When this starts showing up in the neighborhoods, you'll know its end of Iranian civilization, as we know it. :)
Posted on 10/26/2001 11:10:20 PM PDT by kattracks
Tens of thousands of young people have taken to the streets of Iran in the past week, causing some of the worst violence in the history of the 22-year-old Islamic revolution.
The youths – both boys and girls – used two World Cup football qualifying fixtures as an excuse to reclaim the streets and assert their hunger for Western culture and freedoms.
In Tehran, the young people braved tear gas and blows from the security forces to cavort to the sound of the Western pop star Sonique, blaring from radios. Girls blew hooters at Islamic vigilantes armed with staves while their boyfriends fought riot police with stones and homemade explosives.
Shock at a 3-1 loss against Bahrain on Sunday sparked two nights of nationwide protests and the crowds returned to the streets on Wednesday following a 1-0 victory against the Emirates.
"What we're witnessing are the sort of demonstrations which preceded the last months of the Shah,'' said a senior Iranian analyst who wanted his name withheld.
Dozens of banks have been burned and cars overturned as the authorities set up special courts to try more than a thousand detainees officially denounced as football hooligans.
But the chanting of the crowds has been overtly political. Youths taunted groups of brutal Islamic vigilantes known as Bassiji, Persian for holy warriors, and chanted zindibad azadi [long live freedom].
The 11 September attacks have boosted pro-Western voices. Iran has emerged as one of the few Muslim states where people have taken to the streets in sympathy with the US.
Conservatives remain suspicious that expressions of sympathy hide a broader agenda of counter-revolution. Earlier this month in Mohseni Square – a part of Tehran so Westernised that Iranians call it the 51st state of America – police used clubs to disperse a crowd of mourners, including elderly women, holding a vigil for the New York attacks.
Hard-liners say that the war in Afghanistan marks the final stage in the military encirclement of Iran. In addition to the US arsenal in the Persian Gulf, Washington now has thousands of troops close to Iran's eastern border with Pakistan and to the north in Tajikistan.
Western efforts to bring back the exiled shah of Afghanistan are arousing fears of a similar plot to restore a shah to Iran. In silent protests on Sunday, demonstrators in Mohseni Square claimed Reza Pahlavi, the son of the ousted late shah, as their spiritual leader.
Opposition satellite TV channels beamed from Los Angeles have stoked a growing nostalgia for the monarchy. In a belated effort to muzzle the royalists, the Islamic vigilantes have swooped on the rooftops of northern Tehran confiscating hundreds of satellite dishes.
But popular pressure has already extracted concessions from the ayatollahs. While women are still barred from attending football games, they now occupy the front desks in Iranian hotels and strut the streets holding hands with their boyfriends.
Opposition to the great Satan of the US has given way to tacit support for the attack on the Taliban and an official policy of "active neutrality'' in the American bombing. Iran has also undertaken to rescue any US airmen downed in Afghanistan.
Newspaper editorials have openly appealed to the clerics not to waste the opportunity to mend relations with the US and have called on President Khatami to join the alliance.
I hope you're right and I wish we could get some hard numbers on the percentage of Iranians that think the way these rioters apparently think. Personally, I don't think it's sufficient to bring about change. We certainly didn't see that many Iranians demonstrating against the regime during the 80s and 90s -- inside or outside Iran. And it's not encouraging that so many Moslems worldwide oppose what we're doing in Afghanistan and the Middle East, and positively hate our guts. But, from a seed grows an oak. So . . . Here's hoping that something new and totally uncharacteristic is taking place in Iran! :-)
I will forever be grateful to him.
We talked a bit about Iran. He was from Tehran and I had lived in Ahwaz but had visited Tehran several times. Pretty scary place, Tehran is, for a girl born and bred in flat Oklahoma. Those mountains we drove up and down on terrified me. rofl!
The majority of the Iranians are not our enemies but our friends. Just as bloody bill was most probably a communist sleeper and a communist, he didn't speak for the majority of the U.S. people who believe in a Republican form of government and NOT the communist dictatorship that bloody bill envisioned, wanted, drooled over, and got hard thinking about. I still don't know how he got elected that 2nd time. Maybe it needs to be studied so that we can try to prevent any future demonrats from voter/election fraud in the future.
When this starts showing up in the neighborhoods, you'll know its end of Iranian civilization, as we know it. :)
Sounds like a reasonable post to me... can you be a little more specific in your rebuttal? Americans are pro-America, and want to be wealthy. Iranians are pro-Iran, and want to be wealthy. That's typical human self-interest, and harnessing that drive is the main reason that American Freedom has made this the best nation on the face of the earth.
How does that make one's life worthless?
So you're saying what? The current Teheran government is an occupying force? (Isn't that the term Ashrawi and the Palies like to use for their 'oppressors?') The Israeli government is a fundamentalist authoritarian regime? You don't really know how to draw political comparisons, do you?
Try reading history. Lots of it. Then you can safely venture out into the deep end of the pool, so to speak.
The Israelis have a right to existence. They occupied this land long before 1948. The Palestians are just another Arab hate group. They should just go back to their real homeland (Jordan).
Working with Iran could be extremely beneficial to our interests at this time.
I don't believe I stated at anytime during my post that Iranians had no right to live. Thanks for noting this point, Teacher317.
Excellent typo. :)
You'd guess wrong on two points, I_Had_Enough:
1. They are definitely worth living -- don't recall that I said anything close to that and stated such in my post to Teacher317. A relationship with a revitalized Iran could be quite beneficial to the entire Western World at this point. It is, however, important, to note driving forces in relationships with countries. We have made some serious mistakes in our foreign policy in the past by not noting AND understanding underlying national interests.
2. I'm not a mister -- I'm a Mrs. for about 24 years. ;-D
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.