Did Iran activate a terrorist group in Europe?

Tehran already activated terrorist groups decades ago, even before the existence of networks such as Al-Qaeda or ISIS, which committed attacks in Europe. It was Iran’s way of retaliating for European policies in the region, including support for Israel and the American presence in the Middle East.

Europe is suffering a chain of attacks that, although they have not caused fatalities so far, have set off all the alarms. They all have in common that they have been claimed by an alleged new terrorist group called ‘Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya’, which can be translated as ‘Islamic Movement of the Supporters of the Righteous’.

Suspicions fall on Iran because The attacks have for now been claimed in Telegram groups related to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and the Lebanese Hezbollah, an ally of Iran.

In just over two weeks there were almost a dozen attacks, most in Belgium and the Netherlands. Almost all of them have been direct attacks against Jewish institutions and all of them claimed by that group.

The first attack occurred on March 9 with the launch of Molotov cocktails against a synagogue in Liege, city ​​in eastern Belgium close to the Dutch and German borders. Two days later, on March 11, a Jewish community center in Greece was attacked. The next day, the 12th, another synagogue was attacked. This time in the Dutch city of Rotterdam.

Two days passed and on the 14th the attacks returned, now against a Jewish school in Amsterdam. After a quiet week, on March 22 an attack burned down the ambulances at a Jewish center in London. The next day, the 23rd, someone set a car on fire in the Jewish quarter of Antwerp.

Governments begin to take measures to protect synagogues and Jewish educational and cultural institutions. Belgium announced this week that it was mobilizing 200 soldiers with immediate effect to protect Jewish sites that could come under attack.

The European intelligence services are still wondering if there is a new terrorist group carrying out all these attacks or, given that for now they seem to be unprofessional attacks, they could be attacks launched by individuals with no common affiliation but that Iran or groups close to the Guardians of the Iranian Revolution would be taking advantage of to claim them and try to generate fear in the Jewish populations of Europe.

The sources consulted in Brussels assure that, if this group really existed, it would be newly created because it has no past traces and had not been under the radar of any secret service. That is what leads them to think that in reality there is no group as such for now, but rather individual attackers without connection.

European services fear both possibilities. If they were faced with a real group, with structure and command, European intelligence would be blind and would not have detected the creation of a group that is already attacking from Athens to London.

If, however, it is a simple propaganda façade used to claim uncoordinated attacks, its dismantling would be more difficult and Iran could not be easily blamed.

The logo used in the claims shows a hand holding a dragunov precision rifle, a Russian model that has been manufactured since 1963. It is a very popular rifle, which the Soviet Union first and then Russia sold to dozens of countries, especially in the Middle East, Asia and Africa. In recent years it has appeared in Ukraine and Gaza. Even ISIS used it. In the logo, that rifle appears in front of a globe. The iconography is very similar to that of Hezbollah.