NY Journalist Confronts Failed Assassins Ahead Of Sentence For Iran

By Michael Mashburn From Daily Voice

Two men tied to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were sentenced to prison for a failed murder-for-hire plot targeting New York journalist and dissident Masih Alinejad at her Brooklyn home.

Rafat Amirov, 46, of Iran, and Polad Omarov, 40, of Georgia, were each sentenced to 25 years behind bars in Manhattan federal court Wednesday, Oct. 29, following their March convictions for murder-for-hire and attempted murder in aid of racketeering.

Federal prosecutors argued the pair worked with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, offering a triggerman $500,000 to kill Alinejad, an internationally recognized journalist, author, and activist.

Ahead of the sentencing, prosecutors sought 55 years, arguing Amirov and Omarov pursued the plot “quickly and relentlessly” in an effort to silence one of Iran’s most vocal critics, ABC News reports.

Alinejad, who has long faced threats from Tehran, called the verdict a victory for dissidents worldwide. “I looked these men in the eyes — men who intended to silence me for defending women’s freedom — and am still standing,” she said after the hearing.

She added: “For too long, dictators have treated America as their personal playground to orchestrate transnational oppression. It’s past time the US government makes clear that US residents are protected and that if they are targeted on American soil, there will be consequences.”

The 2022 Plot

Prosecutors argued the pair enlisted a Yonkers associate, Khalid Mehdiyev, who repeatedly surveilled Alinejad’s Brooklyn neighborhood in July 2022. On July 28, Mehdiyev reportedly saw her outside her home but missed the chance to retrieve his weapon from his car.

Later that day, NYPD officers pulled Mehdiyev over for traffic violations. A search of his vehicle turned up an assault rifle, 66 rounds of ammunition, a ski mask, gloves, and cash.

Alinejad, alarmed by the surveillance, had already left her home to stay with friends. She was not harmed.

The men were arrested months later: Omarov in the Czech Republic in January 2023 and Amirov in New York weeks afterward.

Background

Alinejad, who has reported extensively on Iran’s human rights abuses, was also targeted in a 2021 kidnapping plot allegedly directed by Iranian intelligence.

In a video posted on X Wednesday before the sentencing, she told followers she was heading to court with the FBI to confront her “would-be assassins,” wearing red “because they were hoping to cover all over my body with blood," she said. "I'm wearing red to celebrate my life."