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Foundation for “Democracy” in Iran
-7831 Woodmont Ave., Suite 395; Bethesda, MD 20814 (301) 946-2918 | Fax: (301) 942-5341 | E-mail: exec@iran.org
Website: www.iran.org
-7831 Woodmont Ave., Suite 395; Bethesda, MD 20814 (301) 946-2918 | Fax: (301) 942-5341 | E-mail: exec@iran.org
Website: www.iran.org
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The Foundation for Democracy in Iran (FDI) is a Bethesda, Maryland-based advocacy group that appears to be the personal project of Kenneth Timmerman, an active supporter of a number of hardline pro-Israel organizations affiliated with the neoconservative political faction in the United States, including the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs and the Committee on the Present Danger. Founded in 1995 with support from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), FDI claims to “promote democracy and internationally-recognized standards of human rights in Iran.” Although its website is regularly updated with news about “threats” from Iran, the top section of the FDI homepage was reserved (as of December 2007) for publicizing Timmerman’s books and his purported Nobel Peace Prize nomination in 2006. He was nominated, along with John Bolton, by former Swedish Deputy Prime Minister Per Ahlmark, a board member of the hardline pro-Israel group UN Watch (February 7, 2006).
According to its website, “key FDI personnel” include Nader Afshar, the president of Middle East Consulting Associates who has worked with the now-defunct U.S. Information Agency and the Voice of America Farsi Service, and William Nojay, a former election monitor for the International Republican Institute. FDI lists three former, “founding members” of its board: Joshua Muravchik, a leading neoconservative writer at the American Enterprise Institute; Peter Rodman, a Henry Kissinger protégé associated with neoconservative formations like the Project for the New American Century; and Mehdi Rouhani, described by FDI as “the spiritual leader of the Shiite community in Europe.”
During the George W. Bush presidency, FDI has served as a conduit for bad news on Iran, often bemoaning what it regards as the lack of initiative by U.S. leaders in taking aggressive action against Tehran. A November 8, 2007 news bulletin posted on FDI’s website related the opinion of former State Department official Scott Carpenter, who argued that giving money to the controversial Office of Iranian Affairs in the State Department “pretty much kills the Iran Democracy Program.” According to the Sun (November 8, 2007) : “Mr. Carpenter, who headed the Middle East Partnership Initiative and was a deputy assistant secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs until he left the Bush administration this summer, predicted the $20 million devoted to supporting the activities inside the Islamic Republic would be relegated to what he called ‘safe initiatives’ such as student exchange programs, and not the more daring projects he and his deputy, David Denehy, funded, such as training for Web site operators to evade Internet censorship, political polling, and training on increasing recruitment for civil society groups.” Said Carpenter: “There is not the expertise, there is not the energy for it [at the Iran office]. The Iran office is worried about the bilateral policy. I think they are not committed to this anymore.”
A news blurb from May 4, 2006, posted on the FDI website quoted a Timmerman article published in the rightist, David Horowitz-associated FrontPageMag.com. Direct talks with the Tehran regime, wrote Timmerman, “are not just a bad idea. They are a monumentally bad idea, whose wrong-headedness has been proven time and again over the past 26 years.” A few days earlier, on May 1, 2006, FDI highlighted a Human Events interview with Reza Pahlavi, son of the late shah of Iran, who said that he hoped to finalize within the next two to three months the organization of a movement aimed at overthrowing the Islamic regime in Tehran and replacing it with a democratic government.
FDI’s selected news items sometimes feature unsubstantiated claims about Iranian activities, including this undated item from early 2006: “Separate sources in the United States and Iran have told FDI recently that the Iranian regime is planning a nuclear weapons test before the Iranian New Year on March 20, 2006.” A similar FDI post from January 19, 2006, claimed: “FDI has learned from sources in Iran that the high command of the Revolutionary Guards Air Force have issued new orders to Shahab-3 missile units, effective since Tuesday, Jan. 16, ordering them to move mobile missile launchers every 24 hours in view of a potential pre-emptive strike by the United States or Israel. FDI’s source says the launchers move only at night.” These items led to the newswire service UPI publishing an alarmist article stating that, “Tehran is planning a nuclear weapons test before the Iranian new year on March 20, 2006, says [FDI,] a group opposed to the regime in Tehran” (UPI, January 19, 2006).
FDI’s other activities include: publicizing anti-Iran events; promoting “opposition activities” of Iranian-American organizations and exile political groups; and publicizing human rights abuses committed in Iran. When Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Columbia University in New York in September 2007, FDI promoted a protest rally through an ad on its homepage showing Adolf Hitler and Ahmadinejad standing side by side, reading, “The Torch has Been Passed from One Genocidal Leader to Another.”
FDI’s website also offers one-year subscriptions to the “Iran Brief,” a monthly newsletter, for $1,100. Stephen Bryen is blurbed on the subscription page promoting the newsletter as ” The only source of inside information on what business is doing in Iran … and what Iran is doing to business.” Although the offer is made on FDI’s website, credit for publishing the Iran Brief is given to Timmerman’s Middle East Data Project, which, also via the FDI website, offers a consulting service. It is unclear whether the newsletter continues to be published; the most current issue synopses available on the website date from 1999.
Among the other items prominently featured on the FDI website as of December 2007 was a January 2007 article written by Timmerman for FrontPageMag.com titled “How to Topple the Mullahs,” which harshly criticized the Baker-Hamilton Study Group Report. Responding to the study group’s conclusion that the United States should pursue negotiations with Iran and Syria to help stabilize Iraq, Timmerman wrote: “For now, the nutty recommendation of the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group that the United States should engage in direct talks with Syria and Iran appears to have been mooted by events on the ground. U.S. military forces have caught Iran red-handed—twice—over the past few weeks in Iraq. No one can possibly doubt any longer what I and many others have been saying for some time: that Iran is involved on the ground in Iraq and is aiding both Sunni and Shia insurgents in an effort to blow that country apart. … It is regrettable and truly astonishing that President Bush has not applied to Iran and to Syria the same global vision he has so eloquently displayed in regards to Iraq and other fronts in the global war against the Islamic jihad. Because there is a clear alternative to the capitulation offered by Baker, Hamilton, and their advisers.”
Funding. There is little information available on FDI’s funding sources. FDI has received a number of grants from the National Endowment for Democracy, including its initial start-up grant in 1995 for $50,000. According to NED’s description of its 1996 grant to FDI for $25,000: “The Foundation for Democracy in Iran (FDI) received Endowment support to monitor and document the human rights situation in Iran. FDI acquires much of its information from sources inside Iran, including local Iranian news reports not normally available in the West. FDI will publish regular reports on human rights conditions in Iran for distribution to the international media, other human rights groups, and policy makers. To inform the Iranian public on their basic human and political rights, the information will be aired through international broadcast services such as the Voice of America and the BBC, in both English and Farsi, as well as through television networks. FDI also maintains an Internet Web site that facilitates international dissemination of its reports, including inside Iran.”
A news blurb from May 4, 2006, posted on the FDI website quoted a Timmerman article published in the rightist, David Horowitz-associated FrontPageMag.com. Direct talks with the Tehran regime, wrote Timmerman, “are not just a bad idea. They are a monumentally bad idea, whose wrong-headedness has been proven time and again over the past 26 years.” A few days earlier, on May 1, 2006, FDI highlighted a Human Events interview with Reza Pahlavi, son of the late shah of Iran, who said that he hoped to finalize within the next two to three months the organization of a movement aimed at overthrowing the Islamic regime in Tehran and replacing it with a democratic government.
FDI’s selected news items sometimes feature unsubstantiated claims about Iranian activities, including this undated item from early 2006: “Separate sources in the United States and Iran have told FDI recently that the Iranian regime is planning a nuclear weapons test before the Iranian New Year on March 20, 2006.” A similar FDI post from January 19, 2006, claimed: “FDI has learned from sources in Iran that the high command of the Revolutionary Guards Air Force have issued new orders to Shahab-3 missile units, effective since Tuesday, Jan. 16, ordering them to move mobile missile launchers every 24 hours in view of a potential pre-emptive strike by the United States or Israel. FDI’s source says the launchers move only at night.” These items led to the newswire service UPI publishing an alarmist article stating that, “Tehran is planning a nuclear weapons test before the Iranian new year on March 20, 2006, says [FDI,] a group opposed to the regime in Tehran” (UPI, January 19, 2006).
FDI’s other activities include: publicizing anti-Iran events; promoting “opposition activities” of Iranian-American organizations and exile political groups; and publicizing human rights abuses committed in Iran. When Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Columbia University in New York in September 2007, FDI promoted a protest rally through an ad on its homepage showing Adolf Hitler and Ahmadinejad standing side by side, reading, “The Torch has Been Passed from One Genocidal Leader to Another.”
FDI’s website also offers one-year subscriptions to the “Iran Brief,” a monthly newsletter, for $1,100. Stephen Bryen is blurbed on the subscription page promoting the newsletter as ” The only source of inside information on what business is doing in Iran … and what Iran is doing to business.” Although the offer is made on FDI’s website, credit for publishing the Iran Brief is given to Timmerman’s Middle East Data Project, which, also via the FDI website, offers a consulting service. It is unclear whether the newsletter continues to be published; the most current issue synopses available on the website date from 1999.
Among the other items prominently featured on the FDI website as of December 2007 was a January 2007 article written by Timmerman for FrontPageMag.com titled “How to Topple the Mullahs,” which harshly criticized the Baker-Hamilton Study Group Report. Responding to the study group’s conclusion that the United States should pursue negotiations with Iran and Syria to help stabilize Iraq, Timmerman wrote: “For now, the nutty recommendation of the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group that the United States should engage in direct talks with Syria and Iran appears to have been mooted by events on the ground. U.S. military forces have caught Iran red-handed—twice—over the past few weeks in Iraq. No one can possibly doubt any longer what I and many others have been saying for some time: that Iran is involved on the ground in Iraq and is aiding both Sunni and Shia insurgents in an effort to blow that country apart. … It is regrettable and truly astonishing that President Bush has not applied to Iran and to Syria the same global vision he has so eloquently displayed in regards to Iraq and other fronts in the global war against the Islamic jihad. Because there is a clear alternative to the capitulation offered by Baker, Hamilton, and their advisers.”
Funding. There is little information available on FDI’s funding sources. FDI has received a number of grants from the National Endowment for Democracy, including its initial start-up grant in 1995 for $50,000. According to NED’s description of its 1996 grant to FDI for $25,000: “The Foundation for Democracy in Iran (FDI) received Endowment support to monitor and document the human rights situation in Iran. FDI acquires much of its information from sources inside Iran, including local Iranian news reports not normally available in the West. FDI will publish regular reports on human rights conditions in Iran for distribution to the international media, other human rights groups, and policy makers. To inform the Iranian public on their basic human and political rights, the information will be aired through international broadcast services such as the Voice of America and the BBC, in both English and Farsi, as well as through television networks. FDI also maintains an Internet Web site that facilitates international dissemination of its reports, including inside Iran.”
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Governing Board
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Nader Afshar (Chairman)
Mr. Afshar is President of Middle East Consulting Associates, and has a Master of Science in development planning from London University, and a Master of Philosophy from the City of London Polytechnic’s School of Business Studies. Mr. Afshar has worked extensively with the United States Information Agency and the Voice of America Farsi Service.******
“Hon.” David M. Beasley
Gov. Beasley first ran for political office as a 21-year old student at Clemson University and became the youngest member of the South Carolina House of Representatives. He rose to become House Majority Leader and Speaker Pro Tempore, before mounting a successful campaign for governor in 1994. As Governor of South Carolina, David Beasley was best known for combining Christian ethics with conservative economics. Since leaving office, Gov. Beasley has been a senior advisor to Merrill Lynch, managed a family-owned bank, and incorporated the Center for Global Strategies, Ltd., an investment group that promotes ethnical development in the Third World. In 2003, he received the prestigious Profile in Courage award from the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation.
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William Nojay (Secretary-Treasurer)
An attorney with Hiscock & Barclay LLP, in Rochester, New York, and previously with Coudert Brothers in Manhattan, Bill Nojay brings legal and compliance expertise to FDI. During a long career of civic activism, Mr. Nojay has served as a volunteer election monitor with the International Republican Institute in Ukraine (2004) and Afghanistan (2005), and has provided pro bono assistance to pro-democracy and freedom movements in Cambodia and elsewhere. He has a JD and a Certificate in International Law from Columbia University Law School and an MBA from Columbia’s Business school.
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Herbert I(srael?) London
-Herbert I London 10 West St, Apt 20E; New York, NY 10004-1088 (212) 227-9822 [65+ Vicki P London, Nancy London]
-American Jewish Congress, Board of Directors 825 3rd Ave, Fl 18; New York, NY 10022-9511 (212) 879-4500
Dr. London is president of the Hudson Institute, professor emeritus and the former John M. Olin Professor of Humanities at New York University.and dirctor of numerous charities and not-for-profit institutions in New York City and Washington, including the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, the Council on Foreign Relations, the New York City Cultural Affairs Commission, and the International Institute of Strategic Studies.
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Kenneth R. Timmerman (President and CEO)
The Foundation’s activities are coordinated by Kenneth R. Timmerman, a journalist and author who also served in the 103rd Congress as an aide to Congressman Tom Lantos (D, Ca). Mr. Timmerman published The Iran Brief, a monthly investigative newsletter on strategy, policy, and trade, between 1994 and 2000, and is currently a contributing editor for Newsmax. com. His most recent book on Middle Eastern affairs is Countdown to Crisis: The Coming Nuclear Showdown with Iran (Crown Forum, New York 2005). In January 2006, he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize 2006 by former Swedish deputy premier, Per Ahlmark. He is also the author of Shadow Warriors: Traitors, Saboteurs and the Party of Surrender, and a novel about Iran, Honor Killing.
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Advisory Board
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Menashe Amir
Mr. Amir is a long time Persian language broadcaster on the Israel Radio International, a channel of Kol Yisrael (“Voice of Israel”). He is also a leading Iranian expert in Israel and a chief editor of the Foreign MinistryPersian web-site. Menashe Amir was born and grew up in Iran, and immigrated to Israel in 1959. He worked as a journalist and a broadcaster for over 50 years, An estimated 5 million iranians listen to his daily radio program in Persian.
Mr. Amir is a long time Persian language broadcaster on the Israel Radio International, a channel of Kol Yisrael (“Voice of Israel”). He is also a leading Iranian expert in Israel and a chief editor of the Foreign MinistryPersian web-site. Menashe Amir was born and grew up in Iran, and immigrated to Israel in 1959. He worked as a journalist and a broadcaster for over 50 years, An estimated 5 million iranians listen to his daily radio program in Persian.
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Pooya Dayanim
As president of the Iranian Jewish Public Affairs Committee (IJPAC), Pooya Dayanim has worked publicly and behind the scenes on behalf of jailed and kidnapped Iranian Jews, and to promote the pro-democracy movement in Washington, DC and beyond. He was elected to the Executive Committee of the Iran Referendum Movement at its inception, and also played a key role in the successor movement, Solidarity Iran. He writes occasionally for National Review on-line, and is regularly quoted in national news stories on Iran.
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Frank Gaffney
Mr. Gaffney is the Founder and President of the Center for Security Policy, based in Washington, DC. He is also a frequent newspaper columnist and news website contributor. In April 1987, Mr. Gaffney was nominated by President Reagan to become the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy, during which time he was the Chairman of the High Level Group, NATO’s senior politico-military committee.
Mr. Gaffney is the Founder and President of the Center for Security Policy, based in Washington, DC. He is also a frequent newspaper columnist and news website contributor. In April 1987, Mr. Gaffney was nominated by President Reagan to become the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy, during which time he was the Chairman of the High Level Group, NATO’s senior politico-military committee.
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Amil Imani
An Iranian-American writer and pro-democracy activist, Amil Imani has been warning of the dangers of radical Islam in America and internationally. Born in Tehran, Imani moved to the United States during the radical Islamic Revolution of 1978/79. Amil’s writings can be found on his website. He is also director and co-founder of Former Muslims United, and the 2010 recipient of the prestigious “Speaker of the Truth Award” from the Endowment for Middle East Truth. His latest book, Obama Meets Ahmadinejad, is available from Amazon.com
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Reza Kahlili
Writing under a pseudonym to protect his family inside Iran, Reza Kahlili is the author of A Time to Betray, his memoir of working inside the IRGC for more than a decade as the CIA’s “eyes and ears” inside the Iranian regime.
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R(obert) James Woolsey
Mr. Woolsey served as the U.S. Director of Central Intelligence from 1993–1995. He also served as Ambassador to the Negotiation on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, Vienna, 1989–1991; Under Secretary of the Navy, 1977–1979; General Counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services, 1970–1973; Delegate at Large to the U.S.-Soviet Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START); and Delegate aLarge to the Nuclear and Space Arms Talks. In 2008 he joined VantagePoint Venture Partners as a venture partner. Jim received his BA from Stanford University (Phi Beta Kappa), and his MA from Oxford University — where he was a Rhodes Scholar — and an LLB from Yale Law School.
Mr. Woolsey served as the U.S. Director of Central Intelligence from 1993–1995. He also served as Ambassador to the Negotiation on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, Vienna, 1989–1991; Under Secretary of the Navy, 1977–1979; General Counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services, 1970–1973; Delegate at Large to the U.S.-Soviet Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START); and Delegate aLarge to the Nuclear and Space Arms Talks. In 2008 he joined VantagePoint Venture Partners as a venture partner. Jim received his BA from Stanford University (Phi Beta Kappa), and his MA from Oxford University — where he was a Rhodes Scholar — and an LLB from Yale Law School.
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Founding Board Members
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Joshua Muravchik (founding member)
Dr. Muravchik has been a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute since 1987. Prior to that, he was a Fellow in Residence at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and Executive Director of the Coalition for a Democratic Majority. AEI Press published his 1991 study, Exporting Democracy, and The Imperative of American Leadership, in April 1996. His latest work, Heaven on Earth: The Rise and Fall of Socialism, was published by Encounter Books in 2002.
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Peter W. Rodman (founding member)
Mr. Rodman was director of National Security Programs at the Nixon Center for Peace & Freedom until July 2001. His most recent book, America Adrift: A Strategic Assessment, was published by the Nixon Center with a forward by Henry Kissinger. From 1984-1986, Mr. Rodman served as Director of the State Department Policy Planning Staff, and was Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs from 1986-1990 under Presidents Reagan and Bush. Mr. Rodman also served at the NSC during the Nixon and Ford administrations. Since July 2001, he has been serving as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs.
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Dr. Mehdi Rouhani (founding member)
As the spiritual leader of the Shiite community in Europe, Dr. Rouhani worked for many years to promote understanding among the world‚ Äôs great religion. The brother of Grand Ayatollah Sadegh Rouhani, who has been under house arrest in Qom since 1985, Dr. Rouhani became a tireless advocate for ending absolute clerical rule until his death in Paris in January 2000. Dr. Rouhani studied in Qom and Nadjaf (Iraq), and was awarded the title of Mujtahed, one of the highest achievements of Islamic scholars, at the age of 28 in 1958.
