The Tehran Initiative

by Joel C. Rosenberg

  From Imam Khomeini International Airport, the Twelfth Imam and Javad were taken by a Bell 214 Huey military helicopter to the Qaleh, the Supreme Leader’s heavily guarded retreat complex on Mount Tochal, one of the highest peaks in the Alborz mountain range, far above all the smog and noise and congestion of the capital. Waiting for them were his closest advisors: the Ayatollah Hosseini, President Ahmed Darazi, Defense Minister Faridzadeh, and General Mohsen Jazini, commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps.

  They all fell prostrate the moment the Mahdi walked into the main dining room. Each one praised him lavishly and thanked Allah that he had not suffered from the attack.

  The Twelfth Imam warmly welcomed their worship. Indeed, to Hosseini it seemed he reveled in it, gained strength from it. Then the Mahdi instructed them to once again take their seats and proceed with the briefing for which he had come. Javad, meanwhile, sat against the wall in the back of the room and took notes.

  The Ayatollah cleared his throat and assumed command of the meeting. “First, as you directed, we are selecting deputies to form a group of twenty. You said they must be men of honor and courage, men willing to die for your sake and for the sake of Allah. This is almost complete. We now have seventeen of the twenty. A copy of the names and bios for each is in the folder in front of you. We hope to have the other three on board within the next few days.”

  The Mahdi nodded but said nothing, looking neither pleased nor disappointed.

  “Inshallah, we will hold our first meeting—quiet, discreet, without any press attention—of this high command next Monday. We would be honored, of course, if you chose to join us. Meanwhile, we have directed the seventeen to begin recruiting their quota of a total of 313 disciples. Some are mullahs that we implicitly trust. Most are military commanders and leaders of business and industry, and most are Iranian, though we have some well-trusted Arab members, a few Turks, and a handful of Pakistanis. As you requested, they are extraordinarily gifted in the areas of organization, administration, and warfare. We will be careful not to ever gather this Group of 313 in one place but are instead creating a cell structure. None of the members will know that there are 313 of them in total. None of them will be privy to any details except those that are necessary for completing their own operations. This should all be in place by the end of next week.”

  Again the Mahdi nodded. Hosseini waited for a moment, hoping for something clearer, more demonstrative, but it was not forthcoming, so he proceeded with his briefing.

  “Now, with those basic details out of the way, it is with great pleasure that I inform you that our first operation—the one to assassinate Egyptian president Ramzy—was highly successful,” Hosseini continued. “While I wish I could say that the American president and the leader of the Zionist entity were also killed in the attack, some of the events were beyond our control. Still, we proved how vulnerable the Americans and the Zionists are, and we have put them on the defensive without their tracing the attack back to us.”

  “Foolishness!” the Mahdi shouted. “Pathetic and childish!”

  Everyone in the room was stunned, Hosseini most of all.

  “How dare you initiate any action against our enemies without clearing it through me?” the Mahdi fumed. “This is not a democracy. You are no longer the Supreme Leader. I am. I will tell you when we are going to strike. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes, my Lord,” Hosseini half whispered.

  “What’s that?” the Mahdi demanded.

  “Yes, my Lord!” Hosseini repeated, stronger this time, though still with a tremor in his voice.

  The rest of the group followed Hosseini’s lead.

  “I thought I had made myself clear,” the Mahdi continued. “We will proceed to annihilate the Little Satan first and all the Zionists with it. This and this alone is your first objective. I told you: you must bring me the blood of the Jews on the altar of Islam. You must wipe the ugly, cancerous stain of Israel from the map and from the heart of the Islamic Caliphate. I told you that this was only the first step. I told you not to be distracted or confused. This was not the ultimate objective. Destroying the Little Satan alone is too small a thing. The main objective is to destroy the Great Satan. But we must move methodically. We must move systematically. I am not interested in merely assassinating their petty leaders. We are going to annihilate the Americans. Extinguish them. Obliterate them. Vaporize them. In the blink of an eye. Before they know what has hit them. The Americans are a dying empire. A sinking ship. Their time will soon come. But first we must hit the Zionists and rip them from the beating heart of the Caliphate. You must hit them before they strike, but with your gutless act of cowardice, you have endangered my entire plan. You have pushed the Zionists to attack me personally. And I guarantee you it’s only a matter of time before they launch a massive first strike on this country. This could have been avoided if you had listened to me, if you had obeyed me. Now we must rapidly change course.”

  Hosseini and his colleagues fell to the ground again, imploring the Twelfth Imam to forgive them and give them a second chance. The ayatollah, for one, feared his life was in danger. He had slaughtered servants for lesser crimes than this.

  * * *

  Tel Aviv, Israel

  Roger Allen still had no idea what he was going to say.

  When his plane landed at Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv, he still had heard nothing from the White House Situation Room and nothing from the secretaries of state or defense. He didn’t blame them. They had multiple crises on multiple fronts, and this was why they paid him the big bucks, he told himself before remembering that he had actually been making nine times his current salary in the private sector and used to leave his office in Naples, Florida, each day no later than three o’clock, often to play a round of golf before going home to the missus. It all felt like a million years ago.

  They still had an hour-long drive up Highway 1 to Jerusalem, so the director, two of his senior aides, and his security team linked up with the chief of the CIA’s Tel Aviv station and climbed into a convoy of three bulletproof SUVs.

  “Two key things before we get there,” the station chief began as they departed the airport grounds. “First, the Israeli media is reporting that Naphtali wasn’t injured in the attack.”

  “That’s not accurate?” Allen asked.

  “Not exactly.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The prime minister actually suffered second- and third-degree burns on his back and the backs of his legs. From what we can gather, he heard the RPG fire, instantly recognized the sound, and hit the deck of the limousine. His lead Shin Bet agent was standing in front of the open door. As reported, he did block most of the blast and clearly saved his boss’s life. But the fireball did penetrate the interior of the car and scorched the PM more badly than any of us knew.”

  Allen tensed, knowing this was going to make a delicate conversation all the more difficult. “How’d you find out?” he asked.

  The station chief said nothing.

  “On second thought, never mind,” Allen said. “What’s the second thing?”

  “Zephyr’s hunch on the Twelfth Imam attack.”

  “A drone strike?”

  The station chief nodded. “When you watch the video frame by frame, you can actually see the blur of one of the incoming missiles.”

  Allen exhaled. “That’s not good.”

  “No, sir.”

  “How many countries have UAVs at this point?”

  “Forty-five or so.”

  “How many of those had a motive to hit this Mahdi guy?”

  “Three.”

  “The Israelis, the Egyptians, and us?”

  “Right.”

  “And we didn’t do it.”

  “Right.”

  “So it’s the Egyptians or the Israelis.”

  “It seems unlikely, sir, that the Egyptian high command would have made a decision to retaliate militarily so quickly after a decapitating strik
e against President Ramzy. They’re still trying to figure out who’s in charge in Cairo. The VP is the one on television speaking for the government, but under the Egyptian constitution, the line of succession actually goes to the speaker of the People’s Assembly, who hasn’t been seen in public since this crisis began.”

  Allen nodded and looked out the window as they began climbing the Judean Hills toward the Holy City. He didn’t have proof that the Israelis were responsible for the drone attack, but he certainly had strong circumstantial evidence. The problem was, he was heading into his meeting with the Israeli prime minister with nothing. He couldn’t just tell Naphtali not to launch a massive preemptive strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities. He needed leverage. There had to be consequences. But for that, he needed a presidential directive.

  The secure phone in the backseat of the middle SUV rang. The station chief answered it, then turned to Allen. “It’s for you,” he said.

  Allen took the phone.

  “Director Allen, this is the White House operator. Please stand by for the president.”

  * * *

  Oakton, Virginia

  Najjar spotted a satellite dish on his neighbors’ roof.

  His first thought was what he wouldn’t give to sneak into their house to watch some television and find out what was happening in the outside world. That, however, was quickly replaced by a second thought far more useful. He remembered a satellite TV program he had stumbled onto one night in Hamadan when Sheyda and the baby had been visiting her parents. He could still see the man on the program speaking so boldly, so powerfully. The message had stunned him, frightened him. Even now he could clearly remember how ashamed he had felt for pausing on that channel and listening. But now that he recalled the message, his heart began to race.

  “It’s time,” the man, a priest of some kind, had said, “for the church to stand up with courage and conviction and say in the power of the Holy Spirit, ‘Islam is not the answer; jihad is not the way. Jesus is the way. Jesus is the truth. Jesus is the life. And no man or woman can come to the Father except through faith in Jesus Christ.’ This is the message of John 14:6. This is the message of the entire New Testament. And this message of faith is filled with love, not with swords.”

  Remembering, Najjar felt electrified, just as he had when he’d heard the words.

  “Now is not the time to hide in fear from the Muslim world,” the priest had declared without hesitation. “Now is the time to take the gospel of Jesus Christ to every man, woman, and child on the planet and proclaim Him as the hope of mankind, the only hope for the troubled world.”

  Najjar had never heard anyone talk like that before or since.

  “The God of the Bible is moving powerfully in the Muslim world today,” the man had continued. “He is drawing Muslims out of Islam to faith in Jesus Christ in record numbers. Yes, there is much bad news in the Muslim world today. But there is also much good news; more Muslims have come to faith in Jesus Christ in the last three decades than in the last fourteen centuries of Islam put together. This is the greatness of our great God.”

  At the time, Najjar had questioned every word. Now he had no doubt this was all true. Muslims really were leaving Islam and becoming followers of Jesus Christ like never before. He certainly had. Now everything was different. And still, one phrase echoed in his heart again and again: “Jesus is the way. Jesus is the truth. Jesus is the life. And no man or woman can come to the Father except through faith in Jesus Christ.”

  Satellite television. That was the answer, Najjar realized. He needed to get himself to a TV studio that could beam his message into Iran. But first he had to escape the “hospitality” of the Central Intelligence Agency.

  24

  Langley, Virginia

  Zalinsky answered the call on the first ring.

  “Jack, it’s Eva.”

  “What do you have?”

  “David was right—the cell is Iranian.”

  “You’re positive?”

  “One hundred percent. The dead guy is Rahim Yazidi, Iranian national and member of the Revolutionary Guard Corps. The guy we have in custody is Navid Yazidi, his younger brother. Also Iranian. Also part of the Revolutionary Guard. The guy we’re looking for, the head of the cell, is named Firouz Nouri. His father is Mohammed Nouri, a leading Twelver mullah in Qom, Iran, author of several books on the Twelfth Imam. I’m sending you all the paperwork by secure e-mail as we speak. But there’s more.”

  “What?”

  “The name Nouri—does that ring a bell?”

  “Vaguely. Why?”

  “I’m pretty sure this guy Firouz is related to a guy named Javad Nouri.”

  “It’s still vague. Keep talking.”

  “Remember David delivered a bunch of satellite phones to a guy we suspected was close to the Supreme Leader?”

  “That was Javad Nouri?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re sure?” Zalinsky asked.

  “I’m sure his name was Javad Nouri,” Eva said. “Was it the same Javad Nouri? Is he related to Firouz? I’m going to need some more time to pin all that down for certain. But it fits—the father’s a true believer, his older son is a senior government aide, his younger son on a mission for the Supreme Leader. It’s still circumstantial, but it definitely doesn’t point to al Qaeda or the Brotherhood running this attack. This came from Tehran, Jack. David was right.”

  It appeared he was, Zalinsky realized. He thanked Eva for her work and ordered her to catch the next flight back to DC. He needed her back at Langley, for things were about to get very difficult. Then he speed-dialed Murray’s office.

  “I have something for you, Tom, and we need to get it to the director and the president immediately.”

  * * *

  Oakton, Virginia

  “Dr. Malik?”

  The agent, making his hourly check on the doctor, stopped pounding on the door of the master bedroom for a moment. He could hear the shower running, but there was no response.

  “Dr. Malik? Can you hear me?”

  Still nothing.

  He radioed downstairs to the watch commander and explained the situation.

  “Go in,” the commander said.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Very well.” The agent tried the handle, but it was locked. So he drew his pistol, put his shoulder to the door, and broke it down. Then he pounded on the bathroom door and called out a few more times. When there was still no reply, he gave one last warning, then broke down that door as well.

  To his astonishment, Najjar Malik was not to be found.

  * * *

  Jerusalem, Israel

  Roger Allen arrived at the Knesset building early.

  He cleared security and was taken directly to the prime minister’s office, only to learn that Naphtali was not going to be available for another hour. There was no explanation from the PM’s chief of staff other than that dinner wasn’t going to work any longer, that Naphtali had been “unavoidably detained” and “would appreciate Mr. Allen’s patience.” He also said that when the meeting did occur, it would take place with principals only. Staff, even senior aides, were not invited.

  Allen was furious but did his best to keep his legendary temper in check. He knew exactly what was happening. Naphtali was trying to send him a message that he didn’t take orders from the United States, least of all from a man who ran the very agency that had failed to detect or prevent an attempt on his life and was doing precious little, in his view, to punish the country he considered directly responsible. Allen was tempted to thank the PM’s chief of staff, say he had other business to attend to, go check into the King David, and get some work done until the leader of the Jewish State could deign to meet with a senior representative of Israel’s only serious friend left on the planet.

  But now was not the time for a diplomatic temper tantrum. That would surely get picked up in the Israeli media—and then the Arab and Iranian media—and ca
use more harm than good. So he sat alone in an electronics-clean anteroom down the hall from Naphtali, unable to make calls, unable to use e-mail, and without any of his staff.

  * * *

  Oakton, Virginia

  Najjar knew he didn’t have much time.

  He climbed out the bathroom window of the safe house, then lowered himself onto the garage roof and jumped to the ground. Then he sprinted through the backyard of the safe house and into the side yard of the neighbors who had just gone on vacation, crouching behind a row of shrubbery and praying that he couldn’t be seen. He’d fully expected to be caught. The fact that he hadn’t been, he hoped, had to be the hand of Providence.

  Glancing around to make sure no one was looking or within earshot, he wrapped a hand towel he had taken from the master bathroom around his fist and smashed through a basement window of the neighbors’ house. Then he scraped away all the remaining glass and climbed inside.

  Najjar landed in a sea of Barbie dolls and toy cars. He paused for a moment, wondering if a security alarm was about to go off. When it didn’t, he started breathing again and hastily proceeded to the main floor.

  Staying low and away from any of the windows along the back of the house, he found his way to the laundry room and through it to the garage. Sure enough, the subcompact he’d seen drive in and out every day was still there, right beside the empty space for the minivan. Now all he needed was the key. He checked the wall by the door but found only rakes and tools. So he moved back through the laundry room and into the kitchen, furiously riffling through drawers and cabinets but finding nothing. Next he headed into the main foyer. Unfortunately, though there was a small table with a vase of roses by the front door, there were no keys. Nor were there any hanging near the door.

  Najjar’s heart was racing. He’d never broken into anyone’s house. He had certainly never borrowed anyone’s car without their permission. He was terrified of getting caught.