generalspeaking

That Seething Cauldron

How well did Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri plan his timely death. To ensure massive perturbation for his critics, for Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei alongside President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who surely must curse the inconvenience of his death with its inauspicious coincidence of falling within the sacred month of Muharram and its tangential connection with the mourning of the Prophet Muhammad's grandson.

Not only is the implied message intolerable, that there is a connection between the mourning for Imam Hussein, but that for the very symbol of human rights and resistance to the totalitarian Islamic Republic of Iran, through mourning the death of this model for reform. Nationwide protests are being planned by opponents of the current regime, to mark the 7th day since Montazeri's death, a ritual that will be shielded and supported by the traditional holiday of Ashura, which the authorities cannot possibly interfere with lest they be seen as impious.

The spiritual father of the reform movement in Iran, spurred on by atrocious events to denounce the human rights abuses of his colleague, the Grand Ayatollah and his governing council, along with the illegitimacy of the summer election that re-installed President Ahmadinejad, enjoyed his position as spiritual leader of the first order of the green revolution. The holy city of Qom (not far from where the latest-revealed, illicit nuclear installation stands) was packed with mourners.

The vehicle carrying the leader of the opposition, Mir Hossein Mousavi, was attacked by motorcycling Basiji in a show of intimidation, as he proceeded to the memorial service. The memorial service for Montazeri itself was halted by government agents. His steadfast denunciation of the brutal excesses of the Islamic Republic ensured his premier place as a hated seditionist.

"A political system based on force, oppression, changing people's votes, killing, closure, arresting and using Stalinist and medieval torture, creating repression, censorship of newspapers, interruption of the means of mass communications, jailing the enlightened and the elite of society for false reasons, and forcing them to make false confessions in jail is condemned and illegitimized", he thundered.

He just about covered most of the ill deeds conceived and practised by the rulers in Tehran. The response from the country's top judge gave warning to reformers: "I say to leaders of the sedition that we have enough evidence against you. If the regime has shown tolerance until now, don't suppose that we do not understand." The response from protesters has been anything but muted in their chant of "Death to the Dictator".

For after all, it was just a handful of protesters who were murdered by prison guards and the Republican Guard, post-election. This may well be the dawn of an entirely new era.

Labels: Human Rights, Middle East, Traditions

posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, December 22, 2009