Political Articles

[Rasputin]

[Rasputin]

[Rasputin]

"I am already against the next war," read the bumper sticker on a car ahead of me. I long to tell the driver: the next war is already here; Islamists are waging it in every corner of the globe and the "moderate Muslims" are either actively supporting them, placing the blame on the West, or simply looking the other way. This war aims to wipe out everything that free people cherish, including the right of expressing their sentiments. Banishing war has been the perennial dream of mankind's best, while its worst have been frustrating its realization. To renounce war unilaterally and unconditionally is surrender and death.

Humanity has suffered horrific wars in the past. Yet, the present multi-form and multi-front war waged by Islamists has the potential of inflicting more suffering and destroying more lives than any before it. Ruthless Islamic forces are advancing rapidly in their conquests while those of freedom are acquiescing and retreating. Before long, Islamism is poised to achieve its Allah-mandated goal of cleansing the earth of all non-Muslims. Any and all means and weapons are to be enlisted in the service of this final holy war that aims to establish the Islamic Ummeh.

But Islam is a religion of peace and the great majority of Muslims are not party to any plans and actions of the radicals, so claim academic pundits, leftist journalists, and hired Islamic apologists. The incantation of these "authorities" is the lullaby that puts the people into a sleep of complacency. For an average free human busy with all manners of demands on his time and resources, would hardly want to worry about the threat of Islamism when those he believes are "in the know" emphatically claim that there is nothing to worry about. Some of these advocates of Islam go further by accusing those who sound the alarm as racist, bigot, hatemonger and much more.

But where are all the peace-loving moderate Muslims that supposedly are in great majority? The Muslims who are neither jihadists themselves, nor do they support them? I and others, time and again, have been calling upon them to stand up and show the world that they oppose the fanatical Islamists. It is small comfort even if the vast majority of Muslims are not fanatic radicals, when they do nothing to demonstrate their position. It is instructive to recall that it is invariably a minority, and more often than not a very small minority, that launches a campaign of death and destruction.

Perhaps it is wishful thinking on the part of the non-Muslims to believe that one can be a Muslim moderate, given that Islam is radical at its very core. To be a moderate Muslim demands that the person explicitly renounce much of the violent, exclusionary, and radical teachings of the Quran. By so doing, the individual issues his own death warrant in Islamic countries, is condemned as apostate if he lives in a non-Islamic land and may even earn a fatwa on his head.

It is deadly, in any confrontation, to assess the adversary through one's own mental template, because the two templates can be vastly different from each other. People in the West are accustomed in relativistic rather than absolutistic thinking. To Westerners, just about all matters range from black to white with an array of gray shades between the two poles. To Muslims, by contrast, nearly everything is in black and white and with virtually no shades of gray. The former type of thinking is typical of more mature minds, while the latter is that of young children and the less-enlightened.

This absolutist thinking is enshrined in the Quran itself. When the starting point for a Muslim is the explicit fanatical words of Allah in the Quran, then the faithful are left with no choice other than literally obeying its dictates or even taking it to the next level of fanaticism. Good Muslims, for instance, do not shake hands with women, even though the Quran does not explicitly forbid it. Although the Quran stipulates that men are rulers over women, good Muslim men take it upon themselves to rule women not much better than they treat their domesticated animals.

All extreme systems operate outside of the constraints of checks-and-balances and according to the principle of negative feedback loop. That is, once it starts, the extreme becomes more and more extreme until self-destructs and takes the larger system down with it. Cancer is a case in point. It begins with only a few cells. Left unchecked, the few cells continue expanding and stop only with the death of the host.

Fanatical Islam may indeed be a minority. Yet it is a deadly cancer that has metastasized throughout the body of the world. Urgent confrontation of this advancing disease is imperative to stave it off.

Dozens of Islamist shooting wars of lesser and greater bloodletting are presently raging in the world, aided and abetted by the "moderate Muslim" majority. The so called moderate Muslims, even if they exist, are complicit in the crimes of the radicals either by providing them with funds, logistics, and new recruits or by simply failing to actively confront and unequivocally renounce them.

As is the case with cancer cells, it is the malignant minority that is death-bearing.

In Germany of the 1930s, for instance, very few people were Nazis and most Germans dismissed them as a bunch of hot-headed fools. Before long, the hot-headed few cowed in the dismissive masses and as a result millions lost their lives.

The tentacles of the Islamist hydra have deeply penetrated the world. The Egyptian-based Muslim Brotherhood poses a clear threat in Egypt with its large block of representatives in the parliament, but also wages its deadly campaign through its hundreds of well-established and functioning branches all over the world.

The Wahabis finance thousands of madressehs throughout the world where young boys are brainwashed into becoming fanatical footsoldiers for the Petrodollar-flush Saudis and other emirs of the Persian Gulf.

The end-of-the-world believers of the bomb-aspiring Iran's Khomeinism are busy establishing the Shia hegemony in an arc extending from the Gulf of Oman to the Mediterranean Sea.

The Al Queda and dozens of its like-minded jihadists relentlessly carry their barbaric campaigns in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kashmir, the Philippines, the former Soviet Union republics, the Russian federation, Somalia, North Africa and parts of Europe, as well as other lands.

I keep hoping that the purported peace-loving moderate Muslims are indeed the great majority who would prove me right by demonstrating their peacefulness and moderation in action. Thus far, only a faint murmur of equivocation is all that I hear from these people.

Is "moderate Muslims" an illusion? The only viable alternative for peaceful people of Islamic background, therefore, is to leave the bondage of violent Islam altogether and join ranks with humanity's free.

The selected puppet president Ahamadinejad boasts that Iran's mullahs' nuclear train has no reverse gear and lacks brakes. He should harbor no illusions. The non-Islamist masses of Iranians will not docilely submit to the mullahs' maniacal plans. It is the unmatched force of freedom that has no reverse gear and it is the force fully capable and determined to bring the mullahs' train to a screeching halt before it is armed with the Armageddon nuclear weapons they so doggedly pursue.

[Rasputin]

The day I left Iran for good in 1983, I had no idea what living as a foreigner really meant, but now I do.

Being a foreigner no matter where I am, I always comprehend at most half of what people say. It means not getting jokes, not making connections between an old TV show character and something that is happening at the present time. I feel as if I've been thrown onstage to play a role I haven't learned yet. I feel as if I'm trapped at night in a labyrinth, trying to find the exit.

Being a foreigner means I've lost this deep sense of belonging to a place. It feels like an endless struggle just to try to look like everybody else, just to have a banal discussion at work, to offer a neighbor details of a soup recipe, to tell my child a night-time story. It means never being fully in the present, almost like being half deaf, or half blind, or half retarded. It means having to say, "What did you mean?" 100 times a day.

Being a foreigner means that even if I go back to my own country, I will still be a foreigner because I would not feel the fears and concerns of those living in Iran today. I would not laugh at their jokes. I would not cry at their endless funerals. I would not pray to their shameless god. I would not follow their rules. I would not listen to their void. I would not lie to pretend to be something that I am not. I would not look like them. And still I would have to answer this question: "Where do you come from?" 100 times a day.

Being a foreigner means I can't really understand my own children's words. It means I am a mother who is never going to be there, fully, for them, never sharing their deepest feelings, their deepest fears, never able to heal their wounds.

Living as a foreigner is like playing a guessing game. Most of us lose this game. Some of us, after years of trying, finally succeed in dragging ourselves to the top where ordinary life quietly flows.

I thought I was there, at the top.

Until one day I heard that the USA might start a war with Iran.

I really don't know what I am supposed to feel. What am I allowed to say? Am I living in a free country as I always thought I was?

I left Iran without any regrets. And still I think of my leaving as an accomplishment. Still I think I am living right now in "heaven on earth" or the "happiest place in the universe."

So why don't I feel happy? Why doesn't this place feel like the promised heaven? The prospect of a war with Iran has broken the illusion of happiness. It is heating up my heaven.

What if I am not really happy?

I am not sure what I will feel if US bombs destroy my childhood house, the house that I hated, if those bombs kill my childhood friends who weren't really my friends, if they hurt my aunts, my cousins, my nephews whose names I have never learned.

And I am just so tired of the mountain of hatred in my nightmares.

Being a foreigner means accepting hatred. It means forgetting whatever is left from this vast distance in time connecting me to the past, a place I have no right to own, to remember, to love. Because I left. In the act of leaving those memories, I have sworn not to remember them, ever.

What if US bombs like a faraway smell, like a sweet taste, like a familiar image, bring back those anguished, lonely moments I have escaped?

What if with the sound of each explosion, I wake up at the bottom, where I have always remained.

...

Being a foreigner means speaking without being understood.

[Rasputin]

[Rasputin]

Recently I received so many angry e-mails (more than the case for my other articles) when I touched upon the sensitivity of Persian nationalism by calling Xerxes a tyrant. Some of my fellow Iranians asked me why I believe Xerxes was a tyrant and the questioning is legitimate as long as it indeed is a genuine curiosity. Some simply called me names or asked me who I work for (i.e. which dark forces pay me).

How do we define a tyrant in Iran? If Xerxes was not a tyrant then who was a tyrant?

My knowledge of history does not go into much detail so I cannot pretend to be an expert. But so far as I know Xerxes was himself the same Persian king who attacked Sparta and Athens after his father Darius had attempted the same thing and had failed. Why did they want to take over Greece? Was it because the Greeks wrote petitions asking them to liberate Greece from their unjust rulers?

Obviously, many Persians of today (those who think they are the descendants of the ancient Persians) who get so angry about criticising the Achaemenid rulers think that Darius or Xerxes were just rulers who intended no harm. They just for the sake of others' good wanted to take over the whole world, randomly, sporadically, and pretty much continuously attack, conquer and crush revolts just in order to spread civilisation, peace, eventually even freedom or perhaps some sort of democracy?! Aren't the same Iranians getting angry now at George Bush II for contemplating the same portrayed ideals?

The Achaemenid rulers never pretended to have temporary foreign adventures and they proudly annexed previously independent countries and regions killing or intimidating their previously sovereign rulers, often burning down quite a lot in order to teach a lesson to others, while America seems to be more reasonable by leaving the occupied territories sooner or later wherever they take their wars and various other adventures. Also Americans at least try to be careful and kill fewer civilians. Or at least they pretend this much! I am not defending America. I just wanted to make a point by comparison of two situations.

How is it that so many Persians defend someone about whom so little is known? Most, if not all, of what Iranians know about Xerxes and his likes are actually written or translated by Westerners themselves. Iranians seemed to have been unable to read their own same Persian writings of the Achaemenid era?! Yes, it seems so. Thank God these unjust and brutal Westerners of Greece, Germany, France, Britain and America were curious enough to write some history for us and translate what the Persian rulers of thousands of years ago cared to write as well! If they were not so curious we would not have known what we were missing.

I am not defending America, Ancient Greece, Sparta and so on. I am simply wondering about so much hypocrisy and ignorance that is continuously flourishing among the Iranian community. So, Xerxes was a just king, so was Cyrus, Darius and so many other ancient Persian rulers. However they did rule with an iron fist over a large area of the world. No one denies this. Did they do that with the acceptance of all the inhabitants of those areas? No one can deny they did not. They never cared. Didn't they, according to history, attack, conquer, kill and suppress revolts? No one can deny these either.

Creating a vast empire can never be possible without trampling on some rights, walking over hundreds of thousands of dead bodies among whom many innocent, and dictating your own will upon others. But so many of the Persians of today take pride in the likes of Xerxes that it is quite worrisome and makes me think whether we as Iranians are ready to accept democracy or we are actually unhappy with present tyrants and intend nothing but possibly to change the religious tyrant to a nationalist one!

All this desire for personality cult is nothing but a clear sign of social immaturity that ardently defends individuals who have a preference toward what they see as Persian supremacy. And this cannot live in peace with democracy. A true democracy also needs coming to terms with the past, no matter how distant or imaginary it may be, so long as it plays a major role in determining the identity of a large representative mass.

The most powerful Western empire was that of Rome, where there used to be a shaky sort of democracy, as was the case in Greece. Although Italians often take pride in the Roman Empire it is nowadays difficult to arouse so much Italian anger over criticising the Romans. There have been so many Western films in which the Roman rulers and soldiers were demonised. Didn't the Romans ever oppress, kill or torture? Of course they did.

The Roman Empire also did some good, so did the Persian Empire, but the good that these empires did was not intended for the people but for the rulers, because they were often (always in the case of the Persians) self-appointed ruthless warriors. The rulers wanted more power and more power could only be obtained through stability, and stability was provided through some measures that over time created some relative prosperity. The same is true also about the Muslim Caliphate where literature, science, and architecture (including in the past or the present Iranian lands) flourished extensively due to the stability that the Islamic Empire provided. Hence it is not worth praising the Persian or the Roman rulers for their selfish actions.

However it is worth praising George Washington for defending against the British tyranny and building a society that was at least fundamentally meant to be a free one, though it was not and it is not perfect and it will never be so. It is also worth praising many Iranian personalities who have done good for both Iran and for the rest of the world by their pursuit of science and human excellence in many other aspects of life. It is not worth defending or praising one tyrant because it was my tyrant who was supposedly a better man than somebody else's tyrant!

[Rasputin]

Great news! Iran and US have started talking, thanks to bumper stickers:

Iran : If everything is coming your way, you're in the wrong lane!

US: I told you don't follow me, I'm lost too...

Iran : Cover me. I'm changing lanes.

US: Dear Lord, please save me from your followers.

Iran: Don't you like my driving? Then quit watching me.

US: Drive carefully! Remember, it's not only a car that can be recalled by it's maker.

Iran: Don't you wash your car?

US: Don't run your fingers over my car and I won't run my car over your fingers.

Iran: I would give you the finger but it's up my nose.

US: Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change ready.

Iran: Instead of being born again, why not just GROW UP?

US: If your car was a horse, I'd have to shoot it.

Iran : Forget About World Peace... Just learn how to Use Your Turn Signal!

US: Someday we'll look back on all this and plow into a parked car.

[Rasputin]

[Rasputin]

کشورهای مصرف کننده به روندی که از چهار سال پیش شروع شده و با نام «ملی گرایی نفتی» خوانده می شود به عنوان تهدیدی برای سرمایه گذاری بین المللی و امنیت عرضه نفت و گاز می نگرند.

به گزارش شانا در سر مقاله هفته نامه «عرب اویل اند گس» (۱۶ آوریل) آمده است: عده ای تا آنجا پیش می روند که چالش های جدیدی را که بر روابط بین الملل نفت تاثیر می گذارد با تحولات بزرگ دهه 70 که همان ملی گرایی، تحریم، رشد نفوذ اوپک و شوک بهای نفت بود، در کنار هم قرار می دهند.
برای روشن تر شدن موضوع و در نظر گرفتن سهم هر یک نیاز است که برخی واقعیت ها مورد تاکید بیشتری قرار گیرد.
اولین واقعیت این که ملی گرایی جدید نفتی تنها به کشورهای تولیدکننده منحصر نمی شود بلکه در کشورهای صنعتی وارد کننده نفت نیز می توان آن را یافت. نمونه آشکار آن ممانعت مقام های آمریکایی از تصویب واگذاری شرکت آمریکایی «یونوکال» به شرکت ملی نفت برون ساحلی چین (سی ان او او سی) و اعتراض انگلستان به خرید احتمالی سهام شرکت «سنتریکا» از سوی شرکت روسی گازپروم بود.
نمونه دیگر در این مورد تصمیمی است که وزارت صنایع اسپانیا در فروردین (مارس) سال جاری گرفت. وزارت صنایع اسپانیا مقدار فروش مستقیم گاز طبیعی در بازار این کشور به وسیله شرکت الجزایری سوناتراک را به یک میلیارد متر مکعب در سال محدود کرد.
تا آنجا که به کشورهای صادر کننده نفت مربوط است، فصل مشترک ملی گرایی نفت افزایش بهای نفت و گازطبیعی ازسال ۱۳۸۲ (2003) به بعد است. این موضوع قدرت بحث و چانه زنی کشورهای صادر کننده نفت را افزایش داده و سبب شده که آنان روابط خود با کشورهای مصرف کننده و شرکت های خارجی فعال در قلمرو شان را مورد بررسی دوباره قرار دهند.
جدای از فصل مشترک افزایش بهای نفت، تفاوت چشمگیری از نظر انگیزه و اهدافی که این کشورها تعقیب می کنند، وجود دارد.
در روسیه سمت و سوی سیاست جدید نفت و گاز به طور عمده تلاش دولت برای کنترل بخش نفت است که در دوران ریاست جمهوری یلتسین به طور عمده با بهای ارزان به بخش خصوصی فروخته شد. دیگر ویژگی سیاست روسیه اعطای قدرت بیشتر به گازپروم است.

ولادیمیر پوتین در بهمن 82 (فوریه 2003 ) اعلام کرد که واگذاری قدرت بیشتر به گازپروم، این شرکت را قادر می سازد که ابزاری باشد برای کمک به بنیان نهادن دوباره نفوذ اقتصادی و سیاسی روسیه در دنیا.
در آمریکای لاتین، ظهور ملی گرایی در بولیوی و تهدید حاصل از آغاز موج ملی گرایی در ونزوئلا بر ضد شرکت های فعال در منطقه اورینوکو بیشترشبیه به نزاع طلبی نفتی بود که در دهه 70 به ملی شدن صنایع نفت در کشورهای عرب منجر شد.
در کنار این مسئله، بر تمایل هوگوچاوز، رئیس جمهوری ونزوئلا به استفاده از سلاح نفت برای تایید رهبریش در صحنه نفت و تداوم نهضت ضد آمریکاییش نیز، افزوده می شود.
جنبه مصلحت اندیشانه تر ملی گرایی جدید نفتی آن چیزی است که در کشورهایی مانند الجزایر، لیبی و عمان شاهدیم. هدف اصلی که این کشورها تعقیب می کنند، عبارت است از بهره مندی از افزایش بهای نفت در جهت افزایش درآمدها و نیز تعدیل قراردادها با طرف های خارجی به نحوی که منافع خود را بهتر تامین کنند.

در عربستان که به تنهایی یک چهارم از ذخایرنفت اثبات شده جهان را در اختیاردارد، افزایش سرمایه ها و رشد سریع تقاضای جهانی نفت، مقام های این کشور را در کاربست سیاست حفظ انحصارطلبی شان تشجیع کرده است. این به آن معناست که عربستان می کوشد انحصار شرکت «سعودی آرامکو» را در بخش بالادستی حفظ کند و همکاری با شرکای خارجی را به بخش های نه چندان جذاب مانند اکتشاف و تولید گاز و پالایش محدود کند.
برای شرکت های نفتی بین المللی، پیامد اصلی ملی گرایی جدید در عرصه نفت عبارت است از شرایط مالی نه چندان مطلوب در قراردادهای اکتشاف و تولید و دسترسی محدودتر به مناطقی که تولید در آنها بیشترین بازدهی را خواهد داشت.

[Rasputin]

Inside the struggle for Iran

A grand coalition of anti-government forces is planning a second Iranian revolution via the ballot box to deny President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad another term in office and break the grip of what they call the "militia state" on public life and personal freedom.

Encouraged by recent successes in local elections, opposition factions, democracy activists, and pro-reform clerics say they will bring together progressive parties loyal to former president Mohammad Khatami with so-called pragmatic conservatives led by Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani.


The alliance aims to exploit the president's deepening unpopularity, borne of high unemployment, rising inflation and a looming crisis over petrol prices and possible rationing to win control of the Majlis in general elections which are due within 10 months.
Parliament last week voted to curtail Mr Ahmadinejad's term by holding presidential and parliamentary elections simultaneously next year.

Though the move is likely to be vetoed by the hardline Guardian Council, it served notice of mounting disaffection in parliament.

But opposition spokesmen say their broader objective is to bring down the fundamentalist regime by democratic means, transform Iran into a "normal country", and obviate the need for any military or other US and western intervention. Rightwing political and religious forces, divided and dismayed by Mr Ahmadinejad's much-criticised performance, are already mobilising to meet the threat.

The movement amounts to the clearest sign yet within Iran that the country is by no means unified behind a president who has led it into confrontation with the west over the nuclear issue, while presiding over economic decline at home.

"The past two years have been a very bitter time for Iran," said Mohammad Atrianfar, a leading opposition figure with ties to Mr Rafsanjani, the former president now emerging as a likely future kingmaker in Iran.

"Ahmadinejad has done everything upside down - politics, economy, foreign policy - putting all our achievements at risk. He has done a lot of damage at home and abroad."

Mr Atrianfar said that a majority in the Majlis was now critical of the president and would certainly impeach him but for the support he enjoyed from the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

According to Ali Alavi of Siyasat-e Ruz newspaper, some 150 political activists, governors-general, former administration officials and dissident MPs drew up a coalition "victory strategy" at a secretive conference last month presided over by Mr Khatami.

The strategy envisaged "aggravation of the differences among the fundamentalists" and "constant criticism of Ahmadinejad" by "presenting a dark image of the country's affairs," Mr Alavi said.

Opposition sources said that a future reformist-pragmatist government would continue to maintain Iran's claim to nuclear energy and other "national rights" but would seek to settle disputes through talks.

Iran wanted a "normal" relationship with the rest of the world based on mutual respect, the opposition sources said.

In an oblique swipe at Mr Ahmadinejad, Mr Rafsanjani told the weekly Friday prayer meeting in Tehran that the nuclear issue should be settled by negotiations "conducted in a rational atmosphere".

Mr Atrianfar said the economy was the battleground on which Iran's political future would be decided.

The president has faced mounting criticism in recent weeks over high unemployment, especially among younger people, rising inflation and escalating housing costs.

Significantly, for a major oil producer, heavily subsidised petrol prices are due to rise next month, hitting poorer people hardest in a country with poor or non-existent public transport.

"They are playing with fire. Nobody wants to take responsibility for this. It's going to blow up in their faces," said Hussein Dirbaz, a resident of Narmak, the Tehran suburb where Mr Ahmadinejad was brought up.

In an unusual intervention, Grand Ayatollah Yusef Sa'anei, one of Iran's most respected Islamic scholars, has attacked Mr Ahmadinejad's government for failing to tackle social ills such as youth unemployment, drug addiction, and gender inequality.

In a rare interview with a western newspaper at his office in the holy city of Qom, Mr Sa'anei said: "The government should be at the service of the people. But it is putting too much pressure on the people.

"It bans newspapers, sends people to jail, segregates boys and the girls at the universities, makes noise about hijab."

A senior government official said the rising tide of criticism directed at Mr Ahmadinejad was unwarranted. "People say we don't care but that's not true. We've created more credit, more jobs.

"It's too soon to say [Ahmadinejad] has failed. It's too soon to say the reformists will win."

Observers claim that a power struggle is inevitable.

"A very big battle is coming. It's unavoidable," a western diplomat said. "There's a widening gulf between the two sides. There are profound divisions about which way Iran should go. It's going to get very rough."

The looming power struggle could decide whether Iran continues on a path of confrontation with the west or comes in from the cold, the diplomat said.

[Rasputin]

Note: An amicus curiae brief is a letter from a party who is not the plaintiff or the defendant in a case, but who would like the court to consider the ramifications of its verdict beyond the particulars of the case.

The Iranian Supreme Court recently overturned the murder convictions of 6 Basij vigilantes who executed a young couple, Reza Nejadmalayeri and Shohreh Nikpour, on grounds that the couple's behavior was unIslamic. Since a last appeal to undo this decision is still possible, here is a plea to the full membership body of Iran's Supreme Court to consider the political and economic consequences of its final verdict.

In 1875 the United States Supreme Court decision, United States v. Cruikshank overturned the murder convictions of a band of white vigilantes who had participated in the lynching of several black men. The Cruikshank case and the Nejadmalayeri case are connected in ways that go beyond the de facto sanctioning of lynch mobs.

Many decades after the infamous Cruikshank decision -- and many others racist verdicts -- the United States was unable to morally defend itself against Soviet anti-American propaganda. During the Cold War competition for global leadership an amicus brief by the US justice department urged the Supreme Court to consider the international ramifications of how it interprets the US constitution. Similarly, in an atmosphere of anti-Iranian sentiment in the West, Nejadmalayeri should be judged in the light of the current threats to Iran's national security.

War
The most immediate threat to Iran's sovereignty is the possibility of a military strike by the United States. Though support for the Iraq war is fast fading, it is a mistake to take this as an indication that post 9-11 America is ready to make its peace with the Islamic world. None of the leading US presidential candidates, Democrat or Republican are willing to take the option of a military˜possibly nuclear--strike off the table. In a country where polls guide politicians' public statements it is not hard to guess what the candidates' internal polls are revealing about the American state of mind relative to Iran. America's internecine dispute is mainly about how badly the Iraq war was managed. No American leader is seriously considering reversing the policy of military involvement in the Middle East.

Allowing the basij vigilantes to go free gives the impression that the Islamic Regime has abdicated its authority to the mob. If the full membership body of Iran's Supreme Court upholds Nejadmalayeri, any anti-war argument which cites Iran's national sovereignty will lack a solid foundation. A government which does not appropriate enough authority to itself to fully administer the laws of the land, does not have a reasonable claim to legitimacy. In the past, the United States has gained support for military action abroad by successfully demonstrating that the country she is about to invade is run by warlords. Somalia, Afghanistan and the Balkans are examples. The Iranian government's sanctioning of street justice strengthens such a case for war against Iran.

Economy
Global warming concerns have made nuclear energy an attractive alternative to oil. As a result nuclear power generation is increasing steadily throughout the world. In the near future any country that cannot generate its own nuclear power will be at a serious economic disadvantage.

International fear of Iran's nuclear technology program is not just about atom bombs. Due to the extremely dangerous nature of nuclear material, even civilian use of nuclear energy requires trustworthy guardianship. Iran's government must demonstrate a high level of skill and professionalism in administrating the law, so as to foster respect for order among its citizens. Sanctioning vigilantism is a step in the wrong direction. At this point even the most well intentioned defenders of Iran's right to advanced technologies would be reluctant to recommend scientific cooperation with Iran. Iran's growing population urgently needs nuclear energy, and the nation's efforts to obtain it would be hurt if the current Nejadmalayeri verdict is left to stand.

Civil War
Citizens give their consent to be governed in order to enjoy the benefits of protection from the governing body. Victims of state-sanctioned vigilantism are denied the important protection of due process. So far secular Iranians have weighed the benefits of rebellion versus its costs and have decided that in the balance it is better to shrug off basij interference as annoyances. But once basij vigilantism goes beyond harassment to include serious physical harm or death, this balance will quickly change. If Nejadmalayeri is left to stand it could become the turning point where Iranian pacifism towards the regime will shift to militancy.

The Cold War eventually led the United States Supreme Court away from Cruickshank towards Brown v. Board of Education, the landmark case which ended racial segregation in America. This turned out to be of enormous benefit to the country. Without Brown v. Board of Education The United States would not today be able to project her power across the globe, as she would be internally wracked by civil strife. Likewise Iran could benefit from her own landmark court decisions which interpret Iran's constitution with an eye towards national unity and international reputation.

Several years ago the Israeli Supreme Court blocked an attempt by the Israel Land Administration to create separate Arab and Jewish housing developments. The president of Israel's Supreme Court, Aharon Barak was able to protect Israeli Muslims from discrimination by citing a famous legal precedent. The case he cited: Brown v. Board of Education. There is barakat in extending the protection of our laws to all humans, even if at first it seems we are doing it out of expedience. Iran's Supreme court must turn Nejadmalayeri into a Brown v. Board of Education, not leave it as a Cruickshank.

[Rasputin]

One of the many problems with the media's occasionally generous portrayal of Iran is they simply pick what they know or have heard, think it’s good enough and then proceed to run with it.

Recently a friend forwarded me a piece published in the Washington Post about a high school reunion of Americans who lived in Iran in 1962. The article puts forth how Iran was in 1962. 1962? Why 1962? Is that the best we have to offer? How quaint 1962 era Iran was?

Here’s the article, see for yourself. I sometimes wonder if the blatant demonization of Persia as in the recent 300 film debacle, and the more subtle "backwater" depiction as done here, are not part of a conspiracy to hit at us from all sides, both the harsh approach (300) and through the appearance of feigned kindness.

In this case, referring to Iran by someone who graduated in the sixties, as if this is the best relevant point in time to bring up today. As if this will somehow humanize us.

" ... Biblical times?"

" ... Camel crossings?"

" ... thousands of Americans"

" ... We didn't have American things to go to," Jan said. "No football team. No soda shop..."

" ... The Americans lived in compounds but still managed to experience the fabric of Tehran life: the chador-clad women, the irrigation ditches known as jubes running down the sides of streets, ... "

While this may very well have been the case in 1962 era Iran, things were far more advanced by 1979, the most recent time I would expect people to look at. Especially if one is comparing things to now.

Since I was there, I'll remind the esteemed readers that in fact there were close to 100,000 Americans and families living in Iran, not only in Tehran, but also in Esfahan, and Shiraz, in which there were American schools as well.

In TAS (Tehran American School) there was, count them, 5 fully manned American football teams! With a 6th fielded albeit weakly by none other than my alma mater Tehran International School: Iranzamin, who combined players with the Community school to put together the venerable "Trojans" against the Eagles (of course), Raiders (of course), Vikings, Marauders, and Phantoms, of TAS.

Not just high school football teams, but a full tee-ball, minor, major, and pony leagues of over 20 baseball teams per league, played full seasons, complete with scorekeepers, referees, coaches, uniforms and equipment. Hot dogs? Of course! I personally played for 5 years, even got my picture once in the English language Kayhan, showing me catching a rare game-winning fly ball in left field for my team, the Cubs. Kyle, Russell, Jamsheed, Bijan, Kamran, and I were never so proud of that championship season that year.

Not just baseball, but the Boy Scouts of America had not one, but 4 full boy scout troops, covering Cub, Webelo, Boy, as well as the latest advance in scouting at the time, Explorer Scout levels of achievement. Ascending Mt Damavand, learning winter survival skills in the harsh winters of Lashgarak, to the wonderful wildlife of the dead sea deserts of the mighty Kavirs, to spending a week with the Ghashghai tribe, to participation in a world scouting Jamboree on the Caspian coast.

Not only were there soda shops, but there was every kind of teenager hang out joint one could imagine, from great Mexican food, to Ray’s Pizza pantries (#3 was my favorite), to burger stands and other full service teenage consumption restaurants. We even saw Dirty Harry and James Bond shoot many a bad guy in English language movie theaters. Bowled, ice-skated, drank vodka-limes, smoked a little weed or hash, everything a normal American teenager did during the 70's. Wednesdays after school, I spent many an afternoon, reading Cycle World, Car and Driver, and Archie or Richie Rich comics, at the FBI (Foroushgaheh Bozorheh Iran, one of the many large department stores in Tehran) bookstands.

Americans did not live in compounds, because frankly there were too many of them to house, and strange as it might seem today, wandered freely and rented at the many apartments and homes across the cities in which they lived. As a result, trick or treating during Halloween each year was a highly profitable venture. This in stark contrast to Saudi Americans of today even, who must stay separated from the general Saudi population. Approximately 10,000 Americans actually made Iran their permanent home and owned property, horse ranches, orchards and other properties in which they lived alongside their Iranian neighbors. Peacefully, without incident.

Oh sure, occasionally a beautiful blonde teenage American girl would fall in love with an equally beautiful Iranian teenage boy, and the families would be at odds by normal protective fathers who each would forbid their child to see the other. Mostly fearing the very normal and typical heightened sexuality and hormonal outcome typical for the rock and roll infused lifestyle of the seventies. Blame it on the bump and grind of Disco if you want.

Jubes as irrigation ditches and chadors? The difference in design of what is a very common gutter in the streets of any modern city anywhere in the world, calling it an irrigation ditch, is way off. A jube is merely a slightly deeper gutter, which is actually more logical than the short shallow one in the US, but a jube is made out of concrete and everything.

Chadors while a traditional part of the southern poorer parts of Tehran were not as visible in the northern parts of the city, and I would say, in pre-revolution era 1979, it was a rare sight though not unknown, to maybe see one in twenty women wearing the chador at any time. Certainly not a common stereotype of the Iranian woman during the 70's. Most of the chadors were white or the printed paisley kind, more of a long shawl or scarf, rather than the stark black ones we have come to know as standard garb for the most pious or extremist.

By the end of 1979, through the takeover or invasion of Iran by the religious clerics we have seen since, and still see at the helm today, and primarily through the abandonment of their posts by the powers that used to be.

Iran has become what Iran has become. Nothing more, nothing surprising, nothing but a great big damn shame for all of us who witnessed a far better time. So 1962 is definitely not the moment in time that I will choose to remember and look back on.

Especially if I'm going to tell Americans who don't know.

A time it was, what a time it was.

[Rasputin]

A Softer, Gentler Era of U.S., Iran Relations?

BERKELEY, United States, May 3 (IPS) - Tehran's high-level presence at the meeting this week in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt to discuss Iraq's security boosts the chances for eventual negotiations between Tehran and Washington over their long-running disputes, say analysts here and in Iran.

Even if direct talks do not occur this round, indications are that both sides are seeking a way out of the impasse while saving face. White House officials have lately modified their rhetoric on Iran, even though Iranian officials have rejected substantive face-to-face meetings at the summit.

Iranian officials have said that Tehran is ready to negotiate so long as it is "without any preconditions". The United States severed diplomatic relations with Tehran after the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

In recent months, U.S. officials have accused Iran of helping Iraqi Shiite militias launch attacks on U.S. troops by infiltrating advanced explosive device technology across the border. Iranian officials have repeatedly denied these allegations, and Washington has produced no solid evidence to support them. Meanwhile, the dispute over Iran's nuclear programme remains at a standoff.

However, while U.S. President George W. Bush has repeatedly said all options, including the use of force, are "on the table" to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, analysts believe that talking about Iraq's stability could sideline this course of action and allow space for diplomacy.

After the costly catastrophes in Iraq and Afghanistan, Iranian analysts believe that the United States has already eliminated the possibility of military action against Iran. Although the Bush administration has tried to put pressure on Tehran by supporting U.N. Security Council sanctions over its nuclear programme, there has been a shift from the "use of force" to harsh diplomacy.

"A gradual sanctions scenario is currently under review in the U.S. In this scenario, there are increasing steps of sanctions against Iran," prominent Iranian journalist and analyst Mashallah Shamsolvaezin told IPS from Tehran. "The West believes the Iranian economy will not be able to tolerate these sanctions on the one hand, and on the other hand they believe that when Iran is completely exhausted by the sanctions, it will come to the negotiating table about its nuclear plans."

He believes that the U.S. failure in Iraq and Afghanistan removes the possibility of Washington contemplating a military option, politically or economically.

"The only country that can prevent a cumulative crisis in both Iraq and Afghanistan is Iran. If Iran becomes destabilised, the situation will become gravely dangerous," added Shamsolvaezin, editor-in-chief of several reformist newspapers that have been shut down by the government.

"Any attack on Iran will create tension in the region with a ripple effect from northern Afghanistan's border with China all the way to the end of Iraq and Jordan, and this is why it is not very likely that such an attack will take place."

Dr. Abbas Milani, director of Hamid and Christina Moghadam Iranian Studies at Stanford University, also believes that the new trend among politicians in Tehran and Washington is reinforcing diplomacy rather than war rhetoric.

"While there are certainly dedicated minorities in Iran and America who, for different reasons, crave a military confrontation, even an attack on Iran, and while in the expected discourse of diplomacy 'keeping all the options on the table' is believed to be simply wise policy, I think a majority of policy-makers in Washington and in Tehran have realised that at this moment, direct negotiations, even if they end up in failure, is much more in their interest than a military confrontation," Milani told IPS.

"While the apologists of the Islamic Republic have for years advocated 'direct negotiations' between the U.S. and Iran, and have long argued that the U.S. must give the mullahs what they want, there is another way of approaching such negotiations," Milani said.

"The U.S. and Iran, according to this other paradigm, must engage in direct negotiations over all the outstanding issues between them, including the question of the human rights of the Iranian people," he said. "While the U.S. must recognise that democracy in Iran can and must only be created by the people of Iran themselves, it can, and hopefully will, nevertheless, continue to oppose the obvious breaches of the Iranian people's human rights by the regime in Tehran."

The idea of direct negotiations between Iran and the U.S., now the hottest topic in the Iranian news media, has received mixed reactions from the conservative newspaper Kayhan. In its main editorial last week, Kayhan asked the Iranian government to take full advantage of this historic opportunity to punish the U.S. in the region.

According to the editorial, "Bush wants to rescue the U.S. from the trap in which they are caught, thereby saving [the Republican Party] from a definitive loss in the next elections, hence the U.S. is attempting to get closer to Iran to use it to solve its own problems."

The hardliner paper, known to be aligned with Iran's supreme leader and which represents the most radical faction of conservatives in the country, urged Iranian officials to ignore international requests for Tehran's support for stability in Iraq.

"It is true that the U.S. is snarled in problems today, the solution to which might solely rest in Iran's hands. It is natural for U.S. to wish to utilise Iran's unique position to reduce its headaches; however, it is feared that once these headaches diminish, the U.S. will become a new headache itself for Iran and for the region," Kayhan argued.

Of course, for many Iranians, Kayhan's view is interpreted as official propaganda. A political analyst in Tehran told IPS that the hardliners' stance on the question, despite appearances, actually reflects their eagerness to negotiate.

"Remember the arrest of 15 British sailors last month? This newspaper was among the very few radicals who asked for their trial and even death, while they claimed that the sailors have been spies," he told IPS on condition of anonymity.

"But the president released them as an 'Easter gift', and gave them a plethora gifts in a very unusual ceremony, while the same people who protested in the streets against the sailors said nothing and even admired the government," he added. "The more the ayatollahs' rhetoric gets harsh, the more they tend to talk and negotiate. That's an Iranian style of negotiation."

*Omid Memarian is an Iranian journalist and civil society activist. He has won several awards, including Human Rights Watch's highest honour in 2005, the Human Rights Defender Award.

[Rasputin]

پيشروی بدون درهم شکستن و زيرپا نهادن اين خط قرمزها مقدور نيست.
*تقويت دانشجويان آزادی خواه و برابری طلب زمينه های توطئه گری را کاهش دهد.
*گرايش راست با تلاش برای انطباق حرکت بااوج وحضيض تنشهای خارجی به جنبش ضربه ميزند


روشنگری: وقتی نهادهای شبه نظامی و امنيتی و بسيجی ها ماجرای باصطلاح توهين چهار نشريه در دانشگاه اميرکبير به "مقدسات" و "مقام رهبری" را بر سر نيزه زدند, کاملا آشکار بود که هدف آنها تنها پرونده سازی برای گردانندگان اين چهار نشريه دانشجويی نيست و هدف بزرگ تری را تعقيب می کنند. وقتی عاملان دانه درشت سرکوب نظير سلاخ مطبوعات قاضی سابق و دادستان کنونی, مرتضوی به ميدان تهديد دانشجويان پا نهاد, روشن بود که هدف سرکوبگران فراتر از ايجاد تضييقات مقطعی برای گردانندگان چهار نشريه دانشجويی دانشگاه اميرکبير است.

توطئه بسيجی ها در سرقت لوگوی چهار نشريه دانشگاه اميرکبير و انتشار مطالبی که زمينه ساز حمله و سرکوب به گردانندگان اين نشريات و فعالين دانشجويی گردد در يک هفته اخير در اطلاعيه های دانشجويی در دانشگاه اميرکبير و دانشگاههای ديگر به دقت تشريح شده است. اين اقدام در واقع به نوعی تست دانشگاه و زمينه سنجی برای مقابله گسترده با فعاليت های دانشجويی و جزئی از نقشه عمومی امنيتی های حاکم برای تعديل فضای مبارزاتی در دانشگاه است.

واقعيت اين است که "مهرورزان" حاکم با همه توطئه هايشان تاکنون نتوانسته اند فضای سرکوب و اختناق را دانشگاهها حاکم کنند و فضای مبارزاتی را درهم بشکنند و نياز آنها به توطئه نيز از همين جا ريشه می گيرد. از سوی ديگر روشن است که با وجود تمايزات کاملا روشن ميان گرايشات مخالف رژيم در دانشگاه ها و از جمله در دانشگاه اميرکبير و جدال های نظری ميان اين گرايشات, توطئه مزبور نه فقط گروهی خاص که کل فعاليت های دانشجويی را هدف قرار داده است. بهترين سند در تاييد اين ارزيابی اطلاعيه اداره کل فرهنگی دانشگاه اميرکبير است که روز يکشنبه از سوی خبرگزاری ايلنا منتشر شد و در آن "انتشار كليه نشريات دانشگاه تا اطلاع ثانوى ممنوع" اعلام شده است.

در واکنش به توطئه باندهای سرکوبگر افراطی در دانشگاه اميرکبير تاکيد بر سه نکته مهم است: اولا خط قرمزهای تحميلی رژيم تحت هيچ شرايطی و به هيچ وجه تقدس و مشروعيت ندارد. نه در دانشگاه, نه در سطح جامعه. بنابراين چه جنبش دانشجويی و چه هر جنبش اعتراضی ديگری تنها از طريق مشروعيت زدايی دائم از اين خط قرمزها و بی اعتباری عملی آنها می توانند پيشرفت کنند و سنگرهای تازه ای را از دست رژيم بيرون بکشند. پيشروی بدون درهم شکستن و زيرپا نهادن اين خط قرمزها مقدور نيست.

ثانيا: درهم شکستن خط قرمزها بايد بر راهکارهای درست مبارزاتی استوار باشد تا رژيم نتواند آن را به ضد خود تبديل کند. در اين رابطه اتکاء بر توان جنبش وحفظ استقلال آن از اهميت اساسی برخوردار است. توطئه رژيم در دانشگاهها يک رويکرد عمومی است. باندهای سرکوب هر بار تشخيص دهند که با کاربست راهکار توطئه گرانه ای می توانند مطالبات دانشجويی را به عقب برانند و يا فعالين تازه ای را شکار کنند, و محدوديت های تازه ای بر دانشگاه تحميل کنند, از توطئه خودداری نخواهند کرد. اما آنچه مهم است اين است که راهکارها به نحوی اتخاذ شوند که نتيجه در هرحال، حتی در صورت موفقيت طرح های توطئه آميز رژيم، در خدمت منافع جنبش قرار گيرد.

مبارزات دانشجويی تجارب ارزنده ای در اين رابطه از خود برجای گذاشته اند. جنبش دانشجويی تاکنون توانسته است در تقويت فرايند مشروعيت زدايی از رژيم و بی اعتباری خط قرمزهايش نقش مهمی بازی کند. در عين حال در همين جنبش با عملکرد نيروهايی روبرو بوديم که عملا در خدمت تضعيف جنبش و تقويت استبداد قرار گرفت. مثلا در جنبش 18 تير ديديم که گرايشات راست و اصلاح طلب از طريق تلاش برای انطباق حرکت جنبش با مواضع جناحی از قدرت چه ضربه سنگينی بر جنبش وارد آوردند.

برکسی پوشيده نيست که هم اکنون نيز برخی گروه های راست و ليبرال در خارج دانشگاه و هواداران مشی آنها در دانشگاه ها تلاش ميکنند حرکت جنبش دانشجويی را بر اوج و حضيض تنش های خارجی انطباق دهند. اين سياست، اگر چه اين بار ظاهرا راديکال و ساختار شکن به نظر ميرسند، ولی ماهيتا همان نقش را بازی می کنند که در دوره اصلاح طلبی: يعنی تضعيف جنبش به نفع قدرتی خارج از آن و گاه نيز در صورت مساعد نبودن توازن قوا به رواداری های سازشگرانه با بدترين جناح های استبداد حاکم مجبور ميشوند که در عمل به تقويت مواضع توطئه کران "مهرورز" منجر ميشود.

البته جنبش دانشجويی چنان که همه می دانند محل عملکرد گرايش های متفاوت است و با اين که گرايش های مختلف از چپ و راست در دانشگاه, در برابر دستگاه سرکوب ناگزير از برخی همسويی های موقت هستند و با اين که هيچ گرايشی نمی تواند در برابر سرکوب و آدم ربايی و توطئه باندهای رژيم سکوت کند, در مجموع تقويت دانشجويان آزادی خواه و برابری طلب و تضعيف گرايش هايی که راهکارهايشان از فشارهای خارجی متاثر است در دراز مدت می تواند زمينه های توطئه گری دسته های سرکوبگر رژيم را کاهش دهد.

[Rasputin]

If we strip away the verbiage, during the 1990s only three countries in the Middle East publicly supported those Palestinians who see violence as the way to win back the land lost since 1948 to Israel. These were Iraq, Syria and Iran.
Since 2003 Iraq has changed tactics, while Syria seems interested in a "cold peace" with its Jewish neighbor. Only Iran remains committed to ending the Jewish state, an important reason why the United States -- and privately most of the European Union -- holds that it cannot be trusted with the uranium reprocessing technology that could lead to the development of nuclear weapons.

While President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gets live coverage on international networks, in reality he and his team report to the Supreme Leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who directly appoints the heads of key ministries such as interior, defense and foreign affairs. Both the Expediency Council (set up to oversee legislation) and the judiciary report to Khamenei and not Ahmadinejad, as do the Revolutionary Guards, the police and the military.

Since the Khomeini revolution in 1979, those in power in Iran see as their objective the assumption of leadership of the Muslim "ummah," or diaspora. This despite the fact that more than 80 percent of believers are Sunni -- and hence opposed to the Shiite Islam practiced in Iran -- and that most holy sites of the Muslim faith are in Saudi Arabia, with even the primary Shiite sites located in Iraq.

Nevertheless, the Supreme Leader's circle expects that vigorous backing of the hard-line Palestinian cause of extinguishing the state of Israel can be their ticket to support from Muslims worldwide, leading in time to a pan-Islamic entity with Iran at its core. To these zealots, the sacrifice of Iranian interests through confrontation with the United States and the European Union is a price worth paying for the chance of becoming the vanguard of the fastest-growing faith in the world.

There is therefore neither irony nor bluff in the numerous statements from Tehran about the elimination of Israel, an objective constrained only by the obvious limits set by Iran's own military and other weaknesses.

Clearly, an Iran run by a religious establishment operating in accordance with the apocalyptic philosophy of Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini will meet both U.S. and EU unwillingness to permit any activities that could lead to the development of weapons of mass destruction, despite the numerous pacifist statements coming out of Tehran.

The focus of the religious establishment on Israel is not popular with any of the other sectors of Iranian opinion. When the liberal cleric Mohammad Khatami was elected president, there was hope that Iran would move away from rule by the "ulama," or religious establishment. However, even the "liberal" Khatami Cabinet contained fewer technocrats than the previous "conservative" one of Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Since then, under Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the scales have moved even further away from non-religious experts to those having close links with the ulama.

The new president, following the precedent set by U.S. President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, regularly converses with the Almighty -- although in his case, divine diktat seems to be arriving via the Supreme Leader, who must clear his major policy initiatives the way India's Sonia Gandhi does in the case of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

As president, Khatami meekly accepted the overlordship of the clerics, giving way on most policies except cosmetic ones, such as permitting women to loosen the Wahhabi dress code adopted under Khomeini -- a relaxation that has now been reversed. The media remained under clerical control, as did the judiciary, the police, the military and the state sector in industry, which controls 80 percent of the national income.

In the presidential election that took place a couple of years ago, it was not the liberals but Iranian nationalists who emerged as a force, largely uniting behind Rafsanjani. However, in the final lap it was the frugal Ahmadinejad and not the super-rich Rafsanjani who won, thus ensuring the continued absence of a challenge to the clerical establishment headed by Khamenei.

Since then, a bad economic situation made worse by mismanagement under Iran's mullahcracy has resulted in a shift of public opinion toward those who favor an "Iran first" rather than a "religion first" policy. This group would downplay support to the Palestinians in favor of an entente with the West. Its positions are articulated by political scientists such as Hermidas Bavand, who told this columnist that a struggle against Israel on behalf of the Palestinians should not be treated as a vital interest of Iran.

However, on the question of nuclear technology, Professor Bavand is one with the religious establishment in saying that the reprocessing of uranium and the generation of nuclear energy "is a right under the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty) that Iran cannot give up." Of course, an Iran run by its nationalists would be a very different country from the one now being administered by those dreaming of an Islamic empire led by Tehran.

Clearly, rather than the liberals, it is the Iranian nationalists -- a potent force since the overthrow of Mohammad Mossadeq by the Shah in 1953 -- who have the public support needed to challenge the monopoly of power enjoyed since 1979 by the clerics. This allows the adoption of a nuanced negotiating position by the United States and the European Union, who could make it clear that it is the present state structure in Iran that is the obstacle to permitting the country to enrich uranium.

A surgical strike against nuclear facilities -- if not accompanied by attacks on population centers or economic targets -- may result in a sharp meltdown of support for an establishment that would have its military weaknesses revealed. Although the regime is deadly against its own people, Iran has a relatively feeble punch against NATO. A NATO strike that targeted only specific nuclear sites would be very bad news for the mullahcracy.

However, should Israel join in such an operation, it would have the effect of unifying the population along religious lines and converting the regime in Tehran into a potent force in the entire Arab "street." It is small wonder that those in power in Tehran are praying either for peace or for Israel to join with the United States and its allies in a surgical strike that would leave ordinary life in the country unaffected.