Week in Review

DoctorZin provides a review of this past week's [12/18-12/24] major news events regarding Iran. (The reports are listed in chronological order, not by importance)

Ahmadinejad.

• Mehran Riazaty explained Iran’s Political Strategy: Creating crisis, shifting crisis to opportunities then take advantage of these opportunities.
• Baltimore Sun reported that when Ahmadinejad called the Holocaust a "myth" his harsh rhetoric was also an effort to signal that Iran, not al-Qaida, is the leading force behind militant Islam.
• Ali Akbar Dareini, St. Paul Pioneer reported that the recent remarks by Iran's hard-line president are part of a strategy to keep anti-Israel sentiment alive in the Middle East.
• ABC News reported that Iran's foreign ministry spokesman said the West should be more tolerant of Ahmadinejad's views.
• Hamed Irani, Rooz Online reported that while the Majlis (Iran’s Parliament) has a law that bans members of City Councils to hold government posts, there are numerous City Council executives who hold second posts inside the government.
• Adnkronos International reported that Ahmadinejad has issued a circular warning all ministers and state bodies that "no official may go abroad, on a mission or for personal reasons, without prior authorisation and without coordinating with the foreign ministry".
• Radio Free Europe reported Ahmadinejad's anti-Israel statements reflect the official line. A must read.
• FOX News reported that hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has banned Western music from Iran's radio and TV stations.
• Dieter Bednarz, Erich Follath and Georg Mascolo, Spiegel Online reported on Ahmadinejad's challenge to the world.
• Reuters reported that Iran denied reports that a firefight last week in the country's lawless southeastern borderlands was an assassination attempt on President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
• The Associated Press reported that hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's ban on Western music fell on deaf ears.
• The Guardian reminded us that the Iran's president's threats were consistent with Iranian Supreme Leader.
• The Wall Street Journal reported that now that Ahmadinejad has called for banning western music in Iran, we should remember that as Vaclav Havel once said, music can also be a tool of liberation.
• The Associated Press reported that despite Ahmadinejads recent western music ban, music still plays in Iran. But not on TV or radio.
• Meysam Tavvab, Rooz Online reported that IRGC personnel and commanders continue their take over of the government, now focusing on the law enforcement agencies.
• Karim Sadjadpour and Ray Takeyh, The Boston Globe gave their interpretation of Iran's belligerent foreign policy toward Israel.

Ahmadinejad's Worldview.

• The New York Times reviews Ahamdinejad's devotion to Khomeinist ideology.
• Scott Peterson, The Christian Science Monitor published a report on Shia Islam's version of "Waiting for the Rapture in Iran."
• IRIB News reported that Ahmadinejad criticized "suppressive nations" for suppressing "any voice under the pretext of maintaining freedom of expression and impose medieval values and manners in modern disguise on nations." The president then expressed his confidence that all kinds of oppression would come to an end once rule of Islam prevails in the whole world.
• Tom Porteous, Prospect visited Jamkaran, the site of a water well where the 12th and last imam of Shia Islam, the Mahdi, is said to have disappeared a little over a thousand years ago. He discussed Ahmadinejad (and his new leadership) believes that total chaos must be created in order to hasten the return of the Mahdi and the establishment of Islamic rule throughout the world. An interesting read.
  

Power Struggle inside of Iran.

• Farshad Ghorbanpour Sheikhani, Rooz Online reported that despite the numerous government hurdles, a recent Tehran seminar took place at Tehran University where academicians debated the role of the University.
  

Iran's Nuclear Program.

• Khaleej Times reported that while the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) seems to have reversed its position on Iran's nuclear plans, the head of the six-member bloc said: It's not worrisome as long as it is restricted to peaceful use.
• Iran Focus reported that Ali Larijani, Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator and Secretary General of the powerful Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) described President George W. Bush as an “odd” man.
• The Jerusalem Post reported that despite the fact that continued diplomatic initiatives will "not foil Iran's nuclear ambitions," OC Intelligence Maj.-Gen. Aharon Ze'evi (Farkash) told the cabinet on Sunday that "it is important to pursue [them]."
• NewKerala reported that Germany has more to lose from any economic sanctions on Iran than other Western countries.
• The Financial Times reported that Britain, France and Germany face tense negotiations with Iran on Wednesday when the two sides resume talks on Tehran’s nuclear program.
• Radio Free Europe reported that U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said today that Iran cannot be trusted with technology that could lead to nuclear arms.
• EU Business reported that Israeli President Moshe Katsav accused the European Union of showing "hesitation and weakness" in the face of Iran's nuclear program.
• Islamic Republic News Agency reported that Iran condemns the recent EU positions on Iran as 'unacceptable.'
• World Tribune reported that Syria has signed a pledge to store Iranian nuclear weapons and missiles.
• Yaakov Lappin, Ynetnews warned us to take Iran seriously.
• Spacewar reported that diplomats say Tehran is already laying the groundwork for uranium enrichment, and may even be secretly making parts for sophisticated P2 centrifuges.
• ABC News reported that an Iranian exile group called on the U.N.'s atomic watchdog to inspect an extensive network of tunnels which it says the Islamic Republic has built to conceal a clandestine nuclear weapons program.
• The Economist reported that a European diplomat warned Iran that the window for a negotiated way out of the impasse over Iran's nuclear intentions “will not remain open indefinitely”.
• Reuters reported that European powers on Wednesday reopened talks with Iran over concerns that it is secretly trying to make atomic bombs and said the dialogue would resume in January, halting a spiral into confrontation.
• The Jerusalem Post reported that Turkey's ambassador warns the US about Iran's nukes.
• John Hughes, Christian Science Monitor reported that the west's patience is wearing thin with Iran's hard line.
• Zeev Maoz, Ha'aretz suggested a different nuclear policy in Israel.
• Robert Zarate, The National Review reported that the West must get on with that next step of slowing down the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
• Iran.org reported that Iran's the nuclear "negotiations" with the European Union are now being guided in Tehran by Revolutionary Guards Corps political director Yadollah Javani, a Rev. Guards general.
• The New York Times reported that representatives of three European countries and Iran met Wednesday for five hours of closed-door meetings in Vienna; the delegates said the two sides had agreed to hold further talks in January.
• Iran Focus reported that Iran’s new ambassador to IAEA submits credentials.
• Mark Heinrich, Reuters published their analysis on the showdown over Iran.
• The Associated Press reported that Russia's Foreign Ministry said it made a formal offer to Iran on Saturday to move its uranium enrichment program to Russia.
• Mehr News reported that Majlis Speaker Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel said here that Iran does not want mere talks with the European Union on the nuclear issue.
• FrontPageMagazine provided a detailed report that Syria has agreed to store Iran's nuclear material, and Iran will grant asylum to Syrian officials.
  

The Unrest inside of Iran.

• SMCCDI reported that a draftee soldier killed three militiamen in the Varche Military post. Many army members and residents still consider him as a hero for having revolted against injustice.
• SMCCDI reported that a former Militia officer was gunned down in the western City of Sannandaj. Local rumors are stating about the involvement of the regime's intelligence circles as Tchapari was known for openly criticizing many aspects of the daily life and his regret to have taken part in "the creation of a monster".
• SMCCDI reported that dozens of Iranian women closed the highway by setting up barricades and setting car tyres' ablaze in protest to the bad conditions there.
• SMCCDI reported that tens of drivers of the Greater Tehran's Collective Buses were rounded up, today, for intending to protest.

The Iranian Economy.

• The Associated Press reported that the Federal Reserve Board ordered ABN AMRO Bank NV to pay roughly 80 million dollars in fines Monday for conducting financial transactions with Iran and Libya that violated U.S. money-laundering laws.
  

Human Rights/Religious and Press Freedom inside of Iran.

• Kenneth R. Timmerman, The National Review reported that Iran’s Christians have a high price to pay.
• Reuters reported that an Iranian of the Bahai faith has died in his jail cell of unknown causes, 10 years after being imprisoned by Tehran for abandoning Islam.
• René Wadlow and David G. Littman, FrontPageMagazine published a reminder of the UN's Convention on Preventing Genocide and the UN's failure to act on it.
• Reuters reported that the European Union accused Iran of persistent and grave human rights failings.
• Radio Free Europe reported that the European Union issued a statement today criticizing Iran for refusing to resume a dialogue on human rights.
• SMCCDI reported on three more public executions carried in Iran.
• Christian Today reported that a U.S. evangelist who has been declared an “enemy of the state” by Iran has unveiled plans to broadcast special Christmas television programmes into Iran.
• Amnesty International wrote the head of Iran’s Judiciary to express concern at continuing abuses committed against the country’s Baha’i community and they were greatly saddened by the death in custody of a Baha’i prisoner of conscience who had been detained for 10 years solely on account of his faith.
• Omid Memarian, Rooz Online reported Iran’s new ultra-conservative Minister of Culture declared that to get a licence to start a publication would require the applicants to show that their publication is different from existing ones and is thus unique.
• The Times reported that the place Iranians call “Weblogistan” has grown this year from 5.4 million blogs to today to more than 23 million. The bloggers have proved so wily and hard to censor that the Iranian Government has even considered removing Iran from the internet entirely.
  

Iran's troublemaking.

• Mehran Riazaty reported that the two close Shiite friends of Iran in the Iraqi election, Hakim and Ahmad Chalabi are together so far had won 122 seats.
• Mehran Riazaty reported on Iran’s Qods operation in Turkey.
• Eli Lake, The NY Sun reported that early estimates from Iraq's election commission suggest sectarian and religious parties trounced liberals in last week's parliamentary elections.
• Asia Times Online reported Rafsanjani said, "We see now that the United States has been defeated [in Iraq]."
• The Public Affairs Magazine reported that the week-long violence in Baluchistan is being blamed on Iranian intelligence and their Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
• DEBKAfile reported that thousands of Sunni secular Shiite and Kurdish protesters took to the streets of Iraq Friday, Dec. 23, over what they called “the biggest election fraud in Middle East history.”
• Eli Lake, The New York Sun reported that the head of Iraq's election committee accused critics of the election of extortion.
• Iran Focus reported that Iran’s powerful Interior Minister said that the echo of Iran’s “Islamic revolution” could be heard in Iraq.
  

Iran's Military.

• The Jerusalem Post reported that Iran recently acquired 12 cruise missiles with a range of up to 3,000 kilometers.
• Xinhuanet reported that Russia will fully comply with a deal with Iran to supply it with the Tor-M1 air defense systems despite US objections.
• MosNews reported that Iran is interested in developing military-technical cooperation with Russia.
  

Iran and the International community.

• Iran Mania reported that China is conducting negotiations with Iran on developing Yadavaran Oilfield.
• The Associated Press reported that the families of three Americans killed in Palestinian suicide bombings have accused the Italian government of siding with Iran in a legal battle to collect damages from the Islamic regime's assets in Italy.
• Expatica reported that Berlin on Thursday has called on the Iranian government to release a German citizen arrested for fishing illegally in Iran's territorial waters.
• MichNews reported on a new Secular party formed in exile.
  

Can You Believe This?

• News Max reported that Teresa Heinz Kerry says she is "outraged" that President Bush has been too easy on Iran.
  

Inside Iran.

• DNA India reported that at eight o’ clock each evening, Iran grinds to a halt and tunes into a ground-breaking television comedy about a little village of Barareh, with its corrupt councillors, rigged elections and vocal women’s rights groups, a microcosm of Iran today.
  

Inside Iran, the Air Crash in Tehran.

• Rooz Online reported that a movie camera has been found among the debris of last week’s crash of a C-130 transport aircraft and that the entire conversation of the captain and the control tower was recorded on this camera.
  

US Policy on Iran.

• The Washington Post published the full text of President Bush's news conference where he said of Iran: "There are Consequences for Not Behaving."
• Spiegel published a confrontational interview with the US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns.
• ABC News reported that US National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley went on the offensive over Iran in a speech this week.
• VOA News reported that the United States Friday condemned what it said was the persecution of an Iranian of the Baha'i faith who died in prison last week.
  

US Sentate on Iran.

• DoctorZin reported on an underreported US Senate Resolution on Iran reveals a lack of conviction.
• NewsMax reported that the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) thanks U.S. Senator Rick Santorum for his resolution on Iran which condemned the recent disparaging and destructive statements made toward Israel
• DoctorZin reported that the Americans public demanded the US Senate schedule hearings on Iran.
• Brian McGuire, The New York Sun reported that Senate democrats refuse to reveal who stopped pro-democracy Iran resolution.
  

Must Read reports.

• Radio Free Europe reported Ahmadinejad's anti-Israel statements reflect the official line. A must read.
• The Jerusalem Post criticized the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to ElBaradei.
• Nancy A. Youssef, Knight Ridder Newspapers reported that many Iraqi Sunni Muslims are now diverting their anger from Israel to Iran.
• Thomas L. Friedman, The New York Times reported on the real Iran myths.
• Jonah Goldberg, Tribune Media Services discussed Time Magazines reporting of Ahmadinejad points to a deeper issue.
  

The Experts.

• Bill Steigerwald, The Jersey Journal published an interview with Ilan Berman, Author of "Tehran Rising."
• Michael Ledeen, National Review Online published the truth about Tenet's installation of Ahmadinejad as Iran's new president. A clever conspiracy theory.
• Simon Henderson, The Washington Institute published a report: The Elephant in the Gulf: Arab States and Iran's Nuclear Program.
• Amir Taheri, The Jerusalem Post reminds us that Iran is not just Israel's problem.
  

Photos, cartoons and videos.

• Rooz Online published a cartoon "wiping out" Ahmadinejad "wiping out Israel."
• A photo of an Iranian missile with a banner reading: "Israel must be uprooted and erased from history."
• Sobh.org, an Ansar Hezballah web site published more propaganda against the state of Israel.
• John Batchelor interviewed DoctorZin regarding the attempted assassination of Ahmadinejad. Audio clip provided.
• MEMRI published excerpts from a recent Iranian TV broadcast where Iranian "experts" denied of the existence of crematoria at Auschwitz, and a discussion of how Jewish rabbis in Europe used to kill children and take their blood for use during the Passover holiday. Video.
• Seyed Ibrahim Nabavi, Rooz Online developed a creative idea: How About Transferring Israel to Iran? A satire.
• Cox & Forkum published another cartoon: Ahmadinejad's Final Solution.
  

And finally, The Quote of the Week.

Asia Times Online reported Rafsanjani said,

"We see now that the United States has been defeated [in Iraq]."

Sunday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 12.25.2005:

Friedman on The Real Iran Myths

Thomas L. Friedman, The New York Times:

I'd like to thank Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, for his observation that the Nazi Holocaust against the Jews was just a "myth." You just don't see world leaders expressing themselves so honestly anymore — not about the Holocaust but about their own anti-Semitism and the real character of their regimes.

But since Iran's president has raised the subject of "myths," why stop with the Holocaust? Let's talk about Iran. Let's start with the myth that Iran is an Islamic "democracy" and that Ahmadinejad was democratically elected. READ MORE

Its great to see the NY Times got this one right. A must read.

Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

• The Associated Press reported that Russia's Foreign Ministry said it made a formal offer to Iran on Saturday to move its uranium enrichment program to Russia.
• Mehr News reported that Majlis Speaker Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel said here that Iran does not want mere talks with the European Union on the nuclear issue.
• Jonah Goldberg, Tribune Media Services discussed Time Magazines reporting of Ahmadinejad points to a deeper issue.
• FrontPageMagazine provided a detailed report that Syria has agreed to store Iran's nuclear material, and Iran will grant asylum to Syrian officials.
• VOA News reported that the United States Friday condemned what it said was the persecution of an Iranian of the Baha'i faith who died in prison last week.
• SMCCDI reported that tens of drivers of the Greater Tehran's Collective Buses were rounded up, today, for intending to protest.
• MichNews reported on a new Secular party formed in exile.
• And finally, We wish you all a very merry Christmas and a happy Chanukah.

Iran does not want “talks for the sake of talks”: speaker

Mehr News:

Majlis Speaker Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel said here on Saturday that Iran does not want mere talks with the European Union on the nuclear issue.

Speaking to reporters after officially welcoming the visiting President of Tajikistan's Assembly of Representatives, Saidullo Khairullayev, Haddad-Adel said, “We hope that the Europeans hold the same view toward the talks and continue negotiations more seriously.”

“I believe the Europeans have now come to the conclusion that merely negotiating to waste time is not what Iran wants,” he underlined.

“I think the Europeans are aware of the will of the Iranian nation and government to reach their rights and our behavior over the past few weeks has clearly proved that we are strictly against killing time and talks for the sake of talks.” READ MORE

He noted that negotiations should be held within the framework of the International Atomic Energy Agency charter and should focus on reaching a practical result with the aim of meeting Iran’s interests and building confidence.

In response to a question on what measures Iran would adopt if the Europeans set the suspension of enrichment activities during talks as their condition, the speaker said, "This issue should be left for the future. We have repeatedly announced our stance.

"We should wait to see what issues they (the Europeans) will raise. There is no reason to express our pessimism beforehand," he said as carried by IRNA.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Haddad-Adel assessed bilateral relations with Tajikistan as positive, expressing hope that mutual ties would receive further boost in all fields.
"Iran and Tajikistan enjoy deep-rooted historical, political and cultural commonalties. The two sides' officials have tried to expand bilateral cooperation since Tajikistan's independence," he said.

He hoped the two sides would promote bilateral parliamentary cooperation.

Khairullayev, for his part, expressed hope the visit by the Tajik parliamentary delegation to Tehran would help the two countries promote their national goals.

The visit by the president of Tajikistan's assembly of representatives to Iran is taking place at the official invitation of Mehdi Karrubi, the former Majlis speaker.

Friedman on The Real Iran Myths

Thomas L. Friedman, The New York Times:

I'd like to thank Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, for his observation that the Nazi Holocaust against the Jews was just a "myth." You just don't see world leaders expressing themselves so honestly anymore — not about the Holocaust but about their own anti-Semitism and the real character of their regimes.

But since Iran's president has raised the subject of "myths," why stop with the Holocaust? Let's talk about Iran. Let's start with the myth that Iran is an Islamic "democracy" and that Ahmadinejad was democratically elected. READ MORE

Sure he was elected — after all the Iranian reformers had their newspapers shut down, and parties and candidates were banned by the unelected clerics who really run the show in Tehran. Sorry, Ahmadinejad, they don't serve steak at vegetarian restaurants, they don't allow bikinis at nudist colonies, and they don't call it "democracy" when you ban your most popular rivals from running. So you are nothing more than a shah with a turban and a few crooked ballot boxes sprinkled around.

And speaking of myths, here's another one: that Iran's clerics have any popularity with the broad cross-section of Iranian youths. This week, Ahmadinejad exposed that myth himself when he banned all Western music on Iran's state radio and TV stations. Whenever a regime has to ban certain music or literature, it means it has lost its hold on its young people. It can't trust them to make the "right" judgments on their own. The state must do it for them. If Ahmadinejad's vision for Iran is so compelling, why does he have to ban Beethoven and the Beatles?

And before we leave this subject of myths, let me add one more: the myth that anyone would pay a whit of attention to the bigoted slurs of Iran's president if his country were not sitting on a dome of oil and gas. Iran has an energetic and educated population, but the ability of Iranians to innovate and realize their full potential has been stunted ever since the Iranian revolution. Iran's most famous exports today, other than oil, are carpets and pistachios — the same as they were in 1979, when the clerics took over.

Sad. Iran's youths are as talented as young Indians and Chinese, but they have no chance to show it. Iran has been reduced to selling its natural resources to India and China — so Chinese and Indian youths can invent the future while Iran's young people are trapped in the past.

No wonder Ahmadinejad, like some court jester, tries to distract young Iranians from his failings by bellowing anti-Jewish diatribes and banning rock 'n' roll.

What is a fact is the danger someone like Ahmadinejad would pose if his country developed a nuclear weapon. But that is where things are heading. Iran has so much oil money to sprinkle around Europe, it doesn't worry for a second that the Europeans would ever impose real sanctions on Tehran for refusing to open its nuclear program.

"The West has lost its leverage," notes Gal Luft, an energy expert at the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security. Europe is addicted to Iran's oil and to Iran's purchases of European goods. At the same time, the Iranian regime has been very clever at petro-diplomacy.

After the United States invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, "the Iranians knew they needed an insurance policy," Luft added. "So they did two things: they concentrated on developing a bomb and went out and struck gas deals with one-third of humanity — India and China," the world's two fastest-growing energy consumers. So it is highly unlikely that China would ever allow the U.N. Security Council to impose sanctions on Iran.

The whole world seems to be getting bought off these days by oil. Gerhard Schroder, the former German chancellor, just became chairman of a Russian-German gas pipeline project — controlled by the Russian government — that he championed while in office. The man just stepped down as the leader of Germany and now he's working for the Russians! I guess Jack Abramoff was not available.

The word from the White House is that President Bush is trying to figure out a theme for his State of the Union speech and for his next three years. Mr. President, what more has to happen — how many more Katrinas, how much more reckless behavior by Iran, how many more allies bought off by petro-dollars — before you realize that there is only one thing to do for the next three years: Lead America and the world in an all-out push to conserve energy, reduce dependence on oil and develop alternatives?

Because three more years of $60-a-barrel oil will undermine everything good in the world that the United States wants to do — and that's no myth.

It's great to see the NY Times got this one right. A must read.

Firebrand? He's Nuts and He's After Nukes

Jonah Goldberg, Tribune Media Services:

Among the proud recipients of Time magazine's fluffy end-of-year "People Who Mattered" feature, is Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Here's how it begins: "He is an unlikely firebrand: the soft-spoken son of a blacksmith who still sometimes drives a 30-year-old Peugeot. But Iran's new president doesn't shrink from controversy. After winning a disputed election, he said. . . . " Now, before I finish that sentence, let's at least note that so far Time is using the same tone it might use to talk about John McCain, Joe Wilson, George Clooney or some other "soft-spoken" "unlikely firebrand" beloved by the media. READ MORE

So, does Ahmadinejad have a wacky blog? Did he admit on "Larry King Live" that he voted for Ralph Nader in 2000? What makes him such a charming rogue?

Let's pick up that sentence where we left off and see: "After winning a disputed election," Time reports, "he said he would continue Iran's nuclear program, called the Holocaust a 'myth' and pledged to destroy Israel. Even some of the nation's ruling clerics are nervous about what he will do next." So even some of Iran's terrorism-supporting theocratic dictators are "nervous" about this guy.

What, one wonders, would it take for the editors to get really rough? Perhaps if Ahmadinejad offered a deeply negative review of "Brokeback Mountain"?

Time describes Pope Benedict XVI as perhaps "too polarizing a conservative." But for Ahmadinejad, who declared that a member nation of the U.N. should be "wiped off the map" and that the touchstone moral horror of modernity was nothing but a "myth" . . . well, let's make sure to bring up that he drives an old Peugeot. That's a crucial fact. If only we could find out what kind of tree he would be if he could be a tree. Maybe next year.

I know what you're thinking, but this isn't a jab at liberal media bias - though we can have that argument if you like. Rather, this points to something deeper: the resurgence of American isolationism.

Few issues are more shrouded in myth and misunderstanding than isolationism. Even as the "come home, America" chorus grows louder on the left, we're still told that isolationism is a right-wing phenomenon. This myth starts with the Republican Party's rejection of the Treaty of Versailles, which didn't really have much to do with isolationism. The Republican Party - the party of Teddy Roosevelt, after all - was full of interventionists and hawks. And the Democratic Party had plenty of isolationists and doves.

In the 1930s, isolationism was respectable across the ideological spectrum. Norman Thomas - the president of the American Socialist Party - was an isolationist. Oswald Garrison Villard (former editor of the Nation), Charles Beard, John Dewey, Bernard Baruch and countless other liberal luminaries were isolationists of varying intensity.

John F. Kennedy sent the isolationist America First Committee while he was at Harvard with the note, "what you are doing is vital." But that was the same JFK who wrote "Why England Slept" - his senior thesis-cum-bestseller on why Britain was unready for war. Kennedy's explanation: The British people were unwilling to face reality. The same was true of the United States in the 1930s. The memory of the horror and stupidity of World War I was fresh enough in Americans' minds - as was the ongoing Depression - that the idea of going to war or even engaging in world affairs just seemed unthinkable. So, we didn't think about it. We used language that made things seem OK.

But the problem, as Kennedy learned, is that evil men and dangerous forces don't take a timeout until we're ready to pay attention. And that's where Iran comes in. Seriously challenging Iran just strikes a lot of people as too much to fit on the American plate right now, so we prefer to call Ahmadinejad an "unlikely firebrand" instead of a murderous fanatic.

But whatever we call him, it won't change the fact that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons and that Ahmadinejad is a particularly kooky religious fanatic (possibly a member of the Hojjatieh, which seeks to foment global chaos in order to hasten the arrival of the messianic 12th imam).

In response to Ahmadinejad's comments, the world has responded with only slightly more outrage than it would if he'd called for trade barriers on pistachios. It's time to wake up.

Jonah Goldberg is editor-at-large of National Review Online.

Iran and Syria Agree to Share, Hide WMDs

FrontPageMagazine:

Syria has agreed to store Iran's nuclear material, and Iran will grant asylum to Syrian officials implicated in the murder of former Lebanese PM Rafik Harriri, according to Jane's Defence Weekly. According to the London-based defense magazine, the two counties signed a strategic accord to help each other resist international pressure regarding their weapons programs and misdeeds.

Jane's quoted diplomatic sources saying that Syria has agreed to store Iranian materials and weapons if the United Nations imposes sanctions upon the Islamic state. The sources said that Iran committed to protecting any Syrian intelligence officers indicted by the UN or Lebanon.

"The sensitive chapter in the accord includes Syria's commitment to allow Iran to safely store weapons, sensitive equipment or even hazardous materials on Syrian soil should Iran need such help in a time of crisis," Jane's said.

Another aspect of the agreement that directly affects Israel is that Syria committed itself to continue to supply the Iranian-sponsored Hizbullah terror group with weapons, ammunition and other equipment.

Hizbullah currently has 15,000 missiles and rockets that it received from Iran deployed on Lebanon’s border with Israel.

Also affecting the Jewish State is an Iranian commitment to supply Syria with the technology necessary to produce weapons of mass destruction and provide training to the Syrian army. Iran would upgrade Syrian ballistic missiles as well as chemical weapons systems, according to Jane's, and has even agreed to operate "advanced weapon systems in Syria during a military confrontation.” READ MORE

US Condemns Persecution of Iranian Religious Captive Who Died in Prison

David Gollust, VOA News:

The United States Friday condemned what it said was the persecution of an Iranian of the Baha'i faith who died in prison last week. The State Department said members of minority religions and political dissidents in Iran are systematically oppressed.

In a written statement, the State Department condemned the persecution and imprisonment of Iranian Baha'i adherent Zabihullah Mahrami, who died in prison in the central Iranian city of Yazd a week ago of unknown causes.

Mr. Mahrami, 59, a civil servant in the government of the late Shah of Iran, had been sentenced to death by an Iranian revolutionary court in 1996 for apostasy, abandoning Islam. READ MORE

The sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment after protests from the European Parliament and several western governments including the United States and Britain.

In the statement offering condolences to Mr. Mahrami's family, State Department Deputy Spokesman Adam Ereli said he had received death threats in prison and been forced to perform arduous physical labor.

Mr. Ereli said the Mahrami case, unfortunately, is not unique and that the government of Iran is engaged in the systematic oppression of its citizens including the persecution of individuals for religious and political reasons.

He said members of Iran's religious minorities including Sunni Muslims, Sufis, Zoroastrians, Jews and Christians are frequently jailed, harassed and intimidated.

Spokesman Ereli said Iranian Baha'is are denied the right to assemble, maintain administrative institutions or worship freely.

He said the United States calls on the Iranian government to allow freedom of religion for all, and to ensure the rights of free speech and expression without fear of discrimination, intimidation or imprisonment.

The Baha'i faith, an offshoot of Islam, originated in Iran 150 years ago and claims more than five million members around the world including thousands in Iran, where it is officially rejected as a wayward sect.

A Baha'i community statement in New York earlier this week said Mr. Mahrami's death came amid ominous signs that a new wave of persecutions of the group in Iran is underway.

It said nearly 60 Bahai's have been arrested, detained or imprisoned so far this year, up sharply from the last several years.

A Baha'i spokeswoman said Iranian authorities bear full responsibility for the death of Mr. Mahrami, whose only crime she said was his belief in the Baha'i faith.

Shia Islam is the official religion of Iran but some other faiths including Zoroastrians, Jews and Christians are recognized religious minorities, and under Iranian law are nominally free to conduct rites and ceremonies and religious education.

However Human Rights Watch and other monitoring groups says Iran has fallen short of those commitments in practice, and that other provisions of Iranian law are clearly discriminatory, especially toward non-Muslims.

The Bush administration has been a persistent critic of Iran on human rights issues.

In his statement Friday, spokesman Ereli again cited the case of Akbar Ganji, an investigative journalist jailed in 2000 after publishing stories accusing senior Iranian officials of involvement in the killing of several opponents of the regime.

U.S. officials have also strongly condemned recent statements by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denying the World War II Nazi extermination campaign against the Jews, and calling for Israel to be wiped off the map.

Senior officials say the remarks have stripped away a veneer of moderation cultivated by Iran during the tenure of former President Mohammed Khatami, and have made U.S. concerns more acute about other Iranian activities including what they say is its drive to acquire nuclear weapons.

Moscow Offers to Move Iranian Enrichment

The Associated Press:

Russia's Foreign Ministry said it made a formal offer to Iran on Saturday to move its uranium enrichment program to Russia, raising diplomatic pressure on Tehran to accept the Western-backed plan it has so far rejected.

The Russian Embassy in Tehran on Saturday handed over a formal note containing the offer to the Iranian authorities, Russia's Foreign Ministry said in a statement. The note said that "an earlier Russian offer to Iran to establish a joint Russian-Iranian enrichment venture in Russia remains valid," the ministry added. READ MORE

Iran has insisted that it would enrich uranium and produce nuclear fuel domestically despite international efforts to curb its atomic program.

Iran says its nuclear program is only aimed at producing electricity, but the United States accuses Iran of running a covert atomic weapons program. Washington is pushing for Tehran to be brought before the United Nations Security Council, where it could face economic sanctions for violating a nuclear arms control treaty.

Germany, France and Britain have suggested shifting Iran's enrichment activities to Russia, where nuclear material would be enriched only to fuel levels and not to weapons grade. But Gholamreza Aghazadeh, head of the Atomic Organization of Iran, has dismissed the offer as unacceptable earlier this month.

Russia's Foreign Ministry said Saturday's formal proposal represented a "Russian contribution into the search for mutually acceptable solutions in the context of settling the situation around the Iranian nuclear program by political and diplomatic means."

Bus drivers rounded up for protest

SMCCDI (Information Service):

Tens of drivers of the Greater Tehran's Collective Buses were rounded up, today, in downtown Tehran. The drivers were intending to protest against their poor conditions and the arrest of several of their colleagues.

Tens of security agents and plainclothes men intervened immediately and arrested the demonstrators after filming the area and taking pictures from protesters.

Militia's Commander Jaffarzadeh was heard stating to the protesters: "You must end your gathering or I'll cut off your head!"

The protesters, who were composed of hundred drivers, were forced inside several special buses which left the scene for an un-identified location. READ MORE

Official warning was made, earlier, against all drivers who are intending to quit work and to protest. Security agents were seen putting lock on the small and tolerated syndicate's office after taking away many materials, such as, computers and books.

Other drivers have issued a warning to the Islamic regime for the immediate release of all their arrested colleagues. Failure to do so would result in a general strike on Sunday early morning and a day of sit in, with road block, on the Vali-e-Asr avenue from its square till the Tehran's Train Station.

Security forces are expected to be in number and to crush any, such a, gathering especially in the main Capital's artery.

Iran: Secular party formed in exile

J. Grant Swank, Jr., MichNews:

That's the title of the newly organized freedom effort. Its mission is to bring truth to the world community regarding what happens in Iran. Hopefully, the new party will bring actual liberties to Iranians within the borders of Iran.

The chairman of the newly formed entity is Aryo Priouznia, coordinator for the "Student Movement Coordination Committee for Democracy in Iran" (SMCCDI).

The new thrust was established in exile, guided by SMCCI, and now anticipating "millions of Iranians, especially students, Iranian youth and women" to recognize its importance, stated Priouznia, according to L'Opinione by Stefania Lapenna. READ MORE

"Every day there are more Iranians who are rallying around such positive, progressive and humanistic foundations which is the best antidote to radical Islamic ideology and its backward logic, intolerance, and gender discrimination, fascism, and promotion of hate and terror against the West," Priouznia said.

One of the main hopes of any democracy agenda regarding Iran is the youth population. Youths make up the vast majority of Muslim populations anywhere in the world. The same is true of Iran. If democracy can get hold of the youth's idealism and strength, it can find its way in toppling ruthless despots.

"INSP is a new entity that should be able, as a political party, to help in the implementation of the well-known desire by most Iranians for a secular democracy and be permitted and recognized as a nation promoting peace and tolerance," Pirouznia explained.

INSP works with freedom-espousing individuals of all races, religions and backgrounds. The baseline is working for Iranian personal freedoms. INSP anticipates that someday Iran will be set loose from the present tyrannical hold. Iranians in exile have not forgotten those still enslaved by a dictatorship molded by a legalistic, extremist Islamic regime. INSP is opposed to the Iranian theocracy.

Pirouznia believes that present-day Iranians "are one of the most secular and democracy thirsty people of the planet. They are renewing with "Iranism" principles, not Islamism. They're valuing more historic figures like Cyrus the Great than Mohomet the Islamic prophet."

Pirouznia informed media that he does not have faith in the present UN when it comes to defending democracy in Iran.

"There are UN members that are close collaborators of the Islamic regime and others that fear that sanctions against the Islamic regime can create precedents for their own inculpation later for the same reasons. The present problem with the UN is very deep and it goes to the heart of its composition and administration.

"Just to remind you that Iran was, in 1948, a signatory of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and many other conventions. These days, everybody knows that thousands have been executed, tortured, imprisoned, stoned or lashed in Iran under various false excuses, labels and, hence, the Islamic republic is still usurping the Iranian Nation's Chair at the UN, and is continuing its barbarian rule in total impunity."

Saturday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 12.24.2005:

NY Sun credits our blog: Senate Democrats Soften Iran Resolution

Brian McGuire, The New York Sun:

A Senate resolution condemning the president of Iran for anti-Semitic comments he made earlier this month is riling its Republican sponsors on Capitol Hill. They claim Senate Democrats forced them to strip language from the document expressing support for self-determination and a national referendum in the country. ...

When Mr. Santorum moved to introduce the resolution last Friday, Senator Wyden, a Democrat of Oregon, registered an unusual objection. According to the Congressional Record, Mr. Wyden told Mr. Santorum on the Senate floor that he was objecting to the resolution because his Democratic colleagues in the Senate had asked him too. Mr. Wyden did not say who asked him to issue the objection. ...

Mr. Wyden's office did not return repeated calls yesterday to explain who suggested that he object to the Iran resolution or why he was chosen to register the complaint. And a spokesman for Mr. Santorum, Robert Traynham, said he did not know who raised the objection either. "We're still trying to see who those Democrats are," he said. An Internet blog devoted to promoting Democracy in Iran, "Regime Change Iran," detailed the flap over the resolution. It simply said that "Senate Democrats" objected to the resolution. READ MORE

Finally, the main stream media is noticing. Bloggers, keep calling Chairman Lugar's office demanding hearings on Iran and call your democratic Senators asking them "who is responsible for removing the support for self-determination and a national referendum?" We need answers!

Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

• IRIB News reported that Ahmadinejad criticized "suppressive nations" for suppressing "any voice under the pretext of maintaining freedom of expression and impose medieval values and manners in modern disguise on nations." The president then expressed his confidence that all kinds of oppression would come to an end once rule of Islam prevails in the whole world.
• Tom Porteous, Prospect visited Jamkaran, the site of a water well where the 12th and last imam of Shia Islam, the Mahdi, is said to have disappeared a little over a thousand years ago. He discussed Ahmadinejad (and his new leadership) believes that total chaos must be created in order to hasten the return of the Mahdi and the establishment of Islamic rule throughout the world. An interesting read.
• The Public Affairs Magazine reported that the week-long violence in Baluchistan is being blamed on Iranian intelligence and their Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
• News Max reported that Teresa Heinz Kerry says she is "outraged" that President Bush has been too easy on Iran.
• Xinhuanet reported that Russia will fully comply with a deal with Iran to supply it with the Tor-M1 air defense systems despite US objections.
• MosNews reported that Iran is interested in developing military-technical cooperation with Russia.
• Amir Taheri, The Jerusalem Post reminds us that Iran is not just Israel's problem.
• DEBKAfile reported that thousands of Sunni secular Shiite and Kurdish protesters took to the streets of Iraq Friday, Dec. 23, over what they called “the biggest election fraud in Middle East history.”
• Eli Lake, The New York Sun reported that the head of Iraq's election committee accused critics of the election of extortion.
• Iran Focus reported that Iran’s powerful Interior Minister said that the echo of Iran’s “Islamic revolution” could be heard in Iraq.
  
• Iran Focus reported that Iran’s new ambassador to IAEA submits credentials.
• Mark Heinrich, Reuters published their analysis on the showdown over Iran.
• Karim Sadjadpour and Ray Takeyh, The Boston Globe gave their interpretation of Iran's belligerent foreign policy toward Israel.
• And finally, The Times reported that the place Iranians call “Weblogistan” has grown this year from 5.4 million blogs to today to more than 23 million. The bloggers have proved so wily and hard to censor that the Iranian Government has even considered removing Iran from the internet entirely.

Iran Interested in Russian Weapons — Ambassador

MosNews:

Iran is interested in developing military-technical cooperation with Russia, the country’s ambassador to Russia, Gholamreza Ansari, said on Friday.

“Until now, our cooperation has mostly been established in the sphere of trade,” the ambassador was quoted by Interfax news agency as saying. “But the Iranian government now wants to strengthen cooperation with Russia in the field of energy, in particular nuclear energy. We also intend to develop military-technical cooperation.” READ MORE

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov earlier confirmed Russia’s intention to continue military-technical cooperation with Iran. He said that “Russia is supplying Iran with conventional armaments and military hardware such as armored vehicles and air defense equipment of a limited range. This is ordinary commercial trade and we are not going to end it.”

It was reported in the beginning of December that Russia had struck a deal to sell short-range, surface-to-air missiles to Iran. Ivanov said this did not change the balance of forces in the region.

The European Union has formally protested to Russia about the deal.

Iran Accused of Rigging Iraqi General Election

DEBKAfile:

Thousands of Sunni secular Shiite and Kurdish protesters took to the streets of Iraq Friday, Dec. 23, over what they called “the biggest election fraud in Middle East history.” Their umbrella group Maram alleges the UIA’s commanding lead in preliminary results of the Dec. 15 poll and was rigged and is calling for a new election.

DEBKAfile’s sources reveal that the announcement by former prime minister Iyad Allawi, head of the Iraqi List and a key American ally, that he and the Sunni bloc of 30 lists were boycotting the elections, brought US defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld dashing over to Baghdad Thursday night.

Allawi alleges that convoys of trucks carrying sealed ballot boxes stuffed with forged voting slips and other documents went round polling stations on election-day and packed the ballot boxes with pro-Shiite votes. Between 10 and 15 of those trucks were intercepted by Iraqi security forces at the southern Iraqi towns of Qut, Al Amara and Basra. An investigation disclosed that they trucks were organized by Iranian intelligence agents to falsely boost the Iranian majority.

Rumsfeld will do his best to talk Allawi round in order to rescue one of the Bush administration’s greatest feats from collapse. Meanwhile Iraqi and UN officials are examining Allawi’s allegations.

Reading Iran

Tom Porteous, Prospect:

Over the past decade, Iran's clerical conservatives have defeated their reformist rivals. But the summer election of populist Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is generating new conflicts among the networks that control the state.
How will this affect Iran's relations with the west? Is liberalisation really dead?

We had arrived at Jamkaran, a holy shrine outside the Iranian city of Qom and site of a water well where the 12th and last imam of Shia Islam, the Mahdi, is said to have disappeared a little over a thousand years ago. Many Iranians believe that the so-called hidden imam, or "imam zaman" (lord of all the ages), will at any moment choose this place to make his return to solve the world's problems. In recent years, the millenarian cult of the well of Jamkaran has become so popular that a hotel has been built nearby and the old mosque is being expanded to accommodate the thousands of pilgrims who flock to the shrine every week. READ MORE

During my latest visit to Iran in November, I decided to visit Jamkaran after reading a report in a newspaper of a speech delivered by the new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on the occasion of National Saffron Production day. In the speech he had urged Iranians to work hard for the return of the imam zaman, who, according to Shia eschatology, will return at a time of great crisis, defeat the enemies of God and establish an era of universal justice.

On this visit I was struck by two things: the political situation, following the summer's election of Ahmadinejad, was even more finely balanced than usual; and the baffling subject of the imam zaman kept coming up in conversation. It was as if the election had conjured up an element of Shia popular mysticism that had long lurked in the background. There was even a story circulating in Tehran that the new president's cabinet had drawn up a contract with the imam zaman promising to work for the Mahdi's return in exchange for his support. The new minister of Islamic guidance, Mohammad-Hossein Saffar-Harandi, had been dispatched to Jamkaran, so the story went, to deposit the contract in the well, thus sealing the deal.

I asked a young artist friend, Reza, if he would accompany me to Jamkaran. He agreed and persuaded a girlfriend of his to drive us there in her SUV. We left during the morning rush hour and crawled south out of Tehran along highways clogged with exhaust-spewing traffic. Three portly women clad in black chadors stared at us from the back seat of a battered Paykan, the ubiquitous Iranian-made car modelled on the 1960s Hillman Hunter, which ceased production only in May. The women had daggers in their eyes. Not only was Reza's girlfriend "bad hijab" (insufficiently veiled), smoking, driving and irredeemably upper-middle class, but she had just insulted their driver by swerving out in front of him without warning.

My visit to Jamkaran did not yield any miraculous answers to the tricky conundrums of Iranian politics any more than it yielded a sighting of the imam zaman. The well itself consists of holes in the ground—conveniently there are two, one for men and another for women—covered with metal grilles through which devotees drop their wishes and prayers scribbled on special pieces of paper sold at a nearby kiosk for 50 tomans each (about 3p). Besides several unruly parties of schoolchildren, most of the pilgrims were Iraqis. One of them, Mahmoud, told me he had driven all the way from Sadr City in Baghdad. He and his friends were heading for Mashhad, Iran's second city and the site of the shrine of the imam Reza (the eighth imam of Shia Islam) in northeastern Iran. They had decided to visit Jamkaran on the way, as well as the shrine of Hazrat Masoumeh (imam Reza's sister, who is greatly venerated in her own right) in Qom. Back in Iraq, Mahmoud had already visited the shrine of the imam Hussein (the prophet's grandson) in Karbala, earlier in the year. It seemed he was trying to cover as many of the Shia mystical bases as possible to ensure that his prayers were answered.

"A lot of people think this is complete bullshit," said my friend Reza, the son of a communist and grandson of an ayatollah. The more sophisticated mullahs in neighbouring Qom and elsewhere, while respecting the tradition of the hidden imam, reject the cult of the well of Jamkaran as popular superstition. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution, discouraged the cult of the imminent return of the hidden imam, even though his own immense popularity among Iran's poor owed something to the belief of some Iranians that he himself was the Mahdi. Khomeini also outlawed a semi-clandestine group called the Hojjatieh, which emerged during the revolution, and whose members believe that total chaos must be created in order to hasten the return of the Mahdi and the establishment of Islamic rule throughout the world.

Since Khomeini's death, however, the Hojjatieh has reportedly re-emerged in various sectors of the regime, including the Revolutionary Guard, the elite parallel army that was established to protect the Islamic revolution and that bore the brunt of the fighting in the Iran-Iraq war. There are indications that Ahmadinejad and several of his close associates, mostly veterans of that war, are sympathisers or active members of the group. The new president's key supporter among senior Shia clergy, Ayatollah Mohammad Taqi Misbah-Yazdi, is also thought to be associated with Hojjatieh. During this summer's presidential election, Misbah-Yazdi is said to have issued a fatwa instructing all 2m members of the paramilitary Basij (the militia that emerged after the revolution as enforcers of Islamist morality) to vote for Ahmadinejad.

In the past decade, at the same time as Hojjatieh re-emerged as a secretive force around the fringes of the regime, the cult of the hidden imam gained in popularity, mostly but not exclusively among Iran's lower classes. So while many Iranians voted for Ahmadinejad because of his programme of wealth redistribution and because he was not a mullah (an important asset in a country where rule by mullahs has badly dented the reputation of the clergy), some also may have been attracted by his millenarian rhetoric. Thus the election saw a conjunction of the ambitions of a small hardline clique and the yearnings and frustrations of the urban proletariat and rural peasantry.

The result was a victory for Ahmadinejad that finally put an end to the efforts of liberal reformers to transform the Islamic Republic from within its formal political structures, put a hardline populist into the president's office, and once again set Iran off on uncharted and potentially turbulent political waters.

A quarter of a century after the Iranian revolution, the politics of Iran remain full of paradoxes and surprises. The unexpected election of Ahmadinejad as post-revolutionary Iran's first lay president has made it even harder to interpret.

One thing is clear, however: what happens in Iran is of crucial importance not only to the region, but to the world, because of the combination of Iran's geostrategic importance, the US and British presence in Iraq and the uncertainty over Iran's nuclear programme. Furthermore, although the ultimate direction of Iranian politics will be determined by internal forces, the policies of the west towards Iran and the region can play an influential role in shaping the future of Iran, for good and ill.

The usual analysis of Iranian politics—favoured by western commentators, journalists and secular Iranian intellectuals alike—follows what one might call the political-science approach, which takes as its starting point the complex constitution and formal institutions of the Iranian power structure. According to this analysis, a hybrid system of governance has evolved since the revolution in which two separate, unequal and irreconcilable forms of government have coexisted. On the one hand there is the quasi-democratic formal state structure based on a western republican model: an elected chief executive, the president, who presides over a cabinet of ministers accountable to an elected parliament. On the other hand there is a theocratic structure commanded by the supreme leader, a post which was bequeathed by Ayatollah Khomeini at his death to the conservative Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The supreme leader is the ultimate authority and controls powerful unelected decision-making bodies—the expediency council, the guardian council and the supreme national security council—as well as the judiciary and the armed forces.

During the 1990s, after the death of Khomeini and the end of what Iranian officialdom always called the "Iraqi-imposed war," the main story of Iranian politics was the struggle between conservatives seeking to preserve the Islamist ideological legacy of Khomeinism and reformists seeking to use the democratic institutions of the system to promote political and economic liberalisation. By the end of the 1990s, the reformists, backed by much of Iran's educated young population who were fed up with the strident puritanism of the Islamic Republic, appeared to be in the ascendancy. A reformist cleric, Mohammed Khatami, was elected president in 1997 and again in 2001.

At first, Khatami seemed to offer a real prospect of reform and a more open and co-operative approach towards the west. But by the beginning of his second term, disillusion was setting in. It became clear not only that Khatami was unable to deliver significant reforms against the strong opposition of conservative Islamist elements at the centre of the system, but that the system itself was unreformable. This was the conclusion of many secular intellectuals as well as some moderate Islamic philosophers and clerics. As long as Ayatollah Khomeini's overarching principle of velayat-e faqih ("guardianship of the jurist") remained in place, those who claimed to be acting in the name of Islamist ideology, and ultimately in the name of Allah and the holy imams of Shia Islam, would always have the edge over those who claimed to be acting in the name of democracy and the people.

The hardline Islamists had another advantage over the reformists: they controlled the instruments of violence. Throughout the Khatami presidency, whenever the reformists seemed to threaten the hardliners, the latter responded with violence and intimidation. Hence the repression of student demonstrations at Tehran University in 1999, the spate of shootings and assassinations of leading reformists like Saeed Hajjarian (the former intelligence chief turned reformist who survived an assassination attempt in 2000), the arrest and trial of dissidents like Akbar Ganji and Hashem Aghajari, the harassment of reformist journalists and human rights lawyers and the closure of reformist newspapers.

Morad saghafi, one of Iran's foremost liberal intellectuals, is a political scientist and the publisher of the influential liberal journal Goft-e Gu (Dialogue). He also hosts a small group of like-minded thinkers and professionals, some of them western-educated like Saghafi himself, who meet weekly in a small office in one of the wealthier quarters of north Tehran beneath the snow-capped peaks of the Alborz mountains to discuss the political and social issues of the day over lunch, tea and cigarettes.

"Under Khatami, the spaces for legal political struggle were significantly expanded in parliament, in the press and in civil society," Saghafi told me through a haze of cigarette smoke. "These spaces have now been squeezed and shrunk. First the supreme leader rejected the new press laws proposed by the reformist parliament. Then the conservatives won back power in the legislative elections of 2004. And now we have had Ahmadinejad's victory. The question now is this: where will the real political struggles that exist in the country be played out?"

The answer appears to be that for the time being, the key political struggle has transformed from one ostensibly between "reformists" and "conservatives" into one between pragmatic conservatives and radical millenarian Islamists. Since the election of Ahmadinejad, there are two incompatible centres of power and, according to Saghafi, they are on collision course.

On the one hand, there is the conservative and unelected, though pragmatic, expediency council, with expanded powers under the control of former president and senior cleric Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Rafsanjani, a godfather-like figure alleged to have amassed a huge fortune since the revolution, was expected to win the summer's presidential election but lost to Ahmadinejad in the last round. He remains a powerful force in Iran not only because of his role as head of the council but because of his patrimonial network of political support.

On the other hand, there is the newly elected president, a man of humble origins with support among the lower classes and strong links to the Revolutionary Guard, the Basij and probably to extremist cliques such as the Hojjatieh and the Abadgaran ("Developers"). It has become clear since his election that Ahmadinejad represents a close-knit network of factions populated by ideologues with a strong sense of entitlement (in part because of their service in the Iran-Iraq war) and resentment that they have been hitherto marginalised from power. Having grasped the presidency, this network is now seeking to assert itself and expand its power base through a mixture of populist sloganeering, backroom political manoeuvring and stealthy purges of opponents.

While I was in Iran, the power struggle between these two centres of power intensified significantly. Rafsanjani openly accused the president of undermining national unity and elevating incompetent cronies to positions of power. Ahmadinejad hinted that he would seek to bring Rafsanjani and others to trial for corruption. There was also talk of a potential parliamentary vote of no confidence in the new administration. The position of the supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei remained enigmatic. Although Ahmadinejad had originally been the supreme leader's protégé, some thought that Khamenei was now realigning himself with Rafsanjani.

In late November there was a further bizarre twist to this power struggle when an Iranian website published a video of what purported to be a private conversation between Ahmadinejad and a senior cleric. In the video, Ahmadinejad claims that when he delivered his speech at the UN general assembly in September he felt himself to be enveloped by a halo of light and sensed the unblinking attention of the world leaders on him. It was not clear whether the video had been leaked in an effort to discredit the president or to inspire his more credulous supporters.

Given the potential gravity of the situation, most of the Iranians I spoke to remained remarkably sanguine and even optimistic about the outcome of this political conflict. The radical populist agenda of Ahmadinejad, I was told, would be blocked by the pragmatic conservative mullahs for the same reason that the reformist liberal agenda of Khatami had been blocked by that same clerical establishment—because it threatened their political and economic power.

Furthermore, I was told by intellectuals like Morad Saghafi, whatever the outcome of the present struggle within the regime, in the longer term the conservative hierarchy would still have to deal with the internal social forces pressing for greater liberalisation, particularly Iran's younger population. The reformist movement of the 1990s may have been defeated politically, but those who supported it remain a lively and active part of Iranian society. Now they are seeking new strategies outside the political system to maintain pressure for liberalisation by the expansion of civil society, in part through the use of the internet, access to which is increasing fast among the pro-reformist urban middle classes. There is even a chance that the conservatives will emerge from their struggle with the new president somewhat weakened and therefore more vulnerable to reformist pressure.

Another way of approaching Iranian politics is to think of Iran as a "shadow state" bearing close resemblance to the post-Soviet central Asian and Caucasian republics, as well as to Russia itself. According to a professor at Tehran University, whom I spoke to over lunch in downtown Tehran, the formal institutions of the Iranian state, whether elected or not, are not what really matter in Iranian politics. These institutions serve as a façade or as tools that are manipulated, subverted and instrumentalised by an oligarchy of competing networks of politicians, mullahs, senior security officers, speculators and bazaaris (merchants) as a means of accumulating and maintaining wealth and power.

"Did you know that academics are strictly forbidden from researching the kinship ties of the key political and economic families which make up the Iranian elite?" the professor said. "They don't want us to know about these ties because this is where the real power lies. It is within these family-linked networks that the real decisions are taken—often at funerals, weddings and other private functions."

At stake in this political faction-fighting is not the survival or demise of the Islamist revolution, but the economic spoils of political power in Iran. Not only is the formal economy worth about $500bn a year, but there is also a vast informal economy, much of which is actively encouraged by the political system and "managed" by religious foundations (bonyads) and other networks that link the bazaar with different parts of the power structure. In spite of the upheavals of the revolution, US sanctions and the war with Iraq, Iran has experienced rapid economic development in recent years. This has been fuelled by oil, trade, construction and speculation. The main beneficiaries have been the competing elite political and business factions linked to the ruling mullahs. These factions have in turn used their wealth and influence to engage in speculation on the stock market and in real estate, and to reinforce their political power by expanding their networks of patronage.

Since the election of Ahmadinejad, however, the economic situation has deteriorated: foreign investors have fled to the Arab emirates, the stock exchange has plummeted, decision-making has been paralysed in the energy sector because of the failure of the president to get his nominations for the post of oil minister accepted by the parliament, and confidence in the banking system has weakened. Most of this comes down to the erratic signals given by the populist new administration, packed with little-known allies of the president. The poor handling of the economy is one of the most compelling reasons for the oligarchs of Iran to want to rein in Ahmadinejad.

The new president's ideological leanings could also be a liability for Iran's conservative establishment. According to the "shadow state" theory, Islamist ideology is useful so long as it can serve the purpose of maintaining the status quo. But if ideology begins to get in the way of this purpose, it is quickly toned down. This explains why, even as the conservative centrists have maintained and consolidated their power in the past five years, they have not reversed the Khatami-era relaxation of social and dress codes introduced in the late 1990s.

Young women still get away with wearing minimalist and colourful hijabs, body-hugging thigh-length rupushes, make-up and nail varnish. The fashion for young men is longish hair parted in the middle and swept back with the help of copious handfuls of gel, a style that is designed to irritate the fundamentalists. Neckties too are back in fashion, precisely because they are frowned upon by the Islamists. Tehran's parks are crowded with unchaperoned and unmarried couples. Vodka may not be available by the glass, but it is sold on the black market by the litre. Taxi drivers are more likely to make their passengers listen to rock music or slushy Iranian pop than the Koran. Even Tehran slang has been reshaped to reflect the general contempt for the backwardness of the Islamist regime.

Ahmadinejad's new team have indicated that they want to reverse all this and return to the Islamic strictures of the 1980s. But the pragmatist conservatives in the regime know that there is no point exacerbating Islamism's unpopularity by reimposing tedious rules on an unwilling and rebellious youth.

Precisely because it has had its Islamic revolution and been subject to Islamist rule, Iranian society is now more secular than other Muslim states, especially in the Arab world. There is little of the popular Islamist (and anti-western) fervour that seethes in the Arabian peninsula, the Levant and north Africa. Mosques are not well attended. As far as I know, there are no Iranian "terror suspects" held in US secret prisons. After 25 years of Islamist government, Iranians want less Islam, not more.

The optimism of intellectuals like Saghafi is reassuring, their arguments convincing. If Iran were left to its own devices, it would stand a good chance of emerging from its current crisis, ridding itself of the proto-fascist flotsam of the revolution and setting out, in good time, on the path of genuine political reform. However, like so many Iranian conversations about Iran, these are self-centred arguments that fail to take into account the unstable regional and international context.

For a glimpse of the legacy of Iran's last violent conflict with the outside world, you can take line one on Tehran's crowded but efficient Chinese-built metro from Imam Khomeini station to Haram-e Motahar. Haram-e Motahar—the "shrine of the pure one"—is the terminus of the line and is named after the gigantic mausoleum of Ayatollah Khomeini to which it leads. Extra trains are scheduled on Fridays to accommodate the crowds who make the journey. But they do not come here to visit the mausoleum of the leader of the Islamic revolution, which feels neglected even before construction has been completed. Instead, the crowds flock to the adjacent Behesht-e Zahra, Tehran's southern cemetery, where tens of thousands of those whom the "pure one" sent to their deaths in the Iran-Iraq war between 1980 and 1988 are laid to rest.

The martyrs section of Behesht-e Zahra must rank among the most moving war cemeteries in the world. Many graves are marked not only by a tombstone, often strewn with fresh broken flowers, but also by a small aluminium and glass cabinet on stilts showing photographs and other souvenirs of the deceased. On any day of the week, but especially on Fridays, the cemetery still echoes to the cries of mourning mothers, wives, fathers, siblings and friends.

The photographs on the graves of the martyrs in Behesht-e Zahra are faded now by two decades of summers. But the Iran-Iraq war still matters in Iran, and not just for the hundreds of thousands of families who still mourn their dead. A whole generation of Islamist cadres developed their political outlook, plotted their futures and cemented their relationships in the cauldron of the Iraq war front. These cadres include Ahmadinejad and his circle, who are now grasping for control of the state in part because they feel their role in the war entitles them to it.

The Iran-Iraq war also has important legacies in Iran's foreign policy. If Iran, as the US and others suspect, is seeking nuclear weapons, this is not because it wants to "wipe Israel off the map" but because of the experience of the war with Iraq, when Iran's armed forces were relentlessly attacked by Iraq's armoury of non-conventional weapons. In the intervening 20 years, the deterioration and depletion of Iran's conventional arsenals combined with the military consolidation of the US in the region make the argument for a defensive nuclear capability even more compelling. Iraq is no longer a threat, of course, but the US occupation and persistent threats of military action against Iran present a new strategic challenge for Tehran to which a nuclear weapon might seem to offer an easy answer.

Another consequence of the war with Saddam was that it made a generation of Islamist ideologues like Ahmadinejad, who was a commander in that war, acutely conscious of the hostility to Iran not only of Ba'athist Iraq, but of all the Sunni-ruled Arab states. It was Arab and western governments that armed Saddam and helped him produce his poison gas.

Today the hostility and suspicion between the Iranian state and the west continues (even though the people of Iran are, according to some polls, better disposed to the US than are the people of any Arab country). Hostility between Iran and the Sunni Arab states also smoulders on, fanned by the Sunni Arab fears of Iranian influence among Iraq's majority Shias. And Iran's alleged nuclear ambitions alarm the west, whose leaders are obsessed with the potential conjunction of WMD, terrorism and "rogue states."

This is a highly volatile and unpredictable situation whose escalation can only help the most extreme elements in Iranian politics—those who have recently emerged around the president. Ahmadinejad's recent moves on the international and regional fronts, including his hostile statements on Israel, have been interpreted by some as signs of incompetence and inexperience. But they may in fact be part of a plan to provoke an escalation of the regional conflict in order to strengthen his precarious domestic position.

It is impossible to make predictions about Iran. Too many people have got it wrong too many times, often with far-reaching consequences. And there are too many wild cards, including the vagaries of US middle east policy and the hidden hand of the imam zaman. However there are three lessons from Iran's recent experience that are worth noting.

First, the planners of the invasion of Iraq should have paid more attention to its impact on Iran. As it turned out, the removal of Saddam and the occupation of Iraq have directly or indirectly done the following: strengthened Iran's regional influence, increased Iran's incentive to pursue nuclear weapons in order to deter threats that have emerged from the new regional politics, and limited the west's ability to put pressure on Iran. The Iraq war may also have set back, in the short term, the prospects of political reform in Iran—where the religious right has made effective use of the American occupation of Iraq and the accompanying threats of military action against Iran.

Second, a comparison between Iran and Arab states demonstrates the dilemma for those who would like to see more political freedom in the middle east. Iran is certainly closer to achieving real political liberalisation than any other Muslim state in the region, apart from Turkey. But this is partly because it has already had its Islamic revolution. The route to political freedom in Egypt, Algeria, Saudi Arabia and Syria may well lie through the same dangerous terrain. But Iran's political struggles show that emerging from this terrain is an arduous task that can take more than 25 years to accomplish. The alternative in the Arab world is probably more of the same brand of Arab dictatorship that has done so much to nurture Islamist militancy.

Third, the tendency of western politicians and media to focus on ideology in the middle east at the expense of political analysis results in a banal and incomplete picture of what is going on. The ideologies may be real enough, but they are also nurtured and manipulated as political tools by competing elites and states as a means of attaining and holding power. It was always so, and the US and Britain should know this, for they are as much responsible for nurturing and manipulating ideologies in the middle east as anyone else in the past half-century.

A lengthy but valuable read.