Ariane Tabatabai

Ariane Tabatabai is a German-Iranian political scientist who served as chief of staff to the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict at the Pentagon. She was recruited in 2014 by Saeed Khatibzadeh as a founding member of the Iran Experts Initiative, a covert Iranian Foreign Ministry influence operation coordinated through IPIS. Leaked emails showed she consulted IPIS head Mostafa Zahrani about conference attendance — including an Israeli conference invitation — and informed him of opportunities to testify before Congress. In February 2021, Robert Malley hired her to join his Iran team at the State Department, and she subsequently moved to the Pentagon. After the IEI leak in September 2023, the Pentagon launched a security review of her clearance; she was ultimately retained and her top-secret SCI clearance maintained.