TEHRAN — In a sweeping escalation of anti-Iranian policies, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has detained 130 Iranian nationals across the United States in the past week alone, with 670 now held in detention centers.

The arrests, framed by the Trump administration as "counterterrorism measures," have ignited fierce condemnation from Iranians and human rights advocates, who condemn them as racist profiling rooted in Iranophobia.
  
The crackdown has unfolded with disturbing brutality. In Los Angeles, ICE agents stormed the homes of Iranian migrants, including a couple from Pastor Ara Torosian’s Farsi-speaking church. 

According to a Reuters report, Torosian witnessed federal officers pin a woman to the ground during her arrest, triggering a violent panic attack. "She’s sick! Call 911!" he shouted, later asking, "Why are you guys doing this?" despite ICE’s claim of "national security" justifications. 

Simultaneously, ICE Director Todd Lyons confirmed the agency’s "targeted enforcement" against nationals from "high-risk countries—including Iran" in an interview with NewsNation, openly prioritizing ethnicity in operations. 

Fabricated threats and the 'sleeper cell' myth 

Trump Administration officials and anti-Iran propagandists have attempted to stoke fear by alleging detainees had links to “Hezbollah or the IRGC”—rhetoric that could presage a false-flag operation. 

This suspicion is bolstered by an exclusive Tehran Times exposé revealing Tel Aviv’s plot to stage an explosion on U.S. soil and pin it on Tehran, a scheme thwarted only by a timely Iranian intelligence intervention. 

The timing of this exposé and the Trump administration's anti-Iranian persecution is especially damning, coming on the heels of the Israeli regime’s war on Iran—launched June 13 and escalated on June 21 with the US-backed “Operation Midnight Hammer”—in which Washington provided diplomatic cover, real-time intelligence, and logistical support, and joined in the bombardment of Iran’s civilian nuclear infrastructure via B-2 Spirit stealth bombers armed with 30,000-pound GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrators and Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from Ohio-class submarines. 

Despite these baseless allegations fueling anti-Iranian sentiment, ICE’s own June 24 press release detailing 11 arrests cited minor offenses like visa overstays or decades-old drug convictions, not terrorism. 

One case involved forging an official seal; another, a firearm charge. Only one individual was noted as having served in Iran’s military, which is a universal, compulsory duty for all able-bodied Iranian men. 

Weaponizing deportation 

A Supreme Court ruling this week greenlit deportations to third countries without due process, enabling ICE to bypass international anti-torture laws. 

This policy has already inflicted suffering: In February, 12 Iranians—including children—were shackled and flown to Panama on a U.S. military plane. 

"Women and children kept passing out, but U.S. forces did not uncuff them," one deportee said during an interview with American media. Stranded without legal aid or funds, they remain trapped under U.S. surveillance.  

In a statement in February, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baqaei condemned such practices as "humiliating" and vowed to "exhaust all measures" to protect citizens, directing diplomatic missions to assist deportees. 

This legal assault on due process comes in the shadow of Trump’s latest travel ban barring Iranian nationals alongside 18 other countries—a policy Tehran condemned as driven by a “supremacist and racist mentality” that singles out Muslims and Iranians for collective suspicion. 

It lays bare a xenophobic Iranophobia permeating U.S. policy— from White House decrees to ICE’s detention centers—amplifying state-sanctioned prejudice under the guise of national security.