Middle East – Arash Hejazi

Washington Post’s analysis on Iran is ignorant and Naive: There is more depth to what the Iranian people are doing

Arash Hejazi — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 09:50:28 +0000

An article published in Washington Post on June 16 2011, called ‘In Iran, ‘couch rebels’ prefer Facebook’, claims — based on its interview with three or four Iranians, whose identity (except for Abbas Abdi) is not known — that the Iranian people have given up on their protests that started in 2009, because they prefer ‘playing Internet games such as FarmVille, peeking at remarkably candid photographs posted online by friends and confining their political debates to social media sites such as Facebook, where dissent has proved less risky’.

To someone who knows about the undercurrents of the Iranian society, this simple explanation shows how ignorant the Western media, and probably politicians, are in interpreting what’s really going on in the Middle East and the socio-politico-cultural differences in each country. I have seen more that one ‘political’ analysis or opinion pieces in the media that try in vain to compare the successful rebels or ‘revolutions’ in Egypt and Tunisia to Iran and Syria and Libya, while these comparisons cannot be more relevant than comparing the 1917 Revolution of Russia to the Independence wars of America.

First of all, what happened in Egypt and in Tunisia, could not be categorised as ‘revolution’, as what really happened was a successful process of removing a dictator from power, started by an uprising of the people, and then supported by the West. Had not the US forced Mubarak to leave his seat, it would be a much longer process for people to succeed on their own. The root of Mubarak’s power was the enormous support he received from the US. When the US stopped supporting him, it was just a matter of time when the army removed him from power and took full control over the country. Syria and Libya, on the other hand, received no support from the US and the source of their powers were either Oil, or their complex geopolitical arrangements in the region. This is why, after months of rebellion, uprising and civil wars, we can see no progress towards the fall of the dictators in these two countries, despite all the bloodshed and the courageous stand of the people. A real revolution is identified by a fundamental change in power and organizational structures that takes place in a relatively short period of time. It includes complete change from one constitution to another, or modification of an existing constitution, according to Aristotle. We still haven’t seen a change in constitution in Tunisia and in Egypt, only the removal of one person from power.

Iran is not comparable to any of these countries. For one thing, the system ruling in Iran is not a dictatorship (although it is turning into one); it’s a totalitarian regime ruling in Iran, a system, not a single person. I keep being asked by the journalists that the Iranian people can release a sigh of relief once Ahmadinejad finishes his term as the president in 2013. What they don’t know is that Ahmadinejad holds no real power. No single person does. In the Soviet Union it didn’t really matter if Stalin died. The system was designed in a way to be sustainable for the foreseeable future, and was presumably invincible. The presumption was not far from truth. Only someone from within that system could introduce change, a mission that Gorbachev took on. The people could not defeat the system. For the very same reason, in 2009, the Iranians decided that among the approved candidates for Presidency, Mir-Hussein Mousavi was the only person who had the strength, determination tools for introducing this gradual change into the regime. People united behind him for this very reason, despite their varied ideas about the future regime of Iran.

The people of Iran had already experienced the consequences of a full blown revolution. They have witnessed two successful revolutions: The Constitutional Revolution at 1907, and the Islamic Revolution at 1979. Both resulted in fundamental structural and organisational change as well as transition to new constitutions. However, the new regimes that replaced the previous regimes proved a ‘revolution’ to be a poor resolution for the abolishing tyranny. The 1907 revolution resulted in the reign of terror started by a dictator, Reza Shah (who came to power aided by the British), who abolished the new-born democracy in Iran for nearly 70 years. The 1979 revolution resulted in the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran, one of the cruelest and most suppressive totalitarian regimes the world has ever seen.

When the people of Iran who had united under the Green Movement to reclaim their votes were brutally suppressed and the international community did nothing concrete to support them, they realised that their hopes for gradual change had come to nought. Now they were facing another dilemma, if there were no hopes for the gradual opening within the context of the Islamic Republic, how could this system be replaced with a liberal-democratic regime in the most peaceful way?

Revolution wasn’t the answer, as it would incur unspeakable bloodshed: The regime has all the military power, the wealth, the bargaining tools with the world, and all the media outlets. On the other side, the only tool that the people have in their hands, peaceful demonstrations and civil disobedience, have proven to be ineffective in the short-term against an armed-to-the-teeth regime that follows no ethical or moral values and considers any disobedience and dissent as treason, punishable by death on the spot, torture, long-term imprisonment, and execution without fair trials. The international community hasn’t been supportive either. All the sanctions imposed on Iran has been fruitless in stopping Iran from pursuing its nuclear ambitions, and still, the Iranian oil is too precious to the western world to be sanctioned. The oil provides the regime with almost all of the budget it needs to suppress its own people and to sponsor terror around the world.

A few weeks ago, a prisoner attending her father’s funeral was beaten to death in front of peoples’ eyes; a week later, a political prisoner on hunger strike in protest to the crime, was beaten to death inside the prison. Right now, there are 12 Iranian political prisoners on hunger strike. The government of Iran is ready to go the full distance, as it feels that there are no consequences for what they do: ‘Let these 12 prisoners die too, who really cares in the world, or if they do care, what can they really do? They still want our oil, and as long as they do, they will work with us, no matter what.’

On the other hand, Ahmadinejad, once the favourite of Ayatollah Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of Iran, has now apparently fallen out of favour, after disobeying a few direct orders from the Leader. The Supreme Leader cannot even tolerate the empowerment of his own puppet president and let him run the country. The Parliament is now closing down on Ahmadinejad, and the direction of the events implies a rapid transition from a totalitarian regime to a dictatorship: Ayatollah Khamenei wants to hold all the power, something unprecedented in the past 32 years, when the power was balanced between a few who would do anything to support the regime despite their variety of opinion.

This is why the Iranian people have now decided to slow the movement down, and take it to a deeper layer. The social media are still their only way of communication, where you can see real polyphony among Iranians. The people in Egypt wanted Mubarak to go and were united under this single slogan. The people of Iran want a democratic, liberal, and economically dynamic society, and before fighting to achieve it, they are debating it, so when the right time comes, they all understand democracy and freedom in its truest sense. This reflects the maturity of a nation who does not act on impulses, but on intellect; a nation who is closely observing the events, and preparing itself. Let’s hope that everything will work out fine for the Egyptians and Tunisians, but when change comes to Iran, it will be real and intrinsic change, not a short-term facelift.

‘You don’t deserve to be published’ Book censorship in Iran

Arash Hejazi — Thu, 12 May 2011 15:20:52 +0000

Citation: Hejazi, Arash, ‘You don’t deserve to be published’ Book Censorship in Iran, LOGOS: The Journal of the World Book Community, Volume 22, Number 1, 2011 , pp. 53-62(10), DOI: 10.1163/095796511X562644

‘Read the rest of the article in PDF here: ‘You Don’t Deserve to Be Published: Censorship in Iran’

Censorship is as old as human intellect. It has been practised in almost every country at some level throughout history: from 399 BC, when Socrates was forced to drink poison, to the horrors of the Inquisition, and the oficial coining of the concept with the publication of Index Librorum Prohibitorum by the Roman Catholic Church; from the obligation of English publishers to register their books with the Stationers’ Company in the 16th century until the case of D. H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover; and the Nazi book-burning campaign and the absolute offfĳicial control of the governments of the USSR, China, and Eastern European countries over published material.
It has always been a highly controversial issue as well, especially since Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) requested the member states of the UN to enforce freedom of speech in their countries. The concept of censorship has been defĳined by various authors and organizations, but no agreed defĳinition has yet been given; therefore the term covers a wide range of activities which sometimes overlap with other concepts, such as moderation, regulation, sensitivity, and intervention. However, for the purpose of this research, the term censorship only refers to restrictions imposed by an authority or authoritative body on a creative work, which impedes the availability of the original work to its potential audience prior to or after its publication, or forces the creator to modify or omit parts or all of the work against their free will. Therefore,
editorial intervention does not fĳit the criteria, as it can be prevented by the free will of the author. The only exception is self-censorship which can be categorized under censorship by fear; one of the most powerful restrictive tools which may have the power to act as an authoritative body, inflicted by conditions outside the author’s control.
The importance of addressing censorship as an issue becomes more evident when considering that, despite the abolition of most of the traditional and historical tools for imposing restrictions on freedom of speech by the coming of information technology and the internet revolution, it is still being practised, and controls a wide range of the mind’s expressions, including books.
Therefore, it seems that raising awareness towards the consequences of censorship has never been more important since the Enlightenment, and the censorship practised in Iran today is a good example…

‘Read the rest of the article in PDF here: ‘You Don’t Deserve to Be Published: Censorship in Iran’

This article is being republished on the author’s official website according to the rights retained by the author for self-archiving. Republishing or reusing this article without prior consent from the Publisher is strictly forbidden.

Iran, Tunisia, Egypt… What’s next? Time up for dictators?

Arash Hejazi — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 16:37:45 +0000

In the last three years, from 2009 to 2011, several uprisings against dictatorships around the world have happened [namely: Iran, Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan, Yemen, Niger, Thailand and Sudan] with different outcomes. But this does not change the fact that it seems that the people living under dictatorship and totalitarian regimes are fed up. While some of these oppressive governments have been supported by the Western countries, these changes show that apparently there is no room for dictators in the new century. The course of history is determining a new direction for countries suppressed fiercely in the past century. We have to wait and see if the people will be successful in establishing new democracies, or if the Western countries will take these changes seriously or still ignore them and try to continue working with and supporting the dictators.

In all these countries, the ruler controls all the media outlets, there is no freedom of speech, elections are controlled by the same people who are eventually elected, and any kind of opposition is suppressed. How else, the people can show their contempt for the rulers and their desire for freedom and democracy? Their only way is to protest in the streets, which is usually brutally suppressed by the rulers and the free countries just frown upon the brutality. What is going to happen to these people? Who is going to support them? How are they supposed to achieve their freedom, when even by sacrificing their lives, nothing changes?

Iran

In June 2009, after the widespread fraud in Iran’s presidential election during which the incumbent president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was re-selected (not elected) as the president of Iran, large street protests started and lasted for several months. He claimed that he had received 63% of the votes, whereas the people believed that his main rival, Mir Hussein Mousavi was actually the person who had received 63% of the votes.

Iran has been ruled by the totalitarian Islamic regime since 1979. At the beginning of the protests, people only wanted the ballots to be recounted, as almost all were sure that their votes had been rigged. The regime ignored all the complaints from the competing presidential candidates and on June 19, the Supreme Leader publicly announce that those who continue the protests, would be responsible for the consequences, which turned out to be murder, torture, rape and imprisonment. The protests continued, during which, hundreds were shot by the plainclothes police and militia, several were ran over by the police cars, and tens died afterward from the injuries caused by the anti-riot police and the Basij’s batons. More than four thousand dissidents and protesters were arrested, tens of which died in detention centres under torture, and there were documented reports of prisoners being raped during interrogations. The government started blaming all the turmoil on the West and Israel, and did not acknowledge the fact that by their latest activities, they had turned the demand for recounting the votes into a widespread hatred towards the whole regime. Now people were not looking for their votes anymore and were targeting the Supreme Leader, as the unifying symbol of the regime. The Islamic Republic did not back off. They crushed the protests with all their might and ignored all the pledges from various international bodies for observing human rights.

Tunisia

Zine El Abidine Ben Ali became the President of Tunisia on 7 November, 1987, and was in power for 23 years, until 2011. In October 2009, the latest presidential elections in Tunisia were held and a Human Rights Watch report called it “an atmosphere of repression”. Ben Ali faced three candidates, two of whom said they actually supported the incumbent. No independent observer was allowed to monitor the vote, and Ben Ali won a landslide victory, with 89.62%. His opponent, Mohamed Bouchiha, received 5.01%. The candidate who was most critical of the regime, Ahmed Ibrahim, of the Ettajdid party, received only 1.57% after a campaign in which he was not allowed to put posters up or hold any kind of meeting.

In January 2011, though, the people’s protests showed that Ben Ali did not enjoy the support of nearly 90% of the voters. The demonstrations and riots were reported to have started over unemployment, food inflation, corruption, freedom of speech and poor living conditions. The protests led to the ousting of Ben Ali, who stepped down from the presidency and fled Tunisia on 14 January 2011 after 23 years in power.

Egypt

Following the assassination of President Sadat in 1981, Hosni Mubarak became the President of the Arabic Republic of Egypt, and the Chairman of the National Democratic Party (NDP). He has now been in power for 29 consecutive years.Mubarak has been re-elected by majority votes in a referendum for successive terms on four occasions: in 1987, 1993, 1999. No one could run against the President due to a restriction in the Egyptian constitution in which the People’s Assembly played the main role in electing the President of the Republic. After increased domestic and international pressure for democratic reform in Egypt, in 2005 the constitution was amended and it allowed multi-candidate presidential elections. Previously, Mubarak secured his position by having himself nominated by parliament, then confirmed without opposition in a referendum. However, in the September 2005 elections, the electoral institutions, and security apparatus remain under the control of the President. The official state media, including the three government newspapers and state television also express views identical to the official line taken by Mubarak. On 28 July 2005, Mubarak announced his candidacy, as he had been widely expected to do. The election which was scheduled for 7 September 2005 involved mass rigging activities, according to civil organizations that observed the elections. Reports have shown that Mubarak’s party used government vehicles to take public employees to vote for him. Votes were bought for Mubarak in poor suburbs and rural areas. It was also reported that thousands of illegal votes were allowed for Mubarak from citizens who were not registered to vote. On 8 September 2005, Dr. Ayman Nour, a dissident and candidate for the Al-Ghad party – Tomorrow party, contested the election results, and demanded a repeat of the election. In a move widely seen as political persecution, Nour was convicted of forgery and sentenced to five years at hard labor on 24 December 2005.

Then, shortly after the uprising in Tunisia, the street protests started in Egypt. Thousands of people poured into streets, demanding Mubarak to abandon his position as the president. As there protests are still ongoing, we will have to wait and see the outcome. But whatever the outcome, this does not change the fact that Mubarak is not as popular as he believed.

Yemen

Ali Abdullah Saleh became the first elected President in reunified Yemen in 1999 (though he had been President of unified Yemen since 1990 and President of North Yemen since 1978). He was re-elected to office in September 2006. Saleh’s victory was marked by an election that was accompanied by violence, violations of press freedoms and allegations of fraud.

In the past few days, after the Tunisia incidents, thousands of students and opposition activists demonstrated at Sana’a University, calling, very directly, for President Ali Abdullah Salih to go, alluding to events in Tunisia.

Jordan

Jordan’s most executive power is the King. The King traditionally has held substantial power, and although the parliament can control his decisions, but it has rarely happened. The Hashemite dynasty has ruled over Transjordan and Jordan for 90 years.

King Abdullah II, witnessed the uprising of his people in January 2011. Bread and freedom” was one of the slogans, along with calls for the government to resign. Complaining about the king is still taboo in Jordan, so the protests focused on his ministers, even though it is the king who actually pulls the strings.

Kyrgyzstan

President Kurmanbek Saliyevich Bakiyev came to power in 2005, as the acting President after the downfall of President Akayev. Despite initial hopes, Bakiyev’s term in office was marred by the murder of several prominent politicians, prison riots, economic ills and battles for control of lucrative businesses. In 2006, Bakiyev faced a political crisis as thousands of people participated in a series of protests in Bishkek. He was accused of not following through with his promises to limit presidential power, give more authority to parliament and the prime minister, and eradicate corruption and crime.

Finally, in April 2010, after bloody riots in the capital overturned the government, Bakiyev reportedly fled to the southern city of Osh.

Niger

President Mamadou Tandja held the power in Nigeria since 1990. Following a constitutional crisis in 2009, which was caused by Tandja’s efforts to remain in office beyond the originally scheduled end of his term, he was ousted by the military in a coup d’etat in February 2010.

Thailand
The country is a kingdom, a constitutional monarchy with King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the ninth king of the House of Chakri, who has reigned since 1946, making him the world’s longest-serving current head of state and the longest-reigning monarch in Thai history.[7] The king is officially titled Head of State, the Head of the Armed Forces, an Upholder of the Buddhist religion, and the Defender of all Faiths.
As of April 2010, a set of new violent protests by the Red Shirt opposition movement, possibly backed financially by fugitive former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, have resulted in 87 deaths (mostly civilian and some military) and 1,378 injured.

Sudan

The Darfur Conflict is an ongoing civil war centered on the Darfur region of Sudan. It began in February 2003 when the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army and Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) groups in Darfur took up arms, accusing the Sudanese government of oppressing or committing genocide against non-arab Sudanese in favor of Sudanese Arabs. One side of the conflict is composed mainly of the official Sudanese military and police, and the Janjaweed, a Sudanese militia group recruited mostly from the Arab Abbala tribes of the northern Rizeigat region in Sudan; these tribes are mainly camel-herding nomads. The other combatants are made up of rebel groups, notably the SLM/A and the JEM, recruited primarily from the non-Arab Muslim Fur, Zaghawa, and Masalit ethnic groups. Although the Sudanese government publicly denies that it supports the Janjaweed, it has been providing financial assistance and weapons to the militia and has been organizing joint attacks targeting civilians.

Under international pressure, a referendum took place in Southern Sudan from 9 January to 15 January 2011, on whether the region should remain a part of Sudan or become independent. The referendum was one of the consequences of the 2005 Naivasha Agreement between the Khartoum central government and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M).

As of 23 January 2011, preliminary results indicated a landslide of 98.8% voting in favor of independence.