Mired In The Middle Ages

Ancient Persia has a magnificent and an ancient heritage. Modern Persia not so much.

With the Islamic Revolution the country under its new ruling Ayatollahs seemed to regress rather than progress socially. Iran's parochial concerns with its Shia traditions and its animosity toward the larger Sunni populations outside its borders, allied with its xenophobic attitude toward the outside world and its close embrace of Islamism earns it the reputation of a closed society.

Any country ruled by elite religious figures who consider themselves the supreme authority on politics, technology, social conditions and external relations and who bind themselves to the rigid traditions of religious fascism represents of its very nature, a totalitarian one that rejects human rights for its population.

Under the authority of the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as religious head and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as political head, there is the spectacle of the hornet and the scorpion. There is a struggle for power and authority between the two figures, even while the Supreme Leader remains the titular head of state and the religious authority.

Iran's president, who exemplifies the country's rigid authoritarian stance and fervent religious devotion, while aspiring to acquire the annihilating properties of nuclear fission, believes himself to be the superior authority figure. While each supported the other's ambitions they were able to function as heads of government.

Now, it seems that the aspirations of each outdistances their usefulness to one another. It is hard to imagine which of the two is more fundamentally deluded. Both are intensely invested in fundamentalist Islam. The president is meant to take his orders from the Ayatollah, but it is clear that the President feels he should be junior to no one.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad feels his experience on the world stage and his ranking in the country gives him the authority to make decisions unauthorized by the Supreme Leader. Causing offence to those who support the Ayatollah, let alone Ali Khamenei himself. Each sponsors a different replacement as president for upcoming 'elections'.

This is a country that believes in the resurrection of a Hidden Imam, who will bring with him Armageddon; the ascension of the righteous to heaven and the destruction of the unworthy to dwell forever in the netherworld. Only those whom Shia Islam of the Iranian variety blesses will be saved; the lives of all others are forfeit for they are clearly undeserving.

This is a country where the political elite employ exorcists. Where Ahmadinejad's former spiritual mentor feels his pupil has been placed under an evil spell. "I am almost certain he has been bewitched", the ayatollah explained. Indubitably.

Iranian Women's Human Rights

Iranian Human Rights Abuses Against Women Spotlighted Near UN
by Fern Sidman, INN NY Correspondent





Graphic depictions of the most egregious forms of human rights abuses against women in Iran took center stage at a special seminar in New York City on March 3rd. Sponsored by Iran180, which spotlights the litany of human rights abuses that take place on a daily basis in Iran, the seminar was entitled, "Securing Gender Equality: Iran and the CSW."

Held at 777 UN Plaza, a building directly across the street from the United Nations, objectives of the gathering included raising awareness of Iran's violations of women's rights and the staging of symbolic protests against the welcoming of the Islamic Republic of Iran as the newest member of the UN Commission on the Status of Women at its 56th session.

Quoting findings of exiled Iranian lawyer, Zohreh Arshadi, Mr. David Kilgour, co-chair of the Canadian Friends of a Democratic Iran said, "The Iranian penal system is a principal means of sustaining inequality of genders. Its ludicrous premise is that women are deficient in abilities." Kilgour added Arshadi stresses that Iranian women, "have managed to achieve equality in one field only: equal right to imprisonment, exile, torture, being killed and now being slaughtered..."

Speaking of the many Iranian women who are unjustly imprisoned, tortured and often sentenced to death for crimes they did not commit, Mr. Kilgour relayed the narrative of Sakineh Ashtiani, a mother from the frequently targeted Turkic minority, who did not speak Farsi or understand the charge of alleged adultery leveled at her. "She was incarcerated and beaten, then humiliated in front of her family by a public lashing. Her plight and narrow escape from death by stoning became a successful test case for the global community's response to the regime's misogyny," he said.

Mr. Kilgour quoted Irwin Cotler, Canadian MP and chair of the International Responsibility to Protect Coalition, who recently warned Iran is on an "execution binge", and making a "wholesale assault on the rights of its own people." He added, "In 2011 alone, the Iranian regime has already executed at least 120 people. It now leads the world in per capita executions, many of which are in secret, taking place after arrests, detentions, beatings, torture, kidnappings, disappearances, and brief trials in which no evidence is presented."

Echoing previous calls for the disqualification Iran as a member of the UN Commission on the Status of Women, Mr. Kilgour suggested the CSW convene a special session to discuss women's rights in Iran and act to stop the repression of women. "It is our responsibility to act in robust solidarity with the struggle for women's rights everywhere across Iran," he concluded.

The Association for the Defense of Azerbaijani Political Prisoners in Iran's (ADAPP) Fakhteh Zamani said, "In Iran, as throughout the world, women are victims of violence on a daily basis but Iran's justice system provides little or no remedy to the obstacles and violence facing women and girls."

Zamani noted women are not encouraged to bring complaints against their attackers for fear of bringing, "dishonor" on the family as well as reprisals from the attacker and relatives.

Quoting the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women, Ms. Zamani said, "discriminatory law in both the civil and penal codes in Iran play a major role in empowering men and aggravating women's vulnerability to violence. In particular, discriminatory provisions in the civil code relating to the areas of marriage, child custody, freedom of movement and inheritance may lead to, perpetuate or legitimize violence against women perpetrated by private actors."

On the trafficking in girls and women, Ms. Zamani said that the UN Special Rapporteur reported that, "most of the trafficking is said to occur in the eastern provinces, which are mainly Baluchi areas, where women are kidnapped, bought or entered into temporary marriage in order to be sold into sexual slavery in other countries." Concluding with an oft quoted phrase used by Iran's women human rights defenders, she said, "We are both women and minorities; so, in the Islamic Republic of Iran, we are doubly accused."

"I am absolutely opposed to the imposition of Sharia law," declared Shabnam Assadollahi, producer and host of the Canadian based Hamseda Persian radio program. "Sharia law tells us that female hair has evil energy and those women's rights activists in Iran who refused to wear head coverings were beaten and tortured while their children watched," she said. She detailed gruesome accounts of torture of women in Iran saying, "young girls and virgins were raped prior to being executed and after execution their bodies were burned and electrocuted."

Ms. Assadollahi said, "There is no place for Iran on this commission. Just think about the arrogance of this regime to judge others concerning gender equality and human rights."

Speaking in her native Farsi with an interpreter, Iranian rights activist Fariba Davoodi, told of her incarceration in Iran and the barbaric tortures that were inflicted upon her by her captors. "It is the common aspiration of all Iranian women to be free", she said. "When the regime came to arrest me for my activism on behalf of women's rights, they beat me up in front of my children and brought me to their notorious prison where I was kept in solitary confinement in a tiny cell where I was interrogated for long periods of time; where tey kept the lights on all the time and forced me to shower in front of them."

"The fear that women's rights advocates in Iran have is not only from the repressive government but from male family members including husbands, fathers and brothers," she said. Remaining optimistic about the future of women's rights in Iran is a daunting challenge for women such as Ms. Davoodi, "We hope that very soon we will live in a free and democratic Iran, but so long as the regime stays in power, our hopes will not be realized."

As published online at Arutz Sheva, 3 March 2011

Iran Triumphant

The Islamic Republic of Iran's Supreme Leader has been heartened to see that sincere protests against an autocratic government by young people insisting on their right to freedom and equality, to democratic reform, is taking very serious steps toward success. He is jubilant on behalf of the Egyptian people. They may be Arab, and Iranians are Aryan, but they are both joined in Islam.

"This explosion we see among the people of Egypt is the appropriate response to this great betrayal that the traitor dictator committed against his people", railed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. No doubt to great acclaim on the part of those gathered to listen. Who would, of course, never think of comparing the incomparable.

As, for example when Green Party protesters in Tehran came out in their tens of thousands to challenge the 10th presidential elections for the fraud they were recognized to be internationally. At that time the Middle East cringed with the hope that a change in that government might occur, and Iran present as less a threat to them than it currently does.

But those Iranian protesters were shot at and beaten by the Basiji militia, and by the Revolutionary Guards who knew to whom they were indebted, and it was not the reformers. The voices raised in exultation at the prospect of overturning the brutal Iranian regime were muted as their they and their leaders were jailed, tortured or isolated from the populace.

Certainly a successful settling of accounts. And now Iran goes on its course toward total domination of the Middle East, and it has its friends, like Turkey, seeing no reason to fear Iran's conquest of nuclear armament production. Religious persecution, death sentences without trial or jury for dissenters have elevated the Supreme Leader to a position of omnipotence.

Who now will stand courageously forward to defy his edicts brought down in the name of the Iranian Revolution? Editor of the Iranian newspaper Kayhan commenting approvingly on Egypt's travail:

"All the demands and slogans are in complete congruence with the teachings of the Islamic revolution: 'Death to America'; 'Death to Israel'; 'Hail Islam'; 'Death to the Seculars'; 'Islam is My religion."

Courage? It is still there, cowering, but willing to raise its head when the occasion demands: "The starting point of what we are now witnessing on the streets of Tunis, Sanaa, Cairo, Alexandria and Suez can undoubtedly be traced back to the days of June 2009 when people took to the streets of Tehran in their millions shouting 'Where is my vote'" wrote the leader of Iran's Green protest movement, Mir Hossein Mousavi.

Well, Mr. Mousavi, where is your vote? What are those million defiant (subdued) Iranians now engaged with, in preparation for the day when their will may prevail and their abysmally totalitarian government breaking records with their obsession in executing those who offend their righteous sense of Islamism, will be overturned?

Sovereign Canada, Insolent Iran

"The principle of free speech is one of the cornerstones of our democracy. Canada does not accept attempts from the Iranian embassy to dictate what films will, and will not be shown in Canada." Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore

Isn't it important to know, should we not be aware and interested when there are leaders - religious leaders at that - of troubled countries incapable of adequately serving their own population who publicly emote threats against us? Invoking the name of God - albeit their version of the Almighty - to confidently assert that all those who they feel conspire against them, and fail to sufficiently evince subservient awe of their god will be annihilated - "in front of your eyes"?

A 60-minute documentary film scheduled for airing at Library and Archives Canada was cancelled by the good folk at Archives on the receiving end of "threats"; that is, to be precise, threats "of protests". Violent protests, one might add. Upon hearing of that potential those who make the final decisions at Archives shrivelled in abject terror, cowering at the prospect of their building being surrounded by a possible half-dozen protesters.

A speedy cancellation the first solution that came to mind. Not, alternatively, let alone first off to contact the police to alert them of the possibility of loud shouting and slanderous accusations emanating from street level and reaching the tenderly bruised ears of the Archives staff. The imminent showing of the film, Iranium had the interest of quite a number of Ottawans, planning to attend the event. They would have braved the protests.

Weren't they surprised to discover that trembling knees and sensitive eardrums represented requisite attributes for Archives management? A factotum at the down-scaled Embassy of Iran did, after all, send a letter to Archives enquiring as to the feasibility of cancelling the event - oh dear! And those telephone messages from "members of the public" complaining about the screening and "threatening" to protest - migawd!

What's a body to do? Why, take a deep breath, sit perfectly still for five minutes - and begin shrieking. And then place your own telephone call to Fred Litwin, president of the Free Thinking Film Society who was stolidly naive enough to think that he had the freedom to offer the film to an interested viewing audience. Let him know there would be no screening.

Do we need to see in living colour the vile treatment of Iranians protesting their government's abuses of human rights; the threats issued to democracies by Iran's Supreme Leader; be reminded of the theocratic dictatorship's funding and training and arming of proxy militias that exist to threaten the only non-Muslim country in the Middle East? Most Canadians are already aware of Iran's Islamist nuclear program blessed by the Hidden Mahdi.

It does, however, rankle that a specially-produced film, put together by filmmaker Raphael Shore to clarify for those who would like those intriguing details, the policies of the Islamic Republic of Iran, its pursuit of nuclear weaponry, its sponsorship of terrorist groups, its hand in overturning the fortunes of legitimate governments in the Middle East to more closely reflect Iran's own values and priorities.

There are times when we need to be nudged, require reminding of the dangers presented to the civil world by monster regimes which seek to marginalize democracy and institute their very own brand of theistic totalitarianism. We're the poorer when such a regime feels it can act with impunity to bully and frighten legitimate, civilized government institutions with the assurance that their intimidating tactics will succeed in instilling fear and pull-backs.

As they successfully managed to do - albeit temporarily - in Ottawa, when Archives cancelled a scheduled event to appease Iran's tender feelings and circumvent the potential for violent dissent on our streets. Thanks to the resolute and swift action of James Moore who ordered Library and Archives Canada to reschedule the event, and the added support of Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, the non-event is scheduled to become once again, an event to anticipate.

Panic Mode

Library and Archives Canada was to have shown a controversial film, "Iranium" Tuesday evening. Following is their announcement of the event:

Iranium
January 18, 2011
Library and Archives Canada
7:00 PM

Since the inception of the Islamic Revolution in 1979, Iran has displayed an absolute hatred for the West. Coupled with an extremist ideology, this regime has terrorized the world at large for over 30 years. This 70-minute film will explore the principles of the revolution, and visually demonstrate the hatred and violence exhibited by Iran’s brutal leadership. The film will document the regime’s abusive treatment of their once proud citizenry, and will chronicle the regime’s use of terror proxies abroad to inflict deadly messages on their self-described enemies. Please join us for this film, and a speaker..and reception to follow at about 9:00 PM

Admission: $15 (includes HST), $8.00 for students

The event, however, did not take place. Initially, there was indication trouble was brewing when the Embassy of Iran expressed their unhappiness at the screening, objecting strenuously. That hurdle was overcome when Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore stepped into the fray, informing the national library it should plan to proceed, despite the cancellation that had followed Iran's protest.

This was then followed by library officials receiving threatening protests which compelled them to revisit their original decision to cancel, mere hours before the start of the event. Police were called to the scene, and the Archives and Library Canada building shut tight when hand-delivered letters were received; employees were dismissed for the day.

So, for reasons 'beyond our control', a government department that regularly showcases offbeat or controversial or notable films for the purpose of educating Canadians to the realities of the great wide world out there, and how those realities impact on Canada, felt forced to close its public face and send its employees home a little earlier than usual, bowing to the demands of mysterious threats which the police are investigating.

This tells us that a foreign country has exerted its diplomatic presence and its immunity from internal investigation to launch a forcible protest, supporting it by threats issued by those associated with that country's investment in uncivil, anti-human-rights activities that impact globally through that very same country's proxy militias and its oil-derived treasury supporting, training and arming of those same militias.

Canada's perennially-strained relations with a country it has outspokenly criticized as a human-rights offender (under which regime Canadian citizens have suffered arrest and death) argues diplomatic caution with the presence of an embassy in our capital city. Which obliges Canada to be a civil host, but not a subservient one, acquiescing to another country's assault on our civil liberties, freedom of search and expression, and in fact, sovereignty.

The producers of the film, the Free Thinking Film Society paid to rent a theatre in the Library so the film could be screened for the public. They are, obviously, disappointed at this turn of events. "It's like the Iranians have set something in motion and they're able to shut down a film in the capital of Canada", argued Fred Litwin, the film's producer. "They obviously thought they could push around some people and they were right."

They have had ample practise, and have gained much perfection through that practise; the Iranian Republican Guard, the Basiji militia, in ordering people around, shutting down their premises, shuttering news media freedoms of reportage, mounting attacks on protesters, silencing internal critics of the theocratic government of the Islamic Republic of Iran. They are not averse to extending their threats of intimidation outside the country.

The Iranian embassy confirmed they had complained to the Heritage Minister as well as to Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon. Minister Moore's spokesperson described the contents of the film as quite in keeping with Canada's position on human rights in Iran, let alone that country's nuclear program. Moore himself tweeted a protest at the shutdown, iterating his position that it is not up to the Iranian embassy to dictate films shown in Canada.

Coincidentally, the Minister of National Defence is in the Middle East for the purpose of meeting with Israeli, West Bank and Jordanian leaders as well as with members of the Canadian Armed Forces situated in the Middle East. While in Israel he met with Prime Minister Netanyahu, his Defence Minister Ehud Barak and Israel's Opposition leader. Mr. McKay spoke of Canada's concerns respecting Iran's nuclear aspirations.

The best way of stopping Iran's plans, he declared, is "through the demonstration of international resolve", though he expressed some uncertainty about the effectiveness of economic sanctions. "Beyond the nuclear threat, Iranian actions in the form of a proxy relationship with Syria [Hezbollah] and Hamas is just as much a concern for us [as Israel], given our involvement in Afghanistan", he said.

Through the signing of a memorandum of understanding an agreement was formalized to share intelligence resources focusing primarily on the scientific and technological, although MacKay also expressed his opinion that the memorandum could be seen "as a foundation of other opportunities" relating to counter terrorism and joint military training..

Ironically, in light of what has just occurred in a government building in a country where freedom of expression is a given, but nonetheless that freedom has been tampered with by agents of a foreign power whose program is inimical to freedom and to peace, MacKay mentioned that counter terrorism has a very high priority in Canada.

To counter the terrorism that civil society is experiencing in Canada, not only through our participation in the war against the Islamist jihadists in Afghanistan, but through the sinister truncation of our freedoms at home through an incident such as this, it will become incumbent on Mr. MacKay and the Cabinet of Prime Minister Stephen Harper to ponder how it will respond on home soil to Iranian threats.

Support the Iranian people in their struggle to bring democracy and freedom to Iran, and watch the new trailer for Iranium to learn more about Iran’s brutal human rights abuses, as well as the regime’s state-sponsorship of terror and illegal nuclear weapons program. RadicalIslam.org

Iran Updates

"The Islamic Republic of Iran will not retreat one iota from its [nuclear] rights.
"In defending its rights, the Islamic Republic of Iran is defending the rights of all members of the NPT (Non Proliferation Treaty)." Saeed Jilali, Iranian nuclear negotiator

And here we thought - how wrong of us - that Iran's intention was to threaten the world at large and some of its neighbours in particular, with the eventually successful ownership of nuclear-tipped warheads. When all that noble administration of a world-class country had in mind was to defend the rights of all members of the Non Proliferation Treaty. We should hang our heads in shame. Which action just might mollify the Grand Ayatollah for ten seconds flat.

And then the perfidious, malevolent behaviour of Western powers would kick in again and he would be recalled to the reality of Iran's place in the opinion of the United States, the European Union, and that devil's spawn, Israel. There are simply times in the history of a nation and that of a religion that their resolve is sorely tested and their authentic and honourable place seated directly beside God must represent to them their divine destiny.

Grand Ayatollah Khamenei has already been assured through his direct contact with Allah that permission has been given to achieve nuclear dominance. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has tasked his envoys to convince the world community that as a member of the NPT the country has a right to enrich uranium, clearly the most contentious portion of Iran's nuclear program.

And one, incidentally, which has been impaired by the mysterious introduction of a technological wizard named Stuxnet. This inconvenience representing a minor delay in the country's aspirational ascent to complete atomic ownership is but a stumble on the path to success. Not to be mentioned at the Instanbul meeting scheduled to take place January 21/22.

Four sets of United Nations sanctions represent completely irrelevant and obviously obstructionist interference in the affairs of a proud and sovereign country whose social heritage and political/religious standing makes it a world leader among other world leaders. The doubts those other world leaders express with respect to what is obvious to Tehran is beyond contempt.

The two-day tour of the Natanz uranium facility and heavy-water nuclear installation at Arak went as planned, convincing select members of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the Non-Aligned Movement, the Arab League, Syria, Venezuela and Oman that Iran's sincerity and scientific-atomic genius is beyond reproach.

"What we have done is an unprecedented move ... to show 100% transparency", gloated Ali Asghar Soltanieh, envoy to the IAEA. As for reports that technical problems and sanctions have been responsible for delaying Tehran's nuclear programs: "Our nuclear activities are going forward strongly. Our activities, especially in [uranium] enrichment, are also continuing very strongly."

So there, those of faint heart. Time to face reality, United Nations, China, Russia, Britain, France, Germany - and thou accursed, Zionist United States of America.

700 years old troglodyte stone house village in IRAN - 19 Pics

In the north east of Iran at the foot of Mount Sahand in Kandovan, the villagers live in cave homes carved out from the volcanic rock.

Hajj 2009

The usual: chants calling for death to America and death to Israel.

Also note the following (hat tip to Jihad Watch, citing AFP):

..."We need all Muslims, Sunni and Shiite, to be unified and focus on important issues: Al-Aqsa (mosque in Jerusalem), the occupation of Palestine, the problems in Iraq, the Afghan occupation, and the fighting between brothers in Yemen. We need be purified from all infidels."...

And we have this news as well:

Investigations into Iran's nuclear programme will reach a "dead end" unless Tehran starts to co-operate, the UN nuclear chief has warned.

Mohamed El Baradei told governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that there had been no movement on issues that needed to be clarified....

"Investigations...will reach a 'dead end'"? The dead end of trying to reason with Iran's leaders was reached long ago.

Has Tehran cooperated with the West since the Iranian Revolution of 1979?

Only a fool would believe that such cooperation is even possible.

And this morning's "news" prattles on about the couple who crashed the state dinner at the White House and the shopping crowds on "Black Friday."

GERMANY TO GIVE AWARD TO ANTI-ISRAELIST

Wow, looks like Germany is still keeping on with its pretentions: they're going to give an award to one Felicia Langer, who, if she's Israeli herself, is a traitor:

Germany's decision to issue its highest honor to Israeli attorney Felicia Langer, a fierce critic of the Jewish state, has prompted the government in Jerusalem to rebuke the federal republic's president, Horst Köhler, in uncharacteristically strong language.

Langer has "over the years consistently supported the forces that promote violence, death and extremism," Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday. "Anyone who wishes to award her a prize must bear in mind the consequences of legitimizing such positions of intolerance and bad faith."

Langer has called Israel the "apartheid of the present."

Let's also note how people like her and Jimmy Carter wanted that apartheid to begin with, by pushing for a palestinian state, to say nothing of condoning Islam's refusal to integrate with the societies it lives with.

Langer has praised speeches from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and terms the Central Council of Jews in Germany as a "branch of the Israeli Embassy."

The German media are saturated with the unfolding controversy surrounding Langer and her supporters within the government. Israeli governments rarely criticize Germany, but there are concerns in Jerusalem that the Federal Republic's praise of Langer casts doubts on Israel's legitimacy.

The last public row between Israel and Germany revolved around the German-Iranian trade relationship. Aaron Abramovicht hen-director-general of the Foreign Ministry, blasted Germany's economic support for the Iranian regime last summer as manifested by the decision to allow German companies to supply three facilities to liquefy natural gas.

The president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, Charlotte Knobloch, on Wednesday termed Langer a 'friend of Ahmadinejad" and a "supporter of Stalin.' She wrote in an e-mail obtained by the Post that the "decision [to honor Langer] was not properly researched." Knobloch is herself a recipient of the award.

An angry secretary-general of the Central Council, Stephan J. Kramer, on Thursday blasted Tübingen Mayor Boris Palmer for his unwavering support for Langer.

Reached on his mobile phone in Ben-Gurion Airport, before his return to Berlin, Kramer told the Post that Palmer "should be ashamed of himself" for supporting the Iranian regime and the Federal Cross of Merit for Langer.

"There is a distinction between legitimate criticism of Israel and delegitimizing the State of Israel," said Kramer, adding that Lange's statements were "anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist" because she sought to strip Israel of its legitimacy as the homeland for Jews.

If she's really from Israel, she ought to be exiled for her abominations. Israel should have nothing to do with such a foul person. And Germany's government/president should be ashamed of themselves for legitimizing her positions by giving her an award she does not deserve.

Cartoonist Captures Flavor of Top News Topics

I’ve said it before that editorial cartoonist David Donar and I don’t agree on everything when it comes to politics. More often than not, however, I find at least one gem every time I visit his blog, Political Graffiti. Such was the case today as evidenced by the cartoons shown here which cover topics related to Iran, North Korea and health care reform. Enjoy!

In Support of the Iranian Demonstrators

HURSDAY, JUNE 25, 2009
Open letter of support to the demonstrators in Iran!

This morning Ayatollah Ali Khamenei demanded an end to the massive and forceful demonstrations protesting the controversial result of last week's election. He argued that to make concessions to popular demands and 'illegal' pressure would amount to a form of 'dictatorship', and he warned the protestors that they, rather than the police, would be held responsible for any further violence.
Khamenei's argument sounds familiar to anyone interested in the politics of collective action, since it appears to draw on the logic used by state authorities to oppose most of the great popular mobilisations of modern times, from 1789 in France to 1979 in Iran itself. These mobilisations took shape through a struggle to assert the principle that sovereignty rests with the people themselves, rather than with the state or its representatives. 'No government can justly claim authority', as South Africa's ANC militants put it in their Freedom Charter of 1955, 'unless it is based on the will of all the people.'
Needless to say it is up to the people of Iran to determine their own political course. Foreign observers inspired by the courage of those demonstrating in Iran this past week are nevertheless entitled to point out that a government which claims to represent the will of its people can only do so if it respects the most basic preconditions for the determination of such a will: the freedom of the people to assemble, unhindered, as an inclusive collective force; the capacity of the people, without restrictions on debate or access to information, to deliberate, decide and implement a shared course of action.
Years of foreign-sponsored 'democracy promotion' in various parts of the world have helped to spread a well-founded scepticism about civic movements which claim some sort of direct democratic legitimacy. But the principle itself remains as clear as ever: only the people themselves can determine the value of such claims. We the undersigned call on the government of Iran to take no action that might discourage such determination.
Peter Hallward
Middlesex University, UK.
Alberto Toscano
Goldsmiths College, UK.
This letter is also signed by:
Alenka Zupancic, Institute of Philosophy of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts
Alexander Garcia Duttmann, Goldsmiths College
Etienne Balibar, Paris X, Nanterre, and University of California, Irvine
Eyal Weizman, Director, Centre for Research Architecture, Dept. of Visual Cultures
Goldsmiths, University of London
Judith Butler, University of California, Berkeley
Noam Chomsky, Institute Professor (retired), MIT, Cambridge MA USA
Philip Pettit, University Center for Human Values, Princeton University
Rada Ivekovic, Prof., Collège international de philosophie, Paris.
Slavoj Žižek, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia and the European Graduate School
Duane Campbell, Calif. State University -Sacramento
and hundreds more

And, the International Federation of Trade Unions


Iran Day of Worker Solidarity Action
Will Be Organized As Repression Continues

Brussels

The ITUC, EI, ITF and IUF today expressed their
solidarity with the many Iranian workers who have
joined the demonstrations in the streets to call for
respect for their fundamental democratic rights.
Protests for democracy in Iran, organized by trade
unions, will be held in countries around the world
tomorrow.

"The violence against those demonstrating for democracy
has left many people dead and several hundred injured.
This heavy repression of peaceful demonstrations and
lack of respect for human rights is completely
unacceptable," said ITUC General Secretary Guy Ryder.
Trade unions across the world have been appalled at the
Iranian authorities' targeting of independent trade
union action in recent years, with workers attacked and
arrested for demonstrating peacefully for workers'
rights, most recently on 1 May as they attempted to
hold a peaceful May Day rally at Laleh Park in Tehran.
Repression of fundamental rights has now intensified
and widened, with particularly violent reaction by
security forces to the many demonstrations in the wake
of the election, and the arrest of hundreds of people."

Juan Cole on Ahmadinejad

Turning Ahmadinejad into public enemy No. 1

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/09/24/ahmadinejad/
Demonizing the Iranian president and making his visit to New York seem controversial are all part of the neoconservative push for yet another war.
By Juan Cole
Sept. 24, 2007 | Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to New York to address the United Nations General Assembly has become a media circus. But the controversy does not stem from the reasons usually cited.

The media has focused on debating whether he should be allowed to speak at Columbia University on Monday, or whether his request to visit Ground Zero, the site of the Sept. 11 attack in lower Manhattan, should have been honored. His request was rejected, even though Iran expressed sympathy with the United States in the aftermath of those attacks and Iranians held candlelight vigils for the victims. Iran felt that it and other Shiite populations had also suffered at the hands of al-Qaida, and that there might now be an opportunity for a new opening to the United States.

Instead, the U.S. State Department denounced Ahmadinejad as himself little more than a terrorist. Critics have also cited his statements about the Holocaust or his hopes that the Israeli state will collapse. He has been depicted as a Hitler figure intent on killing Israeli Jews, even though he is not commander in chief of the Iranian armed forces, has never invaded any other country, denies he is an anti-Semite, has never called for any Israeli civilians to be killed, and allows Iran's 20,000 Jews to have representation in Parliament.

There is, in fact, remarkably little substance to the debates now raging in the United States about Ahmadinejad. His quirky personality, penchant for outrageous one-liners, and combative populism are hardly serious concerns for foreign policy. Taking potshots at a bantam cock of a populist like Ahmadinejad is actually a way of expressing another, deeper anxiety: fear of Iran's rising position as a regional power and its challenge to the American and Israeli status quo. The real reason his visit is controversial is that the American right has decided the United States needs to go to war against Iran. Ahmadinejad is therefore being configured as an enemy head of state.

The neoconservatives are even claiming that the United States has been at war with Iran since 1979. As Glenn Greenwald points out, this assertion is absurd. In the '80s, the Reagan administration sold substantial numbers of arms to Iran. Some of those beating the war drums most loudly now, like think-tank rat Michael Ledeen, were middlemen in the Reagan administration's unconstitutional weapons sales to Tehran. The sales would have been a form of treason if in fact the United States had been at war with Iran at that time, so Ledeen is apparently accusing himself of treason.

But the right has decided it is at war with Iran, so a routine visit by Iran's ceremonial president to the U.N. General Assembly has generated sparks. The foremost cheerleader for such a view in Congress is Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., who recently pressed Gen. David Petraeus on the desirability of bombing Iran in order to forestall weapons smuggling into Iraq from that country (thus cleverly using one war of choice to foment another).

American hawks are beating the war drums loudly because they are increasingly frustrated with the course of events. They are unsatisfied with the lack of enthusiasm among the Europeans and at the United Nations for impeding Tehran's nuclear energy research program. While the Bush administration insists that the program aims at producing a bomb, the Iranian state maintains that it is for peaceful energy purposes. Washington wants tighter sanctions on Iran at the United Nations but is unlikely to get them in the short term because of Russian and Chinese reluctance. The Bush administration may attempt to create a "coalition of the willing" of Iran boycotters outside the U.N. framework.

Washington is also unhappy with Mohammad ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency. He has been unable to find credible evidence that Iran has a weapons program, and he told Italian television this week, "Iran does not constitute a certain and immediate threat for the international community." He stressed that no evidence had been found for underground production sites or hidden radioactive substances, and he urged a three-month waiting period before the U.N. Security Council drew negative conclusions.

ElBaradei intervened to call for calm after French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said last week that if the negotiations over Iran's nuclear research program were unsuccessful, it could lead to war. Kouchner later clarified that he was not calling for an attack on Iran, but his remarks appear to have been taken seriously in Tehran.

Kouchner made the remarks after there had already been substantial speculation in the U.S. press that impatient hawks around U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney were seeking a pretext for a U.S. attack on Iran. Steven Clemons of the New America Foundation probably correctly concluded in Salon last week that President Bush himself has for now decided against launching a war on Iran. But Clemons worries that Cheney and the neoconservatives, with their Israeli allies, are perfectly capable of setting up a provocation that would lead willy-nilly to war.

David Wurmser, until recently a key Cheney advisor on Middle East affairs and the coauthor of the infamous 1996 white paper that urged an Iraq war, revealed to his circle that Cheney had contemplated having Israel strike at Iranian nuclear research facilities and then using the Iranian reaction as a pretext for a U.S. war on that country. Prominent and well-connected Afghanistan specialist Barnett Rubin also revealed that he was told by an administration insider that there would be an "Iran war rollout" by the Cheneyites this fall.

It should also be stressed that some elements in the U.S. officer corps and the Defense Intelligence Agency are clearly spoiling for a fight with Iran because the Iranian-supported Shiite nationalists in Iraq are a major obstacle to U.S. dominance in Iraq. Although very few U.S. troops in Iraq are killed by Shiites, military spokesmen have been attempting to give the impression that Tehran is ordering hits on U.S. troops, a clear casus belli. Disinformation campaigns that accuse Iran of trying to destabilize the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government -- a government Iran actually supports -- could lay the groundwork for a war. Likewise, with the U.S. military now beginning patrols on the Iran-Iraq border, the possibility is enhanced of a hostile incident spinning out of control.

The Iranians have responded to all this bellicosity with some chest-thumping of their own, right up to the final hours before Ahmadinejad's American visit. The Iranian government declared "National Defense Week" on Saturday, kicking it off with a big military parade that showed off Iran's new Qadr-1 missiles, with a range of 1,100 miles. Before he left Iran for New York on Sunday morning, Ahmadinejad inspected three types of Iranian-manufactured jet fighters, noting that it was the anniversary of Iraq's invasion of Iran in 1980 (which the Iranian press attributed to American urging, though that is unlikely).

The display of this military equipment was accompanied by a raft of assurances on the part of the Iranian ayatollahs, politicians and generals that they were entirely prepared to deploy the missiles and planes if they were attacked. A top military advisor to Supreme Jurisprudent Ali Khamenei told the Mehr News Agency on Saturday, "Today, the United States must know that their 200,000 soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan are within the reach of Iran's fire. When the Americans were beyond our shores, they were not within our reach, but today it is very easy for us to deal them blows." Khamenei, the actual commander in chief of the armed forces, weighed in as well, reiterating that Iran would never attack first but pledging: "Those who make threats should know that attack on Iran in the form of hit and run will not be possible, and if any country invades Iran it will face its very serious consequences."

The threat to target U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and the unveiling of the Qadr-1 were not aggressive in intent, but designed to make the point that Iran could also play by Richard M. Nixon's "madman" strategy, whereby you act so wildly as to convince your enemy you are capable of anything. Ordinarily a poor non-nuclear third-world country might be expected to be supine before an attack by a superpower. But as Mohammad Reza Bahonar, the Iranian deputy speaker of Parliament, warned: "Any military attack against Iran will send the region up in flames."

In the end, this is hardly the kind of conflagration the United States should be enabling. If a spark catches, it will not advance any of America's four interests in the Middle East: petroleum, markets, Israel and hegemony.

The Middle East has two-thirds of the world's proven petroleum reserves and nearly half its natural gas, and its fields are much deeper than elsewhere in the world, so that its importance will grow for the United States and its allies. Petro-dollars and other wealth make the region an important market for U.S. industry, especially the arms industry. Israel is important both for reasons of domestic politics and because it is a proxy for U.S. power in the region. By "hegemony," I mean the desire of Washington to dominate political and economic outcomes in the region and to forestall rivals such as China from making it their sphere of influence.

The Iranian government (in which Ahmadinejad has a weak role, analogous to that of U.S. vice presidents before Dick Cheney) poses a challenge to the U.S. program in the Middle East. Iran is, unlike most Middle Eastern countries, large. It is geographically four times the size of France, and it has a population of 70 million (more than France or the United Kingdom). As an oil state, it has done very well from the high petroleum prices of recent years. It has been negotiating long-term energy deals with China and India, much to the dismay of Washington. It provides financial support to the Palestinians and to the Lebanese Shiites who vote for the Hezbollah Party in Lebanon. By overthrowing the Afghanistan and Iraq governments and throwing both countries into chaos, the United States has inadvertently enabled Iran to emerge as a potential regional power, which could challenge Israel and Saudi Arabia and project both soft and hard power in the strategic Persian Gulf and the Levant.

And now the American war party, undeterred by the quagmire in Iraq, convinced that their model of New Empire is working, is eager to go on the offensive again. They may yet find a pretext to plunge the United States into another war. Ahmadinejad's visit to New York this year will not include his visit to Ground Zero, because that is hallowed ground for American patriotism and he is being depicted as not just a critic of the United States but as the leader of an enemy state. His visit may, however, be ground zero for the next big military struggle of the United States in the Middle East, one that really will make Iraq look like a cakewalk.
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Another "secret" war

Tomgram: The Seymour Hersh Mystery
A Journalist Writing Bloody Murder…

And No One Notices
By Tom Engelhardt
Let me see if I've got this straight. Perhaps two years ago, an "informal" meeting of "veterans" of the 1980s Iran-Contra scandal -- holding positions in the Bush administration -- was convened by Deputy National Security Advisor Elliott Abrams. Discussed were the "lessons learned" from that labyrinthine, secret, and illegal arms-for-money-for-arms deal involving the Israelis, the Iranians, the Saudis, and the Contras of Nicaragua, among others -- and meant to evade the Boland Amendment, a congressionally passed attempt to outlaw Reagan administration assistance to the anti-communist Contras. In terms of getting around Congress, the Iran-Contra vets concluded, the complex operation had been a success -- and would have worked far better if the CIA and the military had been kept out of the loop and the whole thing had been run out of the Vice President's office.

Subsequently, some of those conspirators, once again with the financial support and help of the Saudis (and probably the Israelis and the Brits), began running a similar operation, aimed at avoiding congressional scrutiny or public accountability of any sort, out of Vice President Cheney's office. They dipped into "black pools of money," possibly stolen from the billions of Iraqi oil dollars that have never been accounted for since the American occupation began. Some of these funds, as well as Saudi ones, were evidently funneled through the embattled, Sunni-dominated Lebanese government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora to the sort of Sunni jihadi groups ("some sympathetic to al-Qaeda") whose members might normally fear ending up in Guantanamo and to a group, or groups, associated with the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood.