Lucas: First China, now Iran. How many hostile nations will Biden appease?

There is nothing Joe Biden will not do to appease countries that wish the United States harm.

First China, now Iran.

This was made clear in — of all places — tiny Albania, a struggling democracy, when the government forcefully raided the homes of an Iranian resistance group of some 3,000 people who vehemently oppose the Iranian government and seek its overthrow.

One Iranian was killed, and hundreds injured when 1,000 Albanian police last week sprayed the protesting Iranians with tear gas and pepper spray. The police broke down doors and confiscated and destroyed files, personal devices and 150 computers.

The raid was conducted to combat unspecified “illegal activity,” which translated means attempts by the resistance group to sabotage the Iranian government through electronic and cyberspace activity.

A spokesperson for the U.S State Department, asked if the U.S. was going soft on Iran to secure a nuclear deal, said the police were merely executing a court order. He said, “We support the government of Albania’s right to investigate any potential illegal activities within its territory.”

Joe Biden threw the mullahs in Iran a bone and they were delighted with it.

Called the MEK (Mujahedeen-e-Khaliq), the dissenting Iranians were originally rescued from Iran by the U.S. in 2014 which sought to provide a safe haven for them.

Albania, a NATO member, and a U.S. vassal state, brought them in. They live in camps at a site located between the capital of Tirana and Durres on the Adriatic coast.

Since then, they functioned, with quiet U.S. support, as a thorn in the side of Iranian religious dictator Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the Iranian mullahs who run the Iranian religious police state.

Such political luminaries as former Vice President Mike Pence and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have supported the dissident Iranians, and both have visited the MEK compound.

However, things suddenly took a turn for the worse for them following President Joe Biden’s attempt to make nice with the Khamenei by negotiating a deal to limit Iran’s nuclear program, a deal that former President Donald Trump thrashed in 2018.

Under the Biden deal the U.S would ease sanctions on Iran, unfreeze billions of dollars in Iranian assets, get Iranian terrorists to stop killing Americans in Iraq and Syria, free American hostages, unfreeze billions in Iranian assets to be used for “humanitarian” purposes and stop providing Russia with drones and ballistic missiles.

Pompeo, who visited MEK headquarters last year, accused Biden of “abandoning the Iranian people and enriching their oppressors. The regime is committed to crushing its own people while spreading terror and mayhem abroad, and the Biden administration’s blind desire to appease and negotiate with it has made the world a more dangerous place.”

One irony among many is that Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama and his Socialist government — with U. S. support– shut down the Iranian embassy and broke off relations with Iran last year after it accused Iran of launching a cyberattack against it.

That July 15 attack shut down most of the Albanian government and Rama accused Iran of “state aggression.” The Iranians called him an American stooge.

Now, thanks to Biden, is it is as though nothing happened.

The U.S. is now supporting Rama, a Joe Biden enthusiast, and his attack on the Iranian resistance fighters who he and the U.S once supported in their effort to overthrow the oppressive Iranian government.

Many Albanians feel that the U.S. is simply using Albania as a willing pawn in Biden’s effort to appease the religious militants who run the Iranian theocracy.

The Biden administration through Secretary of State Antony Blinken has made a policy of interfering in Albanian politics, elections, and governance. If America says, jump, Albanian politicians simply ask how high?

It is understandable if the dissenting Iranians of MEK feel that Biden has abandoned them. That is because he has, just as he abandoned thousands of Afghan American allies in Kabul when he recklessly withdrew from Afghanistan.

It’s the Biden doctrine: You help America at your peril.

Peter Lucas is a veteran political reporter who has written three books on Albania, including The OSS in World War II Albania.