>>>>> ".....The revolutionary Islamic regime in Tehran thus faces its most dangerous threat, an opposition which can no longer be dismissed as foreign-inspired, but whose revolutionary Islamic Shiite credentials are impeccable and who claim greater legitimacy than the corruption-ridden, oppressive clique in office.
The gunning down of the nephew of Mir Hussein Mousavi, seen as an assassination, further stoked the fury raging in the streets of Tehran. Yet Moussavi stood aside as the movement's senior cleric, Ayatollah Mehdi Karroubi, used the opportunity to further question the regime's religious legitimacy by asking: "What has happened to this religious system that it orders the killing of innocent people during the holy day of Ashura?"
DEBKAfile's Iranian sources estimate that the outbreaks can no longer be designated "riots" but the precursor of a popular counter-revolution which will gain momentum as time goes by. It will be extremely bloody and may be protracted because the heads of the current regime will not give the opposition an easy ride to power or let go of their positions without a fight.
Monday, showing they mean business, security forces were ordered to storm the offices of Moussavi and the reformist ex-president Mohammed Khatami and arrest seven of their aides.
They also detained two prominent critics of the regime, according to the pro-opposition Rahesabz website: former prosecutor-general and leading dissident Ayatollah Mousavi Ardabili, former foreign minister Ebrahim Yazdi and Emadeddin Baghi, a human rights campaign and journalist.
Revolutionary Iran's places of detention are notorious hellholes of torture and death which some detainees do not survive.
As for the US and the Europeans, they are seeing proof of the fallaciousness of their policy to refrain from applying undue foreign pressure on Tehran for fear of rallying the Iranian people around the regime. In fact, the opposite is the case; turning the heat on the regime will encourage the Iranian masses to more assertively resist their government and shorten its life.
Russia and China, though jealous of their ties with the current regime in Tehran, will not have missed the large cracks forming in its fabric and have to start taking the new situation into account. <<<<
There are legitimate reformers in Iran. Unfortunately it looks like they’re being sidelined by hardline Shiite reformers like Mir Mousavi and Khatami. Sad.