Iran’s Green movement today defied official threats of violent retribution and reaffirmed its capacity to mobilize tens of thousands of protesters. The opposition exploited a government-sponsored anti-American rally on the 30th anniversary of the Tehran Embassy seizure to demand that President Barack Obama side with them against the regime.
The protests came a day after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei bluntly rejected US overtures for engagement.
While not on the scale of the 3-million-strong protests against the disputed June 12 reelection of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the demonstrations — in Tehran and several other cities — were the opposition’s biggest mobilization for two months.
The protests are significant, one account suggests, because they “struck at one of the ideological pillars of the Islamic Republic by showing that a sizable chunk of Iranians disagree with hard-liners’ anti-American agenda.”
Thousands of protesters braved a huge police presence and warnings from the hard-line Revolutionary Guards. Shouts of “Death to the dictator!” were reportedly audible on state TV’s live coverage of the official ceremony celebrating the Embassy takeover.
“I don’t think the opposition is as able to get as many people in the streets as they were after the election,” said Alireza Nader, an Iran analyst for RAND in Washington. “But today’s events show there is still opposition that is willing to come out.”
Harsh prison sentences and reports of the rape and torture of Green activists must have deterred many from joining the latest, but there is clearly considerable political will for the demonstrations to continue.
“The long-term crisis for the government isn’t over,” said Nader. “There is still a strong sense that the Ahmadinejad government is not legitimate. The sentiment is strong among the people, in some of the ruling elite and the clerics.”
Video footage on Tehran Bureau shows paramilitary basiji thugs beating and dragging away demonstrators but also highlights opposition protesters tearing down a giant poster of the Supreme Leader and chanting “A Green and blooming Iran doesn’t need an Atom Bomb”.
That there was any opposition presence on the streets was extraordinary with so many who of those who were prepared to defy the government in past months still languishing in prison.
The reformist cleric Mehdi Karroubi, who has emerged as the regime’s most outspoken critic, joined protesters in Haft-e Tir Square, according to the Mowjcamp reformist website. He narrowly avoided injury when police fired a tear gas cylinder at him, but two of his guards were hospitalized.
As previously noted in the Digest, the main theme of the protests was a demand that President Obama express his solidarity with the Iranian people. A video clip widely circulated on the Internet shows crowds chanting, Obama ya ba oona ya ba ma, which translates as “Obama, Obama — either you’re with them or you’re with us.”
The administration appears reluctant to take up the challenge and its response has been criticized as tepid. President Barack Obama today said:
Iran must choose. We have heard for thirty years what the Iranian government is against; the question, now, is what kind of future it is for. The American people have great respect for the people of Iran and their rich history. The world continues to bear witness to their powerful calls for justice, and their courageous pursuit of universal rights. It is time for the Iranian government to decide whether it wants to focus on the past, or whether it will make the choices that will open the door to greater opportunity, prosperity and justice for its people.
Today’s protests followed a similar hijacking of official events on Qods Day when Green supporters subverted the regime’s annual day of hostility towards Israel. Tehran Bureau’s Tara Mahtafar writes:
By targeting dates of historic significance to the regime, opposition supporters aim to ’subvert’ ideological symbols touted for 30 years by the Islamic Republic and thereby re-brand that date as an ideology-free ‘green’ day, the trademark color of the country’s burgeoning pro-democracy movement.
Supreme Leader Khamenei was reportedly livid at the opposition’s subversion of the official Qods Day demonstrations.
“I think the long-term crisis for the government isn’t over,” said Nader. “There is still a strong sense that the Ahmadinejad government is not legitimate. The sentiment is strong among the people, in some of the ruling elite and the clerics.”
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