Posted on 06/21/2009 12:34:51 AM PDT by neverdem
WHATEVER happens in Iran in the aftermath of this month’s fraudulent elections, one thing is clear: we are witnessing not just a fascinating power struggle among men who’ve known each other intimately for 30 years, but the unraveling of the religious idea that has shaped the growth of modern Islamic fundamentalism since the creation of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt in 1928.
The Islamic revolution in Iran encompassed two incompatible ideas: that God’s law — as interpreted by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini — would rule, and that the people of Iran had the right to elect representatives who would advance and protect their interests. When Khomeini was alive and Iran was at war with Iraq, the tension between theocracy and democracy never became acute.
Upon his death in 1989, however, the revolution’s democratic promise started to gain ground. With the presidential campaign of Mohammad Khatami in 1997, it exploded and briefly paralyzed Khomeini’s successor, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and the theocratic elite. God’s will and the people’s wants were no longer compatible.
To the dismay of Ayatollah Khamenei, who remains supreme leader, Mir Hussein Moussavi, the candidate whom President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad “defeated” in the rigged elections, has become the new Khatami — except he is far more powerful. While Mr. Moussavi lacks Mr. Khatami’s reformist credentials, he is a far steelier politician. And the frustrations of President Khatami’s failed tenure have grown exponentially among a new generation that is less respectful of mullahs and revolutionary ideology.
Yet in the current demonstrations we are witnessing not just the end of the first stage of the Iranian democratic experiment, but the collapse of the structural underpinnings of the entire Islamic approach to modern political self-rule. Islam’s categorical imperative for both traditional and fundamentalist Muslims —“commanding right and forbidding wrong” — is being transformed...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The freedom fighters could sure use guns. I have great concern as to how long they can keep up the revolution without arms.
Untether the right folks in the right places, and maybe, just maybe, cascading events stop the Iranian nuke threat.
It would however require a US administration with some wisdom and courage.
Obama would more likely apologize pre-emptively for having meddlesome thoughts.
Nope.
Dictators fall when their security forces, particularly the army, turn on them.
They remain in power as long as enough armed people are willing to kill others for them. Power grows out of the barrel of a gun, in the final analysis.
Which is why who controls the guns is so critically important.
witnessing not just a fascinating power struggle among men who’ve known each other intimately for 30 years, but the unraveling of the religious idea that has shaped the growth of modern Islamic fundamentalism
WOW. Not much understanding of the Middle East and Islamofacism by these writers....
If they think that there is any unraveling of Islamofacism going on they are either on drugs orjust staing their own hopeful wishes....
Ahhh, don’t worry...They seem to be doing alright with rocks...
I have a good friend I used to work with, and earlier this year he and his wife went back to Tehran for a family wedding before all this erupted...
Basically, the smart folks are getting out, and the folks staying are stupid or insane (his words)...
He told members of his family to get out while they can...I recall him saying that nothing good is going to come from any of this, and no one inside, or out, is going to be able to do a damn thing about it...
How so?
You might want to take a look at this....Excellent
The army isn’t always willing to use its guns.
Tiananmen almost led to regime change because the Peking garrison appeared to be unwilling to fire on the people. So the regime brought in soldiers from distant areas who were willing to kill for them.
Occasionally a regime makes the idiotic decision to punish its army for not killing the people in sufficient number. The revolution in Romania got rolling when the dictator started having his secret police kill undependable soldiers.
He quickly discovered that secret police may be experienced killers, but they don’t usually have tanks or artillery.
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