The strange case of the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, unfolds when federal and local law enforcement in Los Angeles execute three search warrants and arrest seven individuals on charges of alleged material support of a terrorist organization. The individuals arrested are charged with have knowingly conspired to support the MEK by conducting fund raising, financial transactions, and other activities in support of the MEK organization.
In 1999, the State Department designated MEK a foreign terrorist organization. “We have sufficient grounds for concluding that they are a terrorist organization and continue to engage in terrorist violence,” the Department said. The designation of the MEK as a terrorist organization is strange because the MEK had worked with the Agency in covert actions against Tehran. The MEK’s presence in Iraq had also been generously funded by Saddam Hussein, who similarly had supported attacks on Iran from the MEK base near Fallujah.