Iran Archives -

Gun Violence Or Political Assassination?

Given the ongoing conflict with Iran, I found this email from Giffords PAC featuring NBA basketball coach Steve Kerr noteworthy.

I have written about Mr. Kerr’s characterization of his father’s assassination as “gun violence” (sic) a couple of times.

Here is a quick refresher.

Prof. Malcolm Kerr, a noted political scientist and Middle Eastern specialist, was the president of the American University of Beirut from 1982 until he was assassinated in 1984. The assassination was by Shia Lebanese assassins from the Islamic Jihad Organization which we later called Hezbollah and which received significant support from Iran and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Prof. Kerr assumed the presidency of AUB during the midst of the Lebanese Civil War which went from 1975 until 1990. His death in January 1984 came less than a year after the bombing of the US Embassy in Beirut and the bombing of the US Marine Barracks. To say the situation in Lebanon was tenuous for anyone as well as violent would be an understatement. As a prominent American, Prof. Kerr was undoubtedly a target.

Bringing this back to Iran, the Kerr family sued Iran in Kerr v. Islamic Republic of Iran in which they won significant compensatory damages.

From the judgment:

ORDERED, that judgment be entered in favor of the plaintiffs against defendants the Islamic Republic of Iran and its Ministry of Information and Security, jointly and severally, for compensatory damages as follows: Ann Z. Kerr, as executrix of the Estate of Malcolm H. Kerr: $8,025,296.00 Ann Z. Kerr: $10,000,000.00 Susan (Kerr) Van de Ven: $3,000,000.00 John M. Kerr: $3,000,000.00 Stephen D. Kerr: $3,000,000.00 Andrew S. Kerr: $3,000,000.00 Dorothy (Kerr) Jessup: $1,500,000.00 Susan Miller Muhammad, as executrix of the Estate of Marion Kerr Miller: $1,500,000.00 It is FURTHER ORDERED, that the Clerks of Court forthwith enter judgments in accordance with the foregoing; and it is

FURTHER ORDERED, that plaintiffs may arrange for this Decision and Order to be translated into Farsi and, at plaintiffs request, the Clerk’s Office shall cause a copy of the translated Decision and Order to be transmitted to the U.S. Department of State for service upon defendants through diplomatic channels.

Steve Kerr later said he didn’t need revenge nor closure but only went along with the lawsuit as it was important to his family. That indeed may be the case but it was a public acknowledgement that his father’s murder was an act of political violence. In my opinion, political violence, with or without firearms, is a wholly different animal than “gun violence” (sic).

Circling back to the post by Kerr and Giffords PAC, disarming responsible Americans in the face of attacks by Islamic terrorists on a Jewish pre-school in Michigan and an Army ROTC class at Old Dominion University is not only bad policy but dangerous. It was only due to armed private security at the pre-school that no child was hurt. As to ODU, how many more laws could have averted that attack. The killer was a prohibited person, was illegally in possession of a firearm that had been previously stolen, and was in a gun-free zone.

Steve Kerr is free to rail against “gun violence” (sic) all he wants. However, to say he lost his father to “gun violence” is disingenuous at the best and dishonest in light of the facts.

UN Watch: Iran Elected To UN Arms Trade Treaty Post

Illustrating the absurdity of the Arms Trade Treaty talks, Iran was elected to the Asian working group along with Japan and South Korea. Moreover, UN Watch reports that the Iran new agency IRNA is saying that Iran will be the deputy head of the ATT talks.

UN Watch is a Geneva-based NGO which seeks to monitor the United Nation’s performance based upon the UN’s own charter. It is affiliated with the American Jewish Committee.

UN Watch is asking that UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon condemn the selection of Iran to the working group and to a leadership position in the Arms Trade Treaty talks especially given Iran’s role in smuggling of arms to Syria and other rogue nations.

“Right after a UN Security Council report found Iran guilty of illegally transferring guns and bombs to Syria, which is now murdering thousands of its own people, it defies logic, morality and common sense for the UN to now elect this same regime to a global post regulating the transfer of guns and bombs,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, a non-governmental monitoring group based in Geneva.

“This is like choosing Bernie Madoff to police fraud on the stock market. And the U.N.’s scandalous choice of Iran is exactly why we fear that Syria’s declared bid for a U.N. Human Rights Council seat is not impossible.”

UN Watch called on UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who addressed the conference on the same day as the election, to condemn the decision to give Iran a position of responsibility in regulating the arms trade.

“He should remind the conference that the Security Council has imposed four rounds of sanctions on Iran for refusing to halt its probited nuclear program, and that Iran continues to defy the international community through illegal arms shipments to the murderous Assad regime,” said Neuer.

“Syria continues to be the central party to illicit Iranian arms transfers,” the Security Council report recently found, citing the discovery of Iranian shipments to Damascus of assault rifles, machineguns, explosives, detonators, 60mm and 120mm mortal shells and other items.

Neuer expressed concern that the UN’s election of Iran “injects ambiguity about the U.N.’s position on illicit Iranian arms transfers, fuels Iranian propaganda, and grants international legitimacy to a regime that tortures student activists, hangs gays and subjugates women.”

In one way it is good that a nation like Iran is elected to a leadership position at the Arms Trade Treaty talks because it illustrates vividly what an illegitimate exercise these talks have become. That the Obama Administration and the State Department are even participating in them is a disgrace.