Khalid Mehdiyev

#BREAKING A security camera footage obtained by @IranIntl_En shows Khalid Mehdiyev, the man arrested by New York Police Department with an AK-47, outside Brooklyn residence of Iranian dissident journalist @AlinejadMasih. The police says the AK-47's serial number had been removed. pic.twitter.com/6Y8zgvwlTv

— Iran International English (@IranIntl_En) July 31, 2022

Was this a second attempt by the Iranians to rid themselves of one of their highest-profile and most trenchant critics? If so, it highlights yet again Old Joe Biden’s appalling weakness. Weakness, after all, invites aggression.

According to the New York Post, Mehdiyev (which is a common Azeri name; there is a sizable Azeri minority in Iran) had a loaded AK-47 and over a thousand dollars in cash, and had been hanging around Alinejad’s home for two days before he was finally apprehended. The federal complaint  “makes no explicit connection between Mehdiyev and Alinejad but says the accused had focused on an unnamed Brooklyn ‘residence.’”

Mehdiyev showed all the signs of a determined and potentially lethal stalker: “Law enforcement observed Mehdiyev sitting in a gray Subaru Forester SUV with an Illinois license plate for several hours on Wednesday and Thursday. Feds said he ordered food to his car and looked inside of the windows and attempted to open the front door of the residence he was parked outside of.” Finally, on Thursday, Mehdiyev had the poor judgment to run a stop sign and was stopped by the NYPD, which found that he had no driver’s license.

When cops searched his car, they found, apparently along with two days’ worth of takeout cartons, “the loaded AK-47 with multiple magazines, additional rounds of ammunition and a suitcase full of cash. Two other different license plates were also found.”

But Mehdiyev insists that his odd and suspicious behavior was entirely innocent: he “told police he had been staying in Yonkers, but the rent was too high there and he was looking for a new place to live in the Brooklyn neighborhood. He said he had tried to open the front door of the residence so he could knock on an inside door to ask if he could rent a room.” He apparently didn’t explain why he sat outside the place for two days, and he had no plausible explanation for anything else, either: “He initially told officers he had borrowed the car and he didn’t know anything about the gun and said the suitcase was not his.” Yeah, you know how AK-47s can just appear in your car without your knowledge or consent, and what can anyone do about that?

Later, apparently realizing how ridiculous his initial story sounded, Mehdiyev “confessed that the gun was his and he had been in Brooklyn ‘because he was looking for someone’” — an ominous statement when you’re carrying an AK during your search.