Hardline Bloggers: Baseej Embassy Attackers Confess Leadership Aided in Planning

Shervin Omidvar, Rooz Online:

Four months after the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in a Danish newspaper and concurrent with the IAEA resolution to send Iran's nuclear file to United Nations Security Council, Tehran swiftly witnessed violent attacks on the Danish, Austrian, German and Norwegian embassies. Later during the same week, the violence spread through the British and French embassies too. The hardline government called the attacks “popular self-generated movements”, withholding any accountability for them. Tehran's Friday prayer leader called the violence "holy anger".

But the ultra-religious Iranian bloggers have revealed the cheerful preparations of the Basij (Iran's militia) students and pictured the excitement of setting fire to the Danish compound and other embassy buildings.

One of the embassy assailants describes his preparations for the attack in his personal web blog. He says the night before the attack, he and his friends used two cars and seven motorcycles to scout the Danish embassy and coordinated their efforts with the embassy guards. He also revealed that he and his “friends” carried gasoline tanks to the site and how they all planned to celebrate the event as a party. He specifically names Student Baseej (which is the student militia operating under the command of some official organization such as the Passdaran) to be knowledgeable in the plan and preparations and even help in the embassy attacks. READ MORE

The author of the site is student from religious Imam Sadegh University who is also a member of the Student Baseej. He has posted his account of the attacks on his web blog with this address: http://pasokhgooee.persianblog.com/

When his plan is rejected by some students, he invites them to “come along and have some fun, along with fireworks,” a reference to the burning that took place in the Danish embassy compound and buildings.

Another participant in the violent and destructive attacks on the Danish and other embassies was Hamed Talebi. He too has published his account on his web blog at: http://hamedtalebi.blogfa.com.

On his site, he claims to be a reporter for Mehr news agency who also introduces himself as a biased Moslem. He is proud to be the only reporter who had been able to enter the Danish embassy. He explains how he left everything behind to be completely available to attack the embassy and excitingly depicts how he climbed the security walls of the Danish embassy compound.

There are other web blogs that even talk of more similar attacks on foreign embassies to increase pressure on them. A blogger at http://www.motale.parsiblog.com/ describes how the angry crowd in front of an embassy was distributing stones among the participants and asking them to pray for Prophet Mohammad and his next of kin. It also quotes a leader of the gang that attacked the Austrian embassy who asked the violent crowd to perform their religious responsibility in attacking the embassy but at the same time be mindful of the Iranian stores nearby.

Twenty six years ago, Iranian hardline students occupied the US embassy in Tehran and took American diplomats hostage for 444 days. Tehran now again witnessed similar assaults on the embassies of Denmark, Austria, Norway and Germany. Not forgetting the consequences of that event, one wonders what will the next ones be.