Yossi Cohen Israel has agents spying on the ground in Iran, Mossad chief Yossi Cohen said during a closed session at the Finance Ministry, Israel National News reported on January 9. “We have eyes and ears, even in Iran,” the media outlet quoted Cohen. He also warned that Iran is expanding further in the region. “The Iranians are spreading across the Middle East with a vast array of forces, and there is little holding them back.” The Mossad chief added that Teheran is en route “to realize its dream of creating what almost amounts to a land and air bridge allowing them to dump troops across the Middle East.” Cohen’s comment came just hours after reports that  the Syrian Air Defense had thwarted an Israeli missile attack on military targets in the Damascus countryside  and days after  Iranian public prosecutor, Mohammad Jafar Montazeri, accused CIA, Israel and Saudi Arabia of fomenting the unrest which has swept across Iran.