Crackdown in Bahrain Leaves Protesters Dead

At least six protesters were killed when Bahraini security cleared out the main square where protesters had encamped demanding political and social reforms. The Bahraini security was backed by the Saudis, who are trying to keep the situation in Bahrain from spiraling out of control and spilling over into their own country, but the situation is just as likely to backfire leaving the Bahrainis and Saudis disaffected and demanding change. Moreover, it potentially puts the US in an awkward position since it has had close relations with both the Saudi and Bahraini regimes.



For the protesters, their next concern is that the regime will begin mass arrests.

Once again, Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has to declare that the violent crackdowns seen elsewhere in the Middle East and North Africa are unjustified - which is particularly ironic since Iran's mad mullahs and Ahmadinejad have had no problems doing the same with Iran's political opposition - including house arrests for key leading members of the opposition including Mirhussein Mousavi.

Ahmadinejad's action's aren't surprising though. He's trying to exploit the sectarian differences between the protesters in Bahrain, who are largely Shi'ite, and the Sunni ruling regime - a 1,000+ year schism that still causes violence to this day.

Uncertainty and a worsening security situation in Bahrain is leading some governments to warn its citizens to stay away or to leave the country, including the Philippines.

The crackdown has also sent oil prices higher, even though they had been drifting down since the Japanese quake likely resulted in lesser demand in the short term.

Iran Cracks Down Against Protesters

Just days after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad criticized Mumar Khadafi for using brutal force to crack down against protesters and that Khadafi should respect the rights of the Libyan people, Ahmadinejad's regime is busy cracking down on protesters against the Iranian regime.

ran's security forces fired teargas and clashed with opposition supporters in Tehran on Tuesday, where demonstrators were rallying to demand the release of two opposition leaders, according to an opposition website.

"Security forces and people in civilian clothes clashed with demonstrators in Tehran to disperse them," opposition website Kaleme reported.

Sahamnews, another opposition website, reported large numbers of security personnel stationed at main streets and squares in Tehran "to prevent gathering of opposition supporters."

The mullahs and Ahmadinejad are hoping to thwart a repeat of the deadly riots that ensued following the disputed elections that kept Ahmadinejad as president. Once again, they're using security forces and the Basiji to do their dirty work.

There's confusion over the fate of opposition leaders. The regime denies that the leaders, including Mirhussein Mousavi are under arrest, but they're essentially under house arrest.

Days of Protest and Rage Continue Throughout Middle East and North Africa

Protests continue throughout the Middle East and North Africa, with the deadly consequences in Libya and Yemen.

Libyan protesters defy Gadhafi and his regime is struggling to put down growing protests in cities other than Tripoli. The Libyans are preparing for a day of protest against Khadafi's regime.



Bahrain mourners call for end to monarchy. The funerals today have become rallying points for opposition to the Bahraini monarchy.



There are further protests in Jordan.

Four protesters die on Yemen's 'Friday of Rage'.

Meanwhile, the situation in Iran has gotten even more complicated. There are reports that the IRGC, which is the regime's elite military cadre that has its hands in every aspect of the Iranian economy and has been considered most loyal to the regime's mullahs, has actually sought to get assurances that they will not be asked to open fire on protesters.

I'd say that's pretty significant and should give a modicum of hope to the opposition who had previously confronted a united IRGC that was more than willing to use force.

The problem is that the officers who signed that letter are most likely to be replaced/erased from their commands by the regime. They're pretty ballsy to make such demands on the regime, which showed absolutely no qualms about opening fire on the protesters last time.

If the IRGC isn't as reliable as previously believed, that means that the enforcement role may be picked up to an even greater extent by the Basij or the Iranian regime may try to shift around its troops that they know to be loyal to deal with the protesters.

That hasn't stopped the calls for opposition leader Mirhussein Mousavi to be killed and follows similar calls from the Iranian parliament for the death of those opposed to the regime.

With all the unrest in the region, Libya has called off an Arab League summit scheduled for March 29.

A week after Hosni Mubarak was deposed in Egypt, there are renewed protests and strikes, including among Suez Canal workers protesting wages and economic conditions. The problem is that the military, which sent Mubarak packing, has a vested interest in consolidating power in itself and isn't nearly as willing to make changes to the economy because it has inserted itself into nearly every area of the economy.

UPDATE:
Things are getting quite dangerous in Bahrain for mourners and journalists as military has opened fire on mourners and journalists.

A Western official quoted a witness saying that the shooters were from the military, not the police, and that protesters began dropping to the ground after the firing started.

It was not immediately clear if the army was using live ammunition or rubber bullets to fire at the crowd, mostly young men who had been part of a funeral procession for protesters killed earlier in a crackdown by police on their peaceful revolt against the government.

Minutes later, forces in a helicopter fired on a reporter and videographer who were shooting a video on the latest violence.

That earlier crackdown killed at least five people and, once again, left the Obama administration in the uncomfortable position of dealing with a strategic Arab ally locked in a showdown with its people.

On Thursday, the masses of once-peaceful protesters were transformed into a mob of angry mourners chanting slogans like “death to Khalifa,” the king, while the opposition withdrew from the Parliament and demanded that the government step down. At the main hospital following the violence, thousands gathered screaming, crying and collapsing in grief.

Military helicopters opened fire on journalists with the New York Times.

My colleague Michael Slackman reports that he and a video producer for The Times, Sean Patrick Farrell, were just shot at from a helicopter over Bahrain's Pearl Roundabout as they were filming a report there, minutes after the army opened fire on protesters trying to march into the area they had been cleared out of one day earlier in a deadly raid.

A Bahriani blogger who writes on Twitter as RedhaHaji expressed his shock on the social network, writing: "This is not real. Not happening."

UPDATE:
Nicholas Kristof, who is reporting from Bahrain notes that there have been quite a few protesters who were grievously wounded - many with head trauma.

Bomb Rigged Motorcycle Kills Iranian Nuclear Scientist With Ties To Mousavi

A nuclear scientist who the Iranians claim was not involved in Iran's nuclear program was killed when a bomb rigged motorcycle blew up as the scientist emerged from his apartment in Tehran. The scientist, who was a professor at Tehran University, also happened to be a supporter of opposition leader Mirhussein Mousavi, which raises questions as to whether the regime's thugs took out the scientist as a message to Mousavi and his supporters.

State media identified the victim as Masoud Ali Mohammadi, 50, a professor at Tehran University, which has been at the center of recent protests by student opposition supporters. Before the election, pro-reform Web sites published Ali Mohammadi's name among a list of 240 Tehran University teachers who supported Mousavi.

Hard-line government supporters called at recent street rallies for the execution of opposition leaders. But Ali Mohammadi was not a well-known figure in Iran.

The government blamed the rare assassination on an armed Iranian opposition group that it said operated under the direction of Israel and the U.S. Iran often accuses the two countries of meddling in its affairs - both when it comes to postelection unrest and its nuclear program. Israel's Foreign Ministry had no comment.

A spokesman for the atomic agency, Ali Shirzadian, told The Associated Press that Ali Mohammadi had no link with the agency responsible for Iran's contentious nuclear program. Iran is under pressure from the United States and its European allies, which suspect Tehran is seeking to develop nuclear weapons. Iran denies that.

"He was not involved in the country's nuclear program," Shirzadian said of the victim.

Another Iranian nuclear scientist, Shahram Amiri, disappeared in June while on a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia, raising questions about whether he defected and gave the West information on the country's nuclear program. Amiri worked at a university linked to the Revolutionary Guard and his wife said he was researching medical uses of nuclear technology at a university.

That the Iranians are stressing that this wasn't a scientist involved in the nuclear program increases the likelihood that the assassination was the work of the Basiji at the order of the regime to intimidate Mousavi's opposition to cease and desist or face the harsh repercussions.

Iranian Mullahs Continue Crackdown; Regime's Demonstrators Urge Death Of Opposition

The mullahs have sent out their own demonstrators who are calling for the death to the protesters.

Tens of thousands of Iranians have protested in favour of their government in major cities across the country, following recent opposition protests.

Government supporters marched in Tehran, Shiraz, Qom and elsewhere, chanting "Death to opponents!"

The rallies - reportedly organised by the government - were a response to the opposition demonstrations on Sunday.

Tehran has accused Western powers of stirring-up the protests which left at least eight people dead.

Ahmadinejad and Ayatollah Khamenei are continuing to oppress the Iranian people and calling those who consider the government illegitimate pawns of the West, even though all evidence points to the regime stealing the election from Mirhussein Mousavi.

The regime also broke multiple taboos by engaging in a deadly crackdown during Ashura, which is something that not even the feared Shah of Iran did while still hoping to retain power in 1978-1979. The martyrdom of Ali weighs so heavily on Shia thinking that comparisons to Ali and Yazid are prevalent in the opposition's characterizations of the crackdown. They portray Ahmadinejad and Khamenei as Yazid, who killed Ali on the plain of Karbala in 680AD. As Michael Totten points out:

Ashura is a Shia religious holiday, and it is not joyous. It is a day of lamentation that marks the date when the forces of the Umayyad caliph Yazid killed Hussein, son of Ali and grandson of the Prophet Mohammad, during the Battle of Karbala in the year 680. It’s one of the most infamous episodes in the struggle for power that permanently ruptured the house of Islam into its warring Sunni and Shia halves. The Shia – the partisans of Ali and his lineage – have been at war with the Sunnis – those who took the side of Yazid – for thirteen centuries. That Khamenei’s security people would murder unarmed demonstrators on this day of all days, and that his opponents now denounce him as the Yazid of Iran, may very well set most of the religious conservatives against him for as long as he and his government live.

Turnabout is also fair play given that Khamenei once fashioned himself as a modern-day Ali during the Iranian revolution in 1979. Now, he's engaging in the very kinds of activities he once demonstrated against.

UPDATE:
Mousavi's nephew has been buried under the watchful eye of the regime's thugs. It's also interesting how easy it has been for the regime to post images of their counter-demonstrations all while clamping down on the release of any information pertaining to the opposition efforts to get their message out. The regime is more prepared today to thwart online communications between the protesters than it was when the protests first erupted in the aftermath of the election debacle.

UPDATE:
The Iranian regime is claiming that they didn't kill Mousavi's nephew, but rather some unidentified assassin.

Iran Continues Crackdown Against Dissenters

The Iranian regime continues to lash out against its opponents, branding them terrorists and trying to cast blame for the violence on the West and the US in particular.

“Some Western countries are supporting this sort of activities. This is intervention in our internal affairs. We strongly condemn it,” he said, according to The Associated Press. “In this regard, the British ambassador will be summoned today.”The British government said its ambassador to Iran, Simon Gass, would respond “robustly” to any criticism and would reiterate calls for Iran to respect the rights of its citizens.

The conservative speaker of Iran’s Parliament, Ali Larijani, rebuked American and British officials for their “disgraceful comments” about the demonstrations, according to the state-run PressTV. The criticisms of Iran’s action were “disgustingly vivid that they clarify where this movement stands when it comes to destroying religious and revolutionary values,” he said.

The regime arrested Dr. Noushin Ebadi, sister of Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 for her work for human rights in Iran.

Shirin Ebadi, who won the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize for her human-rights efforts in Iran, told the The Associated Press in a phone interview from London that she called her sister Monday, and that she was being punished because of the conversation.

"She was warned not to contact me," she said. "She is detained for the sake of me. She was neither politically active nor had a role in any rally."

Noushin Ebadi, a medical professor in Tehran, was arrested at her home by four intelligence agents late Monday and sent to prison, according to a statement issued by the Nobel laureate.

"It's necessary to point out that in the past two months she had been summoned several times to the Intelligence Ministry, who told her to persuade me to give up my human rights activities," the statement said. "She has been arrested solely because of my activities in human rights. ... Our country at the moment needs more than anything peace and quiet in the shadow of respect for law and any kind of behavior that goes above the law will have negative repercussions."

The opposition Web site Greenroad reported a series of additional arrests, among them Mousavi's brother-in-law, Shapour Kazemi, and Mashallah Shamsolvaezin, a journalist who frequently criticizes the government. Others included the son of a prominent ayatollah, a reporter for the semi-official ILNA news agency, and several activists. Mousavi's nephew was among those killed this week.

Ahmadinejad and the mullahs keep trying to cast the demonstrations as the work of a few instigators, but each time they crack down against the demonstrators, it lays bare the fact that this is a regime that stole the election between Ahmadinejad and Mirhussein Mousavi and that many consider Ahmadinejad as illegitimate.

Demonstrators continue protesting against the regime outside Iran, including in Paris, Brussels, and Berlin.

However, locating video or photos of demonstrations and the situation inside Iran is proving to be difficult because Iran continues to limit the flow of information out of the country so that it can try to eliminate the opposition and its sources of power; the distribution of information and photos that would rally people against the regime.

Days of Iranian Discontent

After a simmering period of relative quiet, the streets of Tehran and other Iranian cities have erupted in violence in the wake of a crackdown by the regime against protesters. Among those killed was a nephew to opposition leader Mirhussein Mousavi in what was considered to be an assassination by the regime.

Information from within Iran remains sketchy given that the regime has done all it can to prevent the flow of information, but twitter and other nontraditional media sources are getting the stories out. The regime's thugs are using extreme violence to put down the demonstrations, but the Iranian people aren't sitting back and taking it.

Not even arrests to Mousavi's aides are going to stop the ongoing demonstrations. After all, the murder of Mousavi's nephew is likely to be a rallying point; he will be seen as a martyr to the cause. His death also shows just how far Ahmadinejad and the mullahs are willing to go in maintaining their iron grip on power.

The opposition cleric and reformist candidate Mehdi Karroubi also lashed out at the authorities for using deadly force during Sunday’s nationwide protests, in which 10 people were reported to have been killed.

“What has happened to this religious system that it orders the killing of innocent people during the holy day of Ashura?” Mr. Karroubi said in a statement, according to the opposition Jaras Web site.

The death of Ali Moussavi, a 43-year-old nephew of Mr. Moussavi, became another flash point between the police and demonstrators.

The police used tear gas to disperse a group of mourners who gathered outside the Tehran hospital where Mr. Moussavi’s body had been held, the Nowrooz Web site reported. A prominent opposition figure said that the younger Mr. Moussavi was shot to death by assassins on Sunday, and that the authorities took his body to prevent a funeral ceremony.

A 27 year-old journalist who was reporting on the street clashes Sunday was also reported missing. Redha al Basha, who was working for Dubai TV, has not been heard from, said a spokesman for Dubai TV. Mr. Basha was last seen surrounded by security forces in Tehran, witnesses said. The decision by the authorities to use deadly force on the Ashura holiday infuriated many Iranians, and some said the violence appeared to galvanize more traditional religious people who have not been part of the protests so far. Historically, Iranian rulers have honored Ashura’s prohibition of violence, even during wartime.

Taking Mousavi's nephew's body to prevent a funeral procession will likely itself provoke further violence. Like they did during this past summer's violence, the regime is trying to claim that the protesters are anti-Iranian terrorists who are being spurred on by the West (and the US).

The violence started over the weekend following the funeral of Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri. Montazeri was one of the major leaders of the original Islamic Revolution, but had become a serious critic of the regime. The regime imposed martial law and that got those seeking to mourn the death of Montazeri, and even those who didn't, upset. The violent crackdown surprised many, particularly because the funeral and the current violence is occurring during the Shi'ite observance of Ashura.

Ahmadinejad and Khamenei Settling Scores The Old Fashioned Way

A rival mullah said that Khamenei turned Iran into a dictatorship. He isn't far off the mark. Both Supreme Ayatollah Khamenei and el Presidente Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are looking to settle scores against political rivals now that Khamenei declared the election results final and installed Ahmadinejad as president despite evidence that the election was rigged. They're going with the tried and true -

Ahmadinejad is prosecuting political rivals.

This isn't something done in a regime based on democracy, or even a veneer of democracy. It's all about consolidating power and eliminating rivals who threaten that power.

Mr. Ahmadinejad spoke in front of thousands of government supporters gathered in a covered arena at Tehran University. The president appeared unafraid to effectively contradict the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who on Wednesday said he was not convinced that reform leaders had conspired in advance with foreign forces to orchestrate the post-election unrest. The supreme leader did, however, stick by the government’s claim that the protests were planned.

If Ayatollah Khamenei was hoping to blunt calls for revenge, more arrests and severe punishment, Mr. Ahmadinejad showed no signs of softening.

“We must deal with those who led these events,” Mr. Ahmadinejad said. “Those who organized, incited and pursued the plans of the enemies must be dealt with decisively.”

Even before the current crisis, Iranian politics had competing power centers. But all such groups had their place within the Islamic republic, even if they had different ideas about government powers and priorities. Political analysts say that what is different now is that President Ahmadinejad is trying to transform his rivals into outsiders, shrinking the circle of those who have a voice and role in the system to a minimum.

“What has been remarkable about the last two months is that the tent of insiders has narrowed to such a small faction,” said Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran expert with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington. “The outsiders are the vast majority of the country.”

Indeed, the tent of insiders is now focused on two thugs - Khamenei and Ahamdinejad. Everyone else either kowtows to those two, toes their line, or is seen as an outsider, even when the opponents are no less strident on matters of Iranian foreign policy than Ahmadinejad or Khamenei:

His remarks were clearly aimed at Mir Hussein Moussavi, Mehdi Karroubi, Mohammad Khatami, and Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani — some of the most important and influential figures in the Islamic republic’s 30-year history — whom the president has wanted to jail as enemies of the state.

“Serious confrontation has to be against the leaders and key elements, against those who organized and provoked and carried out the enemy’s plan,” he was quoted as saying by The Associated Press. “They have to be dealt with seriously.”

Mr. Khatami, a former two-term president and reform leader, blasted Mr. Ahmadinejad in a statement issued on his Web site the night before, sharply criticizing the government crackdown and what he called “these so-called trials,” which have been held for the dozens of intellectuals, former officials and journalists arrested since the election conflict began.

Meanwhile, Khamenei must realize that claims that the demonstrations were the result of foreign agents isn't sitting well with Iranians who have seen their rights stripped from them, and is trying to walk back from earlier statements.

Video confessions are backfiring, primarily because they show that the regime is engaging in methods that result in serious weight loss - torture, withholding of food, etc. Reports of rape are also being made. The show trials are exposing the regime's barbaric methods to lay claim the levers of power.

Iranian Mourners Roughed Up Following Memorial To Slain Protesters

Islamic law provides a 40 day mourning period, the last day of which was today in Tehran. Among those who were memorialized was Neda Soltan, who was murdered in cold blood by the Iranian thugs operating at the behest of the Guardian Council and Iranian thug Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Ahmadinejad and the other mullahs warned that opposition leader Mirhussein Mousavi should stay away from the memorial service.

Of course, it didn't stop the regime from taking the opportunity to rough up those who paid their respects to those slain 40 days ago.



As CNN reports:

The witness saw baton-wielding riot police and Basij militia charging the gathering of 3,000 people and observed at least three beatings. The witness also saw other people running from police who appeared to have been beaten. One of the mourners had a bloody head.

People came to mourn the death of Neda Agha-Soltan on the 40th day after she was shot in Tehran, and the day had the potential to cause broader demonstrations.

For Iranians, a predominantly Shiite Muslim population, the 40th day marks the last day of mourning.

Agha-Soltan, 26, was shot during street protests on June 20. Her last moments were captured on a shaky video, probably shot with a cell phone, and dispatched for the world to see.

Reformist candidate Mir Houssein Moussavi, who was hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's chief challenger, said on his Web site that he and fellow reform candidate Mehdi Karrubi would commemorate Agha-Soltan with her mother at the Behesht-e-Zahra cemetery.

An official death toll in post-election violence has not been updated in weeks, but the Iranian Labor News Agency cited Farhad Tajari, deputy chief of the parliament's judicial and legal commission, as saying that "evidence shows that ultimately 30 people were killed."

CNN fails to note that Mousavi and Ahmadinejad were both hand picked challengers by the Guardian Council and "reformist" is a matter of degree - if not without distinction since both would be generally operating at the behest of the Guardian Council and the Supreme Ayatollah, Ali Khamenei. Further, evidence suggests that the death toll from the crackdown against the protesters is far higher than 30. With the regime cracking down on media outlets, there's no way to officially determine how many were murdered by the regime, and how many remain in custody.

MSNBC reports that the police arrested some of those who attended the memorial at the cemetery, plus they forced Mousavi to leave the cemetery as hundreds surrounded his car. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times reports that the police were forced to retreat as tens of thousands of Iranians converged on the cemetery.

Tehran Bureau is attempting to compile a list of those murdered by the regime. Also, Tehran Bureau relates how an Iranian lawmaker has admitted the existence of a previously secret detention facility under the Iranian Intelligence Ministry building, where some protesters were taken and were routinely assaulted, tortured and deprived of food and water.

Here's more video - showing Iranian soldiers beating on protesters using chains and batons:



This is an evil and corrupt regime to the core.

UPDATE:
More video, this purporting to be from the cemetery skirmishes:

The Iranian Regime Takes Rafsanjani To Task

Yesterday, Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani gave a sermon that got the regime in a tizzy. The full text of that speech is here, in which he slammed China for killing Uighurs (and which those present began chanting Death to China), but which devoted significant time to attacking Supreme Ayatollah Khamenei and President Ahmadinejad for making a mockery of the democratic process such as it exists in Iran.

He said:

As you are aware, according to the constitution, everything in the country is determined by people's vote. People elect the members of the Assembly of Expert and then they elect leader, that is, leader is [indirectly] elected by people's vote. Presidents, MPs, members of the councils are elected by direct votes of people. Other officials are also appointed [indirectly] through people's vote. Everything depends on people. This is the religious system. The title of Islamic Republic is not used as a formality. It includes both the republican and Islamic nature.

The title of Islamic Republic is not just a formality. This is a reality passed on to us on the basis of Koran, as well as the religious sayings of the [Shiite] Imams and prophet. We believe in them. We should have them at the same time. Rest assured if one of those two aspects are damaged we will loose our revolution. If it looses its Islamic aspect, we will go astray. If it looses its republican aspect, it [The Islamic Republic] will not be realized. Based on the reasons that I have offered, without people and their vote there would be no Islamic system...

This was our path. We should reach the destination. We should strengthen it day by day. If the problems after the [presidential] election had not emerged, we would have had taken the best largest step towards realizing the Islamic [aspect of the establishment] at the 30th anniversary of the revolution. I am not going to say that we have not taken the step. I want to explain why this happened.

What I understand is that towards the end of the election campaign we were taken over by doubt. In other words, people started to have doubts and the seeds of doubt were sown, for whatever reason. Whether it was unfavourable publicity or the Voice and Vision's inappropriate actions or other things, seeds of doubt were planted in the minds of the people. We consider doubt as the worst disaster.

Doubt came down on our nation like the plague. Of course, there are two separate currents. There is a group of people who have no doubts, they...and mind their own business. But there is also another group, whose numbers are not few and include a great section of our erudite and knowledgeable people, who say: " We doubt". We should take measures to remove this doubt. This period, after the results of the elections , is a bitter era. I do not believe anyone from any faction wanted this to happen. We have all lost in this event. We have all lost and now ask ourselves: why did it happen. We need unity today, more than ever.

Our country should be united against all the dangers that threaten us. They have now upped their ransom demands and are coming forward to take away our achievements in the fields of hi-tech and particularly nuclear technology. Of course, God will not give them the opportunity to do so, but they are greedy. My brothers and sisters, first of all, you all know me, I have never wanted to abuse this platform in favour of a particular faction and my remarks have always concerned issues beyond factionalism. I am talking in the same manner today. I am not interested in any factions. In my view, we should all think and find a way that will unite us to take our country forward and save ourselves from these dangerous and bad effects, and the emerging grudges. We should disappoint our enemies so that they would not covet our country. What should we do? I have a few suggestions...

Note that while he continues attacking Ahmadinejad and Khamenei for all but stealing the election and sowing the seeds of doubt in the legitimacy of the regime through their heavy handed actions to declare a winner without a full recount, he too supports Iran's long term goals of nuclear technologies and is just as wary of the West and the US as the current regime.

Still, it was the comments about the regime that got Rafsanjani in hot water. One of the official mouthpieces for the government slammed Rafsanjani for questioning the election outcomes. Moreover, at least one member of the Guardian Council, which rubber stamped the election, invokes the name of Allah to support their results:

But a prominent cleric who is a member of the electoral watchdog, the Guardians Council, which upheld the poll result, rebuked Rafsanjani for his focus on popular legitimacy.

"The legitimacy of the government is given by God," the ISNA news agency quoted Ayatollah Mohammad Yazdi as saying.

"Acceptance by the people doesn't bring legitimacy to (an Islamic) government. Mr Hashemi Rafsanjani ignored this important Islamic point and talked in both parts of his sermon yesterday as if governments are assigned only by the people."

These comments give lie to the fact that the people have ever had a say in who governs. It was always concentrated in the hands of the Guardian Council.

It suggests that Rafsanjani is part of a conspiracy against the regime. That's not good news for the regime, but it puts Rafsanjani on the same side as the opposition. It means Rafsanjani is the highest ranking cleric to side with the opposition.

As for the chants of Death to Russia and Death to China, those stem from the fact that both of those countries were quick to recognize Ahmadinejad as winner, though it doesn't mean that the US is on the back burner.

Iranian Regime Tear Gasses Opposition At Prayer

I've been saying that the fight for control of Iran wasn't over by a long shot. There would be lulls in the conflict between the regime and the opposition, but things have once again heated up following Friday prayers. Today's events show that the regime, led by the illegitimate President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Supreme Ayatollah Ali Khamenei continue their assault on the intelligence of all Iranians and once again directly attacked the opposition as they met for Friday prayers.

Tens of thousands of opposition supporters packed Iran's main Islamic prayer service Friday, chanting "freedom, freedom" and other slogans as their top clerical supporter, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, delivered a sermon sharply criticizing the country's leadership over the crackdown on election protests.

Outside Tehran University, where the prayers were held, pro-government Basiji militiamen in front of a line of riot police fired tear gas at hundreds of opposition protesters who chanted "death to the dictator" and called on President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to resign. Some protesters kicked away the tear gas canisters as others scattered and regrouped.

The opposition aimed to turn the Friday prayers into a show of their continued strength despite heavy government suppression since the disputed June 12 presidential election. Opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi, who claims to have won the election, sat in the front row of worshippers, attending for the first time since the turmoil began. Many of the tens of thousands at the prayers wore headbands or wristbands in his campaign color green, or had green prayer rugs.

Rafsanjani is no friend of the West, but even he sees that the regime has gone too far. Rafsanjani had been on the sidelines until now, but taking this stance puts him up against Ahmadinejad and Khamenei.

The protesters continue to stand up against Ahmadinejad at great personal risk to their lives. Women, who make up a significant portion of the protesters are at risk of being raped by the Basiji who are at the forefront of Ahmadinejad's crackdown. Killing protesters turn them into martyrs. Rape then is a favored tactic since Iranian society traditionally shuns such victims:

Taraneh's is not the first allegation of brutal raping of a post-election protester -- according to the UK Guardian, an 18 year old boy in Shiraz was repeatedly gang raped by prison officials while in detention after being arrested for participating in the protests on June 15. That boy's father won't let him back in the family home.

Despite its agitations for reform, Iranian society remains traditional, according to Iranian-British blogger Potkin Azarmehr, and it's the stigma of rape that is being used as a weapon against the protesters. "By killing protesters, the government makes martyrs of them, but by raping them and allowing them to live, it makes them shunned in society," Azarmehr said.

Not that the stigma of rape is exclusive to Iran and other more traditional societies. A friend of Azarmehr's who is presently in Iran told him that he's "sick of hearing that people like Taraneh are better off dead" from friends abroad, just because they "can't handle the fact that she's been raped."

Via Hot Air comes the following two clips showing the protests and the crackdown:





There are also photos purportedly of the ongoing demonstrations and crackdown, including protesters dealing with tear gas fired by police and the Basiji.

World Thug Watch

Charles Taylor is currently on trial for war crimes at The Hague. He admits that his thugs hoisted the skulls of rival groups on stakes, but sees nothing wrong with that. He denies his troops disemboweled rival fighters. It's all part of the testimony into his actions during the war in Sierra Leone.

The invasion of Liberia and his ascent to power was a prelude to Taylor's involvement in the brutal 1991-2002 civil war in neighboring Sierra Leone, for which he is accused of 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

He has pleaded not guilty to all charges at the Special Court for Sierra Leone.

Taylor is not on trial for offenses in Liberia, but his testimony appeared aimed at allegations at the heart of the prosecution case that rebels backed by Taylor in Sierra Leone used terror tactics, including systematic amputations to intimidate the population.

Taylor has dismissed those allegations as lies and rumors.

Elsewhere, Mirhussein Mousavi says that deaths and injuries to protesters against the Ahmadinejad regime will not go in vain.

Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi vowed not to let the blood of protesters killed in postelection crackdown go in vain as he met with the family of a young man shot to death during the turmoil, reformist Web site reported Wednesday.

Mousavi, meanwhile, announced Wednesday that he will attend Tehran’s main Friday prayer services this week for the first time, a key symbolic assertion of the opposition’s presence after the crackdown.

The sermon Friday is due to be delivered by Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a powerful cleric in Iran’s leadership who has not performed the sermon since the turmoil erupted following the disputed June 12 presidential election. Rafsanjani is a top rival of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and is believed to be a strong behind-the-scenes backer of Mousavi.

"I’ll join you (for prayers) on Friday July 17," Mousavi said, according to his Web site ghalamnews.ir.

The main Friday prayer sermon at Tehran University is a significant political platform that hard-line clerics have used in recent weeks to demand a halt to postelection protests and spread the message that that turmoil was fueled by foreign enemies. Rafsanjani’s sermon could give the first opposition voice in the sermon.

The pro-Mousavi Web site mowjcamp.com said reformist leaders will hold street protests after attending the Friday prayers.

The Ahmadinejad regime isn't backing down and has continued to thwart protesters at every turn and is as bellicose as ever, even as the head of their nuclear program resigned over the regime's actions.

North Korea continues to simmer like ripe kimchi, and the UN has added still more companies and entities to its sanctions blacklist:

[N]ations are now banned from doing business with five firms involved in North Korea's nuclear programme, and five individuals are to have their financial assets frozen and face a travel ban.

They include:

* three North Korean trading corporations - Namchongang, Korea Hykosin and Korea Tangun, as well as North Korea's bureau of atomic energy
* an Iranian-based company, Hong Kong Electronics, is also sanctioned, accused of moving millions of dollars used for North Korea's nuclear programme
* Yun Ho-jin, Ri Je-son, Hwang Sok-hwa, Ri Hong-sop and Han Yu-ro now face sanctions because of their involvement in the development of North Korea's banned activities
* countries cannot sell North Korea certain types of graphite or para-aramid fiber because they could be used to make parts for ballistic missiles

Iranian Protesters Defy Regime's Crackdown Threats

Opponents of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Supreme Ayatollah Ali Khamenei aren't giving up so easily. They've once again taken to the streets in demonstrations.

For days, supporters of opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi have been calling for new protests in Tehran and other cities on Thursday, their first significant attempt to get back on the streets since security forces crushed massive demonstrations nearly two weeks ago in Iran's postelection turmoil.

Tehran governor Morteza Tamaddon warned that any new march Thursday would meet the same fate.

"If some individuals plan to carry out any anti-security actions by listening to calls by counterrevolutionary networks, they will be smashed under the feet of our aware people," he said, according to the state news agency IRNA in a report late Wednesday.

Thursday afternoon, a stepped-up number of uniformed policemen along with plainclothes Basiji militiamen stood at intersections all along Revolution Street and at nearby near Tehran University, some of the sites where protests were called.

Still, a group of around 300 young people gathered in front of Tehran University and began to chant, "Death to the dictator," witnesses said. Many of them wore green surgical masks, the color of Mousavi's movement.

Police charged at them, swinging batons, but the protesters fled, then regrouped at another corner and resumed chanting, the witnesses said. Police chased them repeatedly as the protesters continued to regroup, the witnesses said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they feared government retribution.

Within an hour, the number of protesters grew to about 700 and marched toward the gates of Tehran University, the witnesses said. A line of policemen blocked their path, but they did nothing to disperse the gathering as the protesters stood and continued to chant, the witnesses said.

As I've noted, the situation in Iran will continue to ebb and flow as the regime tries to maintain its grip on power and the opposition looks for ways to organize just beyond the regime's grasp.

The regime has continued making threats against the opposition, claiming that they are working at the behest of the US, the West, and/or Israel. It's a tried and true formula in the Middle East, but it's not going to fool many this time around, not when so many people see the regime for what it is - a fraudulent attempt to remain in power.

Iran Continues Crackdown Including Executing Captured Protesters

There have been multiple reports over the past week that the Iranian regime has been arrested, convicting, and executing protesters who are standing up to protest the stolen election.

This latest report gives the most detail to date:

The state-run Fars news agency reported that 20 people were hanged at the Karaj prison west of the capital on Saturday, and another 14 executions elsewhere in Iran have been reported by state media since Wednesday, including six hangings at Teheran's Evin Prison. Many of those executed have been described in state media as drug traffickers - a charge often leveled at dissidents.

Iranian police say that about 1,000 people have been detained for involvement in the public protests that erupted after June 12 presidential elections.

Mir Hossein Mousavi, the defeated candidate who has branded the victory of incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad fraudulent, has been laying low since last Wednesday while still challenging the results.

Ahmadinejad and Khamenei are busy trying to spin the election debacle as though the protests are the result of foreign interference, including claims that Mousavi was a US agent.

That's a most interesting claim, given that Khamenei himself has to sign off on all the candidates that run for office. Mousavi was one of the hand-picked candidates for President, and Khamenei and the Guardian Council have to agree to their credentials. Also, as Supreme Ayatollah, Khamenei is supposed to be infalliable. So, how is it that all of a sudden he's totally wrong about Mousavi?

People out on the streets in the vicinity of protests are also subject to arrest, search, and seizure. The Basij are looking for people who have cellphones with images or video of the demonstrations - and the ensuing crackdowns. They don't want people to see the truth.

Meanwhile, a group of clerics, the Assembly of Qom Seminary Scholars and Researchers, has ruled the election invalid, setting up a confrontation with Khamenei, Ahmadinejad, and their fellow mullahs. The group claims that the Guardian Council no longer has the authority to rule in such matters.

That's in addition to the regime's attacks on employees working at the British Embassy and foreign journalists:

On Saturday, former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani said that post-election events had caused bitterness.

Britain said one of two UK embassy employees detained for "inciting protests" would be released.

Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets in the aftermath of the poll to protest at what they alleged was a fraudulent election.

The protests died down after the authorities deployed lethal force, killing at least 20 demonstrators. More than 1,000 were arrested.

On Sunday, state news agency Irna quoted Iran's police chief as saying about two-thirds of those arrested had been released.

The authorities have blamed the West, in particular the UK, for fomenting the unrest through the use of the media, including BBC Persian television which broadcasts to the country via satellite.

The head of Iran's judiciary, Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi-Shahroudi, has said "those who co-operate with such websites and television channels will face prosecution".

On Sunday, Iran's foreign ministry said a British-Greek journalist working for The Washington Times - who had been arrested in connection with "recent street riots" - had been released.

Iranian Mullahs Continue Crackdown

It should come as no surprise as the regime says that some of the protesters will face the death penalty for their participation in protests against Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stealing the election.

A senior cleric demanded in a nationally broadcast sermon Friday that leaders of the unrest be punished harshly and that some are "worthy of execution."

Iran's ruling clergy has widened its crackdown on the opposition since a bitterly disputed June 12 presidential election, and scattered protests have replaced the initial mass rallies.

Punish them harshly and with cruelty. That's what the mullahs siding with Ahmadinejad and Khamenei want.

In fact, the mullahs are already claiming that the protesters are at war with God himself, so will use such claims to justify their violence. The mullahs are engaging in jihad against their own people by claiming that they are not following the word of Khamenei as enforced by Ahmadinejad.

As usual, the thugs chant death to America and death to Israel to end their Friday sermons, whipping the faithful into a frenzy. Of course, the media simply can't bring itself to repeat precisely what was said, but instead says that the parishioners were saying anti-US and anti-Israel slogans.

It's also reported that Mirhussein Mousavi's website was hacked, which was likely done by Ahmadinejad's thugs because they want to crush the opposition and their means of communications and organization.

Inauguration Day, Iran Style

Ahmadinejad was sworn in today, but 180 members of the Iranian parliament decided to be no-shows. That's pretty ballsy given that Ahmadinejad and his thugs in the Basij arne't above murdering Iranians who stand up against Ahmadinejad and the regime which stole their votes and the election from Mirhussein Mousavi.

More than 180 Iranian MPs appear to have snubbed an invitation to celebrate President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s election win, local press reports say.

All 290 MPs were invited to the victory party on Wednesday night, but only 105 turned up, the reports say.

A BBC correspondent says the move is a sign of the deep split at the top of Iran after disputed presidential polls.

The Parliament is a mullah approved gaggle of politicians, so if they've decided in overwhelming numbers to snub Ahmadinejad, that is a pretty strong rebuff.

The problem is that the legislature may be next up for reprisal by Ahmadinejad. By stealing the election, there's every indication that Ahmadinejad isn't going to be constrained by Iranian law and will use the Supreme Ayatollah to sanction further actions that undermine what's left of the facade of Iranian "democracy" and push Iran fully into a totalitarian dictatorship. Ed at Hot Air also notes the importance of this action.

Mousavi isn't backing down either, although the street demonstrations are sporadic and some have been cancelled.


Where's the UN in all this? Given that all they could probably muster was a weakly worded letter of rebuke, their presence wouldn't exactly be noticed.

Ahmadinejad has called out President Obama for what he calls interfering in Iranian affairs. Well, that was a given regardless of whatever President Obama said. The US and the rest of the world, particularly the British and Israelis are bogeymen for Ahmadinejad and his cronies to pull out when the going gets tough and their designs to turn the Islamic Republic of Iran into the Islamic State become so blatant and overwhelming that Iranians can't help but notice that their votes have disappeared into the night.

One of Iran's ambassadors is taking to calling the protesters a minority, but the fact that 180+ members of the Iranian parliament snubbed Ahmadinejad shows that it's far more than just a minority. You could even argue that it's an overwhelming majority of Iranians.

The protests continue (screen cap from 6/24/2009). The police are present in large numbers, to head off potential demonstrations.

This video purports to show the damage done by police who act as little more than thugs to intimidate the locals into acquiescence.

This video shows the police gathering to quell demonstrations in Tehran:


Meanwhile, as riding the PATH train this morning a gentleman had a button on the lapel of his jacket which asked "Where is my Vote?" The words were laid out in the colors of the Iranian flag (green/white/red).

That's indeed the question that many Iranians are asking - where are their votes?

Settle In For the Long Haul

The situation in Iran is going to continue developing and ebb and flow over the next few weeks and months. The Iranian revolution in 1979 didn't occur overnight. It flowed and ebbed as power struggles occurred behind the scenes and events transpired over a series of months. We should not expect this to be resolved quickly, and the bloodshed seen thus far may be an indicator of things to come.

The regime will continue doing all it can to crush the opposition. They're digging in their heels, including arresting more foreign nationals. Ahmadinejad's thugs have been arresting foreign nationals for some time, including Roxana Saberi and the Alaei brothers, but this is the first sign that they're going after foreign nationals since the election was disputed.

Chief among those that are purportedly being held by the Iranians are those with British passports since the Iranians blame them for the unrest:

Intelligence Minister Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ezhei told reporters that some with links to the West and Israel had planned bombings ahead of the June 12 presidential election, the government-funded Press TV reported Wednesday.

"England is among the countries that fan the flames with their heavy propaganda, which is against all diplomatic norms," the intelligence minister was quoted in the semi-official Fars news agency. "And the BBC Farsi has also played a major role. Also, a number of people carrying British passports have played a role in the recent disturbances."

The British Foreign Office said it was looking into the allegations.

"We have seen reports of the arrest of British nationals in Iran," the Foreign Office said. "Consular colleagues and the embassy in Tehran are making enquiries."

This comes from a regime that has no qualms about sending kids into mine fields during the Iran-Iraq war to blow up mines so that tanks and men with guns could fight. This is from the same regime that has no problem supporting international terrorism, including Hamas and Hizbullah, both of which care nothing for the lives of anyone who get in their way.

Pro-regime demonstrations take to the usual pastiche of burning American flags, but this time they throw in British flags for good measure. They also held demonstrations outside the former US embassy in Tehran.

Indeed, Iranians are dying for change, and some in the US are protesting against the Administration's lackluster response to the situation in Iran.

There are ongoing clashes being reported outside the Iranian Parliament building. Mousavi is reportedly under 24-hour watch by Ahmadinejad's thugs, and Mousavi's wife says that the country is under martial law.

Israel has a significant Iranian Jewish population as the country expelled the Jews following the 1948 War of Independence. They're following the situation closely and want to see the regime fall.

The show of support was organized by Kamal Penhasi, the Iranian-born editor of Shahyad, the only Persian-language magazine published in Israel. "We speak from the throats of the entire Iranian people, whose voices are being silenced by the censorship of the regime that is killing people on the streets …we are part of the Iranian people and want to tell them we are with them. Enough of this regime; the Iranian people deserve their freedom," he said at the demonstration.

Penhasi left Iran shortly after the Islamic Revolution. "I saw what happened in 1979; today's events remind me of that revolution," he said. "This is the great spark in the direction of the big revolution." Penhasi says the regime likes to show that it is strong, but in reality it is crumbling from within. "The people of Iran want their freedom and have taken to the streets to prove it." The young generation in Iran knows exactly what's happening in the outside world, they view Israel as a second paradise on Earth after the U.S. in terms of freedom, he says. Acknowledging that "30 years of brainwashing" have damaged Iranians' sympathy to Israel, Penhasi still believes it's there.

The Jersualem Post reports that the unrest may undermine the regime's ability to export its brand of Islam elsewhere, which is good news since its brand is pretty much associated with Hamas and Hizbullah. It may also impact Iran's nuclear weapons program, although I think that as being more farfetched since not even Mousavi was opposed to Iran obtaining nuclear power and nuclear weapons.

UPDATE:
Barry Rubin notes that there is a difference between Mousavi and Ahmadinejad that should be taken into consideration.

Indeed, to listen to what the Obama administration says—though it has moved up its rhetoric one step in recent days—there is some truth to that assertion. Yet it is foolish indeed for anyone to hope for that outcome.

What is the greater danger:

Iran has a less fanatical and adventurous faction in charge. It continues some of its problematic policies but is more cautious, less prone to risk-taking, devotes fewer resources to spreading revolution, and is more eager to avoid war.

Or

Power being in the hands of a group determined to become the region’s dominant power, eager to use money, subversion, and even nuclear weapons to do so no matter what the consequences.

I’ll choose the first alternative.

Even if it is only a matter of degree, Mousavi would likely be more cautious and less likely to agitate for violence and war against the West - a slightly less confrontational stance than Ahmadinejad. I think there was little difference between the two before the election, but now that the Ahmadinejad and his minions are cracking down in the way of stealing the election, there's no telling the position that Mousavi would take going forward. His positions have been overtaken by events and the Iranian people would not tolerate the mullahs running things as they have for 30 years.

UPDATE:
Have cracks appeared in the Guardian Council with overt support for demonstrations against Ahamdinejad? Hot Air has a photo purportedly of mullahs joining in with marching demonstrators. That assumes that this is indeed a photo of demonstrators against Ahmadinejad. It could also be mullahs marching in support of Ahmadinejad. In any case, we've got the drawing of lines and the mullahs showing their support overtly. They're taking sides.

UPDATE:
Mousavi's still in it, but another of the four candidates on the ballot is stepping back, rather than be seen as standing with the opposition.

Mohsen Rezaei, a former Revolutionary Guards commander, officially captured less than 2 percent of the vote in the disputed election in which President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was declared the landslide winner over his nearest challenger, moderate Mir Hossein Mousavi. Mousavi, Rezaei and reformist cleric Mehdi Karroubi alleged widespread vote-rigging immediately after the election, sparking large-scale protests.

In withdrawing his complaint to the Guardian Council, which oversees Iran's elections, Rezaei reportedly cited national security as his reason, The Wall Street Journal said.

He's as much a thug as Ahmadinejad, and it shows the extent to which the Guardian Council chooses people to run for President that hew closely to its own interests.

It's that Ahmadinejad threw the election that got people to realize just how the Guardian Council truly controls matters and how Ahmadinejad has ripped the veneer of legitimacy from what were really show elections.

UPDATE:
There are multiple reports coming in that Ahmadinejad's thugs have massacred people in Tehran. Persian Kitty, HuffPo, CNN, and other news outlets are reporting similar circumstances. No word on numbers of people murdered by the regime, but expect video and photos to get leaked at some point.

The regime's thugs in uniform opened fire on the crowds.

Hundreds of protesters clashed with waves of riot police and paramilitary militia in Tehran on Wednesday, witnesses said, as Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, insisted the authorities would not yield to pressure from opponents demanding a new election following allegations of electoral fraud.

It was impossible to confirm first-hand the extent of the new violence in the capital because of draconian new press restrictions on coverage of the post-election mayhem. But the witnesses reached by telephone said the confrontation, outside the national Parliament building, was bloody, with police using live ammunition.

Defying government warnings, the witnesses said that hundreds, if not thousands of protesters, had attempted to gather in front of the parliament on Baharestan Square. They were met with riot police and paramilitary militia, who struck at them with truncheons, tear gas, and guns. One witness said he saw a 19-year-old woman shot in the neck.

The Times is also reporting that Mousavi's distancing himself from the demonstrators engaging in today's actions, saying that this wasn't one of his officially sanctioned demonstrations.

UPDATE:
A troubling email from Iran, as posted at Normblog. In the email, the poster claims that more than 150 were killed in the protests over the weekend, and the true numbers are being withheld by the regime to thwart bigger protests. The dead and injured are not being brought to regular hospitals, but to military hospitals so that the numbers can be sanitized.

In fact several independent sources in Tehran hospitals and clinical centres have counted the dead from Saturday at over 150; yes more than 150. Doctors have been silenced from speaking about it. In fact when less than a week before (16 June) the doctors and nurses of Rasul Hospital in west Tehran witnessed 8 killed and 28 wounded from the day's demonstration, in their hospital, they came out on the street to inform people.

But on Bloody Saturday, the situation was totally different after Khamenei's command to slaughter demonstrators. I have a report just from one hospital not so far from my living place... In this hospital alone doctors received 20 dead and many other wounded. Security forces went to all the hospitals to which people themselves had brought the bodies, to gather all the wounded and dead; when paramilitary and military forces gathered the bodies, they sent them directly to military hospitals; they transmitted these bodies to their own centres too. In an unbelievable event in the hospital, of which I have a report, security forces have shot and killed the wounded persons before transmitting them. When doctors and nurses bacame mad and went out on the streets, they have opened fire on them too.

Read it all.

UPDATE:
President Obama is reconsidering a State Department invitation extended to Iranian diplomats to attend US Embassy July 4th celebrations. There was no reason to extend the invites in the first place (as if they would show in any event), but reconsideration isn't sufficient. You would be consorting with an evil and illegitimate regime that is murdering its own citizens who are attempting to protest against a stolen election and the destruction of what feeble human rights they have under Islamic law in Iran.

UPDATE:
Iranian press reports that the police identified and raided a headquarters for demonstrators. Of course, that location is the same as Mousavi's election headquarters. 1984 indeed.

UPDATE:
Hot diggity dog. Obama rescinds invites to Iranian diplomats for 4th of July celebrations at US embassies around the world.

Admissions and Rejections

The Iranian regime continues operating as though the election results actually meant that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won. They're not going to rescind the results, even though their own calculations show that the results were bogus (and outside statistical analysis confirms). They just don't consider the results significantly bogus to annul the results:

On Press TV, the English-language state television satellite broadcaster, Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei, the spokesman for the Guardian Council, declared: “If a major breach occurs in an election, the Guardian Council may annul the votes that come out of a particular affected ballot box, polling station, district, or city.”

“Fortunately, in the recent presidential election we found no witness of major fraud or breach in the election,” he said.

“Therefore, there is no possibility of an annulment taking place.” He was speaking late on Monday in Tehran and his remarks were posted early Tuesday, Tehran time.

That said, there are reports the Guardian Council is contemplating what was previously considered unthinkable. They are contemplating sending Ahmadinejad packing and/or adjusting the role of the Supreme Ayatollah, a position held by Ali Khamenei.

I consider both of those options farfetched, and frankly resemble the rearranging of deck chairs on the Titanic. This regime has lost its legitimacy in the eyes of the Iranian people and most of the world (except for the US State Department, which apparently wants to go forward with hosting barbeques for Iranian diplomats at embassies around the world to celebrate July 4th).

Meanwhile, the regime keeps cracking skulls of protesters and those caught up in the protests:



And they're continuing to make threats that the courts will teach those protesters already arrested a lesson. They're also trotting out people they claim show that the protests were the result of foreign influence. No doubt coercion and propagandists are at work here. It's what the regime does:

Iranian state television, in broadcasts clearly intended to discredit opponents defying a ban on protests, paraded people it said had been arrested during weekend violence.

"I think we were provoked by networks like the BBC and the VOA (Voice of America) to take such immoral actions," one young man said. His face was shown but his name not given.

A woman whose face was pixilated said she had carried a "war grenade" in her hand-bag. "I was influenced by VOA Persian and the BBC because they were saying that security forces were behind most of the clashes.

UPDATE:
The general strike against the regime is on. Ahmadinejad and the Guardian Council had warned anyone striking would be fired.

The stakes are being raised.

At the same time, the regime keeps exposing its depravities for all the world to see. The regime is charging a bullet fee to those killed by the regime's thugs:

A 19-year-old shot in the head and killed during the demonstrations... and Iranian officials asked his parents to "pay an equivalent of $3,000 as a 'bullet fee' -- a fee for the bullet used by security forces -- before taking the body back." One of the most tragic stories I've read in a long time, by the Wall Street Journal's exceptional Farnaz Fassihi.

UPDATE:
This goes to something I've noted before. Mousavi's background doesn't make him a sainted figure either in the opposition to the thug Ahmadinejad. In fact, it appears that he's got just as thuggish a past as Ahmadinejad.

You see, it appears he participated in the attack on the US Marine Barracks in Beirut in 1983 among other terror attacks:

"We had a tap on the Iranian ambassador to Lebanon," retired Navy Admiral James "Ace" Lyons related by telephone Monday. In 1983 Lyons was deputy chief of Naval Operations, and deeply involved in the events in Lebanon.

"The Iranian ambassador received instructions from the foreign minister to have various groups target U.S. personnel in Lebanon, but in particular to carry out a 'spectacular action' against the Marines," said Lyons.

"He was prime minister," Lyons said of Mousavi, "so he didn't get down to the details at the lowest levels. "But he was in a principal position and had to be aware of what was going on."

Lyons, sometimes called "the father" of the Navy SEALs' Red Cell counter-terror unit, also fingered Mousavi for the 1988 truck bombing of the U.S. Navy's Fleet Center in Naples, Italy, that killed five persons, including the first Navy woman to die in a terrorist attack.

Bob Baer agrees that Mousawi, who has been celebrated in the West for sparking street demonstrations against the Teheran regime since he lost the elections, was directing the overall 1980s terror campaign.

He may have had a change of heart, but he was clearly one of the Guardian Council's chosen few to run for President, so he would have been amenable to continuing their policies. The thuggish way they've handled matters since has changed Mousavi's role and that of the regime itself.

UPDATE:
President Obama is giving a press conference and taking questions. In his prepared comments, he noted that the Iranian claims that the US is instigating the protests is patently false. His prepared comments are pretty good, but then decides to use the term "extraordinary debate" to describe the ongoing situation there.

Extraordinary debate?

People are being murdered by the regime in cold blood (and being asked to pay for the "privilege" of being murdered to boot). and that's debate? Sorry, but it was an extremely poor choice of words.

This isn't a debate. It's a struggle for power between an entrenched regime that wants to retain all the power for itself, and the rest of the Iranian people who have finally seen the veil lifted on the totalitarianism of the Iranian political system. The election didn't matter, because the outcome was predetermined. It was rigged.

UPDATE:
Iranian soccer players who wore green armbands in solidarity with Mousavi have apparently been punished for that action. They have been "retired."

According to the pro-government newspaper Iran, four players – Ali Karimi, 31, Mehdi Mahdavikia, 32, Hosein Ka’abi, 24 and Vahid Hashemian, 32 – have been “retired” from the sport after their gesture in last Wednesday’s match against South Korea in Seoul.

They were among six players who took to the field wearing wristbands in the colour of the defeated opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, which has been adopted by demonstrators who believe the 12 June election was stolen.

Most of the players obeyed instructions to remove the armwear at half-time, but Mahdavikia wore his green captain’s armband for the entire match. The four are also said to have been banned from giving media interviews.

Also, there's a new video out that shows Ahmadinejad and mullahs discussing items in Farsi. The translations so far speak to laying the groundwork for the events we've seen unfolding.

Farsi translators need to get their hands on this. If true, it shows the determination of Ahmadinejad and the mullahs to thwart the will of the people of Iran and pursue their own agenda.

UPDATE:
Iran is scheduling Ahmadinejad's "swearing in". Tin hat dictators do not get sworn in. They take power and the people have no choice.

That's what happened. Stop treating Iran as though it is a representative democracy; it never was. It was a totalitarian regime that used elections to give it a veneer of legitimacy, and the veneer has been shorn off by the thuggist tactics of Ahmadinejad and his co-religionists.

Fundamental Shifts

The events of this past weekend in Iran have signaled what is going to reveal a fundamental shift in Iranian politics. If the regime - Ahmadinejad and Khamenei - cracks down and survives the demonstrations, it will purge the regime of anyone who opposes them.

Steve Shippert further notes that there are rumblings among the opposition that they may look to do away with the position and role of Supreme Ayatollah, a position that Khamenei still holds.

Iraq's Ali Sistani appears to have developed a significant following inside Iran, who has watched as he has threaded his way through Iraqi politics and positioned himself as finding that Islam and democracy can go hand in hand.

This is a huge development. One of the biggest questions I and others have had since the Iranian protests/revolt/revolution began was whether Mousavi would be any different in tangible effect (Hizballah & Hamas support, etc.) than Ahmadinejad and whether Rafsanjani was seeking to sack 'Supreme' Leader Khamenei simply to acquire the powerful position for himself. That question perhaps may have been answered today.

My ears first perked up when word made it through the grapevines over the weekend that Rafsanjani had been meeting with other Ayatollahs and clerics in Qom, and had among them a representative of Iraq's Ayatollah Ali Sistani.

Why? Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in 2007 made two very critical statements: that "I am a servant of all Iraqis, there is no difference between a Sunni, a Shiite or a Kurd or a Christian," and that Islam can exist within a democracy without theological conflict. You will never hear such words slip past the lips of Iran's Ayatollah Khamenei. Ever.

Sistani's presence at the Rafsanjani talks in Qom, Iran, through a representative brings therefore added significance. And the al-Arabiya report above seems to suggest that Rafsanjani is not seeking Sistani's support for superficial reasons.

If you're looking for tangible benefits of the Iraqi invasion, it's that the seeds for democracy might be taking hold not only in Iraq, but well beyond. If it takes root inside Iran, Hamas and Hizbullah may be out of business since they lose their financial backing.

Fatah faced a similar problem after Saddam Hussein was overthrown (Saddam used to fund martyrs' funds for the Palestinian terrorists). Without that money coming in, Fatah had to look elsewhere. Eliminate the flow of money to the terror groups, and they will wither on the vine. That presents the best chance for peace in the region, not the ongoing demands to force concessions from Israel.

But for now, the battle for Iran's future is being fought on the streets and online. The regime is showing that it has developed sophisticated means to quell online communications and they had help from European telecommunications companies in the process.

The monitoring capability was provided, at least in part, by a joint venture of Siemens AG, the German conglomerate, and Nokia Corp., the Finnish cellphone company, in the second half of 2008, Ben Roome, a spokesman for the joint venture, confirmed.

The "monitoring center," installed within the government's telecom monopoly, was part of a larger contract with Iran that included mobile-phone networking technology, Mr. Roome said.

"If you sell networks, you also, intrinsically, sell the capability to intercept any communication that runs over them," said Mr. Roome.

The sale of the equipment to Iran by the joint venture, called Nokia Siemens Networks, was previously reported last year by the editor of an Austrian information-technology Web site called Futurezone.

The Iranian government had experimented with the equipment for brief periods in recent months, but it had not been used extensively, and therefore its capabilities weren't fully displayed -- until during the recent unrest, the Internet experts interviewed said.

Demonstrators have been using the Internet and various services online to communicate and get their message out via Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, and the video services YouTube and LiveLeak. Disrupting those services by limiting overall Internet access gives the regime the ability to crack down without anyone being the wiser.

Iranian police continue to call demonstrators hooligans, and threaten to continue using force - at least 19 were killed so far yesterday, and the toll was likely far higher.

There were lots of Internet postings on Twitter and Facebook about a 4 p.m. (7:30 a.m. ET) vigil at Haft-e Tir Square for a young female protester identified as Neda. Her death, which was caught on camera, has become a rallying cry for many protesters.

At Monday's rally in the square, one witness said a male protester in his 20s was chased into an alley by two members of the pro-government Basij militia. A group of protesters chased the Basijis away and then the crowd could be heard chanting "Do not be scared. We are all together."

On Monday, the country's Revolutionary Guard warned that 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 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 ... and to clean the country of these plotters and hooligans," the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said in a statement, according to Iran's state-run news agency, IRNA.

In other words, the regime expects to purge and eliminate its opposition, cementing control via the clearly bogus election results. The regime admits errors were made, but will do nothing to rectify the situation.

You cannot expect anyone to trust the election results when you have 50 cities showing that they had more than 100% voter turnout. Clearly, someone cooked the books, and that can only be the Ahmadinejad regime. After all, if they were truly secure in the fact that they won this election fair and square without chicanery, they would have had no problem allowing a recount. Instead, they used iron fisted force to ram through the election results without scrutiny because it was all a sham.

More to the point, no one in Iran will accept the regime's say on what will come next because they've already attempted to lie their way into securing power for themselves.

Demonstrations continue around the world, including in the United States, Turkey, Germany and France, and the death of Neda has become a focusing moment for the demonstrators. Her death may have been one of the nearly two dozen murdered by the regime, but since it was captured on video in brutal detail, and because she was a very attractive woman before the Basij murdered her, she has become a rallying cry for opponents of the regime.

UPDATE:
The regime's goons aren't above home invasions to terrorize the people:



UPDATE:
They may have murdered Neda, but not her voice. Indeed.

Meanwhile, a Life photographer has apparently gone missing in Tehran. That comes after threats against journalists to refrain from covering the events on the streets of Tehran and elsewhere in Iran. This regime is doing all it can to remain in power and shows the utmost contempt for the Iranian people in demanding they obey the thugs in charge despite admissions of electoral fraud that the Supreme Ayatollah signed off on as legitimate.

The protesters have called for a general strike tomorrow, which the regime has apparently countered with a claim that anyone who doesn't show up is fired.

UPDATE:
BBC is reporting that the thugs in charge were fearful that there would be tremendous crowds showing up to memorialize Neda, so they've taken to cracking down on demonstrators in smaller groups to prevent them from organizing.

And she wasn't even participating in the demonstration when she was murdered:

The fiance of Neda Agha-Soltan, the young woman whose violent death during clashes in Tehran on Saturday was recorded on video and uploaded to the internet, has described the events leading up to her shooting in an interview for BBC Persian TV.

She had been sitting with her music teacher in a car, stuck in traffic, when she decided to get out because of the heat. “She got out of the car for just for a few minutes [and] that’s when she was shot dead,” said Kaspin Makan.

Mr Makan quoted eyewitnesses as saying she appeared to have been targeted deliberately by “paramilitaries in civilian clothing.”

He added that officials had prevented mourners holding a memorial service at a mosque on Monday. “The authorities are aware that everybody in Iran and throughout the whole world knows about her story,” he told the BBC. “They were afraid that lots of people could turn up.”

Depraved... and this is the regime in charge.

HuffPo has more details from the interview with Neda's fiance.

Kasamin Makan, Neda Agha-Setan's fiancee, was interviewed by BBC Persia, noting that Neda would have turned 27 this year. "Neda's goal was not Mousavi or Ahmadinejad, it was her country and was important for her to fight for this goal. She had said many times that if she had lost her life or been shot in the heart, which indeed what happened, it was important for her to continue in this path," he said.

UPDATE:
The regime is setting up special courts to deal with the protesters it has arrested thus far. Keep in mind that the regime has called such protesters terrorists, and has murdered its own citizens to remain in power. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see the writing on the wall. They intent to make examples out of some of those who they've arrested to force the rest of the country into submission to its will.

UPDATE:
More video:

19+ Dead As Iranian Regime Cracks Down on Protesters

The New York Times says at least 13 are dead, but the Iranian government says at least 19 people it considers terrorists were killed in clashes with police. More than 100 were injured. This is just the tip of the iceberg. (Disturbing video of another woman apparently killed by the Basij here).

Mirhussein Mousavi isn't backing down, and his criticism of Supreme Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has only grown.

Mousavi added that the Islamic Republic must be purged of what he called lies and dishonesty, sending out a direct challenge to conservative rulers after a week of unrest in Iran.

The opposition leader, who claims victory in the poll, told supporters he was "ready for martyrdom", according to an ally. But he said he did not seek confrontation with the authorities.

"We are not against the Islamic system and its laws but against lies and deviations and just want to reform it," he said in a statement on his website at the end of another tumultuous day.

Mousavi said if authorities refused to allow peaceful protests they would face the "consequences" – an apparent rejoinder to Khamenei's warning that opposition leaders would be held responsible for any bloodshed resulting from protests.

Ahmadinejad says for the US and Britain to stay out of Iranian affairs.

I guess criticizing the regime for murdering its own citizens for demonstrating against what they believe was a stolen election is meddling. Again, this shows the depravity of this regime and how silence further allows the regime to continue its efforts to consolidate its power.

Now is not the time for silence. It is the time to speak out against the violations of human rights by this evil regime.

The media continues to be restricted from reporting on the situation. The AP runs the following note with its photos:

** EDITORS NOTE AS A RESULT OF AN OFFICIAL IRANIAN GOVERNMENT BAN ON FOREIGN MEDIA COVERING EVENTS IN IRAN, THE AP IS OBLIGED TO USE IMAGES FROM OFFICIAL SOURCES.

In other words, it's got to either use footage from the Iranian media outlets or footage from other media sources.





This is how totalitarian regimes crack down against their opposition. They limit the flow of information that might prove damaging to the regime and crush free speech, the right to assemble peaceably and engage in a free press - rights that we take for granted here in the United States.

UPDATE:
The woman murdered in one of the videos linked to above may have been identified.

The rumor — and it’s all rumor until some newspaper tracks down her family — is that she was 27 years old and a philosophy student. I hope to god this isn’t really her photo because the thought of her being so beautiful and dignified makes the murder somehow that much more obscene.