SJP’s Alex Shams Accused of Being Iranian Agent

Meet Alex Shams, an Iranian-American writer and PhD student of Anthropology at the University of Chicago.

Shams hates Israel and is naturally a member of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at the University of Chicago and supports the BDS movement. Canary Mission has more on his anti-Israel activities, which includes support of terrorism.

Shams has really put himself out there as being anti-Iranian regime and supportive of the protests:

@ajplus Iran’s uprising is not about religion, Iranian American writer Alex Shams says.⁣ ⁣ #Iran #IranProtests #MahsaAmini #MoralityPolice #Hijab #IranProtest #JusticeForMahsaAmini #WomensRights #Islam #Muslim #MuslimWomen ♬ Healing Spiritual Music (Inspirational Ambient Instrumental Background) – P5 – IustinGalea

But something does not seem right.

Things don’t add up with Shams

For a start, Shams does not promote regime change

yet promotes the removal of sanctions, which can only work to bolster the regime:

Seems very odd for someone supposedly pro-protesters.

He has also been called out for posting disinformation to make things out in Iran to be better for Iranian women than they really are.

But there’s more.

What’s with this photo of him with an Ayatollah Khomeini cake?

Keep reading.

In this interview, Shams claims his father came to the US as a refugee yet also claims he started traveling to Iran in the 90s.

This makes no sense. The son of someone who escaped Tehran after the Islamic revolution is not visiting Iran regularly, and not to visit family. Unless something else is at play.

Also, remember his vehemently anti-Shah tweet above? I find that unlikely also coming from the son of an Iranian refugee from 1979.

Shams’ travels to Iran extended to even a few years ago:

which apparently should not be possible for a US-based anthropology student:

He was even there in 2020 during the Covid pandemic. What was he doing there back then?

Finally, Shams’ friend and rumored girlfriend Hoda Katebi – also pictured with the Khomeini cake – has written in Vogue defending the Islamic revolution as “a Western power overthrown by self-determined Muslims and other Iranians”:

Accusations of working for the Iranian regime

Shams is actually being accused of being an agent of the Iranian regime, part of a program called See You in Iran, created as “a way to confront the common misconceptions, obsessions, and manufactured realities associated with a constructed image of ‘Iran’.” But See You In Iran is allegedly really designed to lure foreigners to Iran and have them arrested or even worse:

All of this seems rather compelling to me, and is coming from actual Iranians who oppose their evil regime.

Is Shams on the Iranian Payroll?

In July of this year I provided circumstantial evidence that Iran was behind the antisemitic mapping project. I believe they are very active in the US, and this includes on US campuses, where regime affiliates help sow discord against the US and Israel. So while I do not have incontrovertible proof Shams is on their payroll, I suspect it. He has been to USC, Harvard, and now University of Chicago. Again, not proof he is on their payroll, but could help explain how he can afford all of these schools.


Thanks to Emily Schraeder and her Persian researcher for the information in this post.

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