Calls to ban IRGC amid community alarm following major counter-terror operation

The suspected Iranian terror attack was foiled just hours before it was due to be launched, according to the Telegraph.

Speculation mounted on Sunday night that the target may have been a synagogue, although police said they could not provide further information “for reasons of operational security and public safety”.

Commander Dominic Murphy, Head of the Met’s Counter Terrorism Command, asked the public “not to speculate or share information that has not been confirmed by Counter Terrorism Policing. We have clear and critical reasons not to provide more detail at this time.”

Andrew Gilbert, the Board of Deputies' vice president for security, resilience and cohesion, renewed his organisation’s call for proscription of the IRGC. “We’re calling for the proscription of the IRGC and other extremist groups, including Palestine Action,” he said. “We’re always concerned about community safety.”

Gilbert met the Home Secretary in February with a delegation from the Board who urged Yvette Cooper to proscribe extremist groups including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). 

He confirmed that the Board had raised the issue directly with Security Minister Dan Jarvis in a separate meeting in recent weeks. “We discussed our concern about Iranian proxies,” he said.

Referring to new legislation designed to curb foreign influence, he added: “The government has introduced a level of proscription, but we’re campaigning for them to go further.”

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp, Luke Akehurst, the Labour MP for North Durham and Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, also called on the government to ban the IRGC.

The Community Security Trust (CST) chief executive Mark Gardner reiterated that the Jewish security charity “has said for many years that we want the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) shut down here”.

But Gardner told the JC there was “a very delicate and largely secret mix of intelligence, diplomacy and national security matters being balanced: or else the IRGC would have been banned a long time ago”.

He cautioned that proscribing the IRGC would not “change the threat from Iran", which relies on a mix of covert networks and state backing.

“Even if these arrests finally tip the balance and result in proscription, removing the name from the label will not materially change the threat from Iran.”

The arrests come amid growing concern about Iran’s activities on British soil.

In March, the government introduced new measures targeting Tehran’s influence operations, citing a “long-standing pattern” by Iranian intelligence of “targeting Jewish and Israeli people internationally.”

British intelligence has issued repeated warnings over Iranian plots. In 2023, MI5 director general Ken McCallum revealed the agency had responded to 20 Iran-linked threats since January 2022.

In March last year, Iranian dissident journalist Pouria Zeraati was stabbed in south London. Two Romanian nationals have since been charged in relation to the attack and a third suspect was arrested in January and remains on police bail.

Under the new Foreign Influence Registration Scheme (FIRS), announced by Jarvis in March, Iranian state representatives operating in Britain are required to register with UK authorities. Iran’s intelligence services and military have been placed in the scheme’s highest threat tier.

But the measures do not go as far as proscription, and politicians from across the spectrum have joined calls for the government to ban the IRGC.

Chris Philp pointed to the Labour Party’s pre-election promise to ban the group. He said: “Iran is a dangerous regime, which sponsors terrorists around the world, orchestrates attacks on opponents in countries like the UK and brutally represses its own citizens. Labour promised to proscribe the IRGC in opposition yet they have failed to do so. They have questions to answer.”

Luke Akehurst said: “This adds to the urgency for the IRGC to be proscribed as a terrorist organisation. Labour called for the proscription of the IRGC when we were in opposition. I urge ministers to act on banning this dangerous Iranian organisation now.”

Nigel Farage told the Telegraph: “The IRGC should have been proscribed years ago, without a shadow of a doubt. Friends of mine who live in the Middle East are astonished we haven’t done it.”

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper described the arrests as “two major operations that reflect some of the biggest counter-state threats and counter-terrorism operations that we have seen in recent years.”

When asked about possible links to the Iranian state, she said: “These are major operations that have taken place and the ongoing investigation is immensely important. Of course it involves Iranian nationals in both investigations and we are supporting the police and the security agencies in the investigations that they are taking and the security assessments that they are doing.”