Iran: Is Ayatollah Sane'i The Next Montazeri?

As the death of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri provides a symbol both of mourning and of hope for the challenge to the Iranian regime, Josh Shahryar sees another senior cleric filling the religious and political space:

When Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri died three days ago, perhaps the most nagging question on everyone’s mind was who would replace a man of such stature. Asked about who he had designated as his successor, Montazeri’s son Ahmed replied calmly that his father told him, “The people will decide.” And the people have decided. Maybe not as openly as one would wish, but they surely have.

The Latest from Iran (23 December): This Time, No Pause?

The next spiritual leader of Iran’s reformist movement is none other than Montazeri’s old friend, Grand Ayatollah Yousef Sane’i. Perhaps no other cleric seemed as obvious a choice: not only are his credentials important, but so are his political, religious and social views. And his rise is being helped by the Iranian Government.

Tuesday started with Government-owned media quietly inserting the word Imam before Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s name. This is surely not only a mockery of the Shi’ite faith --- according to which Khamenei is not even a source of jurisprudence –--- but also of common sense. It is a direct consequence of candid suggestions by reformists and clerics alike to elevate Montazeri posthumously to the rank of Imam. Khamenei was quick to order his men to do the same for him before anyone else did it for the cleric whom he had pushed aside as Supreme Leader in 1989 and later placed under house arrest....

At the same time, reports from inside Iran suggested the government has ordered Basij and other paramilitary troops to enter Qom and surrounded Sane’i house and office, as well as Montazeri’s. It was claimed that security forces broke into Sane’i’s office and hung a picture of Khamenei on the wall. Rumors abounded as to what would be the fate of the cleric.

Sane'i, with his official website, has been one of the most vocal critics of the government and Ahmadinejad --- see, for example, the August video of his denunication of the President. The Ayatollah has repeatedly called for the halting of hostilities against peaceful protesters by the security forces, is now paying for those statements. In response, the Government seems to have made up its mind that now that Montazeri is gone, Sane’i must be silenced.

That plan would work perfectly, if the Iranian people did not have something to say about it.

As the news of the attack on Sane’i’s house circulated, droves of people from the nearby cities of Isfahan and Najafabad started flocking to Qom. Witnesses reported hundreds of people departing for the city with one purpose only: to protect Sane’i. Within those people, there were cries of hatred and anger for the government and of love and affection for the successor of Montazeri’s legacy. And why not?

Sane’i is the perfect man to replace Montazeri. He represents the same brand of moderate Islam that Montazeri espoused. This includes his stance that women have equal rights with men and can be judges and sources of jurisprudence. He has denounced suicide bombings, considers nuclear weapons as being against the soul of Islam and forbidden and perhaps shockingly, even believes that followers of other religions if they are sincere would go to heaven.

These are the qualities that endeared him to the late Montazeri and this is the reason why today, thousands of people from around Iran announced their willingness to defend him against the government. It seems likely that the government will continue to press Sane’i. People have already begun to flock towards him. The question is, is he ready to pick up Montazeri’s pen and fight tyranny? Considering what he’s been doing the past few months, the answer is a resounding yes.

Iran Analysis: The Regime's Cracks Widen, The Wave Resurges?

Less than 24 hours after we posted our analysis of the politics surrounding and beyond Grand Ayatollah Montazeri's funeral, I think most of the arguments hold up.

The momentum of challenge to the regime has not ebbed. The Western media has turned from bored/gloomy/hostile sceptic into unreserved cheerleader, as in this editorial from The Washington Post, which echoes some of our analysis but with a much louder, dramatic shout:

We would not underestimate the fact that a figure such as this can bring forth multitudes -- even in death -- while Mr. Ahmadinejad is reduced to unleashing his militia and shrieking at the West. The most momentous international event of 2009 was the uprising in Iran, and though the regime's collapse is not imminent, it is hardly unthinkable.

Iran: Is Ayatollah Sane’i The Next Montazeri?
The Latest from Iran (23 December): This Time, No Pause?

More substantially, Faraj Sorkouhi argues that the Supreme Leader's latest public move, the message to those marking Montazeri's death, may further expose a self-glorification being pursued not as an outcome of support for Ayatollah Khameini, but as a reaction to the lack of it. In condemning Montazeri under the cover of offering condolences --- pointing to his "sins", asking God to forgive him, and thus declaring Montazeri's 20 years of isolation and punishment were of a divine nature --- Khamenei may have stepped too far in trying to adpoe his own God-like image.

There are still long-term questions surrounding the aims and organisation of the opposition --- H. Graham Underwood has just posted an interesting consideration of "The Leadership Void" --- but yesterday one of two rising emotions was that these questions were not immovable obstacles. It appears that the inspiration drawn from Montazeri as an opponent of injustice and defender of values, one whose declaration of values would not be broken by the injustice against him, has re-fired the belief of many that it is possible to embody those values in a political movement that can be hindered but cannot be vanquished.

This morning Josh Shahryar takes one path in examining that belief. He suggesting that Ayatollah Sane'i --- who now is in the midst of tensions in Qom, with rumours of a march today by Basiji against his offices --- may be "the next Montazeri": "He represents the same brand of moderate Islam that Montazeri espoused." Others are now looking to Mousavi and Karroubi with an admiration and hope that had been eroded in recent weeks, and still others see the Green Wave as the leader rather than an in-and-out tide of change.

A caution, however, both about the perceived problems of the regime and the renewed possibilities of the movement for reform. The second emotion I noted yesterday was that of a bleak pessimism. While the President may be shouting and posing all the way to irrelevance (note Tuesday's theatre of removing Mousavi from his role as head of the Arts Institute) and while the Supreme Leader may be looking less than all-powerful, there is still the strength of arms of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard. The emotion is that, as the Revolutionary Guard will not go quietly into the post-election night and as they have allies in the judicial and security systems who will join them in lashing out at a rising opposition, there is more hardship to come.

Darkest before the dawn?

The Latest from Iran: Momentum against a Sinking President? (22 December)

2310 GMT: Moving Towards Qom. More chatter on the post-funeral tension in Qom --- Norooz claims people are moving from Isfahan and Najafabad to "defend" the house of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri.

2300 GMT: Mahmoud Fights Back? On a day which began with our analysis that the President is scrambling to maintain any legitimacy, it appears he tried to send out a signal tonight with the dismissal of Mir Hossein Mousavi as head of the Arts Institute. Salaam News reports that Ahmadinejad flew back from Shiraz just for the meeting deciding on the sacking of Mousavi and will now return to Shiraz.

Then again, one wonders if that will be enough to show Mahmoud's muscle. According to Peyke Iran, only 40 people were on hand to greet Ahmadinejad at Shiraz's airport this morning.

NEW Latest Iran Video: University Demonstrations for Montazeri (22 December)
NEW Iran Special Analysis: After Montazeri — From Protest to Victory?
NEW Latest Iran Video: The Last Goodbye to Montazeri (21 December)
Latest Iran Video: Mourning Montazeri (21 December — 2nd Set)
Latest Iran Video: Mourning Montazeri (21 December — 1st Set)
Iran & The Nuclear Talks: The View from Tehran
Iran Video & Text: Montazeri’s Son Saeed On His Father’s Views, Last Words
The Latest From Iran (21 December): The Montazeri Funeral

2230 GMT: Back from break to find discussion still going on about possible paramilitary/security forces threat to Ayatollah Sane'i, with Rouydad saying that followers have declared their readiness to defend the cleric.

1930 GMT: Rahesabz.net is reporting that Mir-Hossein Mousavi has been finally removed from the directorship of the Farhangestan Institute of Arts - Ali Moallem has been selected as his replacement. The move was decided by the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, which decides on major cultural issues.

1730 GMT: The Internet is buzzing with stories that Government supporters and plainclothes officers have attacked the offices of Ayatollah Sane'i, following vandalism against Grand Ayatollah Montazeri's house and image yesterdat. There is also chatter that a permit has been given for a Basiji march on Sane'I's offices on Wednesday. A story in Radio Zaamaneh summarises the chatter.

Given the volatile situation in Qom, we are being very careful with the reports, which we cannot verify.
1645 GMT: We're off for a holiday break this evening, returning for a wrap-up of the day's events later. Thanks to all for ideas and contributions today.

1545 GMT: Hitting Back. More on that "Ayatollah" we mentioned briefly earlier (1208 GMT), who was taking a shot at both Grand Ayatollah Montazeri and those who mourned him yesterday: it's the Supreme Leader's representative to the Revolutionary Guard, Mojtaba Zolnour.

Zolnour said, "Ayatollah Montazeri was a deputy to Imam Khomeini who misused his power...and meddled in the country's affairs and this served as one of the reasons for his dismissal." As for the crowd in Qom, Zolnour snapped, "Certain individuals...have engaged in confronting the religious leadership...These opportunistic individuals ... engaged in creating chaos, breaking car windows and chanting anti-leadership slogans to destroy the Islamic establishment."

1530 GMT: Regime Tensions? An article in the reformist Rooz Online claims to document unease between Iran's armed forces and the Revolutionary Guard.

1430 GMT: Karroubi Spreads His Message. Another interview with Mehdi Karroubi in the "Western" media, this time in The Times of London. Karroubi, answering written questions, maintains both his defiance and his criticism of the regime while seeking a return to the "right" path of the Islamic Republic and Ayatollah Khomeini:

In today’s Iran, republicanism and Islamism are severely damaged and a lot of the revolution’s principles and the Imam’s have been undermined....If the Imam were alive, without doubt this would not have happened....As one of the Imam’s students and close friends I frankly say that those who claim to act on his thoughts had the least personal, emotional and intellectual closeness to him.

The significance of the statement is almost lost, however, amidst near-farcical ineptitude by Times journalists. They fail to set the interview in the context of the developments since the weekend. Far worse, they headline the article with a "surprising twist": "Mehdi Karroubi warned the West against exploiting the regime’s weakness to strike a deal to halt a nuclear programme that was, he insisted, for peaceful purposes." This is based on the following Karroubi quote:

Nuclear science and achieving peaceful nuclear technology is a right reserved for all NPT [Nuclear Proliferation Treaty] members. We ask Western governments not to use this internal situation as a bargaining chip with the present Iranian Government to reach agreements which would undermine the rights of the Iranian people.

Far from outing himself as a nuclear hardliner (which is a dreadful misrepresentation that has led some in the US to keep the Green movement as arm's length), Karroubi is simply asserting that nuclear power (not nuclear weapons) is a sovereign right. More importantly, his message is that the "West" should not give the Iranian Government legitimacy --- a legitimacy it has failed to establish at home --- through a high-profile agreement.

So a valuable opportunity wasted. Pearls before swine, as my grandmother used to say....

1330 GMT: We're Watching You. An Iranian blogger has posted photographs of Government operatives filming and photographing yesterday's crowd in Qom.

1215 GMT: Today's Protests. We've posted the first claimed video of demonstrations at Elm-o-Sanat and Kurdistan Universities.

1208 GMT: Propaganda of Day. There is the same exact story in both IRNA and Fars News of an Ayatollah denouncing yesterday's demonstrations in Qom, but that's a trifle compared to Fars' attempted top story. Apparently there will be a "large gathering" of people in Qom this afternoon to denounce the recent treatment of the image of Ayatollah Khomeini.

To illustrate the story, Fars has a photo of a recent "large gathering", presumably from last :



1200 GMT: Similar coverage of the Ahmadinejad speech, albeit with a lot more extracts from the speech, by Islamic Republic News Agency.

1155 GMT: And Here's Mahmoud. A massive surprise here: according to Press TV, the President avoided any reference to internal events in his speech in Shiraz and kept it international by attacking the US:

The problem is that the US seeks to dominate the Middle East but the Iranian nation is an obstacle....The nuclear game is repetitious, old-fashioned and boring. Say publicly that you are seeking dominance over the Middle East but Iran does not allow [you]....The world should know that the Iranian nation and the regional countries will make it impossible for the US to dominate the Middle East.

There was more tough talk for Washington on Iran's nuclear potential:

[You should] know that if we wanted to build bombs, we had enough courage to announce that we were making bombs. We are a great and brave nation. We told you that we will launch the [nuclear] fuel cycle and we did it. We told you that we will industrialize the fuel production and we did it....We told you that we will launch a new generation of centrifuges and we did.

No indication in the Press TV article, either in text or photographs, to the size of the crowd, let alone the events of the last 48 hours.

1150 GMT: Sideshows. In case you want a diversion from the main event, here's Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki being tough with France on the nuclear issue: "The French must try to avoid the failed policies that Washington and London have employed during the past few years. It is better for Paris to adopt a policy that is in accordance with the country's prestige."

Or you can tune in to Admiral Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, waving his fist: "My belief remains that political means are the best tools to attain regional security and that military force will have limited results. However, should the president call for military options, we must have them ready."

1140 GMT: Claims of student protests at Tehran Azad University and at Oloom Tahghighat University.

1130 GMT: No clashes reported at the Beheshti University protest. Meanwhile, reports that more than 50 (one report says 230) Najafabad University students have been summoned for disciplinary action, presumably in connection with protests surrounding the death of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri.

There is also a report that electricity was cut off to a student residence at Razi University in Kermanshah, with students ordered to remain in their rooms, to prevent protests.

1100 GMT: Demonstrations v. The President. News is emerging of a protest at Shahid Beheshti University in Tehran, with students demanding the release of classmates arrested on 16/17 Azar (7-8 December). There are also reports of demonstrations at Elm-o-Sanat University in the capital. Reports indicate that security forces have surrounded the campuses to prevent protest moving to Tehran streets.

Meanwhile, we are looking for news on President Ahmadinejad's appearance in Shiraz. Activists are claiming that the regime struggled to get an audience of 10,000.

0945 GMT: From Protest to Victory? We've posted a special analysis, in light of the events of the last 48 hours: "Is there any possibility of a 'movement from below' that frames and presses demands to a satisfactory conclusion?"

0803 GMT: The Iconic Video? We've posted a lengthy (4+ minutes) video of yesterday's crowd in Qom. Words cannot summarise it.

(But, to raise a smile, set this footage against the claim in the pro-regime newspaper Kayhan, noted in yesterday's updates, that "a maximum of 5000 people" turned out.)

0800 GMT: The President's Test. Ahmadinejad is now in Shiraz. We're monitoring carefully both for his statement and any news on the size and mood of the crowd.

0745 GMT: A later and quieter start to the morning after the drama, sorrow, anger, and hope of the last 48 hours. We're working on a special analysis evaluating the significance of the events surrounding Grand Ayatollah Montazeri's death: is this now the next great Green wave of change?

In this context, there is an unintentionally funny sideshow exposing both the weakness of a President and his best (if unintentional) friend yesterday: the American ABC News. Last night Ahmadinejad appeared on the channel which, for days, had been shouting about its "exclusive" interview with the US Public Enemy Number One.

Here are ABC's self-promoting highlights of the discussion: 1) "Iran Prez Won't Say Yes-or-No to Nuclear Bomb"; 2) "Obama Didn't Deserve Nobel Prize"; 3) "Ahmadinejad Defiant Over Sanctions Threat"; 4) "Hiker's Mom Made Christmas Appeal to Ahmadinejad" [three US citizens, detained after they entered Iranian territory this autumn, remain under threat of trial for espionage]. Because the story was written soon after the interview was taped last week, there was no reference to Grand Ayatollah Montazeri or any considered question about the political challenge to the President and the regime.

(In grudging fairness, it appears that ABC re-positioned the clips they showed last night to get some connection with developments. Diane Sawyer's lead question, over archive shots of mass demonstrations this summer, was whether Ahmadinejad would guarantee that protesters would be safe. Ahmadinejad's response: "Can the people in America come on the streets anytime they want?"

That --- again to give some redemption to ABC --- brought out a telling moment. When Sawyer assured Ahmadinead that, yes, with a permit Americans could demonstrate, the President looked a bit uncertain, "Are you sure?" before declaring, "In Iran we have got freedom, more than there is in America.")

A classic example, therefore, of the blinkers of sensationalism but, more importantly, an illustration of Ahmadinejad's fragile position: who amongst the crowd in Qom yesterday really cared about the words he put out on American television screens last evening?

Iran Special Analysis: After Montazeri --- From Protest to Victory?

For an observer 1000s of miles away, the movement of events was dream-like. Initially, as Grand Ayatollah Montazeri's body was moved from his house to the Imam Hassan Mosque, the report were "30,000 to 40,000" on the streets. An hour later, as the procession moved from the mosque to the Massoumeh Shrine, where Montazeri would be buried, the news came of "more than 100,000".

Then it was hundreds of thousands. Not just claims of hundreds of thousands but the first pictures, with an aerial shot of of Qom filled with mourners and demonstrators. Then the videos, first in a trickle, soon a torrent, from Montazeri's house, from the mosque, from the shrine, throughout the city, in Najafabad (Montazeri's birthplace), and in other cities.

Just put two images side-by-side. Three days before Montazeri's burial, the regime struggled (and possibly manipulated) to fill Tehran's Enghelab Square with supporters. Yesterday, there was no need for PhotoShop: this was the genuine expression of emotions from anguish to anger to hope, in numbers not seen since the first days after the Presidential election.

For me, there was one key sign that this was beyond even the moments of the mid-July Rafsanjani Friday Prayer, the "40th Day memorial" of 30 July, the Qods Days demonstration of September, the 16 Azar protests two weeks ago. At no point, even as "Western" media were going Page 1 with their discovery that Iranian post-election resistance had not died, could I step back to evaluate the political significance. This was too big for snap judgements of the type that I could venture a few hours into the protests of previous occasions.

For this was a combination not only of a movement of the past six months but of political and religious sentiments of decades. Montazeri --- the pariah of 1989, dismissed as the next Supreme Leader and shunned by Ayatollah Khomeini, placed under house arrest, condemned as an irrelevancy by the regime --- was now Iran's hope.

Perhaps the most eye-catching testimony to that came not from an admirer of Montazeri or a member of the Green Wave but from a critic and defender of the current regime. Tehran Unversity academic Seyed Mohammad Marandi --insisted Montazeri "said the same thing" for 25 years, Montazeri was an insignificance, Montazeri was linked to "terrorism". What was meant to be a dismissal turned into a tribute: Marandi's words just did not match up to the videos that were reaching our desk at the same moment.

How much of yesterday's sentiment was sympathy, affection, and admiration of an important but singular figure, and how much was a well-spring of wider beliefs about the current state of an Islamic Republic, two decades after Montazeri's ostracism? And does this mean that the movement for fundamental change in the Iranian system, a movement put aside by many observers only weeks ago (note the lack of attention outside Iran to the significance of demonstrations of 4 November), is now unstoppable?

I'm not sure this morning. I'm not sure primarily because, even acknowledging that the mass sentiment yesterday was not only for Montazeri but for Montazeri as a symbol of what could and should be in Iran, a ground-swell still needs focus, direction, objectives.

The practical demands of politics are messy and long-term, compared to the sudden, clear expression we saw yesterday. So, even in the run-up to the ceremonies of Ashura on Sunday --- now how large the demonstrations? --- in the background will be all the legal, political, and religious calculations and manoeuvres that have both preoccupied and frustrated since June. Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi made their appearances yesterday, but the reconcilation now has to be not only with a crowd of mourning but of a movement that seeks a significant victory for its demands of recognition and justice.

So, no easy answers. However, I will venture one far-from-tangential conclusion. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, six months after his claims of victory over the "dust" of opposition, is now a President of the past. I am not sure he was even prominent enough yesterday to get a specific chant from the demonstrators, but he was swept away in the cry, "Montazeri is not dead; the coup Government is dead."

It is surreal but essential ---the relevance of the irrelevant, so to speak --- to watch the interview of Ahmadinejad broadcast by America's ABC News last night. Because the encounter took place last week, both the President and the interviewer, trading punches over the nuclear issues and the detained US hikers, are unconcerned with Grand Ayatollah Montazeri and (in the interviewer's case) the political state of the opposition. So the interview now becomes testimony to a discussion taking place outside the realities of the conflict, both over the last six months and as they have evolved over the last 48 hours.

Ironically, however, Ahmadinejad's marginal position is important. Combined with the "marginal" on the other side --- the failure of Mousavi and Karroubi to get any concessions from the regime on their core demands, being met instead by more threats, the failure of others to establish a National Unity Plan --- it has led to the sharpening of the conflict between the Supreme Leader and a "radicalised" opposition. That, in turn, has led to a muddling, rather than clarifying, of the issues at hand: "radicalised" is at that point laid on certain symbolic acts such as "Death to the Dictator" chants and the omission of the Islamic Republic's coat of arms on the Iranian flag.

It is from that muddle that the next steps and possibilities will emerge. Is Ayatollah Khameini really willing to take this to a battle to the death with the Green movement or will he offer any way back from his threat to arrest them all? Does any space remain for those "within the Establishment" --- a Rafsanjani, a Larijani, other high-profile members of Parliament and Ministers --- to craft a settlement? Does the mantle of Montazeri lead Mousavi, Karroubi, or other opposition figures back to prominence not just through periodic statements but through a sustained public presence, accompanied by clear demands for changes in the Islamic Republic? Is there any possibility of a "movement from below" that frames and presses those demands to a satisfactory conclusion?

After emotions has to come political calculation. But right now, I don't have an answer to those sums and equations. I'm not sure anyone else --- Khameini, Mousavi, Karroubi, or anyone in that crowd at Qom --- does either.

Latest Iran Video: The 100,000s For Montazeri (21 December)

Even by the standards of the outstanding footage we received yesterday --- too much in the end for us to do more than give a snapshot of the events --- this video is, well, incredible:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJVKWtFYDxU[/youtube]

Latest Iran Video: Mourning Montazeri (21 December — 2nd Set)
Latest Iran Video: Mourning Montazeri (21 December — 1st Set)
Latest Iran Video: Demonstrations in Memory of Montazeri (20 December)
The Latest From Iran (21 December): The Montazeri Funeral

Tehran

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XBrgIvJLbpY[/youtube]