Googoosh

Clip from Dar Emtedaade Shab, 1978 (Along the night) ... things that led to the Islamic Republic of Iran ... pity! She, Faegheh Atashin, known as Googoosh, was/is a great star. I didn't know pre-revolutionary Iranian film had this much flesh! Here's her official web site with lots of cool pictures.



And this is for Iran, now, ... She still sounds GREAT after 30 years!

No; Khamenei's savagery is getting worse ...

In this video, people are chanting in support of Karoubi, and then he gets out of the car.


In this video See Khamenei's savage guards:


So my earlier hypothesis is REJECTED! These savages have totally lost it ...

But here is the spirit of hope and courage:

On the eve of 13 Aban Rally: Ayatollah Montazeri apologizes for the event of taking the American diplomats hostage.

13 Aban; November 4th, anniversary of the "Hostage Crisis"; Day of "daneshjoo" (student); people are preparing for it on their roofs:

Ayatollah Montazeri has issued a statement in response to inquiries of his followers, in which he regrets the price Iran has had to pay for the hostage taking event, and the dive that Iran has taken in America's public opinion. He states: "A country's embassy is part of its soil. To occupy the embassy of a country that is not at war with us, is a declaration of war. It is wrong. Many of the young students who were involved in the event have also now recognized that it was wrong." (an example is Mohsen Makhmalbaf, who has issued an official apology for raiding the American embassy in November 1980. This statement by Montazeri is the closest to an apology ever issued by any of Iran's "revolutionaries". Here, he explicitly states that at the time he was behind Khomeini on this (as they feared, or were led to believe that the US was planning another 1953-style coup d'etat in its embassy), but that he now regrets that.

In response to other questions about Iran's relation with China and Russia vis a vis the West, Montazeri has also criticized the Iranian government's blind trust in Russia; and its blanket distrust of America. Montazeri has also mentioned the role of Israel and the Israel Lobby in the US representative bodies, to compromise the prospects of resuming diplomatic relations between Iran and the US. (This is TRUE. The carrots and sticks strategy has never and will never work with Iran. And I am afraid, I will have to agree with that Khamenei that Americans have not been smart to pass "sanction-if" resolutions while waiting for Iran's response! That move has jeopardized ALL trust, putting Ahmadinejad in a really IMPOSSIBLE corner to bend to their demands. And today, Angela Merkel has just made it even worse. What kind of logic governs America baffles me! It sometimes mirror the logic of Iran's worst fanatics.

Coinciding with this, one of the reformist parties has issued a warning based on rumors that in tomorrow's rally, some (on the fascists' side) might conspire an attack on some embassies [I presume China and Russia, although it is not specified] and then to blame it on the reformist greens. This organization is stressing the necessity of remaining peaceful and not reacting to the provocations of the fascist forces of Basij and Sepah. Of course, there is plenty of evidence for the government's explicit intention to AGITATE the anti-Ahmadinejad forces. There is not a day that some ex-IRGC commander or Ahmadinejad minister does not give a speech in some Iranian university. (These events are often attended by and spiced up with vocal and creative forms of reformist student's protest. However, the government's efforts to frustrate the protesters into violence has so far failed).

These young kids must be commended for their restraint.

The commander in charge of Tehran security has issued a statement that the only authorized rally will take place in front of America's embassy. Interestingly, the leaders of both sides (i.e reformist leaders like Mousavi & Karoubi) and coup d'etat IRGC government have been all encouraging tomorrow's rally. I suspect, that in line with the recent show of "mathematics gold Olympian criticized Khamenei in his face and was not killed or arrested"; tomorrows rally, and perhaps the Greens' slogans in criticism of Ahmadinejad or Khamenei will be tolerate; perhaps a nod in the direction of national unity and reconciliation, that despite all tough words, the leaders of Iran on BOTH sides need and wish for.

We shall see ...

Tehran will no longer be the capital; and this is a good thing.

The idea to move Iran's capital from Tehran is not new. Teran is the largest city oft the Middle East, with a day-time population of over 12 million, ranks 16th on the list of the most crowded cities of the world. Tehran has an archaeological history that dates back to 6000 BC; but most of its fame and fortune comes as the Qajar monarch, the brutal Agha Mohammad Khan-e Ghajar, declared it capital in 1795. At that time, Tehran was just a village, but on the skirt of beautiful mountains, with one of the most heavenly waters of earth. (On wikipedia, you can get an overview of the city, old and new.) To the epicureans that Quajars were, Tehran served plenty of pleasure.

In one of the latest meetings of the expediency council (headed by Hashemi Rafsanjani), the 20-years long plan to move Iran's capital from Tehran was put on track. The summary of the issues discussed and resolutions passing through the Expediency Council's is as follows (Persian here): (please note that no where on their web site could I find and EXPLICIT news about the Tehran-move. If you see it, please hint to me).

1. Choosing suitable locations for balanced distribution of residential and business quarters in a manner consistent with economic, social, political, cultural, security and defense considerations.
2. National and provincial developmental undertakings in border regions, via economic incentives; strengthening the infrastructure, suitable population distribution and strengthening the security and defense forces with regards to threats. [don't say from whom!]
3. Reorganization of service industries, and population distribution with considerations for management of natural disasters, accidents, water resources and respecting the geological conditions, in order to increase the safety index of vital and essential infrastructure in population centers, cities and villages.
4. strengthening cooperation, national unity and social bonds by increasing the level of development (towse'eh) across the country by creating poles and centers for development(towse'eh).
5. Transferring the political centers of the city to suitable locations to improve and correct the population distribution across the country to the end of projection [doesn't say WHICH projection!]
6. Balanced development of villages and small towns to prevent uncontrolled migration to provincial capitals.

ُThis, translated to "human" language, means:

• Tehran is built on a disaster time bomb (many new housing developments have taken place on ticking fault lines; against the unequivocal objection of Iranian geologists and urban planners--corruption and violation of expert regulations are so grave that top notch urban planners are quitting their profession in disgust and depression--not to forget Kian Tajbakhsh, the Iranian American urban planner who has received a 12 year prison sentence!!).
• Tehran is a political time bomb, with its various universities and high concentration of cultural and educational institutes posing a great threat to the adjacently located IRI's administration (Literally! Iran's important ministries are situated side by side Tehran's most vocal and political universities: e.g. Oil ministry shares the neighborhood with Tehran Poly Technique (Amir Kabir) and State ministry with Tehran University).

It is estimated (professionally and since 20 years ago) that moving the political and administrative centers from Tehran will at least help a daily reduction of one million people. It will also put a distance between the financial and political districts, that will hopefully reduce corruption. And on the brightest side, it will help Tehran's notorious pollution and hopefully prevent the environmental disasters following massive housing projects (undertaken by Mr Ahmadinejad) with no regards for the designated green zones (or even the historical sites).

I am all for moving the capital from Tehran; who wants to live near corrupt or boring bureaucrats? However, in Iran the government has its hands in EVERY single detail of private, public, economic, and social life (a dependency to which the Iranian people are well accustomed--thanks to dependency on oil-revenues). Therefore, whatever location the capital is going to be, it will need proper communication and transportation infrastructure that will make the the intricate individual/governmental interactions efficient. Let's hope that this will indeed meet the projections of the experts to generate 600,000 new jobs over the next five years; slow down the wave of migration to Tehran; scale down the magnitude of the disaster in waiting, and improve the suffocating smog and traffic problems.

I will be watching with interest where this leads to.

Sarmayeh Newspaper: BANNED ...

This is the newspaper that I often cited. "Sarmayeh" in Persian means "Capital" or "Assets", therefore it was a newspaper focusing on the economy! In recent months, after speaking about Mousavi and Karoubi was "forbidden", Sarmayeh was again focusing on the economy; often providing detailed reports of irregularities in IRGC's economic practice and participation!

There goes another source ... below a snap shot of their headlines today. With everyone of these newspapers going offline, I feel like loosing a friend. Imagine a world when you wake up knowing your favorite newspaper will never be delivered to your door again ... the IRI is loosing the very last particles of its legitimacy ... COWARD CRIMINALS.

Masood Roozbehani's Parents pardon his killer.

Two weeks ago, a 21 year old boy who had committed an unmeditated murder in self defense was brought to the gallows, where the mother of his victim vengfully pulled the stool from under his feet, and ignoring his lawyer's plea, on his knees, to let him hold his legs, when he was dying; the woman had said: "Aah, I am relieved now!"

In the same country, however, parents of Masood Roozbehani have pardoned the killer of their son; proving the fact that the Islamic Penal Code does not deprive Iranians of their humanity; should they choose to transcend and exercise it.

I wish the Roozbehani family to know that I am shedding tears for their son now; and that they have eternalized him by their humane decision; and that they are the hope of that country of ours ... all my respect.

132 killed, 520 injured ...

In a bombing in Baghdad
In one day
In one second
...
...
freedom
to bomb
...

What Happened to Mehrjui's Santuri?

Dariush Mehrjui speaks of how Ahmadinejad's revolutionizing the Iranian cinema ...

Santuri is a film about countering drug addiction ... During Ahmadinejad, addition rates have been exponentially increasing (according to Iran;s official rates) ... Interestingly, the IRGC "martyrs" of the Jundollah's recent suicide attack seem to have been in cahoot with Balouch drug lords [persian link].

Karoubi, the courageous cleric and Ahmadnejad's shameful and shameless media

Today, Karoubi made an unannounced appearance in the Media Exhibit. He was instantly greeted by green chants of support. He was attacked and was injured in the head. Below is the coverage of Farce News (in red): People kicked Karoubi out of the Exhibit. In the picture the instant a show is hitting his head can be seen. [update: the shoe in the picture was photoshopped; Karoubi has denied that anyone has thrown a shoe at him. This is Fars News' "retaliation" for students throwing a shoe at Safar-Harandi; Ahmadinejad's previous minister of culture.] Clicking on the report brings you to error. At least there seem to be some will to put a cap on the shameless behavior of Ahamdinejad's barbaric media! (By the way IRNA is not reporting this.) Click here to see the Fars News snapshot before it was removed. (Intrnet and web sites reporting this are flooded with messages of gratitude and love for Karoubi. With all my hatred of clergy, I bow to Karoubi's resolve.)

He is laughing, as he is escorted out by his bodyguards (source)

How are the Ahmadinejad's media reacting to the Nuclear Closure?! (Part 2: IRNA)

Finally, after 24 hours IRNA is back today, Friday. Their archives is empty of "Thursday"! Again, nothing about Nuclear Proposal; other than: (2nd column, 4th row)

China has welcomed the progress in solving the nuclear negotiations!

Other headlines:

• Ayatollah Amoli: Human rights without God's message is impossible. [don't try to make sense of this]
• Interior Minister emphasized the importance of provisioning plans for natural disasters
• Strong earthquake in Afghanistan
• Falahat-Pisheh: The role of teh media in critical periods in society becomes more important [that's why IRNA goes down for one day and then avoids talking about nuclear negotiations!]
• Ayatollah Sobhani: Without faith, society is never safe.
• Parliament member: With streamlining subsides [he means cutting them] the government narrows the poverty gap [he means with a projected 60% inflation!]
• Iran insists on preventing the militarization of space!

And then in the side bar

• Javad Larijani [again that educated primate,]: Mousavi has to take a posture that suits him!! [this saying is something bully kids on highschool yard would tell others who are trying to standup to them! More proof of the kind of uncultured thugs claiming leadership of Iran ...]
• ProIsrael members [of congress]: Obama shoudl sacntion Iran
• India is careful about relations with Iran
• US/Israel's expensive military exercise was censored [from Western media]
• Program for satellite meetings of Media Exhibition announced (see this)
• The ex-editor of Junge Welt exposes vast media campaign against Iran [well IRNA, why don't you give us the REAL news so we can counter the western media?]

By the way, no news of arrests on IRNA, FARCE news, nor even Tabnak or Etemaad. Meaning the circle of media oppression's tightening--on the eve of the well advertised, poorly attended Media Exhibition!

At least, IRNA could spin the nuclear news like these dudes: Iran's (5.3%) enriched uranium is of such hight quality that the Westen countries are eager to get their hands on! [and sell back the 19.5% one!]

By the way, Fars News' important news (after mentioning that the French Total wishes to invest in Iran's oil fields to produce LNG, in which CNPC of china had already invested and the project ws bid on in EPC [i haven't the slightest clue what these abbreviations stand for; but I am sure all the poor and rural supporters of Ahmadinejad do know these things]) is this:

• Increase in unemployment rate in 23 of American states!!

How are the Ahmadinejad's media reacting to the Nuclear Closure?!

Update (8:00 PM) They have were not satisfied with the distractors I listed below! They have just raided and arrested tens of the family members of the jailed journalists and politicians. The families of the detainees were gathered for a Komeil Prayer; something they have been doing every Thursday in someone's family home in the past few months ... they were collected up in three vans and taken away!

By the way, IRNA is STILL down!

=================================================

IRNA's web site is DOWN! (And Pedestrian tells me it's been down since this morning!!!)

ISNA has NO NEWS!

Farce News: picture speaks volumes! (the nuclear "DEFEAT" is "masked" in title 5!!!!)

HEADLINE: Koolayee (the woman with glasses) in interview with FARS said Extremism lead to failure of reforms!

Title 2: Larijani: Had Mousavi's Coup D'etat succeeded, the Islamism of the system will have been lost! (WHAT THE F>>>!!!!!!)

Title 3: Clinton, Iran's Nuclear program is peaceful!

Title 4: Minister of culture, the leaders of the chaos were operators of premeditated plots!

Title 5: In interview with Al-Alam Soltaniyeh insists on guarantees from the west!

And by the way ...

And of course here's more on Russia's role in mediating ties between Mr Ahmadinejad and Israel! (thanks German for the link) It all makes sense; only if Ahmadinejadists were not such power hungry cheating lying hypocrites!

Also see: Pedestrian reporting from IRIB

:D

LOL!

All Ahmadinejad-lovers and Israeli-Lovers, hahhhahahah!

Iran's Marlon Brando

His name is Behrouz Vosoughi. To some, he is the best male actor in Iran before the revolution.

To my shame, I know too little about pre-revolution Iranian cinema and even less about Vossoughi.

Primarily, because when I was growing up these films were considered "adult film" and my parents had a strict regime of what was suitable for me to watch. My mother was a modern woman, and a feminist one; but she considered the Western cultural emulations displaced, distasteful and inappropriate.

Then, after revolution, these films were banned; and possessing them became illegal. This suited my parents just fine, because at the time Iranian cinema was full of what is considered B-movies (Film-Farsi), which my parents considered corrupt and hallow. Of course, I was in grade school when all this happened. In any case, I did not grow up in a tele-visual or cinematic family! (my pre-revolutionary cinema-going memories belong to when my university-student uncle took me to cinema--and I hated those boring black and white films he subjected me to); or when my father saw to it that the cinema was kept private for a "family" viewing; because in those days cinemas were often for young men who were doing their military service.

Of course, when I left Iran I could access as many film-Farsi's as I wished, thanks to an Iranian video store in my neighborhood that carried the most obscure of them. However, mainly because Vosooghi often played the character of a Rough-Guy; and because I have little ability to watch violence and melodrama I was never attracted to the genre he was suited for. Nevertheless, he has acted in some of the films of notable Iranian directors such as Ali Hatami (Sootehdelam, 1977); Masood Kimiyayi (6 of Kimiai's famous films including Kaiser, 1969, video clip below); Amir Naderi (Tangseer, 1973); several films of Fereydoon Goleh including Kandoo, 1975) and others. Vosughi's career came to an end in 1981 when he chose exile to IRI.

I thought a little video clip of how a cinema star looked in pre-revolutionary Iran, together with a clip of one of his most famous films (Gheysar; meaning Kaiser) would be fun! It is essential to know that the Iranian cinema that, thanks to the French critics, became known as "The Cinema of 90s", is founded on a 100-years long tradition of filmmaking that started during the Qajar dynasty; and for which, academic foundations were established thanks to the efforts of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi. The clerics are now taking advantage of what they completely frowned upon then--and for which they really wanted the Pahlavis toppled! :)

On the Hypocrisy of Succumbing to International Pressure

As soon as news about one million annulling of rigged votes in Afghanistan was broadcast; the Iranians blogsphre and twitter-space was filled with mocking comments to Ahmadinejad, who was the first world leader to RUSH and congratulate Hamed Karzai on his re-election.

I was curious how the Pro-Ahmadinejad news outlets are reflecting this news and what Iran's official response has been to Karzai conceding to hold a second round of election. (Needless to say, the reformists are using the meager space they have to praise Afghans and Karzai for respecting due election process and conceding to second election term to resolve controversies.)

Fars (or False News) was silent. I could not retrieve anything on this from their archive. But, there was a funny piece on IRNA. Since nowadays posts disappear from the web; I decided to take a snapshot:


It's the second title:
"Reformist (2nd khordadi) media praise Afghans' succumbing to humiliation of their national dignity and independence"

The article (a long one) name the reformists (even Hahshemi--who is NOT a reformist) and "analyses" their motivations for praising Karzai's decision. Then we get to the farcical (in their view serious of course) subheading:

History of diplomatic submission and defeat:
It is noteworthy that in this 2nd Khordad site and other reformist media hese days, are encouraging Karzai to giving in to the Western pressure. During managing Iran's nuclear dossier this team that is linked to the heads of the reform, repeatedly backed off to Western threats, and was planning to voluntarily! [exclamation mark is IRNA's] sell all of our nuclear scientists achievements." Demands of this team were undertaken directly by Khatami; and although it went as far as stopping laboratory enrichment, but was stopped by supreme leader and with Ahmadinejad's insistence has gone ahead to the level of 8000 centrifuge centers.

[I have to add that this piece is FULL of Persian grammatical and syntax errors; reflecting journalistic inadequacy of the state-run media--with which, Ahmadinejad's promising to launch a media war against the eloquent writers of the reform who are still in prison.]

I guess we are all waiting for the news of their nuclear submission to "Western" demands! The ONLY good thing that probably came out of Ahmadinejad's Coup D'etat was to bring a closure to this stupid nuclear business! NO! Don't jump to conclusion! Ahmadinejad doesn't have any SPECIAL diplomatic talent. He is doing EVERYTHING that Khatami was doing 8 years ago, vis as vis Western pressure on nuclear issue. Except that during Khatami, we had dogs who are not represented by Ahmadinejad, barking over the shoulders of the reformist diplomats and administration. Also, during Khatami, Clinton was too busy with Monica affairs (for which he had to pay America's war-machine a ransom by bombing Serbia) and then later, a Bushman was running the White House ...

Update: Today (October 22) Haarez publishe a piece that Iran and Israel have met in Cairo to discuss nuclear future! Less than one week ago, Tabnak.ir reported "Russia's Strange Proposal". I can no longer find this piece; but in that report Tabnak (a news source close to conservative Mohsen Rezayee) claimed that Russia's Foreign minister in in interview with Russia Today had stated that Iran and Israel need to negotiate and that there is no reason for tension and war! The "strange"ness of Russia's proposal was "to dare making such proposal to Iran, who, mindful of people's sensitivity, was reluctant to accept legitimacy of Israel, EVEN BEFORE REVOLUTION!" If anyone can find the Russian report of this, or its reflection in other media, please let me know.

Dariush Shayegan: The Theoretician of Dialogue of Civilizations

Dariush (or Daryush) Shayegan, a Sorbonne Graduate and a leading Iranian translator and intellectual, mainly writes in French.

A few years back he published "Cultural Schizophrenia", about the paradoxical confrontation of modernizing Islamic societies with the West; and the western notions of modernity. One of his interesting arguments (which has become empirically evident since the publication of the book in 1997) is that Iran has culturally leaped from tradition to postmodernity, without maturing in modernity, and is thus suffering schizophrenic symptoms (clinically, schizophrenia is characterized by detachment from reality and "self"). He finds it inevitable that Iran (and other progressive Islamic countries) would join the (already post-modernist) multicultural world, embracing diversity and tolerance towards "others".

In 1977, Shayegan initiated an international symposium on the "dialogue between civilizations," a concept that was later (in 2001) appropriated by the Iranian President Mohammad Khatami (whom George Bush shunned, and after benefitting from his help and cooperation in Afghanistan, branded Iran "axis of Evil, thus CRUSHING the reform movement and giving rise to the Ahmadinejad phenomena.)

Today, together with Mohammad Khatami, Shayegan became the first recipient of "Global Dialogue Prize" (500,000 DKK for research on the topic), to be handed in a ceremony in January 2010, In Kopengagen.

I recommend reading his work to anyone interested in philosophizing about Islam-West confrontation, and I am not alone!)

Bahram Baizai refuses to stage the play of his dreams in the upcoming International Fajr Theater

For those who do not know Bahram Beizai; I would describe him as Iran's Stanley Kubrick, with an added bonus: He's also Iran's Brecht!

Those of you who know about world-success of Iranian cinema have most likely not heard about Beyzaie (*). He is an uncompromising perfectionist, whose depth of art and vision often gets him in trouble with Iran's censors. But, Baizai loves the people and people love him. He is a master of Iranian theater, and literature; and although he is not banned from teaching in Tehran university, still much of Iranian theater owes its credit to him.

After a decade long absence from cinema, he was finally given permit to make one of his least favorite screenplays (When We Were All Asleep, 2008). Nevertheless it was an instant success. If you read that article, you would recognize how "hungry" Baizayi has been to talk to people through screen and stage.

By divine's!!! miracle, SUDDENLY Ahmadinejad's ministry of culture and Islamic guidance decided to grant Beizai permission to stage his "dream play" Sohrab-Koshi (written 13 years ago); which has been suffering censorship denials for several years.

However, Baizai has decided to "postpone staging this play to better times".

Ahmadinejad will soon realize that he has been standing on the dignity, genius and credit of many a great Iranian who will no longer allow him to stage his propaganda on their account!

We are tremendously pleased with Baizaee's protest! Remember a long time ago I listed my heros?

* Different spellings of name بيضايي are intentional.

Update: One of the many reasons (Persian) why Baizai decided to not stage the play was the censor's fussing about the name "Sohrab-Killing", fearing that it will invoke the memory of Sohrab A'rabi who was killed in recent protests. (note that Sohrab-Killing act derives from the story in Ferdowsi's Shahnameh (Epic of kings))

Alarming deforestation of Iran in the past 5 years

The news of Ahmadinejad's violation of environmental policies (not the international ones, but the ones set by the Governmental Organization of Environmental Protection) are reaching alarming frequency. If this trend continues, Iran will be fully deforested in the next 30 years. Most endangered are 400 ancient trees, one as old as 3000 years. Often these ancient trees are sites of pilgrim by villagers who believe in their healing power or divinity. I read in one of the links below that such trees run the risk of being cut in the name of "opposing superstition."! Of course this is ironic, given Iran's president has spent 17 million dollars building a mosque in "Jamkaran", where his Imam-Zaman resides in the bottom of a well. Yes Ahmadinejad is a highly superstitious man, and he is caught on video describing to some mullahs how he was surrounded with a halo of light (minute 1:06), mesmerising the audience when he delivered his speech in NY. (here's an audio report on it, in English).

Some of recent headlines:

• Cutting Chestnut trees to install gas pipelines
• 1/3rd of Iran's forests are destroyed in the past 5 years
• Iran's the 100th in terms of forest density in the world, but the 6th in terms of deforestation
• Damavand forest-park allocated to government housing project ...

Iran's Taliban; Ahmadinejad's Mentor: Freedom is a Satanic temptation ...

Iranian newspapers walk a thin line; but they don't need to write editorials to illustrate the very violent nature of Ahmadinejad's supporters. They just need to publish what they say. This clip is from the website of Sarmaye, an economy-oriented newspaper that despite a few warnings, is still operating.

Here, Mesbah Yazdi says:

"Freedom is one of those things that hearing it gives the impression of a sense of beauty for some, but it is a term that has been abused throughout history. America has been trying to promote lack of prejudice (bi-gheyrati) in the name of tolerance, and unfortunately some of the effects of this "tasahol & tasamoh" (means tolerance) appeared in our country too. [Here he is blaming Khatami.] Because they couldn't promote this tolerance in a country of followers of Hossein, they entered from the door of criticizing violence and terrorism[oh dear, cry murder!], and in this way promoted freedom, tolerance and the mixing of men and women, which is not only un-Islamic but also anti-Islamic. They [he means Khatami's reformists] even brought evidences from Islam to prove that Islam is the religion of tolerance [cry murder again]on the one hand, and to condemn violence on the other hand, and thus used beautiful tools to promote their satanic illusions! If someone decidely tries to harm Islam, she should be swiftly and severely confronted and no one has the right to ask for tolerance. "

P.S. I am listening to this report on BBC; it gives a background to Ahmadinejad's apocalyptic views. It is a fair report. I recommend it.

Where is the Supreme!!! leader??!

Apparently he has announced three days of national mourning for the victims of suicide bombing. But, he has not made a "personal" statement. Rumors have been circulating that khamenei is dead; and that pictures of his recent meeting with Senegal president were "doctored". He has been totally absent in the past two weeks; and that he has not made a public statement about the bombings, combined with the fact that despite all cacophony from Mohseni Ejehi (regarding arresting Karoubi) Both Mousavi and Karoubi have come out with public and states-manly statements today makes one wonder what's going on!

Also, Hashemi is very silent; however the conservative's barking fella Asgar-Owladi-e Mosalman! (literally, this man shouts and barks and moves all his body organs when he speaks) has come out yesterday to say: "khatami, Mousavi and Karoubi are children of this system" ...

something's going on, ESPECIALLY because Ahmadinejad's not used the IRGC killings to blame the internal conflict and has pointed the finger at Pakistani borders.

(Of course as many have commented; had Ahmadinejad's administration and IRGC not been acting AS SAVAGES in Baluchestan in recent years, perhaps this level of fundamentalism and Jundollah brutality would not have occurred!)

Suicide bombings: Have IRGC eliminations begun?

UPDATE: Karoubi and Mousavi's have both publicly condemned the bombing and have extended condolences to the families of all the victims (IRGC generals as well as Shiite and Sunni leaders) of the suicide attack. Mousavi has further expressed his commitment to fending off these extremist and fundamentalist agitations that stem from eastern borders of Iran (i.e Pakistan and Afghanistan).

Two hours ago, in a massive suicide bombing in the southeast border province of Sistan va Balouchistan, some of the high-ranking Sepah (IRGC) Commanders were killed:

Sardaar Noor-Ali Shooshtari; the deputy commander of IRGC's ground forces; Sardaar Mohammad-Zadeh; the Commander of Seestan & Baluchistan's IRGC, also IRGC commanders of the cities of Iranshahr, Sarbaz, and the region Pishin were killed. Seestan & Baluchestan (* different spelling is intentional) is the southeastern province bordering with Pakistan and as far as I recall, has been one of the bloodiest and most unstable regions of the country (I was born there). Post coup d'etat, the province has been in turmoil.

According to IRNA, as many as 60 people (update, 29 confirmed dead), including some of the tribal leaders of the province might have died. The high concentration of "important" figures in one place was for a the occation of a "Conference of Unity Between Iran's Suni & Shiite Nomades"

Yesterday, I saw a little news on Roydad that the IRGC is offering lucrative retirement packages; presumably to get rid of the older and original members of the IRGC, the warriors of the 8-years long defense against Iraqi invasion.

I will update this as news flows in and in the meantime, I am going to compilie a list of all IRGC commanders who have died in assassination plots. Scanning the "comment" sections of news web sites, it seems I am not the only Iranian who is smelling rats. I feel the blame for this one lays on the Al-Quaeda/USA coalition; giving the IRI perfect excuse it needs to tighten its grip on Iranian's throat! (The axis of warmongers) (Update: Iran's summoned the Pakistani diplomat demanding their cooperation to arrest the responsible members of Jundollahu.)

• Sepahbod Ali Sayad Shirazi, Chief-of_Staff of Iranian forces in the 8-year sacred defense ( Assassinated in front of his house in 1999; MKO claimed responsibility)

• Brigadier General Ahmad Kazemi, commander of the IRGC Ground Forces
• Brigadier General Saeed Mohtadi, commander of the IRGC’s 27 Mohammad Division,
• Brigadier General Hanif, Director of Intelligence of the IRGC Ground Forces,
• Brigadier General Saeed Soleimani, Director of Operations of the IRGC Ground Forces,
• and Brigadier General Yazdani, Commander of the IRGC Artillery. (All died in a plane crash 1n January 2006. Similarly to today's incident, this group of generals were on a mission of to the Iranian northwest separatist hot-zones. The crash was blamed on Technical failure. What is interesting is that this massive "elimination" happened 6 months after a massive shuffle in the IRGC that followed Ahmadinejad's (other fraudulent) election in 2005. Interestingly, this time around Khamenei's been reshuffling the IRGC and introducing fundamental changes such as creating an IRGC "intelligence organization", which previously was only a division.)

The following high profile generals all died in a plane crash in Kahrizak (near Tehran, and far from the war-zone), in 1981.

• Mohammad Jahan-Ara (Commander of Khoramshahr's IRGC, when under iraqi seige)
• Vali-o-llah Fallahi (Deputy head of the Army) (Uskuwi suggests he was Acting commander of the IRGC)
• Moosa Namjoo (Minister of Defense)
• Javad Fakuri (Consultant to deputy head of the Army) (Uskuwi: commander of the Airforce.)
• Yusef Kolahdooz (Acting chief of staff). (Uskuwi: Acting commander of IRGC)

This event occurred after Banisadr's impleachement and shortly before the liberation of Khoramshahr. In fact these generals were on their way to report on the battlefield realities to Khomeini. The cause of the C130 crash was stated technical failure.

Update: Jundullah has accepted responsibility for this bombing. 35 dead confirmed. (As I said before, let's thank AlQuaeda/USA's Iranian wing!) )ّIn this picture 26 year old Abdulmalek Rigi (Balouch) the leader of the movement ( which, funny funny haha, the BBC refers to as "resistance movement" and NOT terrorist, like they call Hamas & Hizbollah!!!!!!)

Needless to say, scenes like this do not help or buy much sympathy of the IRI amongst the Balouchis ... This is why Abdulmalek can gather himself supporters ...

Abjeez: The Iranian Singing Sisters

After Mohsen Namjoo, Abjeez are my most favorite Iranian Post-Traditionalists. Please go to their colourful web site to discover more.

The Abjeez sisters, Safoura and Melody were born in Iran amongst a family of diverse musicians. Both sisters moved to Sweden along with their family in 1987. Looking up to their father’s passion for music combined with older brother Sufi’s love for guitar encouraged the sisters to start writing, and composing original music. Having experienced living life in countries such as India, Sweden, Norway, England, Spain and United States has also had a great impact and influence on Abjeez music. (source: Album notes)

My FAVORITE Album is Hameh (2007)! Which I just purchased on iTune store. This is a video sample of why I like them. (Eddeaa means pretension)

To shift from the morbidity that neo-resistance has been suffering lately, I have posted a video of one of the songs of their latest Album "Perfectly Displaced" below.

The album is described as "World Pop music for the wired world: flamenco hot, reggae cool, salsa sassy. From the easy bop of "Vaghti ke" to the Flamenco yearning of "Tu Me Haces Falta" or the lashing passion of "Walking in her shoes" the Abjeez blend the rhythms and languages of the world into one great braza.

The Persian lyric of the song is : Jaa-e to khaaliye (your place is empty ... it implies, I miss you.

Mahmoud Dowlatabadi: Preeminent Novelist's latest book Der Colonel Published in German...and censored in Persian ...

Mahmud Doulatabadi is one of the most preeminent novelists of Iran. I discovered Dowlatabadi * when I was 17. I knew Kelidar (کلیدر) was an important book to read. My younger sister who was always richer than I, spent all of her summer savings to buy this 5-volume novel: the love story of Maral and Gol-Mohammad; in the turbulent history of their tribes of Iran's north east province, Khorasan. I remember living with the book, reading it nonstop for 10 days, hardly eating or sleeping. I was perhaps too young for it then; but I couldn't put it down. Maral reminded me of my own grandmother; and the story taught me about the intricacies of individuality, honor, loyalty, love, passion and the cost of breaking from conformity. I read his other books later, but to date, and to author's admission, Kelidar remains his most "perfect" book!

Dolatabadi * is 69, he was born in the village of Dolatabad in Khorasan. Before he became a writer, he earned life from labouring in farming, shoe making, barbering, bicycle repair, herding sheep, slaughter house, print shops, cinema projections--all range of works that are not customary for the "educated" or those with "to-be-educated-to-write" aspirations. His rural experiences set his books apart from the white-glove urban, or aristocratic settings of many of his contemporary literary figures of Iran. He paved his path to literature through theater, starting at the age of 22.

His most recent book, Der Colonel, written simultaneously in Persian and German--a story awaiting 25 years to be told--has made it to German publication, and is suffering Persian censorship, thanks to Mr Ahmadinejad's Coup D'etat ... (Dolatabadi has been a vocal critic of Ahmadinejad) To German speakers, I recommend to listen to his interview Dolatabadi with Ilija Trojanow on Arte.TV about Der Colonel. He talks about his urge to write this novel, and also explains somethings about Iran's literary traditions--especially referring to legendary Ferdowsi (10th century AD), to whom he wishes to have been a devout follower; and Sa'di (12th century AD) and Naser khosrow (11th century Ad) who were globe-trotters to whom he attributes the humanitarian nature of Persian literature. Despite the fact that Dolatabadi's novels root deeply in folk, telling the most obscure of rural stories, his talent is in portraying man in the complex dynamics of his interaction with the world, thus Doulatabadi * considers literature to be a universal entity, one belonging to humanity and not to geography.

He ends his interview with a message of hope:

"The art of we Iranians, is to transit through death and destruction towards light; this is our entire history, and we are still a living nation ..."

* I have spelled Dowlatabadi in all possible phonetic forms. Inconsistencies are intentional.

Can someone explain this please?

This is rally in London! The bearded man is holding a sign that reads:

Islam Will Dominate The World!

Freedom Can Go to Hell!

A non-muslim colleague of mine is asking a question:

"If "Freedom Can go to Hell", can someone arrest this man and put him in jail?"

And a conversation is following: If he is a freedom hater, then why is he living in London?!

And if he is an Islamic-fighter, then why shouldn't the British police treat him like a foreign invader?

Now I know that this man is perhaps in the fringes of the LARGE muslim population of Europe; but seriously, what the hell is he thinking?

Post script: I received two anonymous comments which I think address my narrow-minded question and they deserve to come to fore.

Anonymous 1:

Most demonstrations like this are organised by Salafi and Wahhabi groups, the most notorious of which is al Muhajiroun. They are consummate trouble makers, stirring public hatred for mainstream Muslims amongst the British population. Their leader, Anjem Choudary, is a follower of the Salafi cleric Omar Bakri Mohammed, who left the UK for Lebanon, but tried to come back to the UK to seek refuge in 2006 when Israel started bombing Lebanon.

They have a website advocating a distinctly Salafi ideology,in addition to some rather absurd designs on the UK, www.islam4uk.com, including a march at the end of this month calling for the implementation of Shariah in the UK.

Choudary, in his university days, was heavily into drinking and non-marital sex with non-Muslim women. Some Muslims think he is an agent of the British, implanted to stoke racial tensions to weaken people's resistance to various Orwellian measures that the government want legislated (eg, ID cards, long term detention without trial, etc). Personally, I don't think so, I've seen enough of these extremists to know that they are often hypocrites.

Anonymous 2:

No question his sign is very disturbing but:

1) He might be a British citizen (even born in Britain).

2) I know he and his friends are not going to treat us the same way that we -in the west- treat them but as long as he only expresses his opinion (whatever that opinion might be), he can not and should not be arrested or put in the jail.

3) I actually think this type of demonstrations are counterproductive for them and good for the civil societies, as they show which type of people they truly are and how angry they've become and we show how tolerant and cool we are.

UPDATE: My friend who asked the question wanted me to be clear about the fact that he meant the question as a joke. "I know you did", I told him; "but I (naj) meant the question with the very visceral anger I felt when I saw this picture. This kind of extremism touches me very close at home." Yes, he (my friend) knows what tolerance is; and I wish he will never grow out of it by suffering the consequences of the intolerance the man in the photo is promoting.

Firouzabadi, Iran's head of the Army: Death sentence should have been given to the leaders of the Green Movement!

In this picture, you see the redhead trunk Firouzabadi in Khaki, and Jafari (the murderer head of IRGC in green) in embrace!

And in this picture, the news that was published on FARSENEWS and immediately eliminated! Click on picture for source. On top, "Russia says No to Clinton's call for Sanctions ..."

Support our "BobDylan & LeonardCohen & Marylin Manson" in one: Mohsen Namjoo

You can start by buying his outstanding album, with which he has subjected himself to eternal exile from the Islamic Republic of Iran; with which he has broken almost any cultural & musical rule ever practices in Iran; with which your goose bumps turn to goose mountains, your jaw drops, and you are left breathless with the courage of his genius. Although extremely avant-garde, Namjoo is well trained in Persian traditional music and literature--elements which he mixes with rock, jazz, blues and some other new stuff which I don't have a name or description for.

Making his album a best-seller will be a GREAT slap to IRI's ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance who thinks by alienating our artists and forcing them to exile, they can get rid of them by "throwing the fish out of the water."

My favorite tracks are: 5, 6 and 8. I love the rest too, but they are in the tradition of his previous outstanding work; that for me reached the summit of success in Toranj.

This costs only 3 Starbuck cups of coffee--and it is for a great cause! (If you buy his songs, let me know and I will try to translate them for you.)

Kill Me Not, Mother

His face is turning blue.
The lawyers is shaking in disbelief.
Lucky they don't have to pull him to break his neck and end him sooner.
Lucky he was struggling violently, because he wasn't dying soon enough.
She pulled the stool from under his feet.
"I beg you, madam I beg you let me live", he cried.
"I must see the rope around his neck, I must see the rope around his neck", she was hysterical.
"I beg you madam, I didn't mean to kill him, please pardon me. I am an orphan.", he cried.
"I don't know anything, I don't know, I don't know", she was hysterical.
"I beg you let me live", he cried.
"this is your last chance to pardon and spare his life.", said the guard.
"Please pardon him, please spare his life", chanted in unison 200 gathered outside the notorious prison.
"I know what it is to loose a child", said the mother who had watched his daughter's eye fill with blood.
"I know what it is to loose a child.", said the mother who had received her son's slashed and smashed frozen body a month ago.
"the parents of the victim have given consent to pardon", said the celebrity 5 months ago.
"I killed in self-defense, with a broken bottle, because he attacked me with a knife", had said the 17 year old boy 5 years ago.

...

YOU KNOW WHAT IS SICK??

WHAT IS SICK IS THAT THE FAMILY OF VICTIM WHO WISHED TO TAKE REVENGE WILL HAVE TO PAY HALF OF THE BLOOD MONEY OF Behnoud TO HIS FAMILY! What is sick is that if Behnoud was a woman, she would have cost less to kill. The blood money of women is only half of men. The blood money of religious minorities is only half of the Muslim ones. The blood money of BAhais and Atheists is ZILCH! Killing them opens the doors of heaven!

What is sick is that in case of Akram Mahdavi, it is cheaper to kill her, than to kill her accomplice in crime--who is a man; and therefore, because the family of victim "needs" revenge, they have chosen to kill the cheaper human, the woman!

How I dreaded my Neo-Resistance turning gory ... but I just find it hard to not scream these days ...

If this is Islam, then I will fight to get rid of it ...

CORRECTION: No it is not Islam; it is this BITCH! It's about her EGO ... not even about Islamic penal law ... Apparently the judiciary system has bee trying to get him forgiven ... the BITCH is saying she is "happy" ... FUCK!

How a woman becomes deadly

She is holding a child that she has never had. A limb is falling off of the child. A leg. Or an arm. There is a bullet in the child's eye. The bullet is silver. Blood is flowing into the child's mouth. The child is thirsty. The woman lets her drink the blood. Her left breast is blown up. In its place rests a big scar. You can see the heart through cracked ribs. With no breast, the child cannot be breast fed. With no breast she cannot even prostitute herself to find water or milk. The child is thirsty. The woman's heart is broken by the force of the smashed rib cage. The man is out; holding his penis out to the world; pissing on it, pissing it off. He is hoping that if he urinates enough, the earth, the ancestral land will purify it enough to save his child from thirst; or from the despicable sin of sucking on his own blood. Death doesn't come soon enough to the child whose limb is hanging, whose eyes is wounded. Death doesn't come soon enough to the woman whose breast is blown, whose broken rib cage has broken her pink heart. Death doesn't come soon enough to the man whose phallus is not irrigating the earth, is not starting a creek. Death is waiting in a corner to be sought. Death is waiting to be called upon. Death is waiting to be strapped into a belt. Death is not coming, death is to be sought. Death grins menacingly that she is the port to freedom, the port to heaven. Death is water, death is food, death is freedom, death is a belt, death is the last piece of pride, the last bit of dignity left.

The woman's breast is blown. Her wombs is a ball of fire. She is pregnant with pain. And she is holding a child with a falling limb, with a bleeding eye, and with thirsty lips that are getting used to the salty taste of the blood ... blood the only source of life ... blood the only god ... the woman will give birth to pain, the pain too will be thirsty, the pain will not be able to drink from the exploded breast, the pain will grow into a blood thirsty puberty.

The pain will kill the woman because the woman will kill for pain; all mothers will kill for their thirsty children. The death belt is shining ... the last attire of dignity of a man ... or a woman ...

(c) Naj of Neoresistance. Written a couple of years ago thinking of Palestinian women becoming deadly; published here today because i am devastated by the images of a mother pulling the bench from under a 21 year old boy, to AVENGE ...

They Killed Him ... SHAME ON IRI

They killed Behnoud Shojai (Shojaee) ... 22 years old ... he had killed someone in a group fight (in self defense) when he was 17 ... (The victim had attacked Behnoud with knife; and Behnood had defended himself with a broken bottle) his lawyer was pleading with the world to save him ... human rights activists, including mothers of Sohrab A'rabi and Neda Agha-Soltan were amongst those gathering in front of the Evin prison to get a stay on the execution order ... his lawyer had pleaded that e due judiciary process was not respected ... they killed him ... they killed a 22 years old boy, who had killed someone in a street fight ... they killed him to say:

1. they do not respect people's wish to abolish death penalty
2. they killed him to say they are not afraid of controversy and international pressure (why would they when Obama writes them love letters?)
3. they have sentenced activists to death now ... soon, we shall witness political prisoner's executions ...

Time to act!

Mohsen Makhmalbaf has passed on his Nuremberg HR award to Karoubi. I wish The Nobel Peace Committee had recognized the gravity of the human rights violation, the brutality in China and Iran; I wish they had given the award to raise awareness on this .. I wish Obama had taken a less subtle approach in his acceptance speech ...

They killed a 17 years old boy, because this is when Behnoud was imprisoned, but they killed him after torturing him by swinging him back and forth between his prison cell and the gallows ... he is free from the injustice of Iran's brutal justice system ... but what about others ... apparently, he spent his last seconds BEGGING the victims parents--who had the option of pardoning him; who were there to pull the bench from under his feet ...

Post Script:
The real tragedy is in this:
"مادر و پدر مقتول چهارپایه ای را که برای اعدام در نظر گرفته بودند از زیر پای بهنود کشیدند و بهنود از دنیا رفت.»"
"The parents of the victim who was killed by Behnood pulled the bench from under his feet, and ended his life."

The tragedy is the ignorance of "revenge". These parents could have immortalized their dead son by "forgiving"; yet they chose to be killers themselves. I wonder how they sleep tonight. Will their son come back to them? Will they feel relieved that someone else's mother is mourning? Do they think they are increasing safety and security by carrying an act of revenge? This is gross; this is disgusting. Ehsan's victimized twice. Once by his killer and another time by the killers of his killer, his own parents. I am trying to imagine the street fight when Behnoud Killed Ehsan. If Ehsan was the son of such vengeful parents, it is likely that he was the bully. Maybe he even started the fight. Behnoud killed in self-defense. This was not a premeditated murder; this was an unintentional killing. (Like the killing of ZahrA KAzemi; the Canadian photographer who was killed by a "hard object hitting her head, while being interrogated in the IRI's prisons.) How can such vengeful parents have raised a peaceful, peace-loving teenager? Maybe if Ehsan, their son--who engaged in fights with a knife-- was alive, he would have joined Ahmadinejad's thugs who killed and beat people out of ignorance, class-revenge, or financial need. I know my imagination is running loose ... I know I am judgmental ... but WHAT KIND OF PARENTS avenge their son by killing someone else's son?! Don't they say their "Allah" is Merciful?! And what kind of a Judiciairy system allows a teenager involved in second-degree murder die on the whim of victim's parents--who are perhaps too psychologically devastated to be fair.

I cannot calm down ... (and now parvati told me that Behnoud's been begging the parents of Ehsan to forgive and spare his life ... I cannot calm down ...)

Post Post script:

and yet I come across this story: The family of Mansoor Kahyayee, who was killed at the age of 18 by a 15 year old boy. His father recounts how the society was pressuring them to seek revenge and have the killer executed; but the mother changes her heart and forgives ...

If the parents of a victim give consent, the killer's life will be spared. This is the area where many of Iranian celebrities are trying to make a difference: seeking consent of the parents. Nevertheless, there are many who are killed in Iran because of sexual indiscretion (even if voluntary) or political opposition to the regime. These individuals are harder to save--ironically because there is no Quranic loophole as there is in the case of murder victims' consent ...

These pictures are posted by Ahmad Batebi's blog. Proof that the family of Ehsan Nasrollahi had pardoned Behnoud in presence of witnesses.



Update: the head of the judiciary had tried to intervene and prevent this execution. The woman (mother of the victim) INSISTED on killing ... because he "ego" was hurt that the victim's family did not kiss up her ass enough ...

Tehran Court communication office confirms: 3 death sentences issued for post-election opposition

This news just appeared on Parleman News.

They have chosen the victims from alleged "Monarchists" and "MKO" supporters.

They think by choosing their victims from factions that are disliked by the majority of the Green supporters they put them in a check-mate situation:

If Mousavi and Karoubi supporters oppose this; they will be accused of being Monarchist and MKO "enemy"
If Mousavi and Karoubi supporters remain silent, then they have gotten their hands dirty in IRI's crime against humanity.

Luckily, the Greens are already protesting ... and since the PEOPLE have been the real leaders of this movement; I suspect Mousavi and KAroubi's camps will soon react to condemn these savage verdicts too.

Iran's Afro-Irish Piper? ... No, it's Bushehri Music, Saeed Shanbezadeh Insists.

I bet you didn't know Iran has Pipers who do the African dance when they come together, in weddings, funerals and political protests. Saeed Shanbeh Zadeh is a musician and dancer from Iran's 'Nuclear" harbor, Bushehr. His kind of music is often referred to as "Bandari", but he insists on making distinction between Bandari and Boushehri music; as he considers the latter more diverse and also more "anthropologically" specific. This video is from his Brussel's performance, in solidarity with Iranians who have had about enough of "Molla-Ali" (Ali Khamenei, the soup-ream leader).

Shanbeh Zadeh lives and performs in Paris. He has performed in numerous international events and he is scheduled to perform in the company of the Irish Pipers in The 16th William Kennedi Piping Festival, 12-15 Novemmber, 2009 in the city of Armagh, Northern Irland.

"The Shanbehzadeh Ensemble offers a rare aspect of the traditional music and dance of the Persian Gulf, more specifically of the province of Boushehr, a little known region in the south of Iran. The main instruments they play include the Neyanbânn (Iranian bagpipes), the Neydjofti (a double flute), the Dammâm (two-sided drum), the Zarbetempo (percussion), the traditional flute, the Senj (a sort of cymbal) and the Boogh (a goat's horn).

Saeid Shanbehzadeh: Neyanbânn, Neydjofti, Dammâm - He started playing music at the age of seven in his native town of Boushehr in the south of Iran, with the old masters of the music of the region. He began with percussion, singing, then learning the Neyanbânn (pipes), Neydjofti (double flute) and traditional dance. At 20 he founded the group the Shanbehzadeh Ensemble and won the first prize at the “Fajr” Festival in Tehran in 1990. He also continues to do research and write articles on the music of Southern Iran, which are published in Iranian newspapers. In 1996 he was invited by the University of Toronto to teach for six months and he was named in 1998 the professeur and director of the House of Culture, Music and the Arts of the Isle of Kish in Iran. He has composed music for and acted in several Iranian films [working with notable directors like Bahram Baizai, Rakhshan Bani-Etemad and Makhmalbaf]. "

(source: WKPF website)

(Here's more on Saeid's peace-efforts, by Nima Tamaddon)

Khatami talked about Exchange of Civilizations for 8 years; but Obama won the prize in 8 months!

(Here's my reaction.)

The author of the Persian Blog writes:

It's really cute: Khatami talked about peace and the conversation of civilizations for 8 full years, but in two months, they gave the Nobel Peace Prize to Barak Obama! With my experience in publishing my science articles in foreign journals; I have always understood that a ridiculous injustice prevails. For example, you do a scientific work in Asia and send it to a journal that rejects it. But, if the author is from England, with far inferior quality of work, he will get published in a high impact journal--of course there are exceptions too. Overall, I am getting increasinly convinced that Peace, United Nations, and Human Rights are just market tools! (source:http://chodankalleh.blogspot.com/2009/10/blog-post_09.html)

Rakhshan Bani-Etemad: We are half of the population

This documentary was prepared before the election. It shows coalition of women, from DIFFERENT factions, coming together to press the candidates, ALL of them, to voice out their concerns through the campaign podiums of election campaign

This is all in Persian, but you may enjoy watching the wide range of women participants in political, social, and legal spheres of Iran.

I will keep an eye for a subtitled version of this, subtitle it myself (if i get in touch with the director) or at least provide a summary for you.

The significance of this video, besides demonstrating the VITAL and powerful force of women in Iranian politics, is that the only candidate absent from this documentary is Mr Ahmadinejad!

The significance of this vide is also in the REALISTIC and pragmatic view women have about their demands, and how well aware they are of the fact that the infrastructure of reform shall be built on their foundations.

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nimiaziran@gmail.com

ارسال کنید ساختار اين مستند براساس طرح سؤالات فعالين حقوق زن از طيف متنوعي با ديدگاه‌هاي مختلف درباره مطالبات زنان و در انتها نقطه نظر كانديداه

Obama's Nobel Prize? Pros & Cons

Well, I hope no one expects me to treat this too seriously, I find it amusing! This is good fun!

I don't know what peace Mr O has accomplished so far, but I know he bombed the moon today!

So it turns out that the Nobel committee is again trying to "bias" the world politics, rather than reacting to it. Because, for God's sake, how can Obama in all his eloquence have deserved this prize? One might argue that other contenders were not sensational enough and their peace efforts were of less global concern than that of Mr Obama's. Okey, may be! But, can anything good come out of this? You judge!

a) Mahmud Ahmaghinejad will have another opportunity to send a "I kiss your peace-loving behind Master Hossain Barak" message to the white house.

b) Mahmoud will go on an interview with CNN, PBS, NBC, CBS and even BBC to say something like this:

Look if we violated the human rights in Iran, then why did your Nobel peace-prize winning president cancel funding to the Iranian Human Rights Documentation Center, and prevented the congress from sanctioning our great elected!! government?

c) Barak Hossein Obama will perhaps be shamed to deploy more troops across the world or try America's new generation of bunker-busters to "keep the peace"!

d) If C happens, then Netanyahu and Ahmadinejad move up the list of Nobel committee to be nominated for next years prize to prevent them from further bloodshed!

Anyways, I like Obama; but if I were him, I will not be proud to have received this award. He has not "earned it". He is roped in the ambitions of a committee who want to leave their mark on the world's FUTURE peace. I think I agree with their vision; let's hope they have been right in their judgement.

Post Script: I am watching Obama's statement. This man is brilliant and I like him! "Nobel prize is also awarded to give momentum ... this is a call to action" Great! Now I like to predict that at the end of his speech he will give up his award to a cause! 11:20 am :)

Here's an interesting reaction from Iran

How worse are things getting that Karoubi breaks his silence to refute Ahmadinejad's lies to Charlie Rose?

I didn't know Charlie Rose has interviewed this monster too.

Listening to Ahmadinejad in these interviews is sickening because

1. The translator (with a annoying high voice and an accent that matches Ahmadinejad's lower-class manner of speech) "makes up" things a lot of time.

2. Ahmadinejad lies through his teeth: for example he talks about all the polls taht have been showing in Iran that he will be a winner! This is FALSE: polls taken in Iran indicated taht he will be the looser! Or, he talked about how it was the friends and supporters of Mousavi and Karoubi who "ran the election". Again another falsehood--which has been OFFICIALLY complained against by all three other candidates: the fact that even their monitors were forced out of the branches towards the closing of the polls and was made unable to participate in the count.

3. He diverts attention from the questions at hand. For example Charlie Rose puts a very direct and the most interesting question anyone has put to him yet; which is: "Ayatollah Khamenei, in his speech, said that he doesn't think that the British and the Americans were masterminds of this public revolt.". Then Ahmadinejad says: "no he didn't say that?". Charlie: "he didn't? what did he say?" Ahmadinejad, then diverts teh attention to his interview with Katie Couric, and the "picture-exchange" of that fiasco!

Anyways, a couple of days ago I was wondering why Karoubi is so quiet. I was told that he is waiting for this "National Unity" plan and that in his latest meeting with Larijani, he was given assurance that his concerns will be addressed. That he speaks now means his hopes have waned and he is taking matters in his own hands again. It is becoming apparent that the IRGC is not interested in national unity plan (judging from Jafari's statements (persian) who considers militarization a sign of IRI's success and a necessity for guarding the revolution--from the founders of revolution, like Hashemi, Montazeri, Beheshti, Mousavi, Khatami et al.), that the judiciary that was supposed to be independent is just smoke-screening a new wave of brutality that on the one hand releases Hajjarian after depleting him of influence by putting this disabled man on public TV to deny he has ever meant any of what he has said; and on the other hand issues new arrests, severe punishment for students who have been undermining official's presence on Iranian campuses in the past two weeks, and especially handing out the first death penalty (persian) to at least one of these protesters who has confessed to having link to a Monarchist organization (persian)--so obscure an organization that I had to google it up! Another 25 years old protester is charged with "moharebeh" (fighting against the Establishment) which carries death penalty as well. And interestingly, in his interview with Rose, Ahmadinejad is unequivocally clear: "we don't give a damn these people have a long history of service to the revolution; we have had election so that people won't come on street, and if these people keep protesting, we will deal with them as opposition." Keep in mind that the official opposition to IRI have been: Kurdish resistance; MKO, and Monarchists! All these "opponents" who were caught in the IRI have long met their makers!

Ahmadinejad's wounds are not one or two:

Again, Hassan Khomeini snubbed the regime by not attending the oath of faith ceremony of the armed forces taking place in Khomeini's mausoleum. Also, over 190 of CONSERVAIVE (i.e. right-wing; anti-reform) members of parliament were ABSENT from his Government-Parliament meeting. This is an unmistakeable snub! He dodged Charlie Rose's question about how unpopular he is--but the history is written on a daily basis. Ahmadinejad's only base is GUNS; INTIMIDATION and BULLYing.

In any case, things are moving in the wrong direction--an inch every day.

Perhaps this is why Karoubi's broken his silence and has written to the state television, asking to be given air time, and to refute Ahmadinejad's lies on PBS--which was recently broadcast in Iran. Karoubi insists on evidence of torture in IRI prisons.

A quick survey; if you please?

-What do you check my blog for?

-Do you prefer War/Sanctions/Talk with coup d'etat regime?

-Do you wonder what happened to the protest to election results?

-Why, if IRI is so notorious, aren't people afraid to chant slogans in buses and metros?

-Do you agree with me that the nuclear issue is red herring?

Thanks!

I miss Karoubi

A convicted torturer appointed as commander of Basij (Iran's paramilitary force)

Facts and figures:
Mohammad Reza Naghdi, born in Iraq (Najaf) in 1953, expelled from Iraq with his family in 1980, associated with Lebanon's Hizbollah; and a member of the Supreme Iraqi Islamic (Revolution) Council. (They dropped "Revolution" term in 2007. One of the founding members of the council, Abdul-Aziz Hakeem, a close associate of the IRI, is seen shaking hand with Bush in this picture.)

16 years ago, Khamenei the supreme leader appointed him as the deputy of intelligence office of Sepah's Quds Army. Shortly after this appointment he was granted the General status and moved to Intelligence office of Iran's security, and then promoted further to Iran's army (Ground forces).

In 1999, During Khatami's presidency, participated in a semi-coup against Khatami's reformist government, arresting 164 of of Tehran's mayors and employees, plotting assassination attempts against Abdullah Nouri (Khatami's Interior Minister) and Mohajerani (Khatami's Minister of Islamic Culture and Guidance), coordinating the attack on university dorms.

In 2000 Naghdi and a group of his "plain clothes" associates formed a group (Band-e Kabir, Great Gang) to "prevent social corruption" (read civic liberties). Breaking the law and accused of torture and condemned by court to 3 months of jail--a term he never served. Naghdi is alleged to have participated (together with Mohseni Ejei--Ahmadinejad's minister of Intelligence) in suspicious death of the judge who handled the Mayor's case (suffered cardiac arrest after Air-injection!).

It's noteworthy that the members of Band-e Kabir, were charged with several counts of breaking the law (including kidnapping and extortion using cold weapons and firearms and abusing their governmental credentials) and were prosecuted publicly--however Naghdi who was closely associated with the Leader's circle was spared. Instead of being prosecuted, he was promoted by Ahmadinejad in 2005 and was put in charge of "fight against drug traffic and money laundering"!! Of course, Ahmadinejad changed his mind after Naghdi exposes smuggling practices of one of Ahmadinejad's major financial supporters, removes him from "fight against drug traffic department" and the leader returns Naghdi to the army.

On Sunday, October 4th, the supreme leader appoints Naghdi as the commander in chief of Basij--the paramilitary organ responsible for Ahmadinejad's post-election blood bath ...

Environment Protection sues Gas Corp: 10,000 trees cut in less than 48 hours in Dena's protected forests

Here's the news in Persian.

Here's information about Dena Wildlife Protected Zone. (During Khatami's presidency, efforts were undertaken to protect this area from development)

Here are pictures:

Here's a project by an Environment Protection Agency (started September 2008!)

Conservation of Biodiversity in the Central Zagros Landscape Conservation Zone Project

Wednesday, 17 September 2008

Over an area of 2,500,000 hectares, Conservation of Biodiversity in the Central Zagros Project will work with the agriculture, forestry, rangelands, water and tourism sectors in order to mainstream biodiversity conservation and sustainable use into the sectors. It covers almost all of Chaharmahal & Bakhtiari province, large parts of Kohkiluyeh & Boyerahmad province, and most of Eghlid and Marvdasht districts in Fars province and Semirom district in Isfahan Province. The project will strengthen the ability of the protected area system and will also demonstrate biodiversity mainstreaming at the local level in eight pilot villages across the Zone, and establish mechanisms to facilitate the dissemination and replication of the successful village approaches. Finally, the project will develop the necessary capacity, at individual, institutional and systemic level, in national agencies to support ongoing efforts to improve livelihoods and stimulate economic development across the Zone. Also in this project, the overall mountain ecosystem will remain intact and the range of habitat for large species will be extended to at least the entire Conservation Zone. Hence the health and population of these individual species will stabilise or grow. Through this Project, the habitat for small mammals, invertebrates and flora will be sustainably utilized.

Is Iran's Threat to Israel Real?!

click on the image for details and read Juan Cole's elaborate post, which ends with this:

When Andrew Sullivan first linked to my post, he asked what the comparison would be to Israel. First of all, Iran ranks much higher on the Global Peace Index than does Israel. Then, here are some comparative statistics as between Iran and Israel, in answer to the question. But note that the comparisons are misleading. Israel has 1220 aircraft and Iran has 84. But Iran's include a lot of things like old F-4 Phantoms from Nixon in the 1970s whereas Israel's are state of the art. And, while Israel's military budget is now estimated at a little over $13 bn. annually, it should be noted that over $2 bn. of that is extracted from us Americans and handed over directly with no oversight to Tel Aviv every year, so it isn't exactly all Israel's money (and of course these are only the official figures, ignoring a lot of informal tariff and other tax breaks and transfers of resources). Israel'smassive nuclear weapons industry is not counted in the $13 bn. Again, the figures for what they are worth are fromGlobalfirepower.com.

FINALLY, someone asked it: If Holocaust deserves re-investigation, why the election doesn't?!

This is on Parleman News! (the news site of the parliament's reformist minority)

Antoin Sevruguin, photographer of the Imperial Court of Iran

Antoin Sevruguin (1830s-1933) was an official photographer of the Imperial Court of Iran whose commercial photography studio was one of the most successful in Tehran from the late 1870s to about 1934. The images in this collection provide a rich visual documentation of the Qajar and early Pahlavi dynasties of Iran. (Click to see archives)

While we were busy with the Nuclear Fiasco of Ahmadinejad the converted Jew ...

The following happened:

• NAJA (Iranian police) installed 200 closed circuit monitoring cameras in Tehran and 200 more will be installed soon! 400 Cameras to ensure people are "afraid of committing crimes" like protest!
• Khamenei made new appointments to the file and rank of IRGC!
• Ahmadinejad promised to prepare for a media-war.
• IRI banned the human rights lawyer, Abdulfattah Sultani from attending Human Right events abroad!
• Behzad Nabavi, the old kid of Revolution, jailed and tortured by the Shah and Ahmadinejad, underwent an emergency operation--but remains outside the reach of his family who are worried that his "resistance" to appear in front of the camera and his resolve that "I will not betray Mohandes Mousavi" will cost his life "under operation"!
• Mohammad Javad Larijani, another Coup D'etat supporter and Mousavi-demonizer faced booing students of the best technical university of the country, Sharif University, greeting him with down with dictator chants!
• The grounds on which the parliament speaker Ali Larijani stands became shakier.
• Hashemi made a public "emergency" statement to zealously kiss Supreme Leader's behind--and at the same time made a request to the Judiciary, Sadegh Larijani to investigate and exonerate his family of accusations of corruption laid by Ahmadinejad and his cronies. (don't think Larijani is a common name in Iran. These dudes are brothers)
• The IRI, making a 180-degree turn on its nuclear stance remains to answer questions about the cost of Russian extortion. Incidentally, one of the MAJOR slogans of their election campaign AGAINST Mousavi, was that Mousavi will be soft in front of the Western demands!!!!

IRI's boot on the victims of Kahrizak

Iran's Abu Gharib

Is Ahmadinejad from Jewish ancestry?

I don't have much to add to my previous post. But since according to Haa'retz, Ex-Mossad chief considers Ahmadinejad greatest gift of Israel, perhaps I should just change the title: Ahmadinejad Bastard child of zionism?!

Of course, before this news became "popular", people of Iran have been suspecting a collusion between Ahmadinejad and Israel, and chanting in metro to congratulate the marriage of Basij & Israel!! Needless to say, his religious background is not interesting to me!

What is fascinating is that another conservative anti-reformist, anti-Israeli loud-mouth Habibollah Asgar-Owladi-e Mosalman is also a jewish convert! The "Mosalman" at the end of his name is to ensure he is not mistaken with the non-converted Asgaroladis! (his family converted to Islam during Reza Shah) AsgarOladi, with a wealthy background rooted in Tehran Bazaar, considers himself a follower of Navab-Safavi's path, a radical Islamic fanatic who ran a terrorist group Fadayeean-e Islam, and played an instrumental role in derailing Iran's democracy by participating in the Islamist contribution to the American Coup of 1953.

Those who keep banging the drum of American Coup of 1953, should be reminded that Khomeini and his clerical teachers and predecessors HATED Mosaddegh; and that he Islamists who are now represented by the likes of Ahmadinejad and Asgaroladi helped Americans in 1953.

It is ironic that Khamenei demanded Obama to apologize for the 1953 Coup D'etat given that: (As I recall going to school in Iran)

Unable to exorcise Mosaddeq's ghost, the Islamic Republic has tried to contain it. High school textbooks allocate twelve pages to Kuchek Khan, four pages to Modarres, another four to Shaykh Nuri, and less than two to Mosaddeq -- about the same as given to Navab Safavi, the Fedayan-e Islam leader. Meanwhile, the mass media elevate Ayatollah [Abul Qasem] Kashani as the real leader of the oil nationalization campaign, depicting Mosaddeq as merely the ayatollah's hanger-on. Even more significant, the regime portrays the 1951-53 period as yet another example of leftist betrayal, arguing that the nationalist movement failed because it was stabbed in the back by the Tudeh [communist party of Iran].
[...]
If Mosaddeq fell because of a "stab in the back," the stab came not so much from the Left as from the religious Right. From the very beginning, the clerical establishment had arrayed itself against the National Front. Ayatollah Behbehani, the senior cleric in Tehran and the grandson of the famous constitutional leader, had openly sided with the shah. The substantial influx of CIA money into the Tehran bazaar on the eve of the 1953 coup became known as "Behbehani dollars." Even more important, Ayatollah Borujerdi -- a staunch royalist and the leading marja-e taqlid from 1944 until his death in 1961 -- had tried to stem Mosaddeq's popularity by issuing an edict forbidding the clergy from participating in politics. He epitomized the conservative clergy, who claimed to be apolitical but in fact bolstered the royalist regime. Ruhani, Khomeini's main biographer, tries to explain Borujerdi's behavior by claiming that the "imperialists" had planted "agents" around him to isolate him from society.

(Highly recommended source: Ervand Abrahamian)

Related in Persian.

(Addendum) I should mention that the Green's (Mowj Camp) consider this another "media" distraction designed by the Coup D'etat forces: that this religious frenzy redirects attention from Ahmadinejad's hateful behavior and points the blame to the Jewish minority in Iran, fueling anti-semetic flames while diminishing attention to the responsibility of Ahmadinejad backers in messing up the Iranian's affairs.

Who is Abdulfattah Soltani?

Behind the curtains of the Nuclear Circus, that the world is foolishly obsessed with, the IRI regime keeps violating human rights!

Again, they have disallowed a human right's activist and lawyer to attend and receive the Nuremberg International Human Rights Award in fall 2009. Abdufattah Soltani, 55, father of four, and a relentless justice seeker has seen the inside of Iran's prisons personally (jailed in 1981, 2002, 2005, 2009).

Why are they so afraid of Abdolfattah Soltani to

1. have jailed him in June 2009, on charges of "doubting" the election results--while he had no participation either in election campaign or in the aftermath protests.
2. have kept him locked up for 70 days without any charges, while enticing him to abandon cooperation with Nobel Laureate's (Shirin Ebadi) Human Right Law firm in exchange for freedom (and while jailing these important HR lawyers, like Soltani and Shadi Sadr, violating the HR in worst possible forms.)
3. have violated Article 12.2 of the 1966 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights to restrict his travels abroad to attend Human Right conferences or award ceremonies (since 2007).
4. have jailed him for 8 months (Juy 2005-march 2006) almost immediately after Ahmadinejad's first election--which was contested by Karoubi and Hashemi rafsanjani as fraudulent, but because most Iranians had boycotted that election, it didn't provoke the same popular angry response it did this time.
5. have kept him in solitary confinement from July 30-September 15, 2005, without even being able to contact his wife and mother?

His "crime" was only publicized in July 2006 sentencing: “non-respect of the confidentiality of the preliminary enquiry”! This means, he used evidence in defense of his clients that incriminated the IRI!! He was sentenced to a 5 years jail term, but he appealed the decision and was acquitted on 28 May 2007 of all charges pending against him since July 2005.

Who are the victims he has been representing??

• slain Iranian-Canadian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi(beaten to death in prison)
• jailed journalist Akbar Ganji (Ganji revealed the mafia operations of the IRI in chain murders)
• slain Dr Zahra Bani Yaghub (beaten to death in prison)
• Haaleh Esfandiari (elderly Iranian-American scholar, who even after enduring IRI prison and returning to the US, is still talking peace with Iran.)
• The employees of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, charged with espionage
• The teacher's union, whose members were jailed after a salary protest.
• The bus driver's union, 50 members of which were fired after a salary protest.

Soltani's real crimes are these:

• belief that Iranian authorities, who have been systematically violating the human rights in Iran since 1984, must be tried in international courts for crimes against humanity
• efforts to familiarize average citizens with their basic constitutional rights (he has written a booklet called The Right of The Accused
• courage to expose how the hallow charges of "foreign plot" have been immunizing the Mafia of perpetrators who have compromised the integrity of the judiciary according to the wished of the cult of Ahmadinejad
• insisting on a civil suit he has launched against Tehran's prosecutor and the judge of his case for his unlawful detention.

It is the courage of this man that we must salut (and stop disgracing the Iranian Human Rights movement with lobbyists such as these!)

Ahmadinajd's messianic (Hojjatiyeh) ideology: Americans invaded Iraq not to rob but with deep analyses of armageddon! Imam Mahdi Manages the world!

h/t Nikahang Kowsar
Here's a transcript of what he is saying. Basically he is approving of Bush's armageddonist supporters and scorns some Iranians for not believing in the important matter that "hidden Imam" is managing the world now, and is going to emerge from a chaos in the region.

Some see the appearance of the enemy [USA] and not their conscience, or don't pay attention. These who have come invaded Iraq, in appearance it seems that they have come for oil, robbing the region. That is right, but when you go one layer deeper you see that they have analyses, they come with the awareness that there is going to be an event in this region, that a sacred godly hand will come out to uproot tyranny from the world. They say these things amongst themselves, they have so much attention to these matters. But here, some think that during "absence" Imam (The hidden, Imam Mahdi) has gone to a corner busy with his own life, and doesn't care about world affairs. If Imam didn't care, the world would have turned upside down, universe will have ended. Imam manages the world!

Those who don't know about this Imam, he is the 12th Shiite Imam, a descendant of Prophet Mohamad, who has gone to "hiding" some 12 hundred years ago, but is supposed to come back one day together with Jesus and others and rescue the world! No wonder Iran's plagued with a management crisis after this moron took over!

Ahmadinejad speaks Persian with the ugliest accent of a lowest cultural class (in Iran we call them laat) ... his pronunciation of K and J make me quiver!)

Basiji, Israel, Happy Union! Ahmadi, Israel, Peyvandetan Mubarak!

Payvant = Marriage, Union
Mubarak = felicitation



:D
Hilarious Metro scene in Tehran!

Ahmadinejad's PhD Supervisor (Minister of Transportation, Dr!!! Behbahani) a plagiarist too!

See the full report here; with "copied" parts of article clearly highlighted and etc!

"It should be noted that Behbahani became a professor at the Iran University of Science and Technology in Tehran and interestingly the promoter of Ahmadinejad for his final PhD thesis. An Iranian MP had previously stated that Ahmadinejad’s PhD dissertation defence took place without even having his work scrutinised by anyone, and this made possible with the backing of his loyal professor Behbahani.

Bahbahani also has a history of lying about the official figures related to the Ministry under his supervision and also getting into confrontations with journalists over his falsification of data. He has also been accused of lying by many of his former colleagues, such as the former head of Iran’s air travel organisation who said that “Behbahani lies very easily!”"

Also please recall that Ahmadinejad obtained his PhD degree while serving as the "exemplary!" governor of Azerbaijan!! Some may remember that during presidential debates, Ahmadinejad lashed out at Mousavi's wife for having obtained her PhD while employed by the government--because according to Ahmadinejad it is not permitted and that a PhD requires a lot of hard work that cannot be done concurrently with holding a job!!

How did Ahmadinejad's New York banquet with Israeli-American students go?

This video was prepared by an Israeli reporter, impostoring as Dutch! Pay attention to Ahmadinejad's zeal to take picture with little gals! Imagine what his conservative supporters would do seeing these pictures.

You may all know that Ahmadinejad has a "lover" by the name of Esfandiyar Rahim Mashayee, who got Ahmadinejad in trouble when he said he was a friend of Israeli people. Of course there are theorists who trace Ahmadinejad and Mashai to Zionism!

Well, wine leaves tell me that Ahmadinejad has in fact gone out of his way to extend invitations to some Israeli students in New York! How else would I stumble across a video of which I understand nothing?

Anyone with Hebrew knowledge? What's going on?!

Ahmadinejad's fanatic islamist friends, can you ask him why he is standing so close to "naked" women?! :)

With or Without Ahmadinejad: Nuclear Technology is our RIGHT!

I am not going to repeat myself here!

I am appalled by Obama (one can hardly expect more from Sarkozy or Brown) for acting the way they did.

IRI is RIGHT: the West is better off not loosing this chance, and should negotiate with Iran respectfully.

IRI has not violated IAEA regulations, and the Western fear mongering is

1. derailing Obama's peace process and taking the heat off of Netanyahu's bottom! (Juan Cole puts it best!)
2. derailing Iran's green movement and diverting attention from the MAIN problem of IRI, which is Ahmadinejad (and his ilk)

If you don't want a nuclear race in the Middle East, NEGOTIATE with Iran AND disarm Israel! Press Iran on it's democratic problems; not because you give a damn about people's lives and freedom, but because you can entice the IRI to "enjoy" your capitalist investments and economic participation if they behave democratically--because when it comes to nuclear WMD, your buddy Israel strips you of legitimacy!

Use your carrots carefully and keep your stick at home!

IRGC cannot recruit enough soldiers to "go to fight" with any nation--and they have reiterated that "first strike" is NOT on IRI's agenda (as it has NEVER BEEN BEFORE, attested to by history). But should anyone act offensively, we WILL unite to defend Iran! Now, please don't force us to unite behind IRGC, okey?!

As fiercely as I hate Ahmadinejad, I shall hate you if you sanction Iran!

Mousavi's 13th Statement itself debunks Larijani's opportunistic comparison he drew between Mousavi and Rajavi!

The reason why I am making this post is because one of the opportunist Larijani brothers has recently come out, accusing Mousavi of having turned into Rajavi (the head of terrorist Mujahedin Organization who has not missed any chance to raise arms against their own people, and who promotes nothing but hatred and blood.) Luckily, Larijani’s opportunism oozes out of his letter. But I was compelled to translate parts of Mousavi’s statement that I think are an indirect answer to Larijani. You judge for yourselves! I highly recommend reading this (Mousavi’s 13th statement) to those who think the Greens are seeking an Iraq-Afghanistan kind of an outcome for Iran; especially those who compare Ahmadinejad to Mosaddegh!!!!!!!!

Violence is not the solution. ادخلوا فی السلم کافه “all, enter with compromise/peace”. Anger is a horse that drops his rider. People are justified to get angry at ugly behavior of the security forces and constant propagandist agitations; but this would not change the outcome of their anger [to violence]. We benefit from out efforts proportionally to our patience and wisdom; and if we slide towards unreasonable extremism, we might waste the efforts of a week and a month in a day. Our people consider themselves deserving of more respect from the rulers, because they consider themselves intelligent and wise. And wise is the one who, not only distinguishes between good and bad; but between good and better, bad and worse.

There are still outcomes better than what we achieved on the Quds day; and there are situations worse than what we are suffering and objecting to currently. In the prospect of our current historical context, there is no clear picture of what the outcomes of foundation-breaking actions would be. As stated in the letter sent to all Jurisprudens, Iraq and Afghanistan are two significant examples which we cannot ignore. These examples do not dissuade us from pursuing our rights because we have the patience and the foresight to improve our destiny without paying such hefty price.

What can bring about our grand objective is to insist on our golden motos. Any word that breaks the bond of friendship and brotherhood amongst our people would not help rebuild our identity and national unity. We consider the merciful Islam the solution to our pains, and consider an inverted cover, what the government promotes as Islam.

We demand unconditional execution of the Constitution and the return of the Ismalic Republic to its original moral principles. We want Islamic Republic, without a word more or less, and consider anarchist and destroyer those who find excuses to stray from the Islamic path, modifying the Constitution according to their selfish preferences.

Today’s political atmosphere is not what we wished for 30 years ago. People ask themselves: “what has impeded us from achieving our dreams?” This is a critical question that begs an answer even in relation to our present and future efforts. What must we do to not be confronted with this question 30 years later?

We will attain stability only when we transfer our political and social gains to our daily lives. In the past 100 years, our people have not had few of these [socio-political] achievements, but they have all leaned on activism. As long as the atmosphere of activism has been alive, these achievements have been safe but as soon as people have got tired and gone back home, all was lost. Activism is sacred but it is not permanent. What is permanent is (daily) life.

This is a lesson we learned from our fighters during 8 years of sacred defense. In those years, two groups were present in the frontlines. The first, fought during the war and after that decided it was time for living and making money over money and building tower over tower [literally, building towers has been trendy in post-war years]. The second group went to frontline for a deeper meaning. They did not go to sacrifice, but to benefit from the spirituality of that environment. This is perhaps hard to grasp for those who have not experienced this, but it is true. Not that they did not sacrifice, they did! They were our most famous heroes. But they didn’t think they were sacrificing in exchange for the gems they gained [this is not a materialistic metaphore, it is a spiritual one]. They lived during the war years and their fight began after the war, a quiet fight for the life, or the memory of the life, they had experienced. Without them, we will not have been able to resist for 8 years with empty hands.

During the election, when some of them honored me and turned the Committee of Isargaran [those who Sacrifice] into one of my most active camps; I was proud. Because they stated that they hoped a return to the spirituality of the days of Imam, I felt my responsibility more heavily. I doubt there is anyone in our country to not be proud of them. They are the core of the green center that links us together.

In honor of their resolve, we too must live on the green path of hope; may the same miracle they created [fighting empty handed for 8 years] arrive us. The significance of the Quds day was that is showed the new life that people have chosen is not transient and temporary.

P.S. This article is fully translated by http://khordaad88.com; but I preferred to translate this segment for my blog.

UPDATE: this is the treatment Mohamad-Javad Larijani received today (Oct 4, 2009) at Sharif University: Booed and greeted with: down with dictator, down with hypocrite ...

Following riotous (un)welcome Tehran and Shiraz U students gave Ahmadinejad, Universities closed down for 7 days. Excuse; Swine Flu!

Pedestrian had a fun post on yesterday's opening ceremonies at Tehran U. In this picture, the celebration of school years held in Tehran U's auditorium were closed to students. Why? You might have already read about Karoubi and Mousavi's latest letters and statements--insisting on their position-- and seen many videos showing students chant in green, wishing the downfall of the dictator. (complete report in parlemannews)

Today, Parlemannews reports that the minister of health (the ugly woman in the picture) has ordered closure of the universities out of fear of Swine Flu!!! (The man holding the red file is Kamran Daneshjoo, who has plagiarized articles and faked his PhD degree!)

Unrelated, but important:

The sale of Iran's Telecomunication to the IRGC companies has become a scandal and rumors are circulating that the transaction is against the article 44 of the constitution and may be cancelled.

By the way, another controversy about shady sale of one of the largest Open Zinc Mines of the Middle East to a Basij consortium has surfaced in Sarmaye Newspaper; but the link is suddenly unavailable!! Here the headline:

"ر جریان خصوصی سازی معدن انگوران، بزرگ ترين معدن سرب و روي خاورميانه، شرکتهای وابسته به موسسه مالی و اعتباری بسیج (موسسه مهر اقتصاد ايرانيان)، با تبانی با یکدیگر این معدن را به مبلغ 186 ميليارد تومان خریدند. در حالی که کارشناسان این قیمت را غیر واقعی می دانند و ارزش این معدن را بیش از 1050 میلیارد تومان برآورد میکنند. در حالی که کل این معدن شامل ذخایر روباز و زمینی، ذخیره سنگ تراورتن، ابنیه و تاسیسات فراوان از جمله سوله ها و جاده های مواصلاتی به قیمت 186 ميليارد تومان فروخته شد، تنها سنگ تراورتن موجود در این معدن بیش از 280 میلیارد تومان ارزش دارد!"

There are also rumors that Shariatmadari (the editor in chief of the slander machine, Keyhan), who had bought himself time to provide evidence backing up the slew of accusations that made several individuals and organizations sue him, has run out of time and is summoned to the court.

Two important interview with children of Shahid Hemat and Shahid Bakeri (these are war heros) are published, that leave little doubt that Ahmadinejad's IRGC and Basij have been trying marginalize the most important figures of these organs and stray from their principles.

Translation of "Important" parts of Karoubi's Letter to Hashemi

I am leaving out the first two-third because it is mullah talk. Usually in Iran, people do a lot of smooth talking before they stick the knife! I leave others to translate the rhetorical beginning--which is nevertheless very critical of ineffectiveness of the Assembly and hints at Hashemi's "cowardice". But, I only translate tangible points that are the core of Green's demands. Here's the knife (the bullet form is mine):

Paragraph 11:

Mr Hashemi,

What is your response to the people who are questioning the accountability of the Assembly under your directorship? Had you and the Assembly of Experts taken a look at the trend in which the country's been suffering in the past 4 years, could you not have found a solution to what has culminated into what you are now calling "conspiracy"? [Karoubi is appalled with Hashemi's 'shift' from calling what he used to refer to as 'crisis' to calling it a 'conspiracy' now].

• In your speeches before and after the election, you have warned that the economic crises was destroying country's long term prospects; but shouldn't these crises have been given attention by the Assembly of Experts?
• Is it not your duty to oversee that what is promoted as "privitization" in accordance with the article 44 of the constitution, is sold to a organization taht are under supreme leader like IRGC or "The Committee of Imam's Orders" (which according to Imam's assignment to Ayatollah Sane'i and myself, was supposed to either release the seized assets, or if their illegitimacy established, to confiscate those assets and end its operation in less than two years; a committee whose name has raised several complaints from Imam's grandson who has requested that if the committee is not shut down, at least be renamed to not carry Imam's name) purchase the shares of a government Ministry [Telecommunication] in less than half an hour, adding to their post-election triumphs in the name of privitization! [He is referring to militalization of the ITC, that was purchased by IRGC yesterday].
• Indeed, how much attention have you [in the Assembly of Experts] given the chaotic and unplanned foreign policy that has caused disrespect for our system in the international community?
• Don't social problems and the security atmosphere in our universities and different organizations deserve any attention from the members?
• Indeed, to what extent did you scrutinize the actions of some organizations that are under the supreme leader, which are under your general supervision?
• Didn't you review what is happening in our national media and the drop in viewer's rate?
• Did you talk about the three so called election loosers who are canned and whose friends are in solitary confinement; and that it is only through passage from solitary confinement that hey can have access to national media to confess, while the doors of media are wide open to the supporters of the so-called winner and the Prosecutor General who come and state their unilateral accusations against other candidates?

You didn't know about these points? You knew about them and if you have not talked about them, does it not mean that sense of justice and courage has vanished from our hearts? [He really wants to say from "your" heart.. this is Persian, subtle!] And today, what is your answer to those who think this Assembly has forgotten its duties and has become and ineffective and propagandist institution? Shouldn't this assembly have invited the three candidates who object to the election results, who have all been assets and servants of this system, to express their views before the Assembly issued its statement?

Mr Hashemi,

It's my duty to remind you of Imam's interpretation of the position of the Assembly of Experts when he said: "Now, you jurisprudens of the Assembly of Experts, you who are chosen by this people who has suffered the history of monarchist injustice, you have accepted a responsibility above all orders and have embarked on a task on which depends the destiny of Islam and this suffering people who has given martyrs. History and future generations will judge you and God's great men will witness you and your deeds: والله من ورائهم مُحيط و رقيب. Your slightest negligence, your slightest error or selfish influence and temptations that can stray you from the path will cause a great catastrophe in History".

Indeed, what is the relation of current operation of this Assembly with what Imam stated and with what authority it is given by the constitution which is based on people's vote to this Assembly? Why deny that in this dangerous juncture, this assembly has turned into an ineffective organization. And I, Mahdi Karoubi, am writing this letter today to have warned you and have put my conscience at ease with respect to my devotion to Imam, the revolution, the respected people of Iran; and to have expressed that what is happening in this assembly is nether benefitting the people, nor guarantees the republicanism s the system to which over 98% of Iranians voted in March 1979.

[end]

As hopes for Rafsanjani's meddling & talking sense to Khamenei fade: Karoubi and Mousavi strike out again.

Today:

Ahmadinejad, who was supposed to appear in Tehran University has chickened out. (see video below and more here)
Mousavi, who is accused of Mujahedin-like treason, has issued another statement (#13) that he is not backing off!
And Karoubi has written another public letter to Hashemi Rafsanjani, scolding him for his poor (and cowardly) performance as the head of Assembly of experts.