Iran uses Senator Fatima Payman’s image on anti-West news site
The same Iranian regime accused of plotting attacks on Jewish sites in Australia has turned Australian Senator Fatima Payman into their propaganda poster child.
EXCLUSIVE: An Australian senator has unwittingly become a star of Iranian state propaganda – promoted by the same regime ASIO says plotted to burn down Jewish sites across the country.
Tasnim News Agency, run by commanders of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), has plastered Senator Fatima Payman’s image and words across its pages, hailing her as proof that “Western propaganda” is a lie.
It follows her comments in February praising Iran as a nation that gives women a voice in democracy – remarks she later apologised for.
“I only learned of Tasnim through your query,” Senator Payman told this masthead.
“I don’t know anyone involved. I wasn’t even casually aware of its existence until today.
“I am used to bad actors using my image and likeness to promote their agenda, and I condemn Tasnim for doing so in the strongest possible terms.”
Tasnim began promoting Payman after she quit Labor over its position on Palestine in July 2024.
Since then, it has featured her four times, branding her a truth-teller against “Western propaganda”.
The agency trumpeted her one-time praise of the regime’s treatment of women, declaring: “an Afghan-born Australian senator stated that the lives of women in Iran are contrary to Western propaganda.”
It quoted her saying Iran is a “wonderful place” that allows “women to participate in the workforce, to ensure that they have a voice and their voices are heard, they’re involved in the democratic process”, remarks she made in an interview with PressTV, an Iranian state-owned outlet which is sanctioned by Australia.
Tasnim also amplified her comments that women’s rights in Iran are “realities we’re not privy to” in Australia, in which she blamed “single-sided organisations with a specific agenda”.
Tasnim was founded by IRGC commander Hamidreza Moghadam Far, once an adviser to slain IRGC chief Hossein Salami.
Its current CEO, Majid Gholizadeh, is also a former IRGC commander.
The U.S. Treasury sanctioned Tasnim in 2023 for helping the regime’s “violent suppression” of protests after the death of Mahsa “Zhina” Amini, who died in custody after being arrested for allegedly not wearing a headscarf.
U.S. officials said Tasnim helped the IRGC, Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security and law enforcement forces to “crowdsource the identity of protesters” and “suppress dissent.”
The European Union also sanctioned Tasnim, saying it is “the largest [IRGC] affiliated media outlet and serves as a propaganda machine for the Iranian regime.”
“It is responsible for serious human rights violations in Iran.”
Israel’s intelligence agency Mossad this week named senior IRGC commander Sardar Ammar as the man behind planned attacks against Jews in Australia, Greece and Germany.
In August, Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) chief Mike Burgess revealed the Iranian regime had orchestrated two antisemitic arson attacks last year – at Melbourne’s Adass Israel Synagogue and Lewis’ Continental Kitchen – and “likely more.”
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called them “extraordinary acts of aggression orchestrated by a foreign nation on Australian soil.”
Senator Payman told this masthead she has now written to Tasnim demanding it stop using her image and misrepresenting her position, calling it “potentially harmful propaganda.”
“I do not support the Iranian regime, and I condemn its human rights abuses,” she said.
“In the world of deepfakes and misinformation, the nefarious use of my image is becoming more commonplace and I urge the Government to use all the levers available to stop this from happening.”
“I also want to make it clear that I believe the Iranian regime is responsible for human rights abuses and I condemn all such abuses, particularly when carried out by a State. I condemn the Iranian regime and by extension condemn any organisations that uphold the current regime.”
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Originally published as Iran uses Senator Fatima Payman’s image on anti-West news site
