The Iranian regime has taken a leaf out of the advice that Hitler’s right-hand man, Joseph Goebbels, once gave: “Tell a lie that is big enough and repeat it often enough and the whole world will believe it.” 

Fake news by the Iranian regime, mainly issued to distort the truth about the state of the economy, the real status of the Covid-19 outbreak, and the main Iranian opposition, the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI / MEK Iran), is second nature. Distorting the news and outright lying is in addition to executions, torture, massacres, and terrorist adventurism outside Iran.

The regime has spent billions of dollars of money belonging to the Iranian people on producing fake news in all its possible different forms, in a vain attempt to vilify the (PMOI / MEK Iran).

When a famous Iranian singer, Marjan, died in a hospital in a Los Angeles hospital, there was an outpouring of grief for her amongst many Iranian people, including many who were themselves, artists, and athletes. Marjan had joined the (PMOI / MEK Iran) and had continued to actively oppose the regime from outside Iran.

The Iranian regime was outraged by the messages of support for Marjan. The MOIS pursued a campaign of lies about supporters of Marjan inside Iran, insinuating that they were all members of the (PMOI / MEK Iran). One of the ways they spread lies was to circulate a journal, similar to the (PMOI / MEK Iran) own journal, called “Mojahed.” In the fake journal, they published the names of 16 artists and athletes inside Iran with condolences for the death of Marjan. The nefarious purpose of this fake journal was to pretend that all these people named were members of the (PMOI / MEK Iran) inside Iran.

The media outlets under the control of the regime published extracts from the fake journal, stating that the people that the journal had named were (PMOI / MEK Iran) ‘terrorists.’ The fact that this news was fake could easily be proven because the (PMOI / MEK Iran) has discontinued the production of a paper version of its journal years ago, replacing it with an online version.

.The extract from the Hamshahri journal’s website that slavishly published the fake news had this on its website:

“Why are the pictures of Iranian athletes and artists in the (PMOI / MEK Iran) journal?  The Mojahed Journal, which echoes the MEK grouplet’s point of view, in one of its latest issues, has published the names and pictures of 15 Iranian artists and one athlete.

[The article] is about some of the Iranian actors/actresses’ reactions to the news of an old singer’s death, who had cooperated with and supported the (PMOI / MEK Iran) terrorist grouplet. Shahla Safi Zamir, also known as Marjan, had repeatedly supported Maryam Rajavi, the leader of this group, and their crimes against the Iranian people by attending the headquarters and gatherings of the (PMOI / MEK Iran). Therefore, it was thought that the news of her death would not be reflected in the virtual pages of Iranian actors and actresses. Everyone knows that the (PMOI / MEK Iran) terrorists are the most hated grouplet among the Iranian people, and those who cooperate with them are no exception.

But what happened was the indifference of some celebrities to the dark background of this old singer. After the actors, actresses, and athletes expressed their condolences on the death of the singer on their personal social media pages, Mojahedin Journal seized the opportunity to publish a picture of Ali Karimi and 15 other actors and actresses in its June 9, 2020, issue with the headline “Mourning of Artists in the Death of Lady Marjan.”

This sort of trick employed by the Iranian regime is certainly not new. One of the things that have been done to vilify the (PMOI / MEK Iran) is to publish fake copies of the Mojahedin journals and circulate them around the prisons. One of the most memorable lies was an article published back in June 2003. The article suggested falsely that the (PMOI / MEK Iran) leader and 4 other officials had been arrested by American forces and taken to an unknown location with “al-Qaeda leaders in Iran.”