Filed under: Asia, Middle East | Tags: Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, aqazadeh, Azad, Azadi, Basij, Green Revolution, Iran, Iran Elections, Iranian Elections 2009, Iranian Revolution, Islamic Republic, Khodi, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mir Hussein Mousavi, Mohamed Khatami, Nationalism, Revolutionary Guards
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25 June – 1 July 2009
Issue No. 953
Source: Al-Ahram Weekly Online
Western coverage of the political turmoil in Iran in the aftermath of the 12 June presidential election has for the most part presented a uniform image of the conflict: thousands of young, liberal, and defiant supporters of presidential challenger Mir-Hussein Mousavi have been protesting against what they see as massive fraud, a “coup” to re-elect Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The government, fearful of a popular uprising, has responded with massive use of force, killing and injuring protesters, arresting activists and politicians, and imposing an information blockade.
Analysts repeatedly ask themselves and others, “Is this a revolution?” And, more expectantly, “Are we witnessing the end of the Islamic Republic?” Whatever we are to make of the question of fraud (there apparently were some irregularities, but no evidence of widespread fraud), Ahmadinejad retains a huge popular base that is not prepared to forfeit its position. Rather than viewing the events of the past 12 days as signs of a revolution-in-the-making, we should be Continue reading
Filed under: Asia, Middle East | Tags: Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Barack Obama, Basiji, Electoral Fraud, Electoral Fruad Iran, Green Revolution, Iran, Iran Elections 2009, Iran Protests, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mir Hussein Mousavi, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, Neo-Con, Obama, Protests, Revolutionary Guard Corps, State Repression, Tehran, Zionist
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19 June 2009
Source: Common Dreams
The growing nonviolent insurrection in Iran against the efforts by the ruling clerics to return the ultra-conservative and increasingly autocratic incumbent president Mahmoud Ahmadinjead to power is growing. Whatever the outcome, it represents an exciting and massive outpouring of Iranian civil society for a more open and pluralistic society.
Ironically, defenders of Ahmadinejad’s repression are trying to blame everyone from the U.S. government to nonviolent theorist Gene Sharp to various small NGOs engaged in educational efforts on strategic nonviolent action as somehow being responsible for the popular uprising in Iran. It appears to be based upon the rather bizarre assumption that millions of Iranians would somehow be willing to pour out onto the streets in the face of violent repression by state security forces only because they have been directed to do so by people from an imperialist power which overthrew their last democratic government and subsequently propped up Continue reading
Filed under: Asia, Middle East, North America | Tags: Ali Khamenei, Arab, Baloch, Barak Obama, Basiji, CIA, Election Fraud, Green Revolution, Hossein Mousavi, Imperialism, Iran, Iran Elections 2009, Iran Protests, Islamic Republic of Iran, Kurds, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mass Protests, Mossad, Pakistan, Protests, State Repression, Tehran, Zionism
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18 June 2009
Source: The Hindu
The paranoia about interference from the West is worrying — but it may also be justified.
Long-term instability in Iran is an alarming prospect for western countries keen to resolve disputes over the country’s nuclear programme and other contentious issues. But continuing political weakness in Tehran is also likely to produce the opposite effect — increased regime concern about external attempts to interfere, destabilise, and exploit its vulnerabilities. This paranoid trend threatens unpredictable, even dangerous consequences – but may be justified.
Pinning blame for Iran’s post-election turmoil on Continue reading
Filed under: Asia, Middle East | Tags: 2009 Election Iran, Ahmadinejad, Ayatollah, Ayatollah Khomeini, Ayatollah Montazeri, Bush Administration, CIA, CIA Destablization Plan, CIA orchestarated Protests, Color Revolution, Colour Revolution, Covert "black" Operation, Georgia, Iran, Iran Election 2009, Iran Protests, Iranian Government, Iranian Protests, Islamic Republic, Kenneth Timmerman, London telegraph, Military, military attack on Iran, Montazeri, Mousavi, National Endowment for Democracy, Neoconservative, New Yorker, popular revolution, Protests, Reactionary, Seymore Hersh, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Tehran, Ukraine, Washington
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19-21 June 2009
Source: Counterpunch
A number of commentators have expressed their idealistic belief in the purity of Mousavi, Montazeri, and the westernized youth of Tehran. The CIA destabilization plan, announced two years ago (see below) has somehow not contaminated unfolding events.
The claim is made that Ahmadinejad stole the election, because the outcome was declared too soon after the polls closed for all the votes to have been counted. However, Mousavi declared his victory several hours before the polls closed. This is classic CIA destabilization designed to discredit a contrary outcome. It forces an early declaration of the vote. The longer the time interval between the preemptive declaration of victory and the release of the vote tally, the longer Mousavi has to create the impression that the authorities are using the time to fix the vote. It is amazing that people don’t see through this trick.
As for the grand ayatollah Montazeri’s charge that the election was stolen, he was the initial choice to succeed Khomeini, but lost out to the current Supreme Leader. He sees in the protests an opportunity to Continue reading
Filed under: Asia, Middle East | Tags: 1979 Iranian Revolution, Afghanistan, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Anglo-American, Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, Ayatollah Khomeini, Barak Obama, British Petroleum, Carter Administration, Central Asia, CIA, CIA coup, CIA Destablization Plan, Coup D'etat, Democracy, Egypt, Ex-Foreign Minister Yazidi, George Bush, Haiti, Hamas, Hezbollah, Hosni Mubarak, Iran Election 2009, Iran Guardian council, Iran Interior Minister, Iran June 12 Presidential Election, Iran Protests, Iran Ruling elite, Iran's Parliament, Iran's Prime Minister, Iranian, Iranian Street protests, Iranian workers, Jean-Bertrand Aristed, Jebhe Melli, Lebanon, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mir Hussein Mousavi, Mohammed Javed Mozafar, Mohammed Mossadegh, Monarchy, National Front of Iran, NATO, Palestine, Pashto Radio, Protests, Republicanism, Reza Shah Pahlavi, Sadeq Mahsouli, Seymour Hersh, Soviet Union, Stolen Election, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Tehran, Tehran University, Theocratic State, Theodore Roosevelt, US Media, Venezuela, Wall Street Journal, Washington, Washington Post, White House
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18 June 2009
Source: Global Research
In the run-up to Iran’s June 12 presidential election, early indications suggested the media’s reaction if the wrong candidate won. On June 7, New York Times writer Robert Worth reported “a surge of energy (for) Mir Hussein Mousavi, a reformist who is the leading contender to defeat Mr. Ahmadinejad (and) a new unofficial poll (has him well ahead) with 54 percent of respondents saying they would vote for him compared with 39 percent for Mr. Ahmadinejad.” No mention of who conducted the poll, how it was done, what interests they represented, or if Mousavi winning might be the wrong result. More on that below.
Writing for the influential far right Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Fariborz Ghadar described the contest as “pit(ting) the hard-line Mahmoud Ahmadinejad against two relatively moderate and one conservative challenger.” In spite of one or more independent polls showing Ahmadinejad way ahead, he suggested that “the outcome (isn’t) Continue reading
Filed under: Asia, Middle East | Tags: 1979 Iranian Revolution, Azad, Azadi, Azadi Square, Basiji Militia, Electoral Fraud, Engelob Square, Hojatolislam Mohamed Khatami, Iran, Iran Election 2009, Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Islamic Republic of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Massacre Tehran University, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, Protest, Reza Khan, Riot Police, Shah of Iran, Sharif University, Sohrab Sepehri, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Tehran, Tehran University
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16 June 2009
Source: The Independent
It was Iran’s day of destiny and day of courage. A million of its people marched from Engelob Square to Azadi Square – from the Square of Revolution to the Square of Freedom – beneath the eyes of Tehran’s brutal riot police. The crowds were singing and shouting and laughing and abusing their “President” as “dust”.
Mirhossein Mousavi was among them, riding atop a car amid the exhaust smoke and heat, unsmiling, stunned, unaware that so epic a demonstration could blossom amid the hopelessness of Iran’s post-election bloodshed. He may have officially lost last Friday’s election, but yesterday was his electoral victory parade through the streets of his capital. It ended, inevitably, in gunfire and blood.
Not since the 1979 Iranian Revolution have Continue reading
Filed under: Asia, Middle East | Tags: 1979 Iranian Revolution, Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, British Intelligence, CIA, Coup D'etat, Iran, Iran 2009 Election, Iran Rigged Election, Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Mass Protests, Millions Protest Iran, Mossadegh, Mousavi, Paramlitary, President Ahmadinejad, Tehran
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13 June 2009
Source: The Nation
It’s Saturday afternoon in Tehran, and the streets are generally quiet. But the aftermath of Iran’s rigged election, in which radical-right President Ahmadinejad and his paramilitary backers were kept in office, has left Iran’s capital steeped in anger, despair, and bitterness.
Last night, after the polls closed, heavily armed troops from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps were in evidence in the streets. In one area of north Tehran, where backers of opposition challenger and reformist ex-Prime Minister Mousavi are concentrated, I saw a convoy of at least fifteen military vehicles filled with armed guards idling along the side of the road. The street in front of the Interior Ministry, where votes are counted, is blocked and heavily guarded after rumors that Mousavi supporters might gather there to protest the election count.
Mousavi himself has pledged to fight the Continue reading
( Dated Piece | 8 May 2009 )
Source: Global Research
Washington. U.S. President Barack Obama allocated more war funds for Afghanistan than those earmarked for Iraq in the budget plan he unveiled Thursday, Xinhua News Agency informs.
The president proposed 130 billion U.S. dollars in appropriation to support overseas military operations in fiscal year 2010 that begins Oct. 1, including 65 billion dollars for Afghanistan and 61 billion dollars for Iraq, according to his budget plan released by the White House.
It marks the first time that war spending for Afghanistan overtook those for Iraq and is in accordance with the new administration’s ongoing shift of war focus from Iraq to Afghanistan.
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5 June 2009
Source: ZNet
A CNN headline, reporting Obama’s plans for his June 4 Cairo address, reads ‘Obama looks to reach the soul of the Muslim world.’ Perhaps that captures his intent, but more significant is the content hidden in the rhetorical stance, or more accurately, omitted.
Keeping just to Israel-Palestine — there was nothing substantive about anything else — Obama called on Arabs and Israelis not to ‘point fingers’ at each other or to ‘see this conflict only from one side or the other.’ There is, however, a third side, that of the United States, which has played a decisive role in sustaining the current conflict. Obama gave no indication that its role should change or even Continue reading
RACISM & NATIONAL CONSCIOUSNESS | NEWS/COMMENTARY 