How Iran is using a network of criminal thugs to spread terror to Britain - and the world
I am sitting in the corner of a quiet cafe in the centre of a major Western city talking to an intelligence source who has promised me something exceptional.
'David, we know that Iran – specifically its international terror networks – is a subject of great interest to you,' they say.
I agree. Iran's proxy terror groups Hamas and Hezbollah may be dispensing sadism and death thousands of miles away, but Iran's network of terror stretches out from the Middle East and across continents.
UK counter-terror police have identified over 15 credible Iranian threats to kill or kidnap Britons or British residents since 2022. In March, in the London suburb of Wimbledon, an Iranian-British journalist was stabbed outside his home four times by Eastern European criminals in the pay of Tehran.
'Well, given your interest, we have something for you.' A sheaf of documents slides across the smooth polish of the table. It is marked 'Top Secret'.
'Does the name 'Ramin Yektaparast' mean anything to you?' the source asks. It does.
Yektaparast was a German-Iranian leader of a Hells Angels biker gang. A brutal thug and unashamed anti-Semite with a tattoo of Adolf Hitler on his arm, he was suspected of numerous crimes, including planning attacks on synagogues in Germany in November 2022. These were barbarous crimes in which shots were fired and a Molotov cocktail thrown at synagogues in the cities of Essen and Bochum.
'Understand Yektaparast and you understand exactly how Iran's international machine of terror works,' my source says. 'You're going to get a look right inside it.'
What my source is about to show me is the most detailed account of Tehran's terror modus operandi that I have ever seen. My eyes flick to the first page of the dossier, which is headed: 'Report summarising the investigation of Ramin Yektaparast in Iran by Western Intelligence Agents.'
Ramin Yektaparast is a German-Iranian central to Iran's international terror operation
Ramin in Iran. He was the brain and brawn behind two terror attacks mounted by the Quds Force in Germany in 2022, as well as dozens of other foiled attacks in Europe
I hit upon a startling paragraph: 'It can now be revealed that in early 2024 Yektaparast was detained for covert questioning by foreign intelligence personnel in Iran.
During his interrogation, he described the history of his ties with Quds Force [the foreign operations branch of Iran's Revolutionary Guard]. He provided details of his handlers and of the targets. The accurate information he relayed facilitated the disruption of several terror attacks in Europe.'
I read the words twice and look up.
'Hold on,' I say to my source. 'These Western intelligence agencies captured and interrogated him... in Iran?'
My source looks at me and smiles. Ramin Yektaparast, I read, was the brain and brawn behind two terror attacks mounted by the Quds Force in Germany in 2022, as well as dozens of other foiled attacks in Europe.
He fled to Iran before he was due to stand trial in 2021 for the murder and dismemberment of another biker gang member in 2014. The Quds Force had approached him due to 'his reputation as a cruel gang leader with an extensive network of ties in Europe'.
The Iranians liked this thug's willingness to 'mount any type of terror attack that Quds Force asked of him'. He was passed onto Quds Force Unit 840, described to me as the regime's 'terror export' unit.
Yektaparast knew criminals in about 50 countries, many of them Mafia members. In 2023, he had begun working with gangs in Morocco and Poland as well as bringing members of these gangs to Iran. Most Mafia members have no ideology beyond making money, Yektaparast explained to his questioners in Iran. But the German and Polish mafia are different: they're raised to hate Jews.
He knew the Quds Force had flagged him as a good candidate for recruitment due to his openly anti-Semitic beliefs. His handlers were keen to exploit those ugly convictions and 'presented their anti-Semitic stances to him, noting that the Jews are the cause of all his troubles'.
From there, it was a rapid immersion into the world of the Quds Force, which quickly began to shower him with money. On several occasions, Yektaparast was paid with dollar-stuffed suitcases: for the German synagogue attacks he received $5 million.
Contact was regular, and in multiple locations, including at the Quds Force's HQ in the Afsariyeh neighbourhood of south-east Tehran, as well as in restaurants, cars and elsewhere.
Ramin Yektaparast was well paid for his criminal activities around the globe...
... he is said to have known criminals in 50 countries
He posted pictures of his high-living lifestyle like this one on social media
He began working with their operatives – these ranged from soldiers and killers of ruthless efficacy to Hamid, a 'short fat bully' responsible for arranging the entry and exit of assets to and from Iran.
Among Yektaparast's key contacts was a man named 'Sayeed' (in reality Mohsen Bozorgi from Unit 840). Through him, Yektaparast began to understand how the Quds Force worked. Sayeed was a bearded man. He smoked a packet of cigarettes a day, drove a Peugeot and had two children. He was always armed.
Yektaparast thought Sayeed was intelligent and reckoned he wanted to climb the ranks. No surprise then that Sayeed generally did only what the Quds force leadership told him to do.
Yektaparast was not always impressed with the Quds Force. He believed most of the terror activities abroad were carried out not by Quds Force operatives but by paid agents like him.
Things often didn't go according to plan. The 2022 Germany synagogue attacks were a typical example. The plan was to throw two Molotov cocktails into two synagogues in Bochum, while also shooting at the windows.
For this, he turned to a criminal associate whom he knew hated Jews, a German-Iranian known as 'Babak J', 35. But Babak J ended up throwing Molotov cocktails at a school as well, before being arrested when an acquaintance tipped off the authorities.
Babak J was charged with several crimes including conspiracy to commit aggravated arson and attempted arson and was eventually sentenced to two years and nine months in prison.
Despite the blunder, Yektaparast's handlers were happy. He was paid in full. They were pleased no connection was made between him, the attacks and Quds Force. Europe, they crowed, would have no extra justification to designate the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), to which the Quds Force belongs, an officially proscribed terror organisation.
We are ignominiously timorous when it comes to facing down Iranian terror. Not a single European country has proscribed the IRGC. The Quds Force would be forgiven for believing it can operate with near impunity on European soil.
Yektaparast made clear to his interrogators that the organisation is using the latest technology as part of its foreign terror operations.
In 2022, he began plotting to kill Josef Schuster, the president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany. He wanted to attack Shuster with a drone and contacted a Quds Force individual named 'Sepher', who could arrange for a killer drone to be shipped from Iran to Istanbul and then to Europe on a lorry. He knew there are minimal checks on deliveries from Turkey to Germany.
He worked out that drones could carry up to 20 pounds of explosives and fly over 15 miles. His plan was to use a 3D printer to produce the drone components and then transfer the parts into Europe in packages of toys and video games on a lorry. His handlers loved it.
He began operational tests in Balochistan, near Iran's border with Pakistan. For one test, he used the drone to attack and kill a group of 20. Both Quds Force and Iranian domestic intelligence were aware of this.
He also carried out tests with senior Iranian security officials. At this point I was shown six photos of Yektaparast, taken from his phone, alongside Iranian security present during the tests. Everything was slotting into place.
With the drone selected and the route secured, it was just about transferring the explosives. Yektaparast found an aeroplane flight attendant. His plan was to ask her to take a package of documents on a flight to Germany and sneak the explosive into the documents. The attendant agreed but then changed her mind, and the operation was aborted.
Just under two years later, Yektaparast would be killed, the victim of a shooting in Tehran. UK and US newspapers reported that Israeli Mossad got him, though the Iranian authorities claimed it was the result of a 'personal dispute'.
After my meeting, I check the information on the secret documents against other sources. It all stacks up. The report I saw is clear evidence that Iran is employing the basest criminals to attempt to commit murder on its behalf around the world. And that modus operandi can be turned against anyone, no matter how powerful.
Federal prosecutors in the US recently unsealed charges against Iranian operatives linked to a plot to assassinate Donald Trump in revenge for the then-President's 2020 killing of Quds Force leader Qassem Soleimani.
Trump has made clear that his administration will make dealing with Iran a foreign policy priority. Tension between the two countries is inevitable.
Following my meeting, I keep thinking about what I read in that cafe. But what sticks in my mind is something my source told me: 'David, this story is just the tip of the iceberg. There is so much more. Terror is vital to the Islamic Republic's foreign policy, and the Iranians will never stop, until we stop them.'
Some details have been changed for reasons of security.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14111607/Hells-Angel-Hitler-tattoo-Iran-network-criminal-thugs-terror-Britain.html
Iran executed Jamshid Sharmahd, 69, (pictured in an Iranian court) a German-Iranian who lived in Los Angeles County with his family, after abducting him during a layover in Dubai and convicting him on terror charges
Israel accused Tehran of an assassination attempt after a drone carrying explosives was launched at the family home of Benjamin Netanyahu
Trump has always believed in 'maximum pressure' to force Iran to drop its nuclear program and abandon support of terrorist proxies. (Pictured: aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln in the Arabian Sea, close to both Israel and Iran.)
It is likely that Trump will crack down on Iran's illicit oil sales. Here an Iranian-flagged tanker (right) is caught transferring oil to a Cameroon-flagged tanker to disguise its origin.
