Twitter
StumbleUpon
Facebook
Delicious
Digg
Newsvine
Google
Yahoo
Technorati
Published on Friday, June 19, 2009 by CommonDreams.org
The Iranian Uprising is Home Grown, and Must Stay That Way
The growing nonviolent insurrection in Iran against the efforts by the
ruling clerics to return the ultra-conservative and increasingly
autocratic incumbent president Mahmoud Ahmadinjead to power is
growing. Whatever the outcome, it represents an exciting and
massive outpouring of Iranian civil society for a more open and
pluralistic society.
Ironically, defenders of Ahmadinejad’s repression are trying to blame everyone from the U.S. government to nonviolent theorist Gene Sharp to various small NGOs engaged in educational efforts on strategic nonviolent action as somehow being responsible for the popular uprising in Iran. It appears to be based upon the rather bizarre assumption that millions of Iranians would somehow be willing to pour out onto the streets in the face of violent repression by state security forces only because they have been directed to do so by people from an imperialist power which overthrew their last democratic government and subsequently propped up the tyrannical regime they installed in its place for the next quarter century.
Even putting aside the bizarre spectacle of self-proclaimed “leftists” coming to the defense of a right-wing fundamentalist autocratic like Ahmadinejad, this claim ignores several key factors:
The only people happier than the Iranian elites over Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's apparently stolen election win Friday, were the neoconservatives and other hawks eager to block any efforts by the Obama administration to moderate U.S. policy toward the Islamic republic.
Since he was elected president in 2005, Ahmadinejad has filled a certain niche in the American psyche formerly filled by the likes of Saddam Hussein and Muammar Qaddafi as the Middle Eastern leader we most love to hate. It gives us a sense of righteous superiority to compare ourselves favorably to these seemingly irrational and fanatical foreign despots.
Better yet, if these despots can be inflated into far greater threats than they actually are, these supposed threats can be used to justify the enormous financial and human costs of maintaining American armed forces in that volatile region to protect ourselves and our allies, and even to make war against far-off nations in "self-defense."
The neocons have not been subtle about their desire for Ahmadinejad to continue playing this important role. For example, right-wing pundit Daniel Pipes, at a panel discussion at the Heritage Foundation just before the election, said that he would vote for Ahmadinejad if he could, because he prefers "an enemy who is forthright, blatant, obvious."
Last week, just two days before the Iranian election, Congressional Republicans -- in an apparent effort to provoke a nationalist reaction which would enhance the chances of Iranian hard liners – tried to push through a floor vote to strengthen U.S. sanctions against Iran.
It is interesting how some of the very foreign policy hawks who just last week were dismissing Mir Hossein Mousavi's expected victory as irrelevant since, in their view, there was essentially no meaningful difference between him and Ahmadinejad, are now among the most self-righteous in denouncing the apparent fraud and the most outspoken in their pseudo-outrage at the results.
Their worst-case scenario for these American hawks would be a nonviolent insurrection that would topple Ahmadinejad and allied hard-line clerics and the development of a more pluralistic and representative Islamic Republic in Iran. . Neither the neocons nor Iran's reactionary leadership want to see that oil-rich regional power under a popular and legitimate government. Indeed, the neocons and Iranian hard-liners need each other.
The Nationalist Nature of the Opposition
Mousavi – despite his disagreements with Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei over the years -- has been very much part of the establishment. Indeed, Mousavi would not have even been allowed to run for president otherwise, since the Council of Guardians routinely forbids anyone who is seen to not sufficiently support the country’s theocratic system to participate.
Yet, Mousavi attracted a large and enthusiastic following during the course of the campaign which may have led the ruling clerics to fear that the momentum of his incipient victory could result not just in limited reforms, like those attempted under former president Mohammed Khatami, but revolutionary change. The size and intensity of Mousavi’s final campaign rally, in which he referred to Ahmadinejad as a “dictator” -- which, by extension, implied an indictment of the system as a whole -- may have tilted the clerics into believing they could not take the risk of allowing the anticipated results to be verified. Despite his candidacy displaying a personality and style closer to Michael Dukakis than Barack Obama, Mousavi came to represent the change so many Iranians, especially young people, desperately desired and appeared determined to make happen.
Even among Iranians dedicated to the principles of the Islamic Republic, many now see their country essentially as a police state, recognizing that Ahmadinejad and the ruling clerics are little more than corrupt self-interested politicians who have manipulated their people’s religious faith for the sake of their own power.
However strong their opposition to the current regime, the democratic and reformist opposition simply does not trust the United States, which overthrew Iran’s last democratic government in 1953, armed and trained the Shah’s brutal security apparatus, backed Saddam Hussein in his bloody war against their country, imposed strict economic sanctions on their country, and has hypocritically obsessed about their civilian nuclear program while supporting such neighboring states as Israel, Pakistan and India despite their developing nuclear arsenals.
While Congress in recent years has approved millions of dollars in funding to support various Iranian opposition groups to promote “regime change,” most of these groups are led by exiles who have virtually no following within Iran or any experience with the kinds of grassroots mobilization necessary to build a popular movement that could threaten the regime's survival. By contrast, most of the credible opposition within Iran has renounced this U.S. initiative and has asserted that it has simply made it easier for the regime to claim that all pro-democracy groups and activists are paid agents of the United States.
Feeling pressure from Iranian democrats and major Iranian-American groups regarding such counter-productive efforts, Obama and the Democrats have since ended this controversial program. Ironically, Republicans are now attacking the administration for having somehow abandoned Iran’s pro-democracy struggle while Ahmadinejad and his supporters are citing the now-discarded effort as proof of U.S. complicity in the current uprising.
Generations of Struggle
Most Iranians – who have traditionally been very proud of their political, social and cultural history – would find it rather bizarre to learn that some Western bloggers, ignorant of that very history, are insisting that the recent protests are a result not of their own anger at an apparent stolen election and continued autocratic rule, but simply because some Americans have told them to.
In reality, uprisings like the one witnessed in recent days have occurred with some regularity in Iran since the late 1800s. Indeed, the idea of Americans having to teach Iranians about massive nonviolent resistance is like Americans teaching Iranians to cook fesenjan.
In 1890, unpopular concessions on tobacco and other products to the British led leading Shia clerics to call for nationalist protests and a nationwide tobacco strike, which succeeded in forcing the Shah to cancel the concession in early 1892.
In 1905, in opposition to widespread corruption by the Qajar dynasty and allied regional nobles and a series of other concessions to Russian and other foreign interests, an uprising initially led by merchants and clergy ensued which would continue for the next six years. In what became known as the Constitutional Revolution, many thousands of Iranians engaged in peaceful protests, boycotts and mass sit-ins, along with occasional riots and scattered armed engagements. The result was significant political and social reforms, including the establishment of an elected parliament to share power with the Shah and anti-corruption measures.
A CIA-sponsored coup in 1953 ousted the elected nationalist prime minister Mohammed Mossadegh and his nationalist supporters and returned the exiled Shah to power as an absolute monarch. Through mass arms transfers from the United States, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi built one of the most powerful armed forces ever seen in the Middle East. His American-trained secret police, the SAVAK, had been thought to have successfully terrorized the population into submission during the next two decades through widespread killings, torture and mass detentions. By the mid-1970s, most of the leftist, liberal, nationalist, and other secular opposition leadership had been successfully repressed through murder, imprisonment or exile, and most of their organizations banned. It was impossible to suppress the Islamist opposition as thoroughly, however, so it was out of mosques and among the mullahs that much of the organized leadership of the movement against the Shah’s dictatorship emerged.
Open resistance began in 1977, when exiled opposition leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini called for strikes, boycotts, tax refusal and other forms of noncooperation with the Shahs regime. Such activism was met with brutal repression by the government. The pace of the resistance accelerated as massacres of civilians were answered by larger demonstrations following the Islamic 40-day mourning period. In the months that followed, Iranians employed many of the methods that would be used in the unarmed insurrections that toppled dictatorships in the Philippines, Latin America, Eastern Europe and elsewhere in subsequent years: mass demonstrations, strikes, boycotts, contestation of public space, and the establishment of parallel institutions.
Despite the bloody image of the revolution and the authoritarianism and militarism of the Islamic Republic that followed, there was a clear commitment to keeping the actual insurrection largely nonviolent. Protestors were told by the leadership of the resistance to try to win over the troops rather than attack them; indeed, thousands of troops deserted, some in the middle of confrontations with crowds. Clandestinely smuggled audio cassette tapes of Ayatollah Khomeini speaking about the revolution played a key role in the movement's mass mobilization, and led Abolhassan Sadegh, an official with the Ministry of National Guidance, to note that “tape cassettes are stronger than fighter planes.” Ayatollah Khomeini’s speeches, circulated through such covert methods, emphasized the power of unarmed resistance and noncooperation. In one speech, he said, “The clenched fists of freedom fighters can crush the tanks and guns of the oppressors.” There were few of the violent activities normally associated with armed revolutions such as shooting soldiers, setting fires to government buildings or looting. Such incidents that did occur were unorganized and spontaneous and did not appear to have the support of the leadership of the movement.
In October and November of 1978, a series of strikes by civil servants and workers in government industries crippled the country. The crisis deepened when oil workers struck at the end of October and demanded the release of political prisoners, costing the government $60 million a day. An ensuing general strike on November 6 paralyzed the country. Even as some workers returned to their jobs, disruption of fuel oil supplies and freight transit, combined with shortages of raw materials resulting from a customs strike, largely kept economic life in the country at a standstill.
Despite providing rhetorical support for an improvement in the human rights situation in Iran, the Carter administration continued military and economic support for the Shah’s increasingly repressive regime, even providing fuel for the armed forces and other security services facing shortages due to the strikes.
Under enormous pressure, the oil workers returned to work but continued to stage slowdowns. Later in November, the Shah’s nightly speeches were interrupted when workers cut off the electricity at precisely the time of his scheduled addresses. Massive protests filled the streets in major cities in December as oil workers walked out again and an ongoing general strike closed the refineries and the central bank. Despite thousands of unarmed protesters being killed by the Shah’s forces, the protesters' numbers increased, with as many as nine million Iranians taking to the streets in of cities across the country in largely nonviolent protests. The Shah fled on January 16, 1979, and Ayatollah Khomeini returned from exile two weeks later. He appointed Mehdi Bazargan prime minister, thus establishing a parallel government to challenge the Shah's appointed prime minister Shapur Bahktiar. With the loyalty of the vast majority clearly with the new Islamic government, Bahktiar resigned February 11.
One element that contributed to people’s willingness to mobilize under harsh repression was the value of martyrdom in Shia Islam. The movement’s emphasis was to “save Islam by our blood.” Indeed, there are interesting parallels between the legacy of martyrdom inspired by early Shia leader Imam Hossein with the Gandhian tradition of self-sacrifice. As demonstrated by their subsequent rule, the Iranian revolution’s leadership – unlike Mohandas Gandhi – clearly did not support nonviolence as a principle, but recognized its utilitarian advantages against the well-armed security apparatus of the Shah’s regime.
While the revolution had the support of a broad cross-section of society (including Islamists, secularists, nationalists, laborers, and ethnic minorities), Khomeini and other leading Shia clerics strengthened by a pre-existing network of social service and other parallel institutions consolidated their hold and established an Islamic theocracy. The regime shifted far to the right by the spring of 1981, purging moderate Islamists including the elected president Abolhassan Bani-Sadr and imposing a totalitarian system.
A New Revolution?
Now, a new generation of Iranians is rising up in the tradition of previous generations using largely nonviolent tactics to challenge their oppression. Those out on the streets in Tehran, Isfahan, Tabriz, and other cities are not just middle class intellectuals but also represent a broad cross-section of the poor and working class and include both the majority Persians as well as other ethnicities.
It is not clear whether the opposition can successfully organize a “people power” revolution of the kind which have succeeded in ousting autocrats who attempted to steal elections in such countries as the Philippines in 1986, Serbia in 2000, or Ukraine in 2005 or whether – as in Azerbaijan, Belarus, and Mexico – the regime will remain in power.
In any case, it is clearly a home-grown indigenous struggle. Any effort by the United States (which has allowed one --and possible two--stolen elections to stand in recent years) to intervene will only hurt the pro-democracy movement. Given the history of U.S. interventionism in Iran, Obama's cautious approach will do more to help those in the current popular struggle than anything more explicit, despite Republican demands to the contrary.
The future of Iran belongs in the hands of the Iranians and the best thing the United States can do to support a more open and pluralistic society in that country is to stay the hell out of the way.
Ironically, defenders of Ahmadinejad’s repression are trying to blame everyone from the U.S. government to nonviolent theorist Gene Sharp to various small NGOs engaged in educational efforts on strategic nonviolent action as somehow being responsible for the popular uprising in Iran. It appears to be based upon the rather bizarre assumption that millions of Iranians would somehow be willing to pour out onto the streets in the face of violent repression by state security forces only because they have been directed to do so by people from an imperialist power which overthrew their last democratic government and subsequently propped up the tyrannical regime they installed in its place for the next quarter century.
Even putting aside the bizarre spectacle of self-proclaimed “leftists” coming to the defense of a right-wing fundamentalist autocratic like Ahmadinejad, this claim ignores several key factors:
1) Neo-conservatives and other American hawks were hoping for a victory by the hard-line incumbent to justify their opposition to President Barack Obama’s tentative steps at rapprochement with the Islamic Republic.The Neo-Cons Supported Ahmadinejad
2) Opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi and the vast majority of his supporters are strongly nationalist, anti-American, anti-imperialist, and would neither desire nor accept U.S. support.
3) There has been a longstanding Iranian tradition of such largely nonviolent civil insurrections against imperialist powers and autocratic rulers and no outside power is needed to convince the Iranian people to rebel.
The only people happier than the Iranian elites over Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's apparently stolen election win Friday, were the neoconservatives and other hawks eager to block any efforts by the Obama administration to moderate U.S. policy toward the Islamic republic.
Since he was elected president in 2005, Ahmadinejad has filled a certain niche in the American psyche formerly filled by the likes of Saddam Hussein and Muammar Qaddafi as the Middle Eastern leader we most love to hate. It gives us a sense of righteous superiority to compare ourselves favorably to these seemingly irrational and fanatical foreign despots.
Better yet, if these despots can be inflated into far greater threats than they actually are, these supposed threats can be used to justify the enormous financial and human costs of maintaining American armed forces in that volatile region to protect ourselves and our allies, and even to make war against far-off nations in "self-defense."
The neocons have not been subtle about their desire for Ahmadinejad to continue playing this important role. For example, right-wing pundit Daniel Pipes, at a panel discussion at the Heritage Foundation just before the election, said that he would vote for Ahmadinejad if he could, because he prefers "an enemy who is forthright, blatant, obvious."
Last week, just two days before the Iranian election, Congressional Republicans -- in an apparent effort to provoke a nationalist reaction which would enhance the chances of Iranian hard liners – tried to push through a floor vote to strengthen U.S. sanctions against Iran.
It is interesting how some of the very foreign policy hawks who just last week were dismissing Mir Hossein Mousavi's expected victory as irrelevant since, in their view, there was essentially no meaningful difference between him and Ahmadinejad, are now among the most self-righteous in denouncing the apparent fraud and the most outspoken in their pseudo-outrage at the results.
Their worst-case scenario for these American hawks would be a nonviolent insurrection that would topple Ahmadinejad and allied hard-line clerics and the development of a more pluralistic and representative Islamic Republic in Iran. . Neither the neocons nor Iran's reactionary leadership want to see that oil-rich regional power under a popular and legitimate government. Indeed, the neocons and Iranian hard-liners need each other.
The Nationalist Nature of the Opposition
Mousavi – despite his disagreements with Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei over the years -- has been very much part of the establishment. Indeed, Mousavi would not have even been allowed to run for president otherwise, since the Council of Guardians routinely forbids anyone who is seen to not sufficiently support the country’s theocratic system to participate.
Yet, Mousavi attracted a large and enthusiastic following during the course of the campaign which may have led the ruling clerics to fear that the momentum of his incipient victory could result not just in limited reforms, like those attempted under former president Mohammed Khatami, but revolutionary change. The size and intensity of Mousavi’s final campaign rally, in which he referred to Ahmadinejad as a “dictator” -- which, by extension, implied an indictment of the system as a whole -- may have tilted the clerics into believing they could not take the risk of allowing the anticipated results to be verified. Despite his candidacy displaying a personality and style closer to Michael Dukakis than Barack Obama, Mousavi came to represent the change so many Iranians, especially young people, desperately desired and appeared determined to make happen.
Even among Iranians dedicated to the principles of the Islamic Republic, many now see their country essentially as a police state, recognizing that Ahmadinejad and the ruling clerics are little more than corrupt self-interested politicians who have manipulated their people’s religious faith for the sake of their own power.
However strong their opposition to the current regime, the democratic and reformist opposition simply does not trust the United States, which overthrew Iran’s last democratic government in 1953, armed and trained the Shah’s brutal security apparatus, backed Saddam Hussein in his bloody war against their country, imposed strict economic sanctions on their country, and has hypocritically obsessed about their civilian nuclear program while supporting such neighboring states as Israel, Pakistan and India despite their developing nuclear arsenals.
While Congress in recent years has approved millions of dollars in funding to support various Iranian opposition groups to promote “regime change,” most of these groups are led by exiles who have virtually no following within Iran or any experience with the kinds of grassroots mobilization necessary to build a popular movement that could threaten the regime's survival. By contrast, most of the credible opposition within Iran has renounced this U.S. initiative and has asserted that it has simply made it easier for the regime to claim that all pro-democracy groups and activists are paid agents of the United States.
Feeling pressure from Iranian democrats and major Iranian-American groups regarding such counter-productive efforts, Obama and the Democrats have since ended this controversial program. Ironically, Republicans are now attacking the administration for having somehow abandoned Iran’s pro-democracy struggle while Ahmadinejad and his supporters are citing the now-discarded effort as proof of U.S. complicity in the current uprising.
Generations of Struggle
Most Iranians – who have traditionally been very proud of their political, social and cultural history – would find it rather bizarre to learn that some Western bloggers, ignorant of that very history, are insisting that the recent protests are a result not of their own anger at an apparent stolen election and continued autocratic rule, but simply because some Americans have told them to.
In reality, uprisings like the one witnessed in recent days have occurred with some regularity in Iran since the late 1800s. Indeed, the idea of Americans having to teach Iranians about massive nonviolent resistance is like Americans teaching Iranians to cook fesenjan.
In 1890, unpopular concessions on tobacco and other products to the British led leading Shia clerics to call for nationalist protests and a nationwide tobacco strike, which succeeded in forcing the Shah to cancel the concession in early 1892.
In 1905, in opposition to widespread corruption by the Qajar dynasty and allied regional nobles and a series of other concessions to Russian and other foreign interests, an uprising initially led by merchants and clergy ensued which would continue for the next six years. In what became known as the Constitutional Revolution, many thousands of Iranians engaged in peaceful protests, boycotts and mass sit-ins, along with occasional riots and scattered armed engagements. The result was significant political and social reforms, including the establishment of an elected parliament to share power with the Shah and anti-corruption measures.
A CIA-sponsored coup in 1953 ousted the elected nationalist prime minister Mohammed Mossadegh and his nationalist supporters and returned the exiled Shah to power as an absolute monarch. Through mass arms transfers from the United States, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi built one of the most powerful armed forces ever seen in the Middle East. His American-trained secret police, the SAVAK, had been thought to have successfully terrorized the population into submission during the next two decades through widespread killings, torture and mass detentions. By the mid-1970s, most of the leftist, liberal, nationalist, and other secular opposition leadership had been successfully repressed through murder, imprisonment or exile, and most of their organizations banned. It was impossible to suppress the Islamist opposition as thoroughly, however, so it was out of mosques and among the mullahs that much of the organized leadership of the movement against the Shah’s dictatorship emerged.
Open resistance began in 1977, when exiled opposition leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini called for strikes, boycotts, tax refusal and other forms of noncooperation with the Shahs regime. Such activism was met with brutal repression by the government. The pace of the resistance accelerated as massacres of civilians were answered by larger demonstrations following the Islamic 40-day mourning period. In the months that followed, Iranians employed many of the methods that would be used in the unarmed insurrections that toppled dictatorships in the Philippines, Latin America, Eastern Europe and elsewhere in subsequent years: mass demonstrations, strikes, boycotts, contestation of public space, and the establishment of parallel institutions.
Despite the bloody image of the revolution and the authoritarianism and militarism of the Islamic Republic that followed, there was a clear commitment to keeping the actual insurrection largely nonviolent. Protestors were told by the leadership of the resistance to try to win over the troops rather than attack them; indeed, thousands of troops deserted, some in the middle of confrontations with crowds. Clandestinely smuggled audio cassette tapes of Ayatollah Khomeini speaking about the revolution played a key role in the movement's mass mobilization, and led Abolhassan Sadegh, an official with the Ministry of National Guidance, to note that “tape cassettes are stronger than fighter planes.” Ayatollah Khomeini’s speeches, circulated through such covert methods, emphasized the power of unarmed resistance and noncooperation. In one speech, he said, “The clenched fists of freedom fighters can crush the tanks and guns of the oppressors.” There were few of the violent activities normally associated with armed revolutions such as shooting soldiers, setting fires to government buildings or looting. Such incidents that did occur were unorganized and spontaneous and did not appear to have the support of the leadership of the movement.
In October and November of 1978, a series of strikes by civil servants and workers in government industries crippled the country. The crisis deepened when oil workers struck at the end of October and demanded the release of political prisoners, costing the government $60 million a day. An ensuing general strike on November 6 paralyzed the country. Even as some workers returned to their jobs, disruption of fuel oil supplies and freight transit, combined with shortages of raw materials resulting from a customs strike, largely kept economic life in the country at a standstill.
Despite providing rhetorical support for an improvement in the human rights situation in Iran, the Carter administration continued military and economic support for the Shah’s increasingly repressive regime, even providing fuel for the armed forces and other security services facing shortages due to the strikes.
Under enormous pressure, the oil workers returned to work but continued to stage slowdowns. Later in November, the Shah’s nightly speeches were interrupted when workers cut off the electricity at precisely the time of his scheduled addresses. Massive protests filled the streets in major cities in December as oil workers walked out again and an ongoing general strike closed the refineries and the central bank. Despite thousands of unarmed protesters being killed by the Shah’s forces, the protesters' numbers increased, with as many as nine million Iranians taking to the streets in of cities across the country in largely nonviolent protests. The Shah fled on January 16, 1979, and Ayatollah Khomeini returned from exile two weeks later. He appointed Mehdi Bazargan prime minister, thus establishing a parallel government to challenge the Shah's appointed prime minister Shapur Bahktiar. With the loyalty of the vast majority clearly with the new Islamic government, Bahktiar resigned February 11.
One element that contributed to people’s willingness to mobilize under harsh repression was the value of martyrdom in Shia Islam. The movement’s emphasis was to “save Islam by our blood.” Indeed, there are interesting parallels between the legacy of martyrdom inspired by early Shia leader Imam Hossein with the Gandhian tradition of self-sacrifice. As demonstrated by their subsequent rule, the Iranian revolution’s leadership – unlike Mohandas Gandhi – clearly did not support nonviolence as a principle, but recognized its utilitarian advantages against the well-armed security apparatus of the Shah’s regime.
While the revolution had the support of a broad cross-section of society (including Islamists, secularists, nationalists, laborers, and ethnic minorities), Khomeini and other leading Shia clerics strengthened by a pre-existing network of social service and other parallel institutions consolidated their hold and established an Islamic theocracy. The regime shifted far to the right by the spring of 1981, purging moderate Islamists including the elected president Abolhassan Bani-Sadr and imposing a totalitarian system.
A New Revolution?
Now, a new generation of Iranians is rising up in the tradition of previous generations using largely nonviolent tactics to challenge their oppression. Those out on the streets in Tehran, Isfahan, Tabriz, and other cities are not just middle class intellectuals but also represent a broad cross-section of the poor and working class and include both the majority Persians as well as other ethnicities.
It is not clear whether the opposition can successfully organize a “people power” revolution of the kind which have succeeded in ousting autocrats who attempted to steal elections in such countries as the Philippines in 1986, Serbia in 2000, or Ukraine in 2005 or whether – as in Azerbaijan, Belarus, and Mexico – the regime will remain in power.
In any case, it is clearly a home-grown indigenous struggle. Any effort by the United States (which has allowed one --and possible two--stolen elections to stand in recent years) to intervene will only hurt the pro-democracy movement. Given the history of U.S. interventionism in Iran, Obama's cautious approach will do more to help those in the current popular struggle than anything more explicit, despite Republican demands to the contrary.
The future of Iran belongs in the hands of the Iranians and the best thing the United States can do to support a more open and pluralistic society in that country is to stay the hell out of the way.
Posted in Iran
87 Comments so far
Show AllZunes provides a rationale for one view of the Iranian demonstrations, but that's the problem: the article moves to certainty when it's not clear what's going on.
I'm also surprised that Zunes discounts U.S. attempts to shape matters politically in Iran. This article was not his best work.
-TIA
07/09/1989
Superpowers are Responsible for Terrorism & Extremist; not Islam
By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
"….And people have been made to believe that our religion is a religion that condones extremism. We have terrorist that's put before us and they are called extremist. And we are made to believe that our religion is a religion that is giving birth to these extremist. That is wrong.
What gives birth to these extremist, these guerrilla fighters, or these freedom fighters, or liberators trying to liberate Palestine, or whatever they are trying to liberate. What gives birth to them is the evils that are put upon them by the superpowers.
The superpowers have taken away their life; have made it impossible for them to live the only life they know. They have taken away their land, their home and everything. And destroyed families, and killed their babies and their old people.
So, the superpowers that brought those evils upon those people in Palestine and in other parts of the third world or the Islamic world; they are responsible for the terrorist. They are the makers of terrorist. They are the makers of extremist. Not our religion…."
Awesome article! I am so grateful for commondreams.org, and I hope it enjoys the widest possible readership.
Some of the Faux News watchers in my family could really benefit (though you couldn't drag most of them here if you tried...something about leading a horse to water..)
The Neo-cons and Zionists have been trying for an excuse to attack Iran for a long time. This election won't provide any excuse and one of their chief reasons has also been shot full of holes. Haaretz, an Israeli newspaper reported June 17 two articles that should have been in all newspapers in the US, but was apparently censored. "Mossad:Iran Will Have Nuclear Bomb by 2014" and "Israel Can't Make up it's Mind About Iran Nuclear Timetable". These two articles show how false intelligence has been used by the neo-cons and Zionists in Israel and the US to manipulate public opinion for their political gain. Hopefully someone will now tell the AIPAC crazies and their enablers in Congress to stop running around and screeching, "The Iranians are Coming". A caveat to that story is that it would take the Iranians five years (the CIA says six) if they decide to build a bomb. There is no evidence they are attempting to build any nukes.
Paul Craig Roberts weighs in CP. His take is that the whole election from the buildup in the US media prior to the election, to the US government's claim that they would never want to interfere in Iranian democracy to the street riots after the election all have the earmarks of similiar ops we have taken elsewhere. I was watching Chris Matthews 'Hardball' the other evening. He seemed like a little kid, so excited. He exclaimed " Who would believe that Iran is back in play" That attitude goes to the core of the illusion Washington suffers from. The notion that the U.S. has the god given right to go in and destabilize other countries and establish regimes that are more favorable to Washington than to the populace. Chris will forever 'Root Root Root for the Home Team'.
On the other hand, Matthews also pointed out that every time the U.S. poked it's nose into Iranian politics, we've been on the wrong side, a destabilizing influence.
Not entirely unrealistic a point of view.
"Hope has two beautiful daughters. Their names are anger and courage; anger at the way things are, and courage to see that they do not remain the way they are."
Gosh, millions of Iranians have gone into the streets to demand democracy, but were ignored by their leadership?
This is what happened in the US in the spring of 2003, when millions of citizens (including me) turned out to protest the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld invasion of Iraq, but were ignored.
I am struck by how much more attention the corporate media have given to the current Iranian protests than they gave to those of us who showed up to protest in the U.S., the supposed "cradle of democracy," back in '03.
Maybe it's easier for some people to cheer democracy when it's not happening so close to where they live!
Right on!
Excellent point, Steve.
-TIA
Indeed, Mousavi would not have even been allowed to run for president otherwise, since the Council of Guardians routinely forbids anyone who is seen to not sufficiently support the country’s theocratic system to participate.
Indeed, Obama would not have even been allowed to run for president otherwise, since the Council of Corporations routinely forbids anyone who is seen to not sufficiently support the country’s corporatic system to participate.
A while back I heard that the presidency of Iran isn't where the power is, unlike our own (U.S.) presidency, but rather that the ruling religious leaders hold the real power. That seems consistent with the fact that the Council of Guardians actually selects the candidates for presidential elections, effectively limiting them to people favored by the Council. If that's true, why is there such a tremendous uproar about the suspected rigging of a presidential election?
Also, people keep talking about the insurgency being sparked by the CIA or other Western influences. If that were true, why didn't Iran become a U.S. ally during the Bush administration?
When Zunes writes about the Iran Democracy Fund: "Feeling pressure from Iranian democrats and major Iranian-American groups regarding such counter-productive efforts, Obama and the Democrats have since ended this controversial program. "
What Zunes is actually referring to is:
"no money has been earmarked for such programs in the administration’s fiscal 2010 foreign operations budget request. "
http://www.newsmax.com/timmerman/Obama_Democracy_Iran/2009/06/19/227155.html
In other words, the program to influence Iranian elections will simply not be renewed AFTER the elections are over. It's a little like saying that people stopped donating money to Obama after he was elected president.
One thing lost in this is the centrality of the election itself. ALmost every leftie is humping the mainstream narrative to death, although the reasons are amazingly diverse. My feeling is still this, and I'm not seeing a single otherwise competent and authentic writer addressing it: If this election was actually straight, then how can someone who loves democracy and freedom possibly side with the protestors who would then, in fact, be trying to overturn alegitimate democratic action?
The stakes of this are very high, and I think that if the left continues to press this matter and it turns out that the election was dead on, then we'll be seen as siding with a mob of largely privileged class Iranians taking a largely antidemocratic action.
I'm not interested in all of the bullshit name-calling, and Zunes, certainly, shouldn't be taken seriously at all. Neither should Cole. But there are people I do take seriously peddling the same line, and this worries me greatly. I can handle the silly straw accusations of
"bizarre lefties supporting a right wing theocratic dictatorship". That's transparent horseshit. But I can't handle supporting the worse of the two evils (Mousavi).
Drew, you need to man up and stop playing your cryptic superiority game and if you have dirt on the internal polling, toss it up here. Frankly, a lot hinges on it, and playing smarmy cutesy sensei to the army of unwashed grasshoppers isn't cutting it or scoring you any points.
I'm open to any credible evidence you seem to think you have.
Horseshit?
Read the comments on the articles on Iran posted here. Read the comments of leftists on most sites.
Because Mousavi is opposing Ahmadinejad, the bete noire of the US and Iran, the man some anti-imperialists leftists instinctively defend, anti-imperialists leftists are reflexively attacking Mousavi and his supporters. His supporters are derided as kids who are stooges. As priveleged class Iranians. On other sites, I have seen them derided as "celebrity protesters". Or as women who only care about being able to dress skimpily.
Etc.
Is there a response in here? I take it you don't like the class characterization, and that's fine. Maybe you should have just said that.
You'll be happy to know that, staggeringly enough, even Socialist Worker is taking up the banner of the "green revolution".
I have no doubt that many of those protesters are genuine in wanting an expanded array of freedom, okay? I also have no doubt that many of them believed Mousavi's claim to a rigged election. But that doesn't make them a) right, and b) innocent victims who deserve international support. There were plenty of protesters in the other color revolutions who beleived in the better ideals being paraded around. they were used. You know, like the progressive Democrats who fellated Obama here in the last election. And the comparison is entirely legit.
But while you stroke the victimization angle of the protesters that the media is peddling, don't forget that if the election is legit, you've dismisssed the voice of manymore millions of lower class Iranians who--rightly or wrongly--voted for the president.
This uprising will not result in freedom for anybody, regardless of the outcome. What it will do is burn the credibility of a gullible left who bought the damn story right out of the can without being patient enough to connect some dots and make sure that the central claim spurring the drama was even true.
Yes, there is response in there. And it has nothing to with class. My response is to your claim that the "left" is buying the story that you claim it is buying. My response is to your claim that Zunes' accusation is straw(man) horseshit.
Read the comments here again. Read the comments on other leftist sites. Zunes' accusation is not straw(man) horseshit. Read the comment on the just posted Ghobady article, where a poster said "My guess is the laws may exist on the books but are not being enforced." in reference to various severe anti woman and anti lesbian / gay laws.
Read the comments on the Ghobady article, where a poster basically derided the protesters as privileged Iranians who are protesting because they want to party and get drunk.
I see little evidence that the left is buying into the story that you claim it is buying into. There are leftists that are siding with Mousavi. There are just as many, possibly more, who are siding with Ahmadinejad, or trying to demonise Mousavi, or trying to portray Mousavi as an American / zionist puppet, or trying to downplay any unpleasant realities about Ahmadinejad.
Like I said, read the comments posted here again. Read the comments on the other articles on Iran that have been posted recently.
"I have no doubt that many of those protesters are genuine in wanting an expanded array of freedom, okay? I also have no doubt that many of them believed Mousavi's claim to a rigged election. But that doesn't make them a) right, and b) innocent victims who deserve international support. There were plenty of protesters in the other color revolutions who beleived in the better ideals being paraded around. they were used. You know, like the progressive Democrats who fellated Obama here in the last election. And the comparison is entirely legit."
That is pretty much the reality of all revolutions. Those who believe in better ideals nearly always end up being used. Including the Islamic Revolution that put the current regime in power. Would you make similar arguments if the current Iranian regime were pro-American?
"This uprising will not result in freedom for anybody, regardless of the outcome. What it will do is burn the credibility of a gullible left who bought the damn story right out of the can without being patient enough to connect some dots and make sure that the central claim spurring the drama was even true."
It will also burn the credibility of the anti-imperialist left that reflexively leaps to the defense of anyone and any regime that opposes the US and Israel, regardless of what it does.
When I or probably anyone referred to the "left" it was in the context of the center-left media. We weren't doing a universal poll of rank and file lefties (outside of comments). We were talking past each other about two different things. Go figure.
There's just not much of an argument here, except in your last sentence, which is where I think the core of the disagreement is that I'm addressing in my posts. You say this:
"It will also burn the credibility of the anti-imperialist left that reflexively leaps to the defense of anyone and any regime that opposes the US and Israel, regardless of what it does."
I think this is true up to a point. And in this you're saying which camp your in, which is fine. But that's not really arguing with me on my points more than it is proclaiming your own position. Neither side has sufficient evidence to blindly and completely accept either of these narratives, yet in the press that says it represents the "left", one narrative is being overwhelmingly pitched, and that is *your* narrative (yes, I know the boards are another beast entirely, but are you seriously trying to tell me they carry as much or more weight as the "somebody" faction getting published does?).
I wake up this morning and I see information that leads me to believe that this "protest" is morphing into something very different than what it started as. I'll continue to pay attention to that development, but in the meantime, I need much, much better than your camp is giving me, but your pointis taken as much as it can be.
"There are leftists that are siding with Mousavi. There are just as many, possibly more, who are siding with Ahmadinejad"
Where have you read a post where a "leftist" actually "sided" with Ahmadinejad? Or strongly endorsed either side? Maybe this his happening, but I have yet to see it. It is true that many have tried to counter the outright demonization of Ahmadinejad, because we have already seen this done with Saddam Hussein, Arafat, Kadafi, Kohmeini, etc. All are supposed to be the embodiment or pure evil and were used to justify all manner of violence against them and their countries. But DEFEND him?
Most activists I see are not picking sides at all. The common themes appear to be (1) Should we be meddling in Iran? (2) Is this "revolution" real and grassroots or contrived? (3) How much of the focus on Iran is justified and how much of it is propaganda meant to pave the way to war? (4) What is the best way for us to help promote human rights in Iran and elsewhere? The theme of "We Love Ahmadinejad" is not appearing in any post I have read.
What I have seen is a homophobic, power hungry, small minded dictator. While I oppose any US interference in Iran and its bid for nuclear power and 'Fundamentalist Islamic hegemony', I certainly cannot support this idiot. Actually, I wish the United States would mind it's own business, which would be bringing some semblance of democracy to its own citizens, instead of funding Zionist Israel and bullying Muslims.
These are interesting points to consider. Personally I find it very hard to gain perspective on someone as controversial as Ahmadinejad, so an opposing view is refreshing. This is another interesting view, I think:
http://palestinethinktank.com/2009/04/21/gilad-atzmon-%E2%80%93-ahmadinejad-%E2%80%9Cread-my-lips%E2%8...
But for the same reasons many true progressives find it hard to support Obama (despite his doing a few good things), I suspect most progressives could only give limited support to Ahmadinejad. Maybe both do the best they can within the political constraints they face? Neither, I think, deserves to be lionized or demonized.
I completely agree it is really not our business. On that, there is a near consensus among my circle of friends.
The most shockingly transparent thing about this whole thing is that Americans are still hyper-focused on two of Bush's "axis of evil" countries. Meanwhile how many Americans even know the heads of state for Canada and Mexico? Imagine how few Americans could name the leaders of Turkey or South Korea. But now we are passionately involved in the election of an Iranian president who is not even the head of state.
Before we start taking sides in the dispute over whether there was election rigging ("people in glass houses..."), we should ask why are we are so much more interested in Iran over, say, The Democratic Republic of the Congo?
The Velvet Revolution
The Rose Revolution
The Orange Revolution
The Cedar Revolution
The Purple Revolution
The Tulip Revolution
Each one supported by US aid and NGO's.
Each "revolution" resulted in governments more favorable to US interests.
and now we have The Green Revolution.
Oh thank you for making this point so well! I tried to say something similar in a post elsewhere, but it wasn't nearly as concise and forceful as yours. Well said. :)
don't limit yourself to CIA. think do-gooder liberals coming in the form of NGOs to implement policy and to steer voters through mob appeal.
covert ops. it's all around us. even the US antiwar movement is co-opted having key voices directing antiwar voters in a pointed direction.... all leading to voting for Obama who was elected via mob appeal and brand logos and... oh so color revolution.
true revolutionary leaders like Castro and Chavez laugh at Obama's circus.
Thanks, RedFred! So you're saying that many people in Iran are supporting Mousavi because of similar reasons to those that led many American progressives to support Obama - that Mousavi is a better packaged deal but may prove to be the same old wine? That does make sense. I read somewhere that he was among those who called for the fatwa on Rushdie to be carried out.
Thank you all so much for your posts about Zunes' article. I am very ignorant, but I've begun to notice a pattern in U.S. MSM reporting: when the papers /media grant huge coverage to any country, it is not for reasons of promoting democracy. That's why, when I saw the papers covering Iran's election "crisis" day after day after day, I began to get suspicious. All this concern for democracy is not like the MSM at all. Perhaps I am grossly mistaken, but is it possible that this "unrest" is being fomented by the CIA for Washington's own purposes? Perhaps Mousavi is more pro-corporation or something?
But Professor Boaz's comment about whther the CIA can really moblize such vast numbers also gives pause. Perhaps the truth is somewhere in between - the Iranians are trying to get the "lesser of the two evils," but the CIA is helping?
I keep feeling there's a real story in this somewhere, and as usual, the MSM is not telling it. I'm not sure where to find it, though.
"In 2002, President Bush labeled Tehran part of the global "axis of evil" and advocated the need for change, while Congress allocated $20 million to promote democracy in Iran. In 2006, the administration requested an additional $75 million for democracy promotion, all the while insisting that it does not want regime change in Tehran, but rather "change in regime behavior." From this amount, $36.1 million was allocated for Voice of America television and Radio Farda broadcasting. The remainder will be spent in Iran and abroad supporting NGOs and human rights organizations such as the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center in New Haven, Connecticut.
Some reports indicate that U.S. financial support is in fact aimed at regime change and goes beyond the allocated $75 million. In May, ABC News reported that the CIA had hired Jundallah, a Pakistan-backed Baluchi group, to carry out sabotage operations inside Iran. (Later, ABC reported that President Bush had in fact authorized a covert CIA program against the regime.) "
http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/templateC05.php?CID=2634
More on this:
http://davidrothscum.blogspot.com/2009/06/united-states-is-directing-mousavi.html
SIMPLE QUESTION:
If the neoconservatives wanted Ahmadinejad to stay in power, why were they funding opposition groups?
I don't think it's accurate to say that the majority of Mousavi supporters are anti-American. Anti-imperialist, yes.
There are times when chaos become a major attribute of a system when no one understands what is going on with social changes and pressures, including the people involved who see only a slice of it from their own perspective. even if someone is expert in all the forces involved does not mean they understand all the interactions or the patterns they think they see accurately reflect the reality.
It might be like that in Iran now -- no coherent movements so much as a free-for-all which is too complex for any analysis, despite being able to identify some of the forces entering into the interaction.
Stephen Zunes nails it on the head: the best possible outcome from this situation can only happen if events in Iran are driven from Iran by Iranians. Anything else, & Khamenei gets to have his anointed buffoon, Ahmedinejad, whom is much easier to manipulate & control, than Moussavi, with whom he has a prior history that is not altogether harmonious. Similarly, Khamenei and Ahmedinejad share a similar social background, poor, whereas the crowd opposing them have a more affluent upbringing (especially Rafsanjani). While the corporate media descriptions of "reformers versus conservatives" makes for a snappy narrative on an ADD addled audience, what is actually going on is a lot more complex and multi-layered. If the end result is a partial loosening of the virtual stranglehold the mullahs have on the levers of power of the Iranian state, then that is a good thing.
what makes you think mousavi isnt an annointed buffoon? did he not get approved by khamenei's own guardian council that approves candidates?
and why is he less easier to manipulate and control? the guy was prime minister in the 1980s.
in many ways mousavi is a lot like obama. he is not a challenge to power. he too is a genuflector.
the kids in the street, with their green and "wheres my vote" signs and taking a beating are stooges to a puppet show. who cares where their votes are? their votes wouldnt have changed where the real power lies anyway.
unless this uprising moves away from the election and mousavi and towards a general uprising against khamenei - which in some cases is the case - then its doomed to either extinguish or be co-opted.
Mousavi and Khamenei were rivals during the 80s.
"the kids in the street, with their green and "wheres my vote" signs and taking a beating are stooges to a puppet show. who cares where their votes are? their votes wouldnt have changed where the real power lies anyway."
How very imperialist of you.
"what makes you think mousavi isn't an annoited buffoon?"
For one, Mousavi does not spout the Holocaust denial hooey that is usually the province of dimwitted Stormfront.org types at every opportunity. That alone qualifies Ahmadinejad as a buffoon.
Yes, Mousavi and his supporters are approved by the mullahs, but Khamenei expected them to be token opponents to continue the appearance of plurality in Iran instead of the grubby Middle East theocracy that is too similar to other autocracies in the neighborhood.
"and why is he less easier to manipulate and control?the guy was prime minister in the 1980's."
Khamenei and Mousavi were relative equals during the 80's under Khomeini. Any experience in government, business, or the military will tell one that it is usually a recipe for disaster when former equals (especially those whom were not friendly) have to work together again with one in a superior position over the other. Add in that Mousavi did a much better job with the economy despite the Iran-Iraq War than Khamenei's anointed buffoon has during peace time does not reflect well on the Supreme Leader...and Mousavi in office again would only highlight this. A Supreme Leader appearing fallible in a theocracy is quite dangerous...for the said supreme leader.
But let's not pretend that at present only Iranians are driving events. And it may be that Ahmedinejad won the election.
Astounding.
So you think that CIA involvement is only a "possibility".
Ulterior motive?
You apologists are astounding.
So now we're supposed to pretend that the CIA is ineffective, in spite of Peru, Greece, Iran etc.
And as a result, we're supposed to pretend that the CIA is not a factor in Iran.
And why are we supposed to pretend this? Because you come up with some ridiculous story.
And you expect us to believe it? You Zionist trolls will say anything and see if it sticks on the wall.
Don't like "astounding" when you post the "obvious"ly false? I'll go with "disgusting".
Happy to hear you're not a Zionist. My apologies.
And yet - what proof do you have that dirty tricks don't work anymore? They certainly work in the US.
Besides your story, and I'm wondering how you knew it was CIA - did they leave a calling card? - and why would you possibly think that they couldn't come up with new tricks? New tricks certainly work here.
Again, I'm happy to hear you're not a Zionist, and look forward to your clarifications.
And I agree about moving them to Crawford. The truth of the matter is that if the Israelis moved to the US, I firmly believe both the US and the Middle East would be better off for it, and by extension the world.
Astounding.
So you think that CIA involvement is only a "possibility".
Ulterior motive?
It is times like these that past history of CIA and US Policy will cries of "Boy who cried Wolf" when it comes to question whether CIA is involved in Iran .
This is a natural collateral damage caused by opaque CIA and Hypocrite US Foreign policies (going back 50 years +). Not clear this can be mitigated by secret institutions.
Iranians Up risers must be aware that CIA and US has historically influenced their country.
Only way this Iranian Uprising against oppressive state-religious (God's Government) cabal can be judged to be home grown is how long it can sustain itself.
It must use 1968 US revolutionary methods of - non-violence , flowers and music . Is CIA sponsoring any of these methods? Probably Not!
toophat for you!
Does anyone remember of late: the orange revolution, the cedar revolution or the what-ev-ver revolution of a few years ago? Yup - smells vaguely familiar, huh.
Of course the CIA's history invites a certain natural suspicion here. So would, however, the structure of an ectopn system in which a supreme ruler has to authorize all candidates and vote counting is done in secret with no method of veriification. People hide things for a reason.
So now we are to believe that because the US does not really like Mousavi, they would never support his gaining power.?
It is INSTABILITY they want. They could not care less who came out on top any more then they cared when they armed the Mujahadeen In Afghanistan.
I would point out that Israel helped found HAMAS and thet Great Britain help found the Muslim Bortherhood and that the USA funded and supported Fundamentalists all to ensure the region remained instable.
Again why does mr Zunes not mention the ABC report of 1997 where then President Bush issued a Finding authorizing the CIA to destablize Iran and providing the funds for them to do so?
Are there peoples in Iran who do not support its current governmnet? OF course. There are people in EVERY NATION in the world that do not support their current government. Millions marched to protest the Iraq war in the United States and in Britain. The French regularly take to the streets in protest when they deo not like some policy of their Government.
That does not MEAN fraud occurred and it does not mean that the CIA is not involved or that the Western media reports on this objectively.
You could add to that the $400 million that was set aside to destabilize the Iranian government as late as 2007. Only the top level members of Congress were informed. It might just help if Obama would cancel that program.
Exactly, GW North. Bush made no mystery of the fact that he was going to try to destabilize Iran, and I think we are seeing, at least in part, some of the fruits of that effort. The very alacrity with which US "journalists" jumped to the conclusion that the election was rigged, and the shrill reactions to this hasty conclusion--whether actually correct or not--should raise a thousand red flags. This is psyops at its best.
Zunes, moreover, is wrong when he says that the neocons wanted Ahmadinejad to win. As Glenn Greenwald commented the other day, the people shrieking loudest about the "stolen" elections were the very same who a few weeks earlier were calling for Iran to be bombed. What these people want, as you say, is instability and turmoil. And they've got it.
Nor does it mean that they are involved. People know that the CIA has been involved in IRan, what we've seen no proof of is that this is a CIA backed protest or that the talk of vote fraud is somehow the work of spooks as opposed to legitimate concerns by the Iranian people, which is what I hear from Iranian people, in english and in farsi.
Likewise Irainians are calling the BBC and saying VOC and BBC Persia are encouraging the demostations.
Interesting. Where are you hearing this? Was the BBC let off its leash? Last I heard SMS and mobile networks were still off but regular phones were intermitant in and out of service.
BBC news broadcast on a local USA radio station. Call in show to BBC.
Was the BBC let off its leash?
No, just about everyone is using a proxy including the Supreme Ruler Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who demonized Britain today for encouraging the civil unrest as he didn't want to confront AmeriKKKa directly.
When the CIA is funding Sunni terrorist emanating from Baluchistan it is kind of disingenuous to say the USA should not get involved.
Disengenuous on the part of the CIA, perhaps. But we're talking about someone else commenting on it. As people, I think it's ok to say it. Whether governments listen is another hing.
Zunes is writing as if CIA is not already destabilizing Iran. As an "expert" in his field, presenting a scenario, it is his responsibilty to mention the pre-existing and on going interventions.
As usual, I remain unimpressed.
CIA means homegrown.
Mossad means homegrown. Mossad even boasts about infiltrating Iran.
Good luck to all those who rally for democracy.
That doesn't include the US or Israel.
I say Bullshit.
Read Ken Ballen and Patrick Doherty's report on their poll three weeks before the election.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061401757.html
The four hundred million bucks that the USA approved for the de-stabilization of Iran is clearly being used.
Sophie Scholl-The Final Days
Ah, the ol'e terror free tomorrow poll, brought to you by John McCain.
Drew 10:51 -------- Sorry I lack the information to understand your comment.
Are you an employee of the USA or Israeli governments?
Look up the board of directors of the organization in question.
You don't know the irony inherent in the question you're asking. But I enjoyed being asked it all the same.
Regardless of whether the elections were valid.
And regardless of how powerful CIA efforts are.
My question is why is no one examining Mousavi?
He was Prime Minister 1981-88 and presided over the execution of 30,000 jailed Political Prisoners.
Prior to mass murder he ordered the closure of all Universities for four years.
Some are claiming he was involved in Iran Contra.
Why is supporting a mass murderer a good thing?
If the elections were fixed would destabilizing Iran and/or installing a mass murderer be the lesser of two evils?
As reference the 2000 and 2004 USA elections were stolen by a man who became a mass murderer.
How many people are examining Khamenei's record? Mousavi was Prime Minister under Khomeini. Khamenei was President.
Do you think Iranians are not aware of Mousavi's record? Or Khamenei's record?
There are no saints here. All of them, Mousavi, Khamenei, Ahmadinejad, Rafsanjani, Rehzai, Karoubi, are part of the establishment.
And I don't think anyone seriously thought otherwise. Before people say "no one" they should check a search engine out now and again. If no one is looking at it, where are they getting their information from?
Again, no one knows better than the Iranian people what their government has been up to. An insult to suggest otherwise.
No one means the MSM and every CD article,of the ten or so that have been posted, until one today.
"Again, no one knows better than the Iranian people what their government has been up to. An insult to suggest otherwise."
That is my point.
I find it amusing to see anti-imperialist leftists in western countries try to demonise Mousavi, when in other situations, if he were not challenging the bete noire of the US and Israel, Ahmadinejad, they might even be leaping to his defense: his role in Hezbollah, his role in the Iranian revolution, his anti-American past, his role in the Iranian nuclear program.
It is grand irony, that Mousavi, who was a conservative under Khomeini, is now a progressive, whreas Khamenei, who was more progressive under Khomeini, has now become the arch leader of the conservatives.
Let's see USAans are largely clueles about Obama.
Irans were walked over by the USA in '53.
Many idealists are subverted by the nefarious, why should Iranians be any different?
As the Iranian half of my family tells when I make say as much, welcome to politics in Iran. We (especially we on the outside) don't have to support this or that regime. There are the people, struggling inside the country, and we can give them some credit for working toward the sort of society that they and many others around the world also work for, actually want. What is happening there has surpassed being about Mousouvi.
Mousouvi?!
IF you're going to pawn your wares and babble on, at least get your names right.
Either Moussavi or Mousavi.
Mousouvi isn't the same guy.
Sometimes I get typing to quick. Thanks. It is Mousouvi. On the topic of babbling, why should all you people get to do it like crazy sans logic or sources and yet when someone offers any sort of other comments, cited, you seem to go nuts? Keep the blinders on.
Good morning, class!
Eagerly awaiting the impending onslaught of wild accusations and mud slinging.
Also see: Cynthia Boaz, Asst. Prof. of Political Science, Consultant on Nonviolent Action:
"The Iranian people have periodically risen up against oppressive rulers over the decades, and they don't need external forces to tell them what to do. There are numerous movements in Iran that have been organizing for years. Ahmadinejad's hubris and ignorance in attempting to steal this election has given those movements a window of opportunity to join together and collectively demand an end to the oppression. Do folks really think US agencies -- of whom the Iranian people have every reason to be suspicious given the last 8 years (and beyond) -- are capable of mobilizing hundreds of thousands of people who are ten thousand miles away...and then getting them to continue showing up on the streets, even when they're being shot at? The notion is ridiculous, even ethnocentric in that it presumes that Iranians are so ignorant that they'd turn out in scores to risk their lives just because an American agency suggested it. No, the Green Revolution belongs solely to the Iranians."
LINK: http://tinyurl.com/read-something
And posted at Norman Finkelstein's website:
Gideon Levy writes: "It makes one green with envy: The scenes from Iran prove that some nations are trying to take their fate into their own hands. Some nations are not floating on the surface in sickly indifference, some are not looking around in endless complacence. And some are not following their leaders with the blindness of a herd. There are moments in the histories of certain nations when the people say enough. No more.
Czechs and Ukrainians, French and Russians, South Africans and Palestinians, Thais and Chinese, Lebanese and now Iranians have taken to the streets on at least one inspirational occasion and tried to make an impact. Some succeeded, some failed, but at least they tried. They did not surrender to their failed leaders, who dragged them from bad to worse. This is not only about rising up against a tyrannical regime; sometimes it’s about a struggle for justice in democracies, too. That struggle is not conducted only in polls and elections; such struggles must spill out onto the streets. Here, too."
LINK: http://tinyurl.com/free-everyone
I may be mistaken but is not Norman a rabid zionist?
In more ways than one, yes, you are quite mistaken.
Then he was the victim of a rabid zionist academic.
Dershowitz. Lovely people, these Zionists.
Higly unlikely, but since he's off script on this particular subject I notice that most people here who would otherwise love him are keeping silent. Norman is right on Palestine and here.
You are quite mistaken. He is one of the world's most outspoken critics of Israel, and has paid dearly for it.
Boaz should not be a Professor of Politic Science if she thinks the one unplausible possibility is that the "American agency suggested it".
Kermit did not suggest he bribed and plotted.
And half a century and billions in physcops and blackops developement, the dirty tools are many and some very sophisticated ( besides the basic weapons and logistic support).
I hope by "Here, too" Norman is referring to the USA
The link in question is to Norman Finkelstein's website, in which he has posted an article by Gideon Levy, who writes, "It’s true, there is liberty in Israel, but only for us, the Jews. We have a regime that is no less tyrannical than the ayatollahs’ regime: the regime of the officers and the settlers in the territories. But what do we have to do with any of this? In Iran, police disperse demonstrations with violence, they shoot and kill. And what do we do?
When you get a chance, go on Friday to Na’alin or Bil’in and see what happens there. Demonstrators are killed here with similar brutality, but in Iran the crowd is standing up to a tyrannical regime, while here only a handful of brave people stand up to the Border Police, who are firing weapons. Moreover, we hardly write anything about the protest being silenced with bullets. It interests no one, and this, too, is called democracy."
Though he may as well be referring to the United States, where people are generally as blind.
There's also a pretty good article on the UK Guardian that provides some background on Mousavi and Khamenei:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
commentisfree/2009/jun/18/
iran-mousavi-khamenei
Anti imperialist leftists might want to know that Mousavi was once on Hezbollah's leadership council.
Hezbollah is an anti-Imperialist group, which was founded to end the Israeli occupation of Lebanese lands. Defending your land against occupation for foreign powers is allowed under international law, which is why most European countries refuse to deem Hezbollah as a terrorist group.
The group has Muslims, but also Christians and secular Marxists (Source: The book "Dying to Win"), and its targets are primarily military. At least for me, affiliation with Hezbollah does not rule out support for anyone. Do you think it should?
Also, you named several Iranian leaders and said they are all part of the establishment. That seems likely to be true. Do you know where we can read something fairly objective about them? Maybe someone has written a book that is reasonably unbiased?
The article you referenced is interesting...want to read more. :)
US says Mousavi is friend today....until he says something against the empire....
just like when Saddam was a friend....or Noriega was a friend...etc. etc
sigh.....