New York Times | Iranian Voter's Plea: Stop Saying 'Death to America' - The New York ... New York Times Few in Iran, where roughly 8 million are unemployed, are optimistic that Friday's presidential election will help end a cycle of poverty and turn around the ... |
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Iranian Voter's Plea: Stop Saying 'Death to America' - The New York ... - New York Times
"The regime has been given enough chance to come clean. It hasn't, for good reason. Therefore, I say forget about the regime, think about the people."
He is the oldest son of the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Now Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi says he is fighting for the soul of his nation.
During his father's time, Tehran was a reliable ally and America was not the Great Satan as the U.S. has been so often called in Iran today. That ended when Pahlavi's family was overthrown by the 1979 Islamic Revolution of Grand Ayatollah Khomeini.
Iran's long-exiled prince wants a revolution in age of Trump
Now Pahlavi wants the Iranian people to rise up against the regime and establish a Parliamentary democracy based on democratic values, freedom and human rights.
"What I am calling upon is a process of civil disobedience, which is a method of change. How? By bringing domestic pressure on the system. If enough people refused to cooperate, like Indians in India during British time, when they can paralyze the system by massive sustained labor strikes across the nation, that is not shooting bullets in the streets," he said.
He added that the method of change can be by non-violence, civil disobedience provided that it is nurtured and cared for." He noted that such mass movements have upended power structures from the collapse of the Soviet Union after the fall of the Berlin Wall, to the end of apartheid in South Africa. Pahlavi said there is no reason that a wave of popular support cannot topple the theocratic regime in Tehran, in a similar manner.
"History is full of such examples," Pahlavi notes.
"If change during the cold war was not ultimately, how do we defeat the Soviet system? How do we assist the dissidents? How do we empower or encourage the people who are trapped behind the Iron Curtain? None of these people would ever be heartened enough to ultimately roll of their sleeves and say: Hey you know what? We are not abandoned anymore. From Sakharov to Solzhenitsyn all the way to the others, they said hey, you know what? The world is not going to put up with it."
Reza Pahlavi on Growing Showdown With Iran
"Nelson Mandela was rotting in his cell in South Africa while half the world was doing business with the apartheid regime, until a point that the people in the world said, Basta!, enough, it is no longer acceptable."
Pahlavi said just like opposing past repressive regimes, Americans can take the lead in pressuring Tehran. He sent a letter to then President-elect Trump, hoping that his administration will bear in mind the aspiration of the Iranian people and engage the secular democratic forces, providing support for the struggle of my fellow compatriots for peace, freedom, and democracy.
"The more they hear about what the Iranian people demand, not what the regime wants, but what the Iranian people demand, they will in turn tell their congressmen, senators, and decision makers, What are you waiting for? These people are like us! They don't want to come here and destroy us, or blow us to pieces or wipe a country from the map, they want to be like us!"
Pahlavi also said that more should have been done to encourage the resistance during the so-called Green Revolution in 2009, when Iranians massed the streets demanding a free and fair election.
"If the people on the streets are holding up slogans, in English or in French, they are not practicing their linguistic skills, they are sending you a clear message. They were chanting on the streets, Obama Obama... in Farsi, (which) means either you are with them or you are with us. Make a choice. I think the choice was not to heed the call of the people."
Pahlavi said that he always has hope for a change in his country, because "it is in the nature of human beings."
He said people everywhere yearn for the same thing.
"It is three obvious factors. One is freedom and the ability to speak your mind and believe in what you want. The other one is an opportunity to participate in whatever system that is governing your country and the last but certainly not the least, dignity, human dignity, and when they deprive you as a human being for any of these, will you give up and not stand up and fight, and say if I have to sacrifice myself I am doing it so my children will not have to see this, that is the history of our world. From the days of Moses to today, it was always to be freed from bondage...and Iranians are not expectations to that."
Some fault the Shah's rule, and U.S. policy at the time, for setting the stage that enabled to Islamic revolution to succeed. But Pahlavi said that today, "there is no question" that the regime will eventually fall.
"People are not giving up, they know it's tough, they know it's a high price," he said. "Change will occur. Whether we like it or not, it is a historical conclusion that this type of regime simply cannot survive, it's is just a matter of time. The only question is when, and at what cost."
Follow Eric Shawn on Twitter: EricShawnTV
Ben Evansky contributed to this report.
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Iran's exiled Prince Reza Pahlavi calls for civil disobedience and protests - Fox News
Iran tested a high-speed torpedo on Sunday that is capable of reaching speeds of 200 knots per hour, according to a U.S. official. The test was conducted in the Strait of Hormuz, the vital waterway between the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Sea.
The Hoot torpedo has been tested over the past decade, with the most recent test taking place in February, 2015. It is believed it is able to reach a speed four times faster than the top speed of traditional torpedoes.
According to the U.S. official, the torpedo was tested on Sunday in an area directly south of Bandar Abbas, home to an Iranian naval base located along the Strait of Hormuz.
Sunday's test appeared to be a speed test given that it was not aimed at a target barge.
A torpedo moving at such a high rate of speed would require a sophisticated guidance system to accurately strike its target. The torpedo is believed to have a range of six miles.
Last week, Iran attempted a submarine-launched cruise missile test east of the Strait of Hormuz, but U.S. officials said the test had failed.
Though the waterway is narrow and is a congested international shipping lane, Iran will test new military technologies in territorial waters hugging its coastline.
Disputes between Iranian small boats and American naval ships operating in the Strait of Hormuz or the Persian Gulf are not uncommon.
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Iran tested high-speed torpedo in the Strait of Hormuz, US ...
Some ideas take on a character akin to sacred texts whose validity is rarely questioned. One such belief is that the Islamic Republic of Iran is the biggest threat to the Middle East and the United States. The threat narrative has become required foreign policy catechism in Washington, D.C.
Menacing stereotypes and bellicose rhetoric are the standards by which Iran has come to be judged. It has continually been in the crosshairs of American administrations since the Iranian Revolution of 1979. The process by which a country is determined to be a terrorist state is highly subjective and politicized. The United States has assumed the singular role of terrorism arbiter.
After only weeks in office, the Trump administration officially put Iran on notice for a ballistic missile test, and imposed new sanctions.
It was only a matter of time before the Trump administration would resurrect the Iran the terrorist state mantra to deflect attention from its internal chaos.
The unpredictability of the Trump White House and volatility of the Middle East make it vital to understand the nature of Washingtons anti-Iran bias, how and why Iran has come to be cast as an international sponsor of terrorism and, most importantly, examine why the characterization is false.
The 1979 revolution and the overthrow of the shah freed the country from its obsequious relationship to Washington. Irans regional influence spread not in terms of conquered territory; instead, its revolutionary ideology gave voice to Shiites living in oppressive Sunni majority-ruled countries.
The Islamic Republic presented a dilemma for Washington, accustomed to dealing with the ruling families and autocrats of the Middle East. To curtail the revolutions influence, Washington manufactured a narrative depicting Irans leaders as irrational religious fanatics in charge of a dangerous state that acted contrary to traditional state behavior. Americas attitude was hardened with the takeover of the U.S. embassy in 1979, shaping the negative lens through which Irans policies and actions would be viewed thereafter.
The trauma inflicted by the Iran-Iraq War (1980-88) deepened Irans distrust of Washington. From Tehrans perspective, Americas support for Saddam Husseins aggression was Washingtons attempt to restore the monarchy and to destabilize the government. The post-revolution 1980s were filled with uncertainties and excesses as Tehran struggled to survive its war with Iraq a war largely subsidized by Saudi Arabia and supported by the United States.
In the 1990s, Irans foreign policy shifted toward integrating into the international community and shedding its hard-line image. Tehran attempted to develop closer relations with Saudi Arabia and build constructive ties to the West. Although Iran opposed the 2001 U.S. attack on Afghanistan, the goal of fighting terrorism and toppling the Taliban regime driven from power in November 2001 united the two countries in perhaps the most constructive period of U.S.-Iranian diplomacy.
At a December 2001, meeting in Bonn, Germany, Secretary of State Colin Powell credited Iran with being particularly helpful in establishing an interim Afghan government following the American invasion. It was Javad Zarif, then Irans U.N. ambassador and current foreign minister, who mediated a compromise over the composition of Afghanistans post-Taliban government, ultimately leading to an agreement. And it was Iran that insisted that the agreement include a commitment to hold democratic elections in Afghanistan.
A burst of diplomatic talks between Iranian and American officials took place from 2001 through May 2003. Topics included cooperative activities against their mutual enemies: Saddam, the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Meetings resumed even after President George W. Bush listed Iran among the axis of evil countries in his 2002 State of the Union address.
Tehrans final attempt to normalize relations came in May of 2003, in what became known as the grand bargain. Calling for broad dialogue in mutual respect, Iran suggested that everything was on the table, including full cooperation on Irans nuclear program, ending material support to Palestinian opposition groups and assistance in helping stabilize Iraq.
Convinced that the Iranian government was on the brink of collapse, and emboldened by perceived victory in Iraq in March of 2003, Bush administration officials belittled the initiative. The administrations imperious posture and failure to build on Irans cooperation in Afghanistan led senior officials in Tehran to conclude that Washingtons goal was regime change.
Bush strategists had another objective in ousting Saddam to isolate and increase the military and political pressure on Iran, and to a lesser extent on Syrian President Bashar al-Assads government. Repeated often by administration officials was the refrain, Today Baghdad, tomorrow Damascus, and then on to Tehran.
To curb Tehrans growing influence in Iraq after the 2003 invasion, Bush launched an unprecedented financial war against Iran. A list of strategies developed in 2006 by Stuart Levy the first undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence at the Treasury Department were implemented to drive Iran out of the global economy.
Where Washington sees terrorism, the Iranian government sees itself combating a power structure in the Middle East that benefits the United States, Israel and Sunni Arab regimes.
Congress defines an international sponsor of terrorism as a country whose government supports acts of international terrorism. Tehran does not support international terrorism, but it does provide material support to regional movements that it calls the oppressed, whose battle is directed toward the state of Israel Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. These groups have used violence against Israel to end the brutal occupation of their land.
Tehran regards as legitimate its support for national liberation movements that fight against Israeli occupation and aggression, insisting it is not terrorism. Irans leaders believe that Israels long-term goal is to weaken the Islamic world, eliminating all resistance, in order to carry out its expansionist designs.
Interestingly, the Arab media have accused Washington of sponsoring terrorism because of its support for Israel.
The Israeli government has relentlessly pushed the perception that Iran, specifically a nuclear-armed Iran, is the greatest threat to peace and stability in the region and world, and has successfully sold this provocative idea in the United States. Senior Israeli security officials have refuted the assertion that an Iranian nuclear weapon would threaten Israel. Their claims are poignant, considering the fact that Israel enjoys a huge military and technical advantage in the region, and possesses an arsenal capable of deterring any nuclear aggression.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus motives for vilifying Iran are many, but primarily it serves to distract international attention as Israel continues settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank, Jerusalem and the Syrian Golan Heights.
Saudi Arabia, like Israel, is doing everything in its power to make sure the United States remains engaged in the Middle East. Riyadh relies on Washington to do its heavy lifting, and anti-Iran propaganda helps in its campaign. Saudi rulers believe that the Assad government is pivotal to Iranian influence in the region, and have been encouraging Washington to get rid of him for years. They were buoyed by Trumps recent missile attack on Syria as a sign that Washington is pivoting away from Obamas policy of rapprochement with Iran, and renewing its ties to the kingdom.
The intense focus on Iran as a menace does not correspond to its capabilities, intent or danger. A 2017 Congressional Research Service report stated that Irans national security policy involves protecting itself from American or others efforts to intimidate or change the regime. According to the 2014 U.S. Defense Department Annual Review of Iran, Irans military doctrine is defensive. It is designed to deter an attack... .
Forty-five U.S. military bases encircle Iran, with over 125,000 troops in close proximity. The Congressional Research Service asserted that Tehran allocates about 3 percent of GDP to military spending, far less than what its Persian Gulf neighbors spend.
Irans nuclear program has cultivated scientific innovation and national pride. It required pragmatic leadership to accept the constraints of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. The agreement subjects Iran to greater restrictions and more intrusive monitoring than any state with nuclear programs, while its neighbors possess unlimited nuclear programs and, in the case of Pakistan and Israel, nuclear weapons.
Intelligence agencies and the International Atomic Energy Agency agree that Iran has not been attempting to develop nuclear weapons. According to the IAEA and the U.S. State Department, Iran has been fulfilling its obligations under the JCPOA.
Toughness on Iran has become a litmus test for American politicians to demonstrate their support for Israel. Congress overwhelmingly passed a 10-year extension of the Iran Sanctions Act, which was set to expire on Dec. 31, 2016. The renewal makes it easier for the Trump administration to reimpose sanctions that Obama lifted under the JCPOA.
Unlike other countries in the Middle East that have integrated missiles into their conventional armed forces, Iran has been singled out for the same behavior. Irans recent missile test did not violate the JCPOA. It has no long-range missiles, no nuclear warheads for its missiles, and has not threatened their use. Without nuclear weapons, missiles are of negligible importance. Unlike the Saudis and Israelis, Iran does not have a large, modern air force.
A Feb. 26, 2015, report by the director of national intelligence, titled Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Communities, stated that Iran is not the chief sponsor of terrorism, and removed Iran and Hezbollah from its list of terrorism threats. The report asserted Tehrans intentions are to dampen sectarianism, build responsive partners and de-escalate tensions with Saudi Arabia ... and combat Sunni extremists, including the Islamic State.
Yet there are countless examples of aggression against Iran.
The Saudi government has sought for decades to motivate Sunnis to fear and resist Iran. To that end, it has spent billions on a campaign to expand Salafism (an ultra-conservative, austere form of Islam) as a major counterforce in the Muslim world.
In 2007, Congress agreed to a Bush administration request of $400 million to escalate covert operations to destabilize Irans government, with regime change the ultimate goal. The funding request came at the same time that a National Intelligence Estimate the collective work of Americas 16 spy agencies concluded that Iran had ceased its efforts to develop nuclear weapons in 2003.
Both the Bush and Obama administrations employed some of the most draconian financial methods ever used against a state, including crippling sanctions on Irans entire banking, transportation and energy sectors.
The first known use of cyber warfare against a sovereign state was launched against Iran by the United States and Israel in 2009. The Stuxnet virus crippled Iranian centrifuges used to produce nuclear fuel.
Beginning in 2008, four of Irans nuclear scientists were assassinated on the streets of Tehran; the evidence pointed to Israeli agents. In 2011, a military arms depot was blown up, killing 17 people. The incident was similar to a blast in October 2010 at an Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps missile base in Khorrambad. Both acts of sabotage were attributed to Israel.
American organizations such as the jingoistic United Against a Nuclear Iran, chaired by former Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., have called for attacks on Iranian ships in the Persian Gulf and on Iranian military forces fighting the Islamic State in Syria.
These acts of aggression are justified in Washington and elsewhere by the standard rhetoric of the Iranian terrorism myth, but there is scant intelligence to support the claim. In a 2011 poll conducted in 12 Arab countries by The Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies (based on face-to-face interviews of 16,731 individuals), 73 percent of those surveyed saw Israel and the United States as the most threatening countries, with 5 percent seeing Iran as such.
Most U.S. officials quietly acknowledge that Saudi Arabia and the Sunni-ruled Gulf monarchies are the major supporters of al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, not Shiite Iran. Vice President Joseph Biden concluded just that during a foreign policy speech at Harvard in October of 2014. A recently released classified State Department cable dated Dec. 30, 2009, stated, ...donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide.
It is Iran that is helping to fight the Islamic State in Iraq. Its offensive in the Syrian war was at the request of the countrys sovereign government. Iran lives in the neighborhood and relies on regional allies, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon and Assad in Syria, to bolster its security if attacked. Syria was the only country to support Iran during the Iraq war. Tehran is keenly aware that the outcome of the Syrian war may have major consequences for the regions Shiites, and could reshape the Middle East.
Saudi Arabia and Israel have made Iran their major regional adversary, and to that end have built a formidable alliance. Syria has become the theater for competing regional interests. Both the Saudis and Israelis are aiding al-Qaeda-affiliated forces in Syria. Washington has partnered with Saudi Arabia in the war to achieve its long-established goal of regime change, while Riyadh seeks to end what the Saudis see as the power emerging from the Shiite Crescent Iran, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria.
Israel, for example, has been pressuring the United States and Russia to restrict and ultimately expel Iranian-backed militias from Syria, and has continued to attack pro-Iranian forces in southern Syria. From Israels perspective, Syria ally of Iran and supporter of Hezbollah has been one of the few remaining Arab states capable of standing in the way of its regional ambitions. Israel would like to see Syria fractured into small, sectarian enclaves, so weakened as to be no threat.
Israel has partnered with al-Qaedas franchise in Syria, Jabhat al-Nusra (also called the al-Nusra Front). Al-Nusras goal, like the Islamic State, is to overthrow Assads secular government and establish a radical Salafist regime. United Nations observers have documented the delivery of material aid and ongoing coordination between Israeli military personnel and al-Nusra armed groups. Al-Nusra terrorists are being cared for in Israeli hospitals.
By supporting al-Nusra, Israel has effectively sided with Americas enemy and has, therefore, emerged as a state sponsor of terrorism.
In the wake of the 9-11 attacks, President Bush, in his Sept. 20, 2001, speech to Congress declared, Every nation now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists... . From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.
Iran has been fighting terrorism since 9-11. Its national security depends on stable borders and a stable region. To that end, it is fighting in Syria and aiding the Iraqi government to recapture territories held by the Islamic State. Iranians know all too well the egregious effects of terrorism. For decades, U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies have covertly financed, equipped and trained opposition groups that have fomented and carried out terrorist attacks inside Iran. Thousands of civilians and political figures, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, have suffered injury at the hands of terrorists. U.S. intelligence agencies have supported the acts of violence committed by the Mujahedin-e Khalq listed by the State Department as a terrorist group (now delisted) that advocates the overthrow of the Islamic Republic, as well as the Baluchi militant Salafi group Jundullah. An Iranian ethnic minority, Jundullah is a Sunni group aligned with the thinking of al-Qaeda.
Terrorism is a cudgel used to engender fear. And fear, grounded in erroneous information, can result in destructive government policies, and in the worst case, war. This is especially true of the U.S.-Iran relationship. After almost four decades, Iran and the Middle East have substantially changed, while American policy has not. Irans evolving and nuanced political system does not fit into Washingtons outdated, hegemonic good guy-bad guy worldview.
American, Israeli and Saudi regional objectives depend on the existence of an enemy; and to that aim, Irans terrorism designation has proven a potent rhetorical weapon. Washingtons hardline rhetoric and policies toward Iran merely strengthens the power of the countrys hardliners.
Given the circumstances, Tehran will continue its defensive, cautious strategy cooperating with the West on issues such as the fight against the Islamic State, while asserting what it sees as its historical role in the region.
More Guest Viewpoint articles
M. Reza Behnam, Ph.D., of Eugene is a political scientist specializing in the governments and politics of the Middle East, and American foreign policy in the region.
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The anti-Iran bias - The Register-Guard
New York Times | A Look at the Presidential Candidates in Iran New York Times The president of Iran is facing re-election competition from a career hard-line prosecutor, his own vice president, Tehran's mayor, a former culture minister and the one-time leader of the country's sports organization. The six candidates, all older ... Iran's Farce Presidential Election Iran election: Fierce exchanges in final TV debate Iran's president faces a tough fight for reelection |
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A Look at the Presidential Candidates in Iran - New York Times