Daily News Channel
They’ve entered the United States, yet they are still afraid. Two women arrived at a U.S. airport from Iran, and despite leaving the violence behind, they didn’t want to be identified for fear of their safety
Iran’s political crisis would end pretty quickly if the opposition went toe-to-toe with the security forces — and no matter how courageous and determined the demonstrators, the likelihood of them toppling the regime on the streets right now is pretty remote. Although at least 30 and perhaps many more opposition supporters have been killed and hundreds have been arrested, the regime has used only a fraction of its capacity for violent suppression, and its security forces show no sign of wavering or splintering. The authorities have warned that defiance of bans on demonstration will no longer be tolerated, and reports out of Iran Tuesday suggested that the regime may be moving to arrest opposition presidential candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi.
If the street protests roiling Iran since its disputed election have created a problem for the leadership in Tehran, imagine the dilemma it raises for Iran’s allies elsewhere in the Middle East. Hizballah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah was quick out of the blocks to congratulate President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad when the authorities announced his re-election, calling the result “a great hope to all the Mujahedeen and Resistance who are fighting against the forces of oppression and occupation.” But since supporters of defeated candidate Mir-Hussein Mousavi have taken to the streets to decry the election as rigged, Nasrallah has become more circumspect. And he specifically refuted suggestions that either candidate might be more pro-Hizballah than the other, and merely said “Iran is under the authority of the Wali Al Faqih and will pass through this crisis.” As a longtime client of Iran, Nasrallah is wise to hedge his bets, for he’ll need patronage and weapons from whomever emerges victorious in the post-election battle.
The son of the former shah of Iran called Monday for solidarity against Iran’s Islamic regime, warning that the democratic movement born out of the election crisis might not succeed without international support. “The moment of truth has arrived,” Reza Shah Pahlavi said at Washington’s National Press Club
The contested election results in Iran have brought thousands onto the streets of Tehran in protest. So why have the voices of two of Iran’s most prominent critics — the United States and its leading ally the UK, so far been comparatively muted in their support of the protesters and in their criticisms of the regime?
The dramatic and at times deadly post-election fallout in Iran dominated the Sunday conversation. And as we watched more demonstrations on the streets of Tehran, the debate among key policy-makers in the United States centered on whether the Iranian regime was potentially near a tipping point and whether President Obama has been too cautious his handling of this major challenge.
Iranian protesters who "disturb the peace and stand up to security forces" will be considered a threat to the regime and will be met with a strong response, the country’s Revolutionary Guard warned Monday. “The guardians of the Islamic revolution and the courageous Basiji together with the security forces following the orders of the supreme leader and following him unquestioningly, are determined to act strongly to return peace and tranquility to society ..
Iran on Monday accused the West of "meddling" in its disputed presidential election even as its election authority reportedly acknowledged that the number of ballots cast in dozens of cities exceeded the number of eligible voters in those areas.
President Obama should reach out to Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Moussavi as tensions in Iran over the disputed presidential elections continue to heighten, a former Bush administration official told CNN Sunday. “I would certainly find out if he (Moussavi) wants a conversation,” former Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer. “If he doesn’t, I certainly wouldn’t push it.
Iranian state television yesterday broadcast the soap operas and covered the news about Rafael Nadal’s withdrawal from Wimbledon and Pakistani operations against the Taliban as if they were the most important stories in the world. Meanwhile, arriving over the internet transom, rough and insistent and bloody, were the tiny electronic dispatches from protesters forced off the streets of Tehran, shaky videos from a city screaming for help. For outsiders tuned into the blog posts, Facebook updates, Tweets and YouTube videos, the torrent of information was compelling and confusing, emotional and rife with rumors, full of sound and fury signifying …