Tehrani source close to those detained says some have been beaten heavily and waterboarded with hot water #iranelection
In my younger years, I would simply expect this news to be greeted with universal outrage, knowing that the techniques being described had long been deemed to be well across the Bridge Too Far. Now that I've lived through the Bush administration, however, I am forced to contemplate the possibility that Iran is merely taking legitimate steps to obtain critical information in their nations' vital national security interests. One mustn't preclude the possibility that many of those being waterboarded are privy to information about "time bombs" that may, at this moment, be "ticking." ...
Witnesses at the scene tell The Associated Press that some protesters claimed they suffered broken arms or legs in Sunday's clashes around the Ghoba Mosque.
They say some young demonstrators screamed at police and then attacked them after the officers allegedly beat an elderly woman.
Meanwhile, Former CIA agent Bob Baer thinks so. He says it appears that Iran's Revolutionary Guard, of whom Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a former member, has taken over control of the country from the mullahs. Wouldn't that make Ayatollah Khamenei more of a captive than a leader? Watch:
Interesting, but Baer also admitted that the U.S., and he, have no clue what's going on in Iran. And he previously postulated that Ahmadinejad might have actually won the election. So a grain of salt may be in order. But Baer made a very good point about the Western prism and bias when looking at what's going on in Iran when he wrote this for TIME on June 16th:
Most of the demonstrations and rioting I've seen in the news are taking place in north Tehran, around Tehran University and in public places like Azadi Square. These are, for the most part, areas where the educated and well-off live — Iran's liberal middle class. These are also the same neighborhoods that little doubt voted for Mir-Hossein Mousavi, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's rival, who now claims that the election was stolen. But I have yet to see any pictures from south Tehran, where the poor live. Or from other Iranian slums.
... Some facts about Iran's election will hopefully emerge in the coming weeks, with perhaps even credible evidence that the election was rigged. But until then, we need to add a caveat to everything we hear and see coming out of Tehran. For too many years now, the Western media have looked at Iran through the narrow prism of Iran's liberal middle class — an intelligentsia that is addicted to the Internet and American music and is more ready to talk to the Western press, including people with money to buy tickets to Paris or Los Angeles. Reading Lolita in Tehran is a terrific book, but does it represent the real Iran?
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, meanwhile, asked a top judge Monday to investigate the killing of Neda Agha Soltan, who became an icon of Iran's ragtag opposition after gruesome video of her bleeding to death on a Tehran street was circulated worldwide.
Ahmadinejad's Web site said Soltan was slain by "unknown agents and in a suspicious" way, convincing him that "enemies of the nation" were responsible.
The regime has implicated protesters and even foreign intelligence agents in Soltan's death. But an Iranian doctor who said he tried to save her told the BBC last week she apparently was shot by a member of the volunteer Basij militia. Protesters spotted an armed member of the militia on a motorcycle, and stopped and disarmed him, Dr. Arash Hejazi said.
Washington Bitchy: Nico Pitney smacks down Milbank
Mr. Washington Sketchy himself, WaPo king of snark Dana Milbank, takes one to the thorax from HuffPo blog reporter Nico Pitney, who went one-on-three on CNN's Reliable Sources. Milbank got called out for his whingeing over Pitney's Iran question at Barack Obama's recent presser, including getting called out on his past, gushing coverage of George W. Bush. Watch, and learn:
Afterwards Pitney says Milbank called him names under his breath. Pouty journalism at its best -- hating on new media because they can't BE new media.
“People are depressed, and they feel they have been lied to, robbed of their rights and now are being insulted,” said Nassim, a 56-year-old hairdresser. “It is not just a lie; it’s a huge one. And it doesn’t end.”
12:29 PM ET -- Solidarity. We noted earlier that Mousavi was calling on supporters to release green balloons tomorrow and take video or photos of the scene. NIAC translated the Mousavi Facebook message:
"Ok, now all the world are going to show their supports to Iranians... This Friday, We all are going to send GREEN BALLOONS to the sky to show that now ALL PEOPLE OF THE WORLD ARE IRANIAN. On 9/11 everybody was American, NOW THE WORLD IS IRANIAN."
The Dubya of Persia attacks the U.S. president, using his political doppelganger as a foil. Ahmadinejad the Appointed begins his diatribe with a swipe at the Brits:
"They (The British) already have a bad record in these matters," he said, describing Downing Street as being run by "political retards". "But why did the US president fall into their trap?"
He advised Mr Obama to take a different approach from his predecessor President George W Bush.
"I hope you (Obama) will avoid interfering in Iran's affairs and express regret in a way that the Iranian people are informed of it," Mr Ahmadinejad said.
"Will you use this language with Iran (in any future dialogue)? If this is your stance, there will be nothing left to talk about. Do you think this behaviour will solve the problem for you? This will not have any result except that the people will consider you somebody similar to Bush."
I think the appropriate response to that might be laughter, but then I'm not a diplomat.
More updates:
70 professors were arrested in Iran for meeting with Mr. Mousavi, whose wife has stated that her country is now, for all intents and purposes, under martial law.
Fifa are ready to step in to the political firestorm in Iran and ban the national team from football until the Iranian football federation rescinds the life bans it has issued against four of its players.
Four Iranian footballers all of whom wore green armbands in their recent world cup qualifier against South Korea have apparently “retired” from football.
They include a 24 year old Hosein Ka’abi as well as Ali Karimi, 31, Mehdi Mahdavikia, 32 and Vahid Hashemian, 32.
Fifa does not allow political interference in football and have banned Iran before after claims of improper interference the Iranian regime.
Meanwhile, Iran's government is now denying it has banned the players at all:
TEHRAN (AFP) — The head of Iran's football federation has denied punishing players for wearing green wristbands in a show of support of the opposition during a World Cup qualifier, according to local media.
"The comments in foreign media are nothing but lies and a mischievous act," Ali Kafashin was quoted as saying. "The federation has not banned any player from the national team."
Really? So where are they, and why haven't they been allowed to speak to the media? The potential banning of Iran's soccer team could have particular sting for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government, since:
...Iranian sporting heroes have long been used as pawns to suit their government's propaganda needs.
Team Melli, as the national squad is known to its millions of adoring fans, has historically been one of the strongest teams in Asia, and regularly plays in front of crowds of over 100,000 at Tehran's Azadi ("Freedom") Stadium.
The team is so important to the people of Iran that before the elections, some commentators even went so far as to suggest that Ahmadinejad's success hinged on the national team's success.
Ahmadinejad, who regularly attends national matches and has even trained with the squad in the past, increased his involvement in the team's affairs leading up to the elections. He promised to personally help it achieve international success, and even sent his presidential jet to Pyongyang to fly the team back to Iran after a qualifying game.
Striker Ali Karimi, 31, once dubbed Asia's Maradona, and captain Mehdi Mahdavikia, 32, were among six players who wore the wristbands.
On Wednesday, both players resigned from the national team, known as Team Melli, saying they wanted to clear the way for younger players.
"I am sure that the younger players in the team and the ones who will join later can succeed in Team Melli," Karmi said, while Mahdavikia added: "Team Melli has to get ready for the Asian Cup 2011, and I believe I should give my place to younger players, therefore I am saying goodbye to the team."
... all of which makes the bravery of those players even more apparent. (The resignation statements of the leading players sound about like those "confessions" being aired on Iranian state TV, no?)
Meanwhile, if President Obama accepts the invitation to the World Cup opening ceremony in South Africa, look for it to be a blockbuster on the continent, something akin to when Muhammad Ali arrived in Ghana in 1964. Hope he goes.
UPDATE: The U.S. soccer team is urged to back-up their brothers in Iran:
To the U.S. soccer team players:
Please consider wearing green wristbands in your upcoming match in the Confederations Cup finale. It would be a sign of solidarity and compassion for your fellow soccer brethren who were banned from the game they love and face unthinkable repercussions for simply adorning a green wristband symbolizing peace and freedom. This is not politics, it is human rights. Any slap on the wrist you may face from FIFA pales in comparison to what the Iranian soccer team faced, and what the Iranian people face.
Mir Hossein Mousavi probably didn't set out to become the leader of the next Iranian revolution, but today, he finds himself a central protagonist in what looks for all the world like a struggle for the soul of Iran. The would-be president, who hasn't been seen in public for a disturbing amount of time and is essentially under house arrest, has the potential, at least on the surface, to become Iran's Nelson Mandela. That's both good news and bad news. The good news is that it means that eventually, he could win. The bad news is that it took Mandela more than 27 years.
The former hardliner who became a reformist during (and mostly after) the disputed election of 2009, defied his captors today. From the BBC:
Iran protest leader Mir Hossein Mousavi says he holds those behind alleged "rigged" elections responsible for bloodshed during recent protests.
In a defiant statement on his website, he called for future protests to be in a way which would not "create tension."
... A BBC correspondent in Tehran says the statement is a direct challenge to Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.
... "I won't refrain from securing the rights of the Iranian people... because of personal interests and the fear of threats," Mr Mousavi said on the website of his newspaper, Kalameh.
Those who violated the election process "stood beside the main instigators of the recent riots and shed people's blood on the ground", Mr Mousavi said, pledging to show how they were involved.
Mr Mousavi, a former prime minister, spoke of the "recent pressures on me" that are "aimed at making me change my position regarding the annulment of the election".
He described the clampdowns he and his staff were facing.
"My access to people is completely restricted. Our two websites have many problems and Kalameh Sabz newspaper has been closed down and its editorial members have been arrested," said Mr Mousavi, who has not been seen in public for days.
"These by no means contribute to improving the national atmosphere and will lead us towards a more violent atmosphere," he added.
Of course, there are differences, and the Mandela analogy isn't perfect (it never is.) For one thing, Mousavi is acting with at least the tacit support of very powerful insiders and leading clerics, including would-be "supreme leader" replacement, Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani and former president Mohammed Khatami, and perhaps the speaker of parliament, who apparently was one of the 180 out of 290 members of Iran's parliament who snubbed Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's "victory party" this week. Mandela had no such official quasi-sanction. Still, like Mandela, the movement created in part by him has grown beyond Mousavi's person, to become an organic thing on its own, with his leadership, even in what looks like incarceration, combining with the support of people all around the world to give his supporters courage. And courageous they are.
... if you think Michelle "Internment Camps" Malkin and her crowd really care one iota about the people of Iran. After all, we're talking about Michelle Malkin -- probably the only brown person ever published by the white supremacist site Vdare, who has never demonstrated any emotion toward Muslims outside of the narrow chasm between hatred and loathing -- theoretically being in favor of people who are out yelling "Allahu Akbar" -- a phrase that is an anathema to people like her. No, I'd guess that the wingers are really after with all their carping about Iran is a plan they can reproduce, and thereby pretend that at long last, they're freedom-fighters, too: fighting Barack Obama (of course) ... maybe even in the streets! Witness this interesting comment thread on Malkin's latest supposedly heartfelt Iran post:
On June 24th, 2009 at 2:56 pm, MrOlympia said: I reckon somebody is studying the Iranian situation so when he has to deal with it here…….his brown shirt Besij will be much better prepared. He knows many United States citizens are armed, therefore he will have to be even more brutal.
There are millions of us with military training (only 20 years, 22 days, in my case) who do not consider ourselves to be released from our oaths. There are hundreds of thousands in the active military who understand and honor their oaths. If civil war comes, and that is what you are postulating, the Constitution will win, in my opinion.
Hope is not a plan; not all change is good. WE are the civilian national security force!If you have any doubts as to why the Founding Fathers included the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights, watch the Teheran coverage. “Who will be our George Bush?” The resistance is here; the resistance is now. RESIST!!!!!!!!!
ECS
Ladies and gentlemen, I think we may have spotted the next lone gunman. Hopefully someone who knows this weirdo "Elm Creek Smith" will keep one eye on his gun stash, and 911 on speed dial. And what's really scary is that his comments aren't all that far from the recent nuttiness Twittered by Florida's very own Marco Rubio.
By the way, on the not really giving a crap about Muslims but shooting their mouths off anyway front? Throw in the right wing local politicos who probably couldn't find Iran on a map, or think Barack Obama is a Muslim, and probably can't stand Muslims as a rule anyway ... or all three combined. Say ... I wonder if my old pal O'Neal Dozier is a member of the Southeastern Broward Republican Club ...)
BBC, Huffpo and AJE updates, including word that (no surprise) the Iranian mullahocracy are trying to blame the CIA for the uprisings, and this via Nico Pitney:
6:24 PM ET -- 70 university professors reportedly arrested. "According to the Kalameh website, this evening, June 24th, Mir Hossein Mousavi held a meeting with the university professors who are members of IAUTI. After the meeting, 70 attendees were arrested."
Also this:
6:07 PM ET -- "The Butcher" to oversee prosecutions of protesters. This does not look good.
The Iranian regime has appointed one of its most feared prosecutors to interrogate reformists arrested during demonstrations, prompting fears of a brutal crackdown against dissent.
Relatives of several detained protesters have confirmed that the interrogation of prisoners is now being headed by Saaed Mortazavi, a figure known in Iran as "the butcher of the press". He gained notoriety for his role in the death of a Canadian-Iranian photographer who was tortured, beaten and raped during her detention in 2003.
"The leading role of Saeed Mortazavi in the crackdown in Tehran should set off alarm bells for anyone familiar with his record," said Sarah Leah Whitson, the Middle East and North Africa director of Human Rights Watch.
The Guardian has a frightening headline saying Tehran "like a war zone" as citizens clash with police and Basij militia. Meanwhile, are Mir-Hussein Mousavi and his wife emerging as the Nelson and Winnie Mandela of Iran? From the Guardian story:
The latest confrontations came as the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, whose authority has been challenged by massive grassroots protests, said on state television: "I had insisted and will insist on implementing the law on the election issue. Neither the establishment nor the nation will yield to pressure at any cost."
But the opposition was just as unyielding. One of the defeated presidential candidates, Mehdi Karroubi, stepped up his challenge to the regime, describing the government as illegitimate. Rejecting the outcome of the 12 June vote, the reformist cleric and most liberal of the presidential candidates said on his website: "I do not accept the result and therefore consider as illegitimate the new government. Because of the irregularities, the vote should be annulled."
In another act of blatant defiance, the wife of defeated opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi called on the authorities to immediately release Iranians who had been detained, .
In remarks posted on her husband's website, Zahra Rahnavard said: "I regret the arrest of many politicians and people and want their immediate release. It is my duty to continue legal protests to preserve Iranian rights."
And then there's the tale of the secreted Ayatollah:
Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, one of Iran's most senior clerics, who has been under house arrest for 10 years, called for three days of national mourning from today for those killed.
"Resisting the people's demand is religiously prohibited," he said on his website. Once the heir apparent to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Montazeri fell out with the founder of the Islamic republic shortly before his death in 1989.
If people begin to follow him -- via his website -- doesn't that further erode Khamenei's power?
Plus, what of the safety of those incredibly brave Iranian footballers who wore green wristbands during a World Cup qualifying match last week and who have now been banned for life from the national team by Khamenei, and had their passports revoked? Will they become special targets of the regime? Their names (for purposes of praying for them and their families):
According to the pro-government newspaper Iran, four players – Ali Karimi, 31, Mehdi Mahdavikia, 32, Hosein Ka'abi, 24 and Vahid Hashemian, 32 – have been "retired" from the sport after their gesture in last Wednesday's match against South Korea in Seoul.
Just as the apparent murder last weekend of the student Neda Soltan lent a human face to the uprising in Iran, the controversy generated by the sportsmen's gesture of defiance has paraded Iran's turmoil to football fans across the world.
By stopping the footballers representing their country, Iran has worsened the prospects of an already faltering national team. Fifa, football's world governing body, banned Iran from international competition in 2006 after claims of improper interference by Tehran's rulers. That ban, later lifted, should now be reimposed until Iran learns to keep politics off the football pitch.
Fifa, are you listening? And while we're at it, the world ought to start looking at the old Apartheid South Africa model when it comes to participation in all sports, including the Olympics, until the war on its own people is stopped.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the winner of Iran's disputed presidential election, is to be sworn in by mid-August, Iranian media reported today after the authorities ruled out an annulment of the result.
IRNA, the official Iranian news agency, said Ahmadinejad, who won a "closely contested and disputed 10th presidential election", would be sworn in before parliament between 26 July and 19 August.
... A spokesman for the powerful guardian council, Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei, was quoted by Iran's state-run English language Press TV as saying the organisation had found "no major fraud or breach in the election". As a result, he said, the outcome would not be annulled.
The move came after Iranian security forces yesterday threatened a "decisive and revolutionary confrontation" with opposition demonstrators if protests continued against the regime..
Well, if you insist ... Shah's son positions himself for restoration
Reza Pahlavi, the son of the former dictator of Iran, cries freedom
What does a guy who left Iran when he was 14, lives in Maryland, and whose father was the dictator deposed in the 1979 revolution have to do with the "green revolution" in Iran? Well ... in a word ... nothing. A glance at TIME's list (or anyone else's) of the top ten players in the Iranian political system doesn't even reveal his name. But that hasn't stopped former "Crown Prince" Reza Pahlavi from talking ... and talking ... and talking ... revolution. And he's weeping about it too. It's almost like he's positioning himself on the side of the uprising in order to be "available" to be restored to the throne ... should the Iranian people cry out for his return, of course. (ahem)
Did you catch Pahlavi playing the Iran expert on CNN this morning? It's hard to believe he knows any more about what's going on in his former country than you or I. What about his tear-filled speech at the National Press Club, in which he clutched a picture of Neda, the young woman who has come to symbolize the rebellion, and declared that she is like his own child (if for instance, his child was an Iranian woman who wasn't related to the last guy to order his military police to mow people down in the streets of Tehran...) During his speech, the Crown Prince spoke Big:
Bear in mind that for the great majority of Iranians born after the Islamic Revolution, the unfolding events are the most significant transforming experiences of their collective memory. The courage of their convictions gives hope for peace and democracy in the most troubling region of the world. On the other hand, their defeat will encourage extremism from the shores of the Levant, to the energy jugular of the world. At the very least it will threaten regional tranquility and global economic recovery through fears of terrorism, slowdown of globalization and steeply higher energy prices. At worst, fanatical tyrants - who know that the future is against them - may end their present course on their terms: a nuclear holocaust.
Wow ... a nuclear holocaust? Hadn't heard that before from the Iran analysts who have actually crossed the border into that country in the last 30 years... And Pahlavi's doomsaying wouldn't have aaaaaanything to do with his ties to the nihilist American neoconservative movement that up until about a minute ago was seeking an excuse to, in the words of one of their political people "bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran" ... would it??? Perhaps the most important sentence in Pahlavi's green serenade was "Iranians born after the Islamic Revolution." Said revolution is kind of a sore spot for our friend Reza. As Dana Milbank appropriately snarks:
Yesterday, the 48-year-old son of a dictator was merely voicing his hopes that what his countrymen have begun over the last 10 days will become a revolution. "However, I often don't use the word 'revolution,' because I think revolution has a very negative connotation in everybody's collective memory."
Particularly Pahlavi's. His family had lived a life of great extravagance until Ayatollah Khomenei deposed the shah in 1979, a year after Jimmy Carter hailed the monarch as "an island of stability." Even yesterday, the former crown prince was defensive about those days. "They had orders not to hit -- fire on people," he said of his father's troops, who, whatever their orders, managed to kill thousands.
Ah, the good old days. And of course, being a patriot, Pahlavi is only too happy to serve his country by restoring them. More Milbank:
Whatever the Iranian demonstrators are seeking, there is little evidence from their Twitter feeds that they are seeking the restoration of the monarchy -- and Pahlavi, who was a teenager getting flight training in Texas during the Islamic revolution, was shrewd enough not to propose it. "This is not about restitution of an institution," he said. But should a democratic Iran "choose to have me play a more prominent role," he added, "let that be their choice."
Yes, of course. "Their choice." And as to the potential nuclear holocaust that will ensue if the revolution he is most decidedly NOT a part of fail?
Luckily, Pahlavi had a solution: himself. While he said repeatedly that he is not running for any office, he also spoke of his "supporters" and even his "platform" of human rights for his homeland.
"People support me because of the very fact that we are talking the same language: freedom, democracy, human rights," the shah's son said. "I'm not demanding people to support me today because of me. I'm demanding people to support me so that I can best serve them achieve what their goal is, which is achieve freedom."
Pahlavi does have his supporters: about 500 of them ... in Los Angeles. Plus this guy in London. And coincidentally, the last time he stepped into the spotlight was back in 2001, following the September 11 terror attacks, as ordinary Iranians took to the streets to declare their love for America, causing Pahlavi to step forward and ... surprise! ... offer himself as a potential future leader of Iran. From 2001:
Despite his cold-generated cough, the prince spoke enthusiastically for almost two hours, about his vision of Iran and the progress of his campaign for democracy in Iran, whicj he discussed in an interview with the Middle East last year.
Commenting on what his mother Empress Farah Pahlavi, told London Arabic daily Asharq Al-Awsat two days earlier - that her son wants to return and serve his country like any ordinary citizen- the Shah in exile sys the important thing is that the people of Iran are given the right to chose how they wish to be governed. Whether the future for Iran involves a republic or constitutional monarchy, is not the issue at this time, he says. The first aim shold be for the wishes of the Iranian people to be recorded in a free and fair election.
"My mission in life, from the day I started 21 years ago, remains the same, " said the man who most Iranian liberals in exile, as well as an increasing number of Iranians at home, consider him to be the hope of salvation from what many describe as its current nightmare.
He outlines his vision for a comprehensive strategy to give Iranian people freedom of choice and real democracy, in his book, " Winds of Change: the Future of Democracy in Iran" published feb 2002 in Washington by Regency Publishing Inc., which he dedicated to the memory of all Iran's fallen heroes and patriots.
" My goal is to reach a stage when the Iranian people can go to a national referendum and vote their conscience and vote for their future. That day, the day the Iranians go to the polls, is the end of my mission in life. What they want to do afterwards is entirely up to them and I stand ready to serve them in whatever capacity that they see fit. "
In his 1946 book, Millspaugh provides an indication of the prevailing terror practiced by Reza Shah. Millspaugh states that Reza Shah "had imprisoned thousands and killed hundreds, some of the latter by his own hand." As the consequence of the terror, "Fear settled upon the people. No one knew whom to trust; and none dared to protest of criticize. ... Evidence also appeared abundant and pitifully convincing, that he (shah's) terror operating on a timid and sensitive people had shaken nerves and unbalanced minds. Moreover, he let loose a spirit of violence that lent sinister implications to the mercurial temperament of the people, the disunity of the country, and the disorganization and weakness of the government."
State Department records provide a vivid account of hte reign of terror inflicted on the people of Iran between 1921 and 1951. for twenty ears, the country was a complete and brutal military dictatorship. Parliament became a rubber stamp and complete censorship was imposed. Iran's newspapers and their editors were early victims of the dictatorship. The suppression of newspapers, the physical violence (specially the savage beatings administered by Reza Khan himself), and even the murder of recalcitrant editors are described in the records. There are many instances of arrest and subsequent disappearance of opponents, including numerous members of the ulema, the most notable that of Seyed Hassad Modarres. the arrests and extrajudicial killings of political personalities are described in detail in the American records...
And this about the ascension to the Peacock Throne (with help from the American CIA) of Reza's father, Muhammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, from the book "All the Shah's Men" by Stephen Kinzer:
One morning soon after his arrival, the new secret police, called Savak, organized a crude maneuver to impress upon him the terms of his incarceration. A gang of thugs turned up in front of his home, and they began shouting violent anti-Mossadegh slogans. At their head was none other than the gang leader Shaban the Brainless, who had become on e of the regime's favorite enforcers. Fora time the mob seemed ready to storm the house. It retreated after one of Mossadegh's grandsons fired several rifle shots into the air from inside. Several minutes later two Savak officers arrived and asked to see the prisoner. They carried a letter for him to sign. It was a request that Savak agents be assigned to protect him. Mossadegh, who understood the realities of power, signed it without protest. Within an hour Savak agents took up posts outside and inside the walled complex where he lived. their standing orders, which did not change for the rest of Mossadegh's life, were to allow no one other than relatives and a few close friends to visit him.
In the weeks following the coup, most of Mossadegh's cabinet ministers and prominent supporters were arrested. Some were later released without charge. Others served prison terms after being convicted of various offenses. Six hundred military officers loyal to Mossadegh were also arrested, and about sixty of them were shot. So were several student leaders at Tehran University. Tudeh and the National Front were banned, and their most prominent supporters were either imprisoned or killed.
Hussein Fatemi, who had been Mossadegh's foreign minister, was the most prominent figure singled out for exemplary punishment. Fatemi was a zealous antimonarchist, and during the turbulent days of August 1953 he had attacked the Shah, whom he called "the Baghdad fugitive," with special venom. .... In one speech, he addressed the absent monarch: "O traitor Shah, you shameless person, you have completed the criminal history of the Pahlavi regime! The people want revenge. They want to drag you from behind your desk to the gallows." Now that the tables were turned, the Sha had his chance, and he did not miss it. Just as he had promised Kermit Roosevelt, he arranged for Fatemi to be summarily tried, convicted of treason, and executed.
Fatemi had once compared the Shah to a snake "who bites mortally when the opportunity presents itself." In the end he was among those who suffered the deadly bite. Becasue of his fate, and also because he was the only member of Mossadegh's inner circle who was a descendant of the Prophet Mohammad, his memory is honored in Iran today. One of the main boulevards in Tehran is Dr. Hussein Fatemi Avenue.
It's almost hard to believe, with all the GOPers out there demanding that President Obama demand a recount in Iran (as Rep. Mike Coffman, embarrassing my former state of Colorado, suggested tonight on "Hardball") that there are any non-Iranians out there with much to say about Iran that isn't completely idiotic. The idea that the American president should demand a recount in a country that isn't the United States is at minimum ironic, given what happened in our presidential elections in 2000, complete with five of our very own Republican mullahs putting their thumb on the scale on the side of their political compatriot. It's also insane. Watch Chris Matthews try to explain as much to a stumbling Coffman tonight:
Luckily, there are a few sane people left with access to the mainstream media. From TIME Magazine's Eben Harrell (in London):
So why has Europe, so often cast as the more timid side of the transatlantic partnership, responded more vigorously this time? The answer, according to Robin Niblett, director of the London-based international-relations think tank Chatham House, lies in the low-rumbling crisis in the background of the disputed election: Iran's nuclear program.
"The United States is the only country that can convince Iran that it is not as threatened as it thinks it is, and that's crucial to the negotiations [over Iran's disputed enrichment program]," Niblett says. "The Obama Administration is playing it absolutely right: it is determined to convince the Iranians that its goal is not regime change. Any public denunciations could damage Obama's efforts to coax Iran out of its defensive posture."
Meanwhile, over in Europe:
Domestic politics is also playing into the strong rhetoric on the part of European leaders like Sarkozy and Merkel, according to Niblett. "It is in Sarkozy's nature to be plain-speaking and tough, and that's played well domestically. His popularity has dropped recently, so his stance on the importance of free elections plays well. It does for Merkel too, as it distinguishes her from [Social Democrat Foreign Minister and Vice Chancellor] Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who has been more measured in his response."
Yeah, domestic politics is playing a big role here, too. It seems some of our Republican/neocon friends are more interested in attacking the president of the United States than in pursuing an intelligent foreign policy that benefits America's national security.
Next up, real, live Republican grown-up Peggy Noonan (who unlike the neocons, is a conservative Ronald Reagan actually bothered to listen to):
Stifling and corrupt religious autocracy has seen its international standing diminished, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is among other things a Holocaust denier, has in effect been rebuked by half his country, and through free speech, that most painful way to lose your reputation, which has broken out on the streets. He can no longer claim to speak for his people. The rising tide of the young and educated seems uninterested in reflexively hating the West and deriving their meaning from that hatred.
To refuse to see all this as progress, or potential progress, is perverse to the point of wicked. To insist the American president, in the first days of the rebellion, insert the American government into the drama was shortsighted and mischievous. The ayatollahs were only too eager to demonize the demonstrators as mindless lackeys of the Great Satan Cowboy Uncle Sam, or whatever they call us this week. John McCain and others went quite crazy insisting President Obama declare whose side America was on, as if the world doesn't know whose side America is on. "In the cause of freedom, America cannot be neutral," said Rep. Mike Pence. Who says it's neutral?
This was Aggressive Political Solipsism at work: Always exploit events to show you love freedom more than the other guy, always make someone else's delicate drama your excuse for a thumping curtain speech.
And she adds this:
Should there at this point, more than a week into the story, be a formal declaration of support from the U.S. government? Certainly it's time for an indignant statement on the abuses, including killings and beatings, perpetrated by the government and against the opposition. It's never wrong to be on the side of civilization. Beyond that, what would be efficacious? It must be asked if a formal statement of support for the rebels would help them. And they'd have a better sense of it than we.
The current policy, much criticized by prominent Republicans, vindicated Barack Obama's boast in his Cairo speech that he is a "student of history." The student in him knows that the worst thing the United States could do at the moment is provide the supreme leader and the less supreme leaders with the words to paint the opposition as American stooges -- or, even worse, suggest to the protesters that some sort of help is on its way from Washington.
Cohen then delivers a nice splash of cold water to Paul Wolfowitz's (surprise, surprise!) TOTALLY WRONG ANALOGY in his recent column comparing Ronald Reagan's intervention with a former colony with Barack Obama's positition vis-a-vis a government WITH WHICH WE HAVE NO FORMAL RELATIONS... (sigh)
Some of Obama's critics have faulted him for not doing what Ronald Reagan (belatedly) did following the fraudulent election in the Philippines in 1986. After some dithering, Reagan virtually forced President Ferdinand Marcos into exile. How neat. How not a precedent for Iran.
Marcos was, to exhume a dandy Cold War phrase, an "American lackey." The Philippines itself was a former American colony. We knew the country. Hell, at one time, we virtually owned it.
In contrast, not a lot is known about how Iran is actually governed. If, for instance, the White House asked the State Department to send over someone with on-the-ground experience in contemporary Iran, the car would arrive empty. The last American diplomats left Iran in 1979. The United States has to rely on foreign diplomats and journalists for its information.
Yet according to some of the dumbest elected persons I've ever heard on television, our president should take to the airwaves and ... wait for it ... demand a recount in Iran. Brilliant.
In the end, the Nation's Washington editor Chris Hayes got it right on Rachel's show tonight. The neoconservative movement is fundamentally about this weird, preening desperation to make every world event, every happening in every culture, even ones we fundamentally don't understand -- All About Us. Thus, the Iranian uprising is about Us (not about the economy, or joblessness, or frustration with the strictures of religious law, or the things the Iranians say it's about. Silly brown people -- they just don't get that it's really all about them wanting Us to guide them to freedom!) The protesters are speaking to Us (not to the Europeans who used to run the place, or to other English-speaking people, just Us. The color green is so close to the color blue that even THAT must ... MUST be About Us. This desire to jam the United States and our inflated self-portrayal as The World's Greatest/Only Defender of Liberty Everywhere into the center of every conceivable conflict is actually starting to look like a mental affliction, and it's one that I, for one, am very glad was not visited on 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue last November.
You've kind of got to feel sorry for Marco Rubio. His GOP Senate opponent Charlie Crist has got all the name recognition, all the money, all the big endorsements ... and all he's got are those losers at Club for Growth, the Limbaugh crowd and a couple of guys holed up in their mother's basements in Davie stockpiling guns (and teabags) ... waiting for the black helicopter invasion. So you'll forgive Marco if he's a little liberal with "the Twitter..."
Dropped a muffin on floor at airport. Was advised that 2 second rule applied but decided not to risk it and bought another one. 30 minutes ago from TwitterFon
No... not that one ...
I have a feeling the situation in Iran would be a little different if they had a 2nd amendment like ours. #sayfie #tcot #nra2:38 PM Jun 21st from TwitterFon
Yeah, that one. Marco? You're not suggesting that you wish the protesters in Iran could get into an actual shoot-out with the military, police and Basij militia, are you...? And worse, you're not suggesting that you generally support that kind of thing ... at the same time ... you're trying to become a United States Senator ... right?
You know, Twitter can be a darned dangerous thing in the hands of a politician... particularly a politician who probably couldn't find Iran on a map, let alone know a darned thing about the place, but who has been set free by social networking software to unleash his inner Limbaugh.
UPDATE: Thanks to Kathy Riordan for correcting me (and everyone else) on the previous, erroneous, Neda photo. Read more about the photo snafu on her blog.
The death of a 27(?)-year-old Iranian philosophy student whose murder in the streets of Tehran, apparently at the hands of the "Basij" militia, was captured on cellphone video, has become the new rallying cry for Iranian protesters. With a name and face to put on the protests, it seems the Twitter Revolution is morphing into Neda's revolution, at least in the media...
There have conflicting stories about her age, with some news reports putting her age at as young as 16 (which is what CNN was still saying this morning), which may be part of the mythology that's building around the still boiling uprising in Iran.
Meanwhile, a man who says he was Neda's Fiancé, speaks.
"Neda wanted freedom, freedom for everyone," said Kaspeen Makan, who was engaged to Neda Sultani, 27, the young Iranian woman who has become a symbol of the reformist struggle in Iran after a video of her being killed by a Basij sniper during a protest on Saturday was posted on the Internet.
"She said a number of times that even if she dies and takes a bullet to the heart, which apparently is what happened, it will be a step forward. Neda, in her young age, taught a lesson to many people," said Makan in an interview with the BBC.
He noted that she was not affiliated with any political camp. "Neda's goal was not Mousavi or Ahmadinejad, but her homeland. It was important to her that the homeland advance a step forward."
Full BBC interview here. It's clear that one of the reasons that the Neda story is so affecting is that she was a pretty, western looking young woman. That's evident from some of the right wing blog reaction. Case in point (from The InQuisitor):
I hope to god this isn’t really her…because the thought of her being so beautiful and dignified makes the murder somehow that much more obscene….If there’s any justice, there’ll be videos like this of Khamenei and Ahmadinejad someday soon.
Neda Sultani pictured without headscarf. AFP.
Yeah, that usually moves the wingers. For the rest of us, Neda's story is tragic and affecting just on its own, and our hearts go out to her family and to the people of Iran who are risking their lives for the future of their country.
Meanwhile, Iranian officials admit that ballot stuffing took place in 50 cities, to the tune of perhaps 3 million votes. Lucky for the regime they rigged the election by 11 million votes!
More liveblogging and updates on what's going on in Iran, where the government apparently put down Neda mourning protests yesterday with brute force, (though apparently, Islamic tradition states that mourning takes place 3, 7 and 40 days after a death, so there could well be more "Neda protests" coming...) from the Beeb (minus their reporter, who was kicked out of Iran over the weekend) and the Times of London. More opinion on Neda via Taylor Marsh, and of course the Huffpo.
George Will says it all: neocon Obama critics wrong on Iran
You're seeing the split again: neocon nuts versus actual conservatives, this time on the issue of Iran, in the persons of realists like Dick Lugar, old school ex-regime changers like (the awful) Henry Kissinger, and paleocons like Pat Buchanan and on Sunday, George Will.
What these guys seem to have in common is that they were part of the Nixon crowd -- people who in general are skeptical (if not downright disdainful) of neoconservatism and its interventionist, Wilsonian bent (not to mention the fact that the same neocons who are now screeching for Obama to help the demonstrators were rooting for Ahmadinejad to win the election...) Buchanan and others (including Zbigniew Brzezinksi) see the neocons hovering around the Iran situation, looking for an opening for military intervention. They've seen that movie before and don't want to catch another viewing. By the way Brzezinksi has to have had the quote of the weekend, when he appeared on the best of the Sunday shows, "Fareed Zakaria GPS," and conflated the right wing Iranian regime and our own neocons:
In Iran, we have two different forces at work. You have those who are for more democracy but who are also nationalistic and you have those who are supporting the regime who in many respects are ... very similar to our Neocons. They are Manichean, they look at the world as divided into Good and Evil and many of them see America as the personification of Evil...
[Obama] has struck exactly the right note. He's offering moral sympathy, he's identifying himself morally and historically with what is happening in Iran but he's not engaging himself politically, he's not interfering, because that would turn out badly and it could be exploited by the Neocons in Iran to crush the revolution ...
Ouch!
Meanwhile, the White House is reportedly getting frustrated with the lack of credit Obama is getting for the Cairo speech, which undoubtedly inspired reform-minded Iranians, at least according to Chuck Todd.
Double meanwhile, courtesy of Andrew Sullivan, Matt Steinglas wades into the muck that is the neocon mind.
Nico Pitney has all the updates, including Youtube video of disturbing, violent scenes of police beating women, and one woman who was fatally shot (warning: graphic) apparently by the pro-government "Basji" forces.
Meanwhile, Mr. Mousavi is said to have told some that he is preparing for martyrdom. Ominous. And he's now charging that the election was rigged months in advance.
President Obama issued a very strong, well done statement:
The Iranian government must understand that the world is watching. We mourn each and every innocent life that is lost. We call on the Iranian government to stop all violent and unjust actions against its own people. The universal rights to assembly and free speech must be respected, and the United States stands with all who seek to exercise those rights.
As I said in Cairo, suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away. The Iranian people will ultimately judge the actions of their own government. If the Iranian government seeks the respect of the international community, it must respect the dignity of its own people and govern through consent, not coercion.
Martin Luther King once said - "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice." I believe that. The international community believes that. And right now, we are bearing witness to the Iranian peoples’ belief in that truth, and we will continue to bear witness.
Asked if he aspired to return to Iran as shah and restore the monarchy, Pahlavi said it would be premature to answer. "The only thing that I'm concerned with -- which is my agenda, my political agenda -- is to end up with a secular parliamentary, democratic system," Pahlavi said.
Such a system could take the form of a parliamentary monarchy such as in Sweden or Japan, he said. "I'm not fighting for any job right now. This is not about me," Pahlavi added.
The temptation in the West (particularly in the media,) is to assume that the Iran situation is a straightforward clash between an incumbent regime and "the people." That's clearly true on a basic level. But as in all complex things, there is always more than one level.
The day before the Friday prayers by Ayatollah Ali-Khameini, a column appeared on Al Jazeera English that offers some tantalizing tidbits about the Ayatollah Khameini (not to be confused with the Ayatollah Khomeini who died in 1989 and whose authority one must assume would never have been questioned, particularly in the streets.) The current Ayatollah is another guy entirely, who was put in place after the previous "SL"'s demise, by a council of men who theoretically, can remove him from power ... read on ... [at left: you say Khameini, I say Khomeini. The current Iran "supreme leader" is pictured on the left, and the 1979 revolution leader on the right]
Not since the 1979 Islamic Revolution when Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini overthrew the shah has Iranian society been so rattled and divided.
According to the Iranian constitution, the Guardians of the Constitution are supposed to monitor and sign off on election results.
After the votes have been counted and the winner announced by the interior ministry, the Guardians have the responsibility to endorse the result within 10 days if there are no complaints from the defeated candidates.
The president-elect is then confirmed and later sworn in by Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
But last week's election did not follow these procedures.
Despite complaints by Mir Hossein Mousavi, Mehdi Karroubi and Mohsen Rezaei, the opposition candidates, Ayatollah Khamaenei congratulated Ahmadinejad in a public speech and pointed out that he had got 14 million votes more than the first time he was elected president four years ago.
What comes next, is an explanation of how Iran's governmental system works, which suggests that a truism of Western understanding about Iran: that the "supreme leader" is the top man in Iran, is not entirely true...
Many moderate clerics, some of whom are believed to be members of the powerful Assembly of Experts, have questioned the wisdom of Khamenei in hastily endorsing Ahmadinejad's "victory".
The Assembly, which selects the country's supreme leader, is chaired by Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani who is considered by many as one of the pillars of the Islamic Revolution.
He was the man behind the election of Khamenei as supreme leader soon after the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeni in 1989.
In theory at least, the Assembly has the constitutional right to question and even replace the supreme leader.
Which brings to mind a couple of paragraphs from that MSNBC.com profile of the opposition leader, Mr. Mousavi:
Mousavi promised economic reform, freedom of expression and a campaign against economic corruption.He also pledged to review laws that discriminate against women, remove the ban on privately owned television stations and curb the power of the supreme leader by taking control of security forces.
What? Could it be that Khameini, whose job description includes "commander in chief of the armed forces," and who served as president in the 1980s during the time Mousavi was prime minister (a position which afterward was eliminated) be fearful of his former colleague, and of being removed from power? That brings us back to the Al Jazeera article:
Some influential moderate clerics privately admit that Khamenei has not done "justice" to the presidential candidates and has not treated them with impartiality.
This behaviour, they believe, could jeopardise his position as leader since one of the main qualities required of the supreme leader is "justice".
Rafsanjani is also the chairman of the Expediency Council which is a body charged with the power to resolve differences or conflicts between parliament and the Guardians of the Constitution, but its true power lies more in its power to oversee the supreme leader.
It is a well-known fact that there is a lot of bad blood between Ahmadinejad and Rafsanjani whom the president accuses of corruption and aristocratic behaviour.
Ahmadinejad angered Rafsanjani when in his presidential television debate with Mousavi, he alleged that all the three opposition candidates had been put forward by Rafsanjani to defeat him.
He further accused Rafsanjani of unlawfully accumulating massive wealth over many years and putting his cronies in the way of the president.
The allegations prompted Rafsanjani to write a highly critical open letter to Khamenei, which the supreme leader ignored.
The result has been serious public rift within the establishment and many observers believe Rafsanjani may be encouraging the ferment among supporters of the opposition presidential candidates.
Mohammed Khatami, the former Iranian reformist president, has also been serving in the ranks of the "green movement" of Mousavi, who together with fellow candidate Karroubi, have been calling for the annulment of the election which they believe was rigged by Ahmadinejad supporters.
All this leaves Khamenei in a very difficult situation.
Difficult indeed... If Khamenei were to be removed, you know who would be the most likely next "supreme leader?" Why, Mr. Rafsanjani. I guess politics really is alive and well in Iran. From Bloomberg:
Now, the two men are locked in conflict amid a wave of protests against the June 12 re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a Khamenei ally. Rafsanjani supports Mir Hossein Mousavi, who says that he won the vote and has drawn hundreds of thousands of Iranians into the streets to rally behind him.
Ahmadinejad and Mousavi are the public faces of a power struggle among Iran’s ruling clerics. As the country is swept up in protests not seen since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the conflict risks undermining the regime’s existence, said Mohammad-Reza Djalili, an Iran expert at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva.
“The divisions within the ruling elite in Iran are making it very hard for the authorities to crack down decisively,” Djalili said. The regime “is going through its biggest crisis in 30 years. The divisions are getting deeper and deeper.”
Speaking at Friday prayers in Tehran today, Khamenei said Ahmadinejad’s re-election was valid and warned of a crackdown on “political elites” if the unrest continues. “Street demonstrations should end,” Khamenei said. “If they don’t, leading politicians will be held accountable for the chaos.”
Rafsanjani’s support legitimizes Mousavi’s fight against the regime, broadening his base and making it harder for the government to respond, said Cliff Kupchan, a senior analyst at New York-based Eurasia Group.
“Rafsanjani is extremely influential,” he said. “That is providing a degree of protection to the opposition.”
More intrigue:
“The political contest playing out in the election is, in fact, among rival factions of the same regime,” said Trita Parsi, an Iran scholar and head of the Washington-based National Iranian American Council, the largest U.S.-Iranian association. Ahmadinejad represents a view that “the established political class has hijacked the revolution,” Parsi said.
... Rafsanjani, imprisoned and tortured by the shah’s secret police, was an associate of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of the Islamic Revolution.
Khomeini died in 1989 and Khamenei replaced him with the aid of an endorsement from Rafsanjani, who later that year became president. Rafsanjani remained the key figure in Iranian politics for at least four years because Khamenei lacked authority, Pedram said.
After 1993, Khamenei built up his own power base in the Revolutionary Guards, the Basij and other security structures by cultivating younger politicians who had served in the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war.
Rafsanjani was defeated when he tried to return to office in 2005 presidential elections by Ahmadinejad, 52, a former mayor of Tehran who promised to redistribute oil wealth to the people.
During this year’s presidential campaign, Khamenei and Rafsanjani took pot shots at each other, either directly or through Mousavi, 67, and Ahmadinejad. The president complained in a televised debate on June 3 that Rafsanjani was spearheading Mousavi’s campaign and accused the former president’s family of corruption.
Rafsanjani sent back an open letter to the supreme leader denouncing Ahmadinejad’s “lies.” He called for a “fraudless” election.
Khamenei endorsed Ahmadinejad’s re-election on June 13, calling it a “glittering event.” Amid escalating protests, Khamenei two days later ordered the top clerical body to investigate irregularities, and then requested a partial recount. Mousavi rejected those moves and is demanding new elections.
Allies of Rafsanjani and Mousavi include former president Mohammed Khatami, 65, who sought to promote social and political freedoms during his 1997-2005 administration.
Three senior religious figures in the holy city of Qom, the center of Islamic learning in Iran, have publicly supported Mousavi. They are Ayatollah Asadollah Bayat Zanjani, Ayatollah Yosuf Sanei and Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri. Rafsanjani is trying to rally support among the clerical establishment against the supreme leader, Pedram said.
Complexity doesn't make for good television copy, but it definitely gets you closer to the truth.
Like most people watching this drama unfold, I fully support the Iranians who are rallying in the streets and I'm rooting for them. Hell, I'm even tempted to break out my own green armband. But I'm also cognizant of the fact that as a Westerner, and an outsider, I don't fully understand all that's going on in Iran, nor its complexities and nuances. So like Obama, I think its best to root for the green revolution from a healthy distance. We should pay attention to what's going on, and offer our full moral support. But we should not to demand that American leaders start meddling in the attempts by a people -- any people -- to find their own way to freedom. If they want our help, I'm sure they'll ask for it.
In a sense, I guess you could say I'm taking what should by all rights, be the conservative position.
Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali-Khamenei delivered Friday prayers, along with a crushing blow to the reformist movement. From Reuters:
Iran's Khamenei demands halt to election protests
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Friday demanded an end to street protests that have shaken the country since the disputed presidential election a week ago and said any bloodshed would be their leaders' fault.
(Editors' note: Reuters and other foreign media are subject to Iranian restrictions on their ability to report, film or take pictures in Tehran.)
He defended Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as the rightful winner of the vote and denied any possibility that it had been rigged, as Ahmadinejad's opponents have alleged.
"If there is any bloodshed, leaders of the protests will be held directly responsible," Khamenei said in his first address to the nation since the upheaval began.
"The result of the election comes from the ballot box, not from the street," the white-bearded cleric told huge crowds thronging Tehran University and surrounding streets for Friday prayers. "Today the Iranian nation needs calm."
Supporters of runner-up Mirhossein Mousavi have called another rally on Saturday. If they proceed in defiance of Khamenei's explicit warning, they risk a severe response from security forces, which have so far not tried to prevent mass demonstrations. ...
At the sermon's end, Khamenei began lamenting his physical condition and weeping, a move which made the throngs of dignitaries and Basiji militiamen gathered before him weep in response. Observers said Khamenei's gesture, similar to one he made during the height of 1999 student protests, was a call for his loyalists to crack down on the demonstrators.
"Our vote is written in blood, and we gave it to the leader," roared the huge crowd, which flowed out of the Tehran University venue and into the streets outside.
Khamenei blamed Western media and officials for stirring unrest by exploiting internal political differences over the election results. Such allegations have been running for days on state television. Khamenei singled out the U.S., mocking America's concern for human rights issues in Iran, noting that secretary of State Hillary Clinton's husband was president when federal forces stormed the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas. Scores of people died after a fire ravaged the compound.
"Do you even believe in human rights?" he said, criticizing the U.S. for its involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, and its support for Israel.
"The followers of the Davidian sect were staging a sit-in protest in a house," he said. "The authorities asked them to come out. The Davidians refused. More than 80 men, women and children were burned alive in this house."
He called the British "the most evil" of the Western governments, most likely for launching the highly influential BBC Persian satellite news channel months before the vote. Iranian channels have jammed the channel's signal. "Please see the hungry wolves in ambush gradually removing their masks of diplomacy and showing their true faces," he said. "Today, senior diplomats of some Western countries, who addressed us diplomatically up until today, have now removed their masks. They are showing their true faces." [BTW the British are not amused...]
"American officials remarks about human rights and limitations on people are not acceptable because they have no idea about human rights after what they have done in Afghanistan and Iran and other parts of the world. We do not need advice over human rights from them."
Of the opposition, Khameini said:
Without naming the three losing candidates who have challenged the election results, he ordered them to "open their eyes" and see behind the demonstrations "the enemy hands working, the hungry wolves waiting in ambush".
He added, with distinct menace: "Those politicians who somehow have influence on people should be very careful about their behaviour if they act in an extremist manner...This extremism will reach a sensitive level which they will not be able to contain. They will be responsible for the blood, violence and chaos."
Mr Khamenei also blamed the deaths, violence and vandalism of the past week on "ill-wishers, mercenaries and elements working for the espionage machines of Zionism and western powers".
Consider the ante "upped." Robert Fisk sums it up:
The whole pattern of [the speech] is 'obey'.
So what will the opposition do now? If Mousavi goes ahead with planned protests, it's hard to imagine he won't be hauled off to jail. If the people go into the streets, one wonders whether the security forces will show their sympathy, or brutality. And while Americans, Europeans and much of the world may be rooting for the Green Revolution, only the neocons appear ready to see their blood shed in the effort.
This morning on MSNBC's very own mini Fox News Channel (also known as "Morning Joe,") Zbigniev Brzezinski and Pat Buchanan laid it out as plainly as I've heard it said. Both men agreed that there is an element in the U.S., which, apart from simply using the Iran situation to score political points against President Obama, wants to see blood running in the streets of Tehran so that they will have an excuse to say "see? we can't negotiate with Iran. I guess we'll have to bomb them and take out their nuclear capability." As Buchanan pointed out, that's why the neocons wanted Ahmadinejad to win, and why they, and Bibi Netanyahu's hard right government in Israel, is rooting for the forces of doom to prevail in Iran (a take explained thoroughly and succinctly in the Asia Times. Today's must-read.) The thirst for further Middle East "conquest" has even brought old Paul Wolfowitz out of the woodwork, packing completely asymmetrical comparisons between Iran and both the Philippines and the old Soviet Union, neither of which were theocratic republics steeped in an ancient Persian culture, at least the last time I checked... Wolfowitz's WaPo op-ed is helpful, however, in reminding us that he was indeed one of the nut-case neocons that Ronald Reagan thankfully ignored throughout much of his presidency, otherwise we would probably have wound up at war with the U.S.S.R ... President Obama should heed the late Mr. Reagan, and ignore the neocons, too.
Meanwhile, Democrats will likely cave in to the GOP's silly politicking on Iran's protests.
And now some video:
From "Morning Joe" (yech...) the smart take of Richard Engel:
He's gone from colorless insider to political rock star — a graying, bearded veteran of the Islamic regime who now stands at the forefront of a youth-driven movement fighting for change.
Despite his newfound fame, Mir Hossein Mousavi still works out of his old office at the Iranian Art Academy and lives in the same unassuming brick home in a middle-class district of Tehran as before, according to an aide.
Only now, he travels with armed guards provided by the very government he is challenging. ...
Thousands of supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi, the man they consider the true winner of Iran's disputed presidential election, have held a rally in Tehran to mourn the recent deaths of protesters.
Thursday's gathering took place at the capital's Imam Khomeini Square in spite of a statement by the highest legislative body that it would meet the candidates to discuss their complaints about the vote.
... Mousavi had issued a statement on his website calling for Thursday to be observed as a day of mourning for those killed during the protests against the election result.
Chanting "Peace be upon (Prophet) Muhammad and his family", the opposition supporters, many dressed in black, marched in south Tehran, the witnesses said.
Mousavi had urged his supporters to wear black as a sign of remembrance and remain peaceful.
One witness said the marchers carried pictures of Mousavi and placards like "We have not had people killed to compromise and accept a doctored ballot box" and "Silent, keep calm".
Mousavi somehow managed to reach the venue and addressed the huge crowd.
He announced that a rally scheduled for Friday had been cancelled, and that his supporters should prepare for a major march planned for Saturday afternoon from Tehran's Revolution Square to Freedom Square.
Mousavi has applied for a permission at the interior ministry but it is unclear whether this would be issued.
About 100 people gathered outside the United Nations building in Tehran earlier on Thursday urging the Guardian Council to take action over the disputed poll. Officials have barred the foreign media from covering such "unauthorised" events. However, they are expected to ensure a heavy turnout for a special sermon to be delivered by Ayatollah Ali Khameini, the country's supreme leader, at the Tehran University campus on Friday. ...
For now, the only thing I'd criticize Obama for is stating that there's not much difference between Ahmadinejad and Mousavi. That may have been true before the election, but it's probably not now. Although, his saying what he did had the effect of distancing the U.S. from the opposition, which is probably what the administration wanted, and in the end, most probably the right thing to do. Let's let the Iranians speak for themselves. The neocons' days of treating Muslims like wayward children who must be given democracy by their western benefactors (usually at the barrel of a gun) is over.
Tens of thousands of people have again taken to the streets in Iran's capital Tehran in protest at election results. It follows a call by presidential challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi for further peaceful demonstrations.
An even larger protest is expected on Thursday, which Mr Mousavi says should be a day of mourning for the eight people killed after Monday's protest. ...
... Heavy restrictions have been placed on the BBC and other foreign news organisations. Reporters are not allowed to cover unauthorised gatherings or move around freely in Tehran - but there are no controls over what they can write or say. Opposition demonstrations gathered in force in central Tehran on Wednesday afternoon.
The BBC's Jon Leyne in the capital says it is difficult to verify the numbers attending. Some estimates say between 70,000 and 100,000, others up to 500,000.
The march was reported to be in silence to try to avoid provoking the authorities.
Meanwhile the BBC has amazing video of an amazing green wristband protest by members of the Iranian soccer team that in some ways, recalled the protests by Black athletes at the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City, though clearly, the soccer team members who did this protest are taking considerably greater risk with their lives... Watch:
Al Jazeera reports the Iranian interior ministry is cracking down on bloggers, and preparing to investigate an attack on university students. In fact, bloggers have been ordered to remove any offending posts.
Al Jazeera also plays up President Obama's comments about similarities between Mousavi and Ahmadinejad, which seem to be having the desired effect in Tehran:
The Revolutionary Guard has warned the country's online media it will face legal action if it "creates tensions".
Within the country, mobile phone text services have been down since the election. There is no access to Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube.
The interior ministry has ordered an investigation into an attack on university students in which it is claimed four people were killed.
At least seven people have been killed in recent clashes between the authorities and the opposition movement, according to state media reports, while hundreds more are thought to have been injured.
For its part, the foreign ministry summoned the Swiss ambassador, who represents US interests in Tehran, on Wednesday to protest at "interventionist" US statements on Iran's election.
Obama told CNBC there appeared to be little difference in policy between Ahmadinejad and Mousavi.
"Either way we are going to be dealing with an Iranian regime that has historically been hostile to the United States," he said.
So is Mousavi different? Christian Amanpour and Richard Engel, the two best American reporters on the case in my view, both say yes, on domestic issues, and increasingly as the revolution goes on. But his history is one of a hardliner, and an establishment figure. More on Mousavi here and here. One interesting note: Mousavi was prime minister when the current Ayatollah, Mr. Khomeini, was president. Hm... apparently, Khomeini isn't wild about the idea of having an Iranian president who is his peer...
The fate of Iran rested last night in a grubby north Tehran highway interchange called Vanak Square where – after days of violence – supporters of the official President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at last confronted the screaming, angry Iranians who have decided that Mirhossein Mousavi should be the president of their country. Unbelievably – and I am a witness because I stood beside them – just 400 Iranian special forces police were keeping these two armies apart. There were stones and tear gas but for the first time in this epic crisis the cops promised to protect both sides.
"Please, please, keep the Basiji from us," one middle-aged lady pleaded with a special forces officer in flak jacket and helmet as the Islamic Republic's thug-like militia appeared in their camouflage trousers and purity-white shirts only a few metres away. The cop smiled at her. "With God's help," he said. Two other policemen were lifted shoulder-high. "Tashakor, tashakor," – "thank you, thank you" – the crowd roared at them.
This was phenomenal. The armed special forces of the Islamic Republic, hitherto always allies of the Basiji, were prepared for once, it seemed, to protect all Iranians, not just Ahmadinejad's henchmen. The precedent for this sudden neutrality is known to everyone – it was when the Shah's army refused to fire on the millions of demonstrators demanding his overthrow in 1979.
Yet this is not a revolution to overthrow the Islamic Republic. Both sets of demonstrators were shouting "Allahu Akbar" – "God is Great" – at Vanak Square last night. But if the Iranian security forces are now taking the middle ground, then Ahmadinejad is truly in trouble.
"On this issue, I do not believe that the president is taking a leadership that is incumbent upon an American president, which we have throughout modern history, and that is to advocate for human rights and freedom — and free elections are one of those fundamentals," the Arizona Republican told John Roberts on CNN's American Morning.
President Obama Tuesday said that he has deep concerns over the election results in Iran, but stressed that "it's not productive, given the history of U.S.-Iranian relations, to be seen as meddling, the U.S. president meddling in Iranian elections."
McCain disputed that assessment. "We're not meddling in any country's affairs when we call for free and fair elections and the ability of people to exercise their human rights," he said Monday. "And when they disagree with a flawed or corrupt election, as the Iranian people have, [not] to be beaten and even killed in the streets."
To which one astute commentator replied (with link added by me):
Yes, McCain, lets do get more involved. Shall we bomb, bomb, bomb Iran? Shall we tell Ayatolla what we want him to do, and then if he refuses, what, blame President Obama for not being forceful enough? Win win either way, right?
Natch.
And as usual, the most comprehensive collection of info is available from Nico Pitney at the Huffpo.
