Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

MUJAHIDEEN • 453and the Friday prayers leaders never use the group’s name but referto it rather as the munafiqeen, or hypocrites, a wordplay and rebuttalof their chosen self-designation as Mujahideen.Although the MKO’s members had hoped in June 1981 to launchtheir own revolution against the clerical regime, they made two miscalculations.First, being themselves mainly members of the less traditional,more Westernized middle classes, they underestimated thedepth of support Khomeini enjoyed among the masses of the moretraditional lower classes of society. Second, because they undertooktheir campaign of antiregime terror during the middle of a nationalwar of self-defense against an Iraqi invasion, their actions were arguablytreasonable, whatever the political failings of the regime mayhave been. In fact, the MKO later accepted the state sponsorshipof the Iraqi regime, set up bases within Iraq, and deployed its ownarmed units under Iraqi command against Iranian troops in the warfronts, a move that cost it whatever support it had enjoyed among Iraniannationalists within Iran. The MKO leader, Masud Rajavi, whohad fled Iran with Bani-Sadr in 1981, briefly rallied exiled oppositiongroups in a National Council of Resistance. Over time, however, theMKO degenerated into a cult of personality centered on Rajavi, whoenforced a rigid ideological conformity on the group’s membership,alienating most of its allies and sympathizers.On 5 April 1992 five MKO members took over the offices of theIranian United Nations Mission in New York City and vandalized it.No injuries occurred, and the five submitted to arrest by the FederalBureau of Investigation (FBI) and were charged with violations ofthe applicable sections of Title 18 of the U.S. Code pertaining toprotection of diplomatic persons and their property. Although thisevent was largely ignored at the time, in fact it was one of the mostserious incidents of international terrorism that had occurred in theUnited States up to that date.In April 1994 the U.S. Department of State added the MKO to itslist of international terrorist groups, a move that drew a hostile reactionfrom a hundred members of Congress, who demanded that theState Department justify its designation of this group, which had beenactively lobbying Congress and portraying itself as a democratic oppositionto the Iranian regime. Accordingly, on 31 October 1994 theDepartment of State issued a report identifying terrorist actions by theMKO, its previous history of anti-U.S. attacks, its state sponsorship by