generalspeaking

Testing the Iranian's Regime's Resolve

"[Pro-regime demonstrators, in] resolutions [issued at the end of counter-rallies on Saturday, warned against] any kind of move masterminded by the anti-revolutionary forces and the US, British, and Israeli spy agencies to stir unrest and dissidence in Iran."
"[Millions of Iranians across the country] gathered in the streets Saturday] to show allegiance to the Islamic Republic one day after tens of people staged economic protests in a few towns."
"[Moreover, pro-regime protesters] further reiterated their everlasting allegiance to Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei."
"Harsh chants [were expressed at Tehran protests with riot police dispatched to the scene], Unlike other protests in various cities which were against the economic situation and high prices, the one in front of the University of Tehran was political."
Fars News Agency, Islamic Republic of Iran

"The opportunists who wanted to benefit from the situation have been dispersed with the arrival of [the other] students."
Tasnim news agency

Students hold placards in protest at the University of Tehran.

Four days and counting. From the eclipse of 2017 to the emergence of 2018, a replay of the street protests that took place in 2009 when Iranians attempted to resist the re-election of then-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for a second term, were overruled by Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khomeini and his select group of ruling Ayatollahs. Opposition to the ruling Ayatollahs and the Republican Guard Corps has simmered for years.

Iranians resentful of the fact that their Islamic Republic regime has regained billions of dollars yet failed to lift the colossal weight of poverty from people living with inadequate food, medicines and lacking the services required in any jurisdiction that claims it represents the best interests of those it rules, have weighed the impact on their lives of their government funding terrorist groups and investing in new advanced weapons systems, all the while exhibiting indifference to their basic needs.

The zeal to hold their masters to account for their parlous state of indigence in view of rising prices for basic foods while funding goes outside the country has roused students at Tehran's university to protest against the funding of Hezbollah and Hamas, of the vast resources that have been sunk into assuring that Syria's murderous president's position remains intact while Sunni Syrians are deprived of life and property, of arming the Houthi rebels in Yemen are roiling the sensibilities of ordinary Iranians.

Iranians chant slogans as they march in support of the government near the Imam Khomeini grand mosque in the capital Tehran on December 30, 2017. (AFP PHOTO / TASNIM NEWS / HAMED MALEKPOUR)

Their 'moderate' president Rouhani has warned that though Iranians have the right to protest politically, violence will not be countenanced. So far, it has been the police that have responded to the protests. So far hundreds of arrests have taken place among the protesters, along with injuries and fatalities when police have turned to lethal means of persuasion. Not yet have the heavy hitters in the regime's arsenal like the motorcycle-militia Basij or the military yet been called out as they were in 2009.

The regime-linked media claiming that Washington and Jerusalem are responsible for inciting Iranians to these riotous declamations against their own government echo the claims made in 2009 that Washington, London and Jerusalem had pivotal roles in the Green Movement that erupted in loud and vigorous protests which in the end, amidst brute force of similar lethal means an abrupt end finally claimed the movement and its leaders were imprisoned. The death of a young woman whose photos in death were carried around the world moved the international community.

Infamously, the Obama administration chose a hands-off policy and nor did it go so far as to give a brief modicum of moral support to the protesters of the Green Movement. This time around, people have been mobilized to venture out en masse, first in an expression of their frustration over high consumer prices, then adopting the more controversial expressions of rejection of their Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khameini and the Shia conquest agenda linked to the growing crises in the Middle East.

Video footage on social media showed people marching through the holy city of Qom, with protesters chanting "Death to the dictator", and "Free political prisoners", (most notably Green Party leaders), along with other chants mentioning the toppled monarchy of 1979. Even the unimaginable criticism of the regime in its support for the Palestinians, along with other regional movements, with no focus on the problems that beset ordinary Iranians.

Iranian pro-regime protesters hold anti-Israeli placards at a rally in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, Dec. 30, 2017 (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

Obligatory counter-demonstrations were not in short supply, with those loyal to the regime, whether spontaneously or ordered to appear, vocal in their support of the Islamic Revolution that had done so much over the years to create a new vision of Islamist conquest on the move. "The enemy wants once again to create a new plot and use social media and economic issues to foment a new sedition", Ayatollah Mohsen Araki told a crowd in Tehran

While anti-regime students at the University of Tehran repeatedly shouted "Not Gaza, not Lebanon, my life for Iran", in rejection of the reality that the government is placing more emphasis on regional issues than on problems in Iran, pro-regime students shouted "Death to the seditionists", seizing  control of the entrance to the university; scenes particularly favoured by regime-supporting news agency which play videos depicting the dramas unfolding.

Iranians chant slogans as they march in support of the government near the Imam Khomeini grand mosque in the capital Tehran on December 30, 2017. Tens of thousands of regime supporters marched in cities across Iran in a show of strength for the regime after two days of angry protests directed against the country's religious rulers. (AFP PHOTO / TASNIM NEWS / HAMED MALEKPOUR)

All the internal problems that Iranians have focused on, according to the regime, are the responsibility of America and Israel. As for American President Donald Trump's support for the protests, they betray a president who is "deceitful and opportunist", for "the Iranian people see no value in the opportunistic remarks by American officials and Mr. Trump". Foreign ministry spokesman Bahram Ghasemi stated: "The constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran has established democratic structures for the legal support of people's civil demands".


Now, all that remains is for the Republic to hear out those demands and rectify its program; turn that particular ship of state in a reversal of its destructive policies and in effect return it to the respected position it held under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Instead of limiting its uranium enrichment, ditch it. The oil that Tehran sells on the global market profiting it in terms of tens of billions, has been signed over in costs to acquire Western advanced warplanes.

Iranians march against the high cost of living in Tehran.

Labels: Iran, Protests, Violence

posted by Pieface @ Monday, January 01, 2018