The Islamic Republic of Iran’s judiciary announced that it executed Jamshid Sharmahd on October 28, 2024. Sharmahd was a German citizen and U.S. resident who anchored a television show for the opposition Tondar [“Thunder”] group. He became a target of the regime after a 2007 Iranian hack exposed his identity.
He was also the man President Joe Biden left behind. On September 11, 2023, the Biden administration acknowledged a complicated, multi-country hostage and prisoner swap deal. In exchange for a $6 billion ransom, Iran released five Iranian American hostages, but he inexplicably left Sharmahd behind.
The Iranian regime often seizes hostages to ransom for cash. Mohsen Rezaei, a prominent Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) general and a member of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s inner circle, once suggested taking 1,000 American hostages to fix Iran’s economic problems. The hostages Biden ransomed were Iranian Americans who sought to do business in the Islamic Republic before running afoul of the IRGC. Sharmahd was different. He did not travel freely to Iran; rather, Iranian agents kidnapped him from Dubai.
Jamshid Sharmahd did not travel freely to Iran; rather, Iranian agents kidnapped him from Dubai.
Tondar is not Iran’s largest opposition group, but it is among the most potent. It supports the restoration of the Iranian monarchy, whom many Iranians today remember fondly as custodians of the “good ol’ days.” Its call for separation of mosque and state is also increasingly popular inside Iran. While there is no direct connection between Tondar and violence inside Iran, it rejects nonviolence as unrealistic given the willingness of the regime to use violence.
That the Islamic Republic targets Tondar likely reflects the regime’s fear that Tondar’s platform and satellite television station have resonance with the Iranian public. Indeed, Sharmahd was not the first Tondar official to fall victim to regime kidnappers and assassins. In 2007, Iranian agents likely kidnapped Tondar leader and British resident Fathollah Manoochehri (a.k.a., Frood Fouladvand), along with his associates Nazzen Schmidt and Alexander Valizadeh, who respectively held American and German citizenship. The regime likely executed all three without fanfare. Sharmahd’s fate was similar. A resident of California, he had assiduously avoided entering Iran despite his German passport and U.S. green card.
As the United States looks ahead, it is essential to recognize that the Iranian regime’s hostage taking is not the work of rogue individuals but rather a rogue regime. Regardless, the Biden administration failed in one of its primary jobs: To protect American citizens and legal residents. That Biden paid $6 billion but left Sharmahd behind suggests the United States learned nothing from the Iranian murder of former FBI investigator Bob Levinson, whom President Barack Obama left behind as he ransomed American hostages from Iran in 2016. The mantra of both Obama and Biden appears to be: Leave no man behind unless inconvenient or Iranian interlocutors object.
