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“Ahmadinejad and the ‘Half-Pregnant’ Khomeinists”
-Amir Taheri
06/04/2007

ARTICLE SNIPPET: “Is the crisis provoked by the capture of the British hostages part of a smokescreen for a crackdown on dissidents in Iran?

The question is posed in Tehran as the establishment debates the future course of the regime’s foreign and domestic policies.

The crackdown is beginning to gather pace.

Several publications critical of aspects of government policy have been closed down, and numerous officials regarded as “not revolutionary enough” elbowed out, especially in the provinces.

And now the regime seems to be setting the stage for show-trials that recall the worst days of Stalinism in the Soviet Union.

Last month a member of the Islamic Consultative Assembly (Majlis), the regime’s ersatz parliament, was sent to prison for six years on trumped up charges. The real guilt of Salaheddin Ala’i, however, was that he had criticized the brutal repression of dissidents in Iran’s Kurdistan province.

Next week, it would be the turn of Mostafa Tajzadeh, a former Deputy Interior Minister to stand trial on charges of undermining the security of the Khomeinist state.

Tajzadeh is one of the most interesting figures of the establishment. A man with impeccable revolutionary credentials he has always insisted that the regime cannot ensure its future by silencing or murdering critics.

Tajzadeh is expected to be followed by Muhammad-Reza Khatami, a brother of former President Muhammad Khatami.

The younger Khatami also has an impressive revolutionary CV.

In 1979, he was one of the two dozen or so “students” who raided the United States’ Embassy in Tehran and seized its diplomats hostage.

Later, he built a career with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and solidified his revolutionary credentials by marrying a granddaughter of Ruhallah Khomeini, the ayatollah who created the Islamic Republic. During his brother’s presidency, Muhammad Reza acted as Deputy Speaker of the Majlis.

And, yet, he too, is targeted by the new radical administration of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and charged with “activities that undermine the Islamic system.””